Guest post by Allison Prinsen: How to Be a Good Ally During Autism Awareness Month (and Year-Round)

Today I am very proud to have my daughter, Allison Prinsen, as my guest here on the blog, writing about Autism Awareness Month. I asked Allison to share her thoughts on this subject, knowing she'd have something insightful to offer -- and she certainly did. I hope you find this post as informative and helpful as I do.

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How to Be a Good Ally during Autism Awareness Month (and year-round)

It’s Autism Awareness Month. Companies all over the world will be “lighting it up blue” and collecting donations for autism foundations. 

But before you don a puzzle-piece shirt or drop a coin into a donation box, here are a few tips on how to support autistic people in the best way possible. 

Promote autism acceptance, not just autism awareness.

There’s nothing inherently bad about autism awareness campaigns. But the thing is, people already know autism exists. And too often these campaigns are fear-mongering and paint autism as a terrible crisis and something in need of a cure. Many—perhaps most—autistic people don’t see it this way. We see our autism as part of who we are, as something that gives us strengths as well as challenges. Many of us take the position that we are not disabled specifically by our autism, but by a society that is too often unaccepting and unaccommodating of us. So promote autism acceptance—an attitude that seeks to respect autistic people, accept our differences, and celebrate our strengths.

In addition, before you donate to an autism charity, find out more about it. Is it seeking to do research for a cure, or is it seeking to help and support autistic people? Many autism charities are disliked by the autistic community. Which brings me to my next point:

Don't rely on Autism Speaks for your autism expertise.

Autism Speaks is an organization that is hated by the majority of the autistic community. Some of the reasons why:

- they have very few autistic people on their board of directors

- only 3% of their money goes to helping families and autistic people

- they have often used fear-mongering language in talking about autism, such as in the “Autism Every Day” video, where autism was portrayed as a monster coming to steal your child

- they once made a video in which a woman talked about wanting to kill her autistic child

More info here: https://thecaffeinatedautistic.wordpress.com/new-autism-speaks-masterpost-updated-62014/

 

Instead, support autism organizations actually run by autistic people, and that prioritize autistic voices, such as Autism Self-Advocacy Network and Autism Women’s Network. As a corollary, you may want to avoid “Lighting it up Blue”, as this is an initiative started by Autism Speaks. The autistic community has created a hashtag, #RedInstead, that serves as an alternative.

Listen to Autistic people.

This is the most important tip. Autistic people will always be the foremost experts on autism. Listen to us when we tell you what we have trouble with and what we can and can’t do. Don’t force us to do things we are uncomfortable with, but don’t underestimate our capabilities, either. Even if our struggles don’t show on the inside, or we are able to pass as neurotypical most of the time, that doesn’t mean we aren’t struggling. 

You may ask, “Well, what about low-functioning autistics? They can’t speak, so how can we listen to them?” First of all, functioning labels are widely inaccurate, since not every autistic person fits so neatly into one category or another. It is possible to be highly intelligent but nonverbal, or verbal but intellectually disabled. Second of all, there are blogs by so-called “low-functioning” people who are able to tell their stories and share valuable insights on autism. Check out Non-Speaking Autistics Speaking, Ballastexistenz, or Carly Fleischmann.

In conclusion, should you support autistic people this month and all year? Absolutely! But make sure you’re going about it the right way.  Most autistic people don’t want to be cured or treated like there is something wrong with us. We want to be listened to, respected, and accepted for who we are.

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From Jeannie: Comments are very welcome below, but note that Allison may not reply since she may not be checking back.

"What Would Jesus Do?" - Asking the wrong question

Today I have a post up at Tim Fall's blog, Just One Train Wreck After Another. Tim posts regularly, with humour and insight, on issues of faith, and I'm honoured to be hosted there.

Here's the start of my post, with a link to read the rest of it over at Tim's blog.

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“What would Jesus do?”

We’ve all heard this question. We’ve seen the “WWJD” bracelets and key chains.

But sometimes I wonder how helpful a question it is – especially when we turn “what Jesus would do” into “what we should do.”

Click HERE to read the rest. 

Five Minute Friday: ENOUGH

Today I'm participating again in the Five Minute Friday blog linkup. This week's word is ENOUGH.

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[Jesus and his disciples] came to Bethsaida, 

and some people brought a blind man 

and begged Jesus to touch him.

He took the blind man by the hand 

and led him outside the village. 

When he had spit on the man’s eyes 

and put his hands on him, 

Jesus asked, “Do you see anything?”

He looked up and said, “I see people; 

they look like trees walking around.”

Once more Jesus put his hands on the man’s eyes. 

Then his eyes were opened, 

his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly.

(Mark 8:22-25)

I love reading the stories in the Gospels about how Jesus met people, interacted with them, blessed them, healed or taught them. I was reading this passage from Mark just the other day.

When I don’t wear my glasses, people DO sort of look like trees walking around -- very blurry trees -- so I can imagine how the blind man felt when Jesus applied spit to his eyes and asked if he could see anything. 

As I pondered the passage, I imagined what it would have been like if, instead of telling Jesus that people looked like trees, the man had said, “Wow! This is amazing, Jesus, thanks! It’s so much better than what I had before. No, really, this is good enough! Blurry is better than blind. I’m satisfied.”

This man might have thought, after Jesus touched his eyes, that this was the best he was going to get. He could have reasoned, “This isn’t really what I hoped for, but it is a major improvement. I don't want to seem ungrateful. Jesus is doing his best here, and he’s a busy man. Maybe I should just pretend it’s good enough.”

I’m glad he didn’t pretend, but was honest with Jesus. When he told the truth, Jesus touched his eyes again and he could see with perfect clarity.

I wonder if Jesus did this two-stage healing on purpose: to give the man a chance to play a role in his own healing. The man had needed others to bring him to Jesus, but here he had a chance to own his need and say honestly, “This is good – but it’s not enough.”

Are there times that I settle for second best because I’m afraid to say it’s not enough? Maybe Jesus can do more of a work in me if I’m truly honest, like the blind man was.

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