It's heartening to see so much attention and resistance #RFK Jr’s abominable #eugenics -based comments. However, I’m seeing a lot of rebuttals that play into these narratives, no matter how unintended. This thread contains a few thoughts for allies and supporters of #Autistic people #autisticsky 1/ - ThreadSky

audralmitchell.bsky.social • 10 days ago

It's heartening to see so much attention and resistance #RFK Jr’s abominable #eugenics -based comments. However, I’m seeing a lot of rebuttals that play into these narratives, no matter how unintended. This thread contains a few thoughts for allies and supporters of #Autistic people #autisticsky 1/

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sarahdawn.bsky.social•10 days ago

Thanks, this is v insightful. I’m wondering how to talk w my MO right wing cousin who has a non verbal autistic 6yr old who is celebrating “having attention on this”. It’s possible she isn’t familiar w “eugenics” and I don’t know how to explain this other side. Ideas or resources are appreciated!

audralmitchell.bsky.social•10 days ago

That sounds really tricky. In terms of sources, the Autistic Women and Nonbinary Network is excellent. Devon Price's work is often a good starting place. On the eugenics side, I really like Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha's books and Eli Clare's work (especially 'brilliant imperfection')

audralmitchell.bsky.social•10 days ago

There's tons of academic literature but I don't know how helpful that will be for your family. I wrote something about different kinds of verbal and other-than-verbal thinking that has a lot of these sources in the refs https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/25148486221108177

audralmitchell.bsky.social•10 days ago

Sorry - I don't want to assume that your family aren't academics (just don't know how much they want to read!) I also suggest M. Remi Yergeau's 'authoring autism' which gets into all kinds of fascinating discussions of autistic ways of communicating, verbal and otherwise

audralmitchell.bsky.social•10 days ago

On eugenics in general (not Autistic-specific) Ruha Benjamin's work is a standout for me, and she has some great pieces in the media that crystallize her points

sarahdawn.bsky.social•10 days ago

I love Ruha’s work, love to read more of it! The academics is probably more for me and my sis... thank you so much Audra!

audralmitchell.bsky.social•10 days ago

Most importantly, it's crucial not to (inadvertently) lean into ideas or narratives that play into eugenics, #anti-Autism #ableism or #antidisabilityhate. Here are a few common examples I've seen in the last day or so 2/

audralmitchell.bsky.social•10 days ago

1)“Vaccines don’t cause autism – something else does and we’ll find that!” (this one often comes from the #medical community) The desire to eliminate an entire community based on dislike of that community is not ok, regardless of the rationale given. 3/

audralmitchell.bsky.social•10 days ago

2) “we shouldn’t sacrifice healthy children [by refusing vaccines] just to prevent autism”. This implies that ‘healthy’ (presumably non-Autistic children) are inherently more valuable, and that Autistic children (and adults) are a necessary evil to be endured in order to secure ‘healthy’ society 4/

audralmitchell.bsky.social•10 days ago

3)“I know lots of Autistic people who work, pay taxes, play baseball, date, are married, have children, etc”. Absolutely, so do I! But these are not criteria for being a human, or deserving to exist. 5/

audralmitchell.bsky.social•10 days ago

Autistic people who do not do these things, who do not speak, who do not and/or cannot work, who do not have or want sexual relationships and much more also deserve to exist. (Spoiler alert: we all do!) 6/

audralmitchell.bsky.social•10 days ago

These arguments play directly into hierarchies (e.g. ‘severe’, ‘mild’, ‘verbal/nonverbal’ ‘dependent/independent’) that have long been used by the #medical community to 'grade' or rank Autistic people 7/

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