Autism Speaks is an ableist organization disguising themselves as a charity. Here's a small list to show how shady they are:
- There's no autistic people on their board. This is the equivalent of having a Women's Rights organization run entirely by men. - Only 3% of the money donated to them is used to help families and autistic people. - They want to cure autism, and they treat autistic people like they're diseased non-entities who ruin the lives of neurotypical people. - They never talk about the experiences of autistic people, only neurotypical parents who "suffer" with having autistic children. And I emphasize children; autistic adults don't exist to Autism Speaks, apparently. - They were behind the "I Am Autism" public service announcement video, which goes into the HORROR and EVIL and TRAGEDY of autism and "what autism stole" from families of autistic children, complete with narration by a disembodied voice. While it's been removed from their Youtube channel, neither Autism Speaks or the director of the video (Alfonso Cuarón, who also directed the third Potter movie) have apologized for it. - "Autism Every Day" is even worse. Their former vice president considered driving off a bridge with her autistic daughter, but decided against it because, 'cause oh no, she also had a non-autistic child waiting for her at home! She says this to the camera within earshot of the autistic daughter in the room on screen. - They're allied with the Judge Rotenberg Center, an institution that frequently uses electroshock on autistic people as punishment for even minor infractions. - There's tons of cases where Autism Speaks has turned their backs against the very people they're supposed to help (including even neurotypical moms!), listed in the link that I'll provide below.
You can find more information here. I'll close this off with a quote from this post why "curing" me of autism is so problematic for me:
Autism Speaks would have you believe that we are living tragedies waiting for the day when we can be cured, when nearly every Autistic person I know does not want to be cured and does not believe in this concept of a cure. Curing me of autism conjures the same mentality as the idea of curing me of femininity; it's so fundamentally perverted and disturbing that words fail to describe how appalling and horrific the idea of severing an essential part of our humanity is to us. No, being Autistic is not sunshine and rainbows. But it is as much a part of who we are as our other attributes.
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- There's no autistic people on their board. This is the equivalent of having a Women's Rights organization run entirely by men.
- Only 3% of the money donated to them is used to help families and autistic people.
- They want to cure autism, and they treat autistic people like they're diseased non-entities who ruin the lives of neurotypical people.
- They never talk about the experiences of autistic people, only neurotypical parents who "suffer" with having autistic children. And I emphasize children; autistic adults don't exist to Autism Speaks, apparently.
- They were behind the "I Am Autism" public service announcement video, which goes into the HORROR and EVIL and TRAGEDY of autism and "what autism stole" from families of autistic children, complete with narration by a disembodied voice. While it's been removed from their Youtube channel, neither Autism Speaks or the director of the video (Alfonso Cuarón, who also directed the third Potter movie) have apologized for it.
- "Autism Every Day" is even worse. Their former vice president considered driving off a bridge with her autistic daughter, but decided against it because, 'cause oh no, she also had a non-autistic child waiting for her at home! She says this to the camera within earshot of the autistic daughter in the room on screen.
- They're allied with the Judge Rotenberg Center, an institution that frequently uses electroshock on autistic people as punishment for even minor infractions.
- There's tons of cases where Autism Speaks has turned their backs against the very people they're supposed to help (including even neurotypical moms!), listed in the link that I'll provide below.
You can find more information here. I'll close this off with a quote from this post why "curing" me of autism is so problematic for me:
Autism Speaks would have you believe that we are living tragedies waiting for the day when we can be cured, when nearly every Autistic person I know does not want to be cured and does not believe in this concept of a cure. Curing me of autism conjures the same mentality as the idea of curing me of femininity; it's so fundamentally perverted and disturbing that words fail to describe how appalling and horrific the idea of severing an essential part of our humanity is to us. No, being Autistic is not sunshine and rainbows. But it is as much a part of who we are as our other attributes.