Autism as Academic Paradigm
The sad truth is that dehumanizing ideologies are still with us in the modern university, although they take very different forms. Prime examples include the unacceptable ways we sometimes talk and think about the autism spectrum.
By all means should we talk about the strengths of various conditions as well as enumerating their weaknesses. We must be very careful, however, not to inadvertently validate a dubious premise. When responding to stereotyping and discrimination by defending the “look how great these people are” proposition for any group, be they autists or someone else, you sort of buy into the idea that there is something to defend. That autists need an apologia in the form of a list of extraordinary personages and incredible feats in order to justify their existence.
The average, ordinary person never does anything that has significance outside of their relatively narrow circle of friends or their relatively small local community. Ordinary people don’t do extraordinary things, at least not extraordinary things that are relevant above the strictly personal level. And that’s fine. No one expects most people to be especially amazing and fantastic. No one expects most people to make world-changing discoveries or rise to the top of society. Ordinary people are perfectly content with people being ordinary, and I’m perfectly happy with letting them be so, too. But the catch is this: if ordinary people cannot be expected to be extraordinary in order to justify their existence and participation in society on an equal footing with others, why should autistics, or other special groups?
To the credit of Tyler Cowen, the author of this essay, he doesn’t, I think, veer too far off into that kind of argument. But I see it all the time among self-styled autistic advocates, and I’m sure it’s prevalent among the support communities for other conditions and variations of humanity, like schizophrenia, ADHD, homosexuality, dyslexia, or what have you. (I’m not suggesting that those have much in common, except having been marginalized by society.)
The frame the debate is set in is this: autists are put on trial, and are asked to defend themselves. Advocates of autistic rights respond by mounting a positive defense. That’s the wrong response. The right response is to reject the whole trial. No one should have to apologize for existing or demanding that they be allowed to participate in society on an equal footing with other groups of people. I take that as one of very few ethical axioms: no one, absolutely no one, should have to apologize for existing. Existence is not a choice. Wanting to live a fulfilling life isn’t something to apologize for. You don’t have to be extraordinary to be allowed ordinary rights and freedoms.
Related to this, I think, is the concept of “autistic pride”, like “gay pride”, “mad pride”, and other kinds of pride in having whatever condition you have. (What’s the PC term to use here? “Condition” sounds neutral, but on the other hand I don’t want to lump homosexuality in with mental illness, nor autism in with any of them. Hmm. Know that I mean no offense to any of the groups, though.) To take pride in being who you are is an understandable reaction when society puts you down for being who you are, so I have sympathy with the prideful, but I don’t think it’s sensible. Autists don’t choose autism, gays don’t choose to be gay, and so on. Some of these aspects of personality (sexual orientation) are completely neutral, while others (autism) come with a bundle of strengths and weaknesses. But in either case, I don’t think it’s anything to be proud of. Whether it’s good or bad, it’s not your fault or your responsibility. I think there’s something to be said for a kind of existential pride, being proud of being, since that is (I imagine) positive for your mental health, but I don’t think there’s much to be said in favor of a pride for any particular attribute (skin color, sexual orientation, neurological variation) that came with you when you were born and that you cannot choose, lose or effect.
Unfortunately, when people are bullied by an in-group who define them as an out-group and discriminate against that group, their response is usually to make the out-group their in-group, to respond in kind by closing themselves off from the outside in the same way the outside has closed itself off from them. That’s understandable, but it’s not a viable long-term solution. If we are to live together for a long time, the solution is not for groups of people, however defined, to cluster together and regard the outside of the group as less worthy. Not every pride movement and not everything the movements do contributes to this in-group/out-group schism, but I often get a feeling, even when I’m thoroughly in the group doing the pride thing, that it’s not about gaining acceptance from society at large, it’s about showing society at large to be inferior.
