Poll: Autism. Bad or Good?

[Blitzkreg]

To be perfectly honest, we're a social species, and we need each other, so while some individuals may thrive with their extra learning skills, without proper social skills, they can sometimes be more of a drag than a bonus. I dont mean to generalize, but social skills are far more important in the way of operating around other people in my opinion.

I was about to post a long-winded argument about why it isn't good when I saw this. Thanks dude.

Not a problem man, when I saw you responded, I was expecting to get flamed...

 

[Liquid155]

You may say that, but my brother changed dramaticall when he had his MMR injection. Before he had it he would babble away and was able to say "Kelly good girl" (we would say that to our dog when she was around him as a baby) "dada" "mmmm" and "ssss" for my parents and myself and generally acted like a 'typical' baby.

After he had his MMR jab all of this stopped. He was hyperactive. He actually learned to walk before he crawled, and later would spend most of his time running around in circles in the living room, fall down asleep and within 2 hours be up and he would do it all over again.

I'm a linguistics major in college and one of the areas I've studied is language impairment in a range of conditions including autism.

Normal language development continuing to a certain point and then abruptly stopping is very common in Autism. When language is affected in Autism, this is usually how it happens. The age when it stops just happens to correspond with the age most children get vaccinated.

It's unusual, and still not completely understood, but despite the correlation there really is nothing to link vaccines to Autism.

Thank you very much for the depth of your post and the information. I will take it to heart and I appreciate it, but I suppose it will probably take me a while to acquainted with the idea, especially when you believe something (even if it is wrong) for such a long time.

Thanks again

I'm not going to write you a paper on language acquisition in normally developing and Autistic children. You wanted an explanation for what happened other than vaccines and I was simply pointing out that that's what normally happens whether the child has been vaccinated or not.

If you want to understand it better, look it up. There has been plenty written on the subject. If not just blame whatever you like.

 

[spartan231490]

I think you should change the title to aspergers, not autism in general, because aspergers is generally a mild form of autism. I read somewhere that most people with aspergers are diagnosed with it after they are adults, and live reasonably normal lives even before diagnoses.

OT: People without aspergers can learn 3 languages and have good math and reading skills. When i was 10 years old, I could read at a 12th grade level, and i could probably do math at a 9th grade level too, my school only tested reading and didn't do advanced classes, but I could do simple multiplication when I was 3. Admittedly, I only speak english, but that's just because I don't care, speaking other languages would not make my life any better so I don't learn them. Well, i took spanish in High School, but that was required for college.

Not to bring you down, but did you read at a 12th grade level because the Accelerated Reading test said you did? Because if that's true, I hate to inform you but that's bunk. Everyone in my 7th grade English class could "read at a college level" and that's quite frankly ridiculous. Unless you actually sit down and take those classes at that level, I don't think you can accurately say that you were capable of performing at that grade. I'm sure you were gifted to some degree, but I hate when the school system inaccurately inflates the egos of students, because they effectively get ***** slapped when they try the "real thing" (high-level courses).

Now, onto the OP. If he's happy and isn't infringing on the happiness of others, then it's fine. It could even be a good thing, but that's speculation. If it's making him miserable and he hates his life because of it, then it's probably not a good thing. It's really that simple.

No, i read at a 12th grade reading level because the accelerated reading test said i did, and because I read "The Lord of The Rings," without difficulty, and easily handled silmarillion and shakespear as well, but thanks for playing. And i handled high level honors courses and got valadictorian without any trouble at all as well. Let me define "without any trouble at all". I spent all of my study halls and most of my classes reading books for my own entertainment, and i skipped a fair amount of homework because it was so boring. And yet, i aced every test and essay, and like i said, i was valadictorian of my class.

 

[Hairetos]

I think you should change the title to aspergers, not autism in general, because aspergers is generally a mild form of autism. I read somewhere that most people with aspergers are diagnosed with it after they are adults, and live reasonably normal lives even before diagnoses.

OT: People without aspergers can learn 3 languages and have good math and reading skills. When i was 10 years old, I could read at a 12th grade level, and i could probably do math at a 9th grade level too, my school only tested reading and didn't do advanced classes, but I could do simple multiplication when I was 3. Admittedly, I only speak english, but that's just because I don't care, speaking other languages would not make my life any better so I don't learn them. Well, i took spanish in High School, but that was required for college.

Not to bring you down, but did you read at a 12th grade level because the Accelerated Reading test said you did? Because if that's true, I hate to inform you but that's bunk. Everyone in my 7th grade English class could "read at a college level" and that's quite frankly ridiculous. Unless you actually sit down and take those classes at that level, I don't think you can accurately say that you were capable of performing at that grade. I'm sure you were gifted to some degree, but I hate when the school system inaccurately inflates the egos of students, because they effectively get ***** slapped when they try the "real thing" (high-level courses).

Now, onto the OP. If he's happy and isn't infringing on the happiness of others, then it's fine. It could even be a good thing, but that's speculation. If it's making him miserable and he hates his life because of it, then it's probably not a good thing. It's really that simple.

No, i read at a 12th grade reading level because the accelerated reading test said i did, and because I read "The Lord of The Rings," without difficulty, and easily handled silmarillion and shakespear as well, but thanks for playing. And i handled high level honors courses and got valadictorian without any trouble at all as well. Let me define "without any trouble at all". I spent all of my study halls and most of my classes reading books for my own entertainment, and i skipped a fair amount of homework because it was so boring. And yet, i aced every test and essay, and like i said, i was valadictorian of my class.

Congrats dude. I'm actually all of those things too, including Valedictorian. None of that lends to the fact that you read at a 12th grade level at the age of 10 though.

I'm just saying that, unless you have solid evidence that you could sit down in a 12th grade literature class and do just fine at the age of 10, people are going to call you on it because it just makes you look like you're bragging your ass off. Reading Lord of the Rings isn't extremely difficult, neither is Shakespeare (also, reading doesn't imply comprehending).

I'm not trying to bring you down, I'm just trying to get you to not let tests like the AR test get to your head because it makes you look like a jerk when you bring it up.

 

[spartan231490]

I'm going to start off saying this "My little brother has autism", he wasn't born with it he was given a vaccine when he was 2 years old to help him from receiving the flu, but all of the vaccines in that year had expired and had mercury inside of all of the expired bottles and effected hundreds of kids within those years.

Okay, first, I registered solely so I could tell you how completely and utterly wrong you are. There is no connection whatsoever between vaccines and autism.

Also, Asperger's causes very little to no change in mental development or cognitive abilities. That's one of they key differences between it and other autism spectrum disorders. Asperger's didn't make your brother smart, his genes did. Just like his genes gave him Asperger's.

Anyway, to the question: bad. Obviously. Just because autism is less bad in some doesn't make it good. If you'd ever seen an autistic child who couldn't interact with the world in any meaningful way you'd know that. EDIT: By "less bad" I mean a lot of people can function quite normally. But in general: bad.

The OP never said that it made his brother smarter, he said that the added focus let him learn more. focus does help people to learn, if you've ever had a class about a subject your interested in, and a class about a subject you have no interest in whatsoever, you would know that.

 

[spartan231490]

I think you should change the title to aspergers, not autism in general, because aspergers is generally a mild form of autism. I read somewhere that most people with aspergers are diagnosed with it after they are adults, and live reasonably normal lives even before diagnoses.

OT: People without aspergers can learn 3 languages and have good math and reading skills. When i was 10 years old, I could read at a 12th grade level, and i could probably do math at a 9th grade level too, my school only tested reading and didn't do advanced classes, but I could do simple multiplication when I was 3. Admittedly, I only speak english, but that's just because I don't care, speaking other languages would not make my life any better so I don't learn them. Well, i took spanish in High School, but that was required for college.

Not to bring you down, but did you read at a 12th grade level because the Accelerated Reading test said you did? Because if that's true, I hate to inform you but that's bunk. Everyone in my 7th grade English class could "read at a college level" and that's quite frankly ridiculous. Unless you actually sit down and take those classes at that level, I don't think you can accurately say that you were capable of performing at that grade. I'm sure you were gifted to some degree, but I hate when the school system inaccurately inflates the egos of students, because they effectively get ***** slapped when they try the "real thing" (high-level courses).

Now, onto the OP. If he's happy and isn't infringing on the happiness of others, then it's fine. It could even be a good thing, but that's speculation. If it's making him miserable and he hates his life because of it, then it's probably not a good thing. It's really that simple.

No, i read at a 12th grade reading level because the accelerated reading test said i did, and because I read "The Lord of The Rings," without difficulty, and easily handled silmarillion and shakespear as well, but thanks for playing. And i handled high level honors courses and got valadictorian without any trouble at all as well. Let me define "without any trouble at all". I spent all of my study halls and most of my classes reading books for my own entertainment, and i skipped a fair amount of homework because it was so boring. And yet, i aced every test and essay, and like i said, i was valadictorian of my class.

Congrats dude. I'm actually all of those things too, including Valedictorian. None of that lends to the fact that you read at a 12th grade level at the age of 10 though.

I'm just saying that, unless you have solid evidence that you could sit down in a 12th grade literature class and do just fine at the age of 10, people are going to call you on it because it just makes you look like you're bragging your ass off. Reading Lord of the Rings isn't extremely difficult, neither is Shakespeare (also, reading doesn't imply comprehending).

I'm not trying to bring you down, I'm just trying to get you to not let tests like the AR test get to your head because it makes you look like a jerk when you bring it up.

I think it's ironic that you think I'm being arrogant and bragging about this, when you are judging me. I'm not going to try to convince you anymore because, no i didn't take a senior lit class at the age of ten, and i can't prove that i easily could read and understand a 12th grade level book, because that's what 12 grade reading level means. I was debating on weather or not to post again, and i figured, why not. I'm not doing anything interesting anyway, just watchin reruns of House, but let me get to the point. I'm not so unconfident, that I need others to validate my opinion of myself. I know that I had at least a 12th grade reading level when I was age 10, if not a college. I know this, because the books I read in high school and college were no more difficult to understand than the books I was reading then.

 

[Grigori361]

I'm going to start off saying this "My little brother has autism", he wasn't born with it he was given a vaccine when he was 2 years old to help him from receiving the flu, but all of the vaccines in that year had expired and had mercury inside of all of the expired bottles and effected hundreds of kids within those years.

The doctor who first stated that vaccinations caused autism was banned from practicing medicine in the UK earlier this year because he fabricated the results of his study. Later he was banned by the AMA as well. You can read about it if you care to.

http://health.usnews.com/health-news/managing-your-healthcare/brain-and-behavior/articles/2010/05/24/health-buzz-autism-vaccine-doctor-stripped-of-medical-license.html

OKay hold on, you said he fabricated his research, but all I see is him being banned because of immoral practices, simply put. You can't ban research because of immorality, all those nazi experiments that jumped our medicine ahead 30-50 years would have been banned to.

The medical journal that published his "findings" retracted them shortly after he was indicted. If his studies on autism weren't fabricated the there would be no reason to retract them now would there?

No offense but that just comes off a a tid naive, There's always more going on then there is suppose to be. If they pulled it for morality while technically legal it is also a violation of scientific principals, which admittedly include knowledge irregardless of it's source.

Now he sounds like a right douche, and I wouldn't trust his research farther then I can piss on it. But plenty of scientific things have been held back for political reasons, the Soviets did it all the time, and Capitalism still does it.

Funny example, there is a form of "contraception" called the 'lady comp', which is basically just a computer that can tell you where you are in your cycle and if you can get pregnant. It has a higher effectiveness if used properly then the pill or condoms, and all of North America Health pretty much denies it exists.

I actually called the Canadian Government for information on it before I bought one for my gf (now my ex) and they refused to comment on it, or acknowledge it's existence at all.

Tt has, for the record a 99.7% prevention rate, the pill is between 97% - 99.5%, and comdoms around around 90%-99%.

The most effective birth control in the world (no effect for STDS though) and more or less all of north American medical science refuses to acknowledge it exists.

Me and my ex used it for two years without problems.

 

[Grigori361]

I think you should change the title to aspergers, not autism in general, because aspergers is generally a mild form of autism. I read somewhere that most people with aspergers are diagnosed with it after they are adults, and live reasonably normal lives even before diagnoses.

OT: People without aspergers can learn 3 languages and have good math and reading skills. When i was 10 years old, I could read at a 12th grade level, and i could probably do math at a 9th grade level too, my school only tested reading and didn't do advanced classes, but I could do simple multiplication when I was 3. Admittedly, I only speak english, but that's just because I don't care, speaking other languages would not make my life any better so I don't learn them. Well, i took spanish in High School, but that was required for college.

Not to bring you down, but did you read at a 12th grade level because the Accelerated Reading test said you did? Because if that's true, I hate to inform you but that's bunk. Everyone in my 7th grade English class could "read at a college level" and that's quite frankly ridiculous. Unless you actually sit down and take those classes at that level, I don't think you can accurately say that you were capable of performing at that grade. I'm sure you were gifted to some degree, but I hate when the school system inaccurately inflates the egos of students, because they effectively get ***** slapped when they try the "real thing" (high-level courses).

Now, onto the OP. If he's happy and isn't infringing on the happiness of others, then it's fine. It could even be a good thing, but that's speculation. If it's making him miserable and he hates his life because of it, then it's probably not a good thing. It's really that simple.

No, i read at a 12th grade reading level because the accelerated reading test said i did, and because I read "The Lord of The Rings," without difficulty, and easily handled silmarillion and shakespear as well, but thanks for playing. And i handled high level honors courses and got valadictorian without any trouble at all as well. Let me define "without any trouble at all". I spent all of my study halls and most of my classes reading books for my own entertainment, and i skipped a fair amount of homework because it was so boring. And yet, i aced every test and essay, and like i said, i was valadictorian of my class.

Congrats dude. I'm actually all of those things too, including Valedictorian. None of that lends to the fact that you read at a 12th grade level at the age of 10 though.

I'm just saying that, unless you have solid evidence that you could sit down in a 12th grade literature class and do just fine at the age of 10, people are going to call you on it because it just makes you look like you're bragging your ass off. Reading Lord of the Rings isn't extremely difficult, neither is Shakespeare (also, reading doesn't imply comprehending).

I'm not trying to bring you down, I'm just trying to get you to not let tests like the AR test get to your head because it makes you look like a jerk when you bring it up.

I think it's ironic that you think I'm being arrogant and bragging about this, when you are judging me. I'm not going to try to convince you anymore because, no i didn't take a senior lit class at the age of ten, and i can't prove that i easily could read and understand a 12th grade level book, because that's what 12 grade reading level means. I was debating on weather or not to post again, and i figured, why not. I'm not doing anything interesting anyway, just watchin reruns of House, but let me get to the point. I'm not so unconfident, that I need others to validate my opinion of myself. I know that I had at least a 12th grade reading level when I was age 10, if not a college. I know this, because the books I read in high school and college were no more difficult to understand than the books I was reading then.

GET A ROOM!!!


I mean does it really matter THAT much who can read at what level? yeah sure I Read the LOTRS The Hobbit, and the Silmarilion before I hit grade 6. Me thinks you both need to chill the hells out.

 

[Dastardly]

SNIP

Opinions like this is why mental health is so disgracefully overlooked in so much of the western world.

And vacuous statements like yours are why many of the supposed mental health proponents can't be taken seriously. If you're unwilling to engage in any kind of meaningful, informed discourse, kindly get to the part where you step away from the keyboard.

Some people have real disorders, and some people fake it. Get the hell over it.

Some people pretend to have cured cancer with miracles. Some people fall on the floor of churches and pretend to speak in magical languages. And they can pull the wool over the eyes of many simply because there's no solid way to disprove them. Welcome to earth, it ain't just the "West."

 

[yamitami]

I'm tired of this vaccine BS. People just point that finger because the major signs of autism show up around the time kids start getting their vaccines. My little brother hit every developmental milestone dead on average until he was 2 and he stopped talking and didn't say another word until he was 5.

Also a vaccine being expired has no bearing on how much mercury is in it so you're checking your facts less than most people who like to toss that disproved nonsense around.

As for your question, autism as a whole isn't good OR bad. It's just different. Even if talking about the negative effects it can have, mainly having problems with being social, it's still not 'bad'. It's a disadvantage, sometimes a major disadvantage, but it's not BAD. Yes, it would be easier for my little brother if he wasn't autistic. Life would also be easier for me if I wasn't a gay woman living in the Bible Belt. That doesn't make homosexuality bad and it doesn't make autism bad. Just different.

 

[yamitami]

He wasn't born with it he was given a vaccine when he was 2 years old to help him from receiving the flu, but all of the vaccines in that year had expired and had mercury inside of all of the expired bottles and effected hundreds of kids within those years.

They have disproved this SO MANY TIMES.

Drives me mad to hear it.

You get more mercury eating a single piece of tuna.

You may say that, but my brother changed dramaticall when he had his MMR injection. Before he had it he would babble away and was able to say "Kelly good girl" (we would say that to our dog when she was around him as a baby) "dada" "mmmm" and "ssss" for my parents and myself and generally acted like a 'typical' baby.

After he had his MMR jab all of this stopped. He was hyperactive. He actually learned to walk before he crawled, and later would spend most of his time running around in circles in the living room, fall down asleep and within 2 hours be up and he would do it all over again.

He was diagnosed with ADHD and learning difficulties and is currently happy (although it took a lot for him to get there) at a special school where he will be playing catch-up for the rest of his life.



tl;dr - I honestly am not sure what caused it, but I honestly believe it has something to do with the injection.

OT: Why the fuck would something like Autism be good or bad? are you seriously trying to annoy/upset people? I would never wish for something like that on anyone.

My little brother is autistic. Due to lost paperwork with the military and the fact that we were base jumping he didn't get his first vaccines until he was almost 3. He stopped talking a couple months after he turned 2. The same is true for autistic kids who never had vaccines at all. Normal development until the age of 2 is PART of autism. Some hotshot researcher just decided to twist facts to make a name for themselves and picked vaccines since kids happen to get those the same age as the visible signs of autism start. My dad proves to his math classes that their grades are dependent upon the price of tea in China, just to show them that you can bend statistics to make any coincidence look like a causality. And then everyone else jumped on the wagon with other conditions that show up at 2.

Just look at all the OBs who got sued by parents who gave birth to a child with Down Syndrome--a GENETIC condition. Some people don't care if it's nobody's fault. They just want someone to blame even if it isn't true.

Secondly, and this is just my opinion, I don't think that calling autism *bad* helps anything. It's not a disease. It's not something that can be cured because there is nothing to cure. The brain of an autistic person is simply wired differently than a 'normal' person.

Can it make things difficult? Yes. Would it be easier for the person if their brain was wired the 'normal' way? Yes. But it's not bad. It's not wrong. It's just different. My brother might be mostly socially inept but he paints these amazing oils when the subject is one of his fixations and no one in the world has more extensive knowledge of all things Mario. The metaphor I usually use is myself in that I'm gay and I live in the bible belt so this can make things generally suck. Does that mean there's something wrong with me? No. My brain is just wired differently than a 'normal' heterosexual woman.

End game: if you call autism bad then it becomes bad. If you call any disability or talent or condition bad then it becomes bad even if it's something neutral or even beneficial. My mom teaches a girl who flat out does not speak not because of anything physical but because other kids made fun of her voice so much that she can't make herself use it. There is a world of difference between someone who lost their legs and thinks of it as a challenge to overcome and the person who lost their legs and thinks of it as the end of their world. There are hundreds of people who made full recoveries from things that should have 100% killed them simply because they were too stubborn to die and plenty who just gave up and died of something totally minor.

My point is that if you view autism (or ADHD or blindness or freckles) as something inherently BAD then the person who has that condition or trait WILL pick up on it. When my brother was diagnosed my parents took up the challenge and made sure that he always knew that there was nothing wrong with him. The autistic kids with parents who take diagnosis as the end of the world and a terrible crippling thing, they statistically don't do as well as the lucky ones like my brother. And this goes for everything, like I said, from medical issues to high pitched voices.

Sorry to turn this into an essay but ever since I was 5 I've been telling people that there's nothing wrong with my brother and half the time they don't listen. So this kind of hit a sore spot. But I hope that maybe you'll reevaluate the type of language you used to describe your sibling's situation and maybe ponder what signals you're sending them unintentionally.

 

[sirkai007]

I'm going to start off saying this "My little brother has autism", he wasn't born with it he was given a vaccine when he was 2 years old to help him from receiving the flu, but all of the vaccines in that year had expired and had mercury inside of all of the expired bottles and effected hundreds of kids within those years.

The doctor who first stated that vaccinations caused autism was banned from practicing medicine in the UK earlier this year because he fabricated the results of his study. Later he was banned by the AMA as well. You can read about it if you care to.

http://health.usnews.com/health-news/managing-your-healthcare/brain-and-behavior/articles/2010/05/24/health-buzz-autism-vaccine-doctor-stripped-of-medical-license.html

OKay hold on, you said he fabricated his research, but all I see is him being banned because of immoral practices, simply put. You can't ban research because of immorality, all those nazi experiments that jumped our medicine ahead 30-50 years would have been banned to.

The medical journal that published his "findings" retracted them shortly after he was indicted. If his studies on autism weren't fabricated the there would be no reason to retract them now would there?

No offense but that just comes off a a tid naive, There's always more going on then there is suppose to be. If they pulled it for morality while technically legal it is also a violation of scientific principals, which admittedly include knowledge irregardless of it's source.

Now he sounds like a right douche, and I wouldn't trust his research farther then I can piss on it. But plenty of scientific things have been held back for political reasons, the Soviets did it all the time, and Capitalism still does it.

Funny example, there is a form of "contraception" called the 'lady comp', which is basically just a computer that can tell you where you are in your cycle and if you can get pregnant. It has a higher effectiveness if used properly then the pill or condoms, and all of North America Health pretty much denies it exists.

I actually called the Canadian Government for information on it before I bought one for my gf (now my ex) and they refused to comment on it, or acknowledge it's existence at all.

Tt has, for the record a 99.7% prevention rate, the pill is between 97% - 99.5%, and comdoms around around 90%-99%.

The most effective birth control in the world (no effect for STDS though) and more or less all of north American medical science refuses to acknowledge it exists.

Me and my ex used it for two years without problems.

Don't care about the Lady comp.

It may have been due to Dr. Wakefield being hired as an expert witness by a law firm that was suing a pharmaceutical company on client claims that their product was harmful to children.

 

[DSK-]

You may say that, but my brother changed dramaticall when he had his MMR injection. Before he had it he would babble away and was able to say "Kelly good girl" (we would say that to our dog when she was around him as a baby) "dada" "mmmm" and "ssss" for my parents and myself and generally acted like a 'typical' baby.

After he had his MMR jab all of this stopped. He was hyperactive. He actually learned to walk before he crawled, and later would spend most of his time running around in circles in the living room, fall down asleep and within 2 hours be up and he would do it all over again.

I'm a linguistics major in college and one of the areas I've studied is language impairment in a range of conditions including autism.

Normal language development continuing to a certain point and then abruptly stopping is very common in Autism. When language is affected in Autism, this is usually how it happens. The age when it stops just happens to correspond with the age most children get vaccinated.

It's unusual, and still not completely understood, but despite the correlation there really is nothing to link vaccines to Autism.

Thank you very much for the depth of your post and the information. I will take it to heart and I appreciate it, but I suppose it will probably take me a while to acquainted with the idea, especially when you believe something (even if it is wrong) for such a long time.

Thanks again

I'm not going to write you a paper on language acquisition in normally developing and Autistic children. You wanted an explanation for what happened other than vaccines and I was simply pointing out that that's what normally happens whether the child has been vaccinated or not.

If you want to understand it better, look it up. There has been plenty written on the subject. If not just blame whatever you like.

I wasn't being sarcastic or offensive - I genuinely wanted to say thank you for the insight :/

 

[DSK-]

He wasn't born with it he was given a vaccine when he was 2 years old to help him from receiving the flu, but all of the vaccines in that year had expired and had mercury inside of all of the expired bottles and effected hundreds of kids within those years.

They have disproved this SO MANY TIMES.

Drives me mad to hear it.

You get more mercury eating a single piece of tuna.

You may say that, but my brother changed dramaticall when he had his MMR injection. Before he had it he would babble away and was able to say "Kelly good girl" (we would say that to our dog when she was around him as a baby) "dada" "mmmm" and "ssss" for my parents and myself and generally acted like a 'typical' baby.

After he had his MMR jab all of this stopped. He was hyperactive. He actually learned to walk before he crawled, and later would spend most of his time running around in circles in the living room, fall down asleep and within 2 hours be up and he would do it all over again.

He was diagnosed with ADHD and learning difficulties and is currently happy (although it took a lot for him to get there) at a special school where he will be playing catch-up for the rest of his life.



tl;dr - I honestly am not sure what caused it, but I honestly believe it has something to do with the injection.

OT: Why the fuck would something like Autism be good or bad? are you seriously trying to annoy/upset people? I would never wish for something like that on anyone.

My little brother is autistic. Due to lost paperwork with the military and the fact that we were base jumping he didn't get his first vaccines until he was almost 3. He stopped talking a couple months after he turned 2. The same is true for autistic kids who never had vaccines at all. Normal development until the age of 2 is PART of autism. Some hotshot researcher just decided to twist facts to make a name for themselves and picked vaccines since kids happen to get those the same age as the visible signs of autism start. My dad proves to his math classes that their grades are dependent upon the price of tea in China, just to show them that you can bend statistics to make any coincidence look like a causality. And then everyone else jumped on the wagon with other conditions that show up at 2.

Just look at all the OBs who got sued by parents who gave birth to a child with Down Syndrome--a GENETIC condition. Some people don't care if it's nobody's fault. They just want someone to blame even if it isn't true.

Secondly, and this is just my opinion, I don't think that calling autism *bad* helps anything. It's not a disease. It's not something that can be cured because there is nothing to cure. The brain of an autistic person is simply wired differently than a 'normal' person.

Can it make things difficult? Yes. Would it be easier for the person if their brain was wired the 'normal' way? Yes. But it's not bad. It's not wrong. It's just different. My brother might be mostly socially inept but he paints these amazing oils when the subject is one of his fixations and no one in the world has more extensive knowledge of all things Mario. The metaphor I usually use is myself in that I'm gay and I live in the bible belt so this can make things generally suck. Does that mean there's something wrong with me? No. My brain is just wired differently than a 'normal' heterosexual woman.

End game: if you call autism bad then it becomes bad. If you call any disability or talent or condition bad then it becomes bad even if it's something neutral or even beneficial. My mom teaches a girl who flat out does not speak not because of anything physical but because other kids made fun of her voice so much that she can't make herself use it. There is a world of difference between someone who lost their legs and thinks of it as a challenge to overcome and the person who lost their legs and thinks of it as the end of their world. There are hundreds of people who made full recoveries from things that should have 100% killed them simply because they were too stubborn to die and plenty who just gave up and died of something totally minor.

My point is that if you view autism (or ADHD or blindness or freckles) as something inherently BAD then the person who has that condition or trait WILL pick up on it. When my brother was diagnosed my parents took up the challenge and made sure that he always knew that there was nothing wrong with him. The autistic kids with parents who take diagnosis as the end of the world and a terrible crippling thing, they statistically don't do as well as the lucky ones like my brother. And this goes for everything, like I said, from medical issues to high pitched voices.

Sorry to turn this into an essay but ever since I was 5 I've been telling people that there's nothing wrong with my brother and half the time they don't listen. So this kind of hit a sore spot. But I hope that maybe you'll reevaluate the type of language you used to describe your sibling's situation and maybe ponder what signals you're sending them unintentionally.

I'll look into the subject a in-depth when I have the time. As the general consensus is that it's developmental, I will read up on it. Thank you very much for your info/story and insight.

 

[Grigori361]

Don't care about the Lady comp.

It may have been due to Dr. Wakefield being hired as an expert witness by a law firm that was suing a pharmaceutical company on client claims that their product was harmful to children.

Agreed, my point to make it perfectly clear was simply a statement on how the "system" operates, for example, even if a medical practitioner where to honestly beleive it (ie that vaccines are harmful) they aren't allowed to say so, (usually) health sciences are very strictly regulated.

And unless one uses their authority for whatever the medical oversight committee of that country says is okay, then that license (ie to do medicine) is usually considered for being revoked.

Once again I don't actually share the belief that vaccines cause autism personally, but oversimplifying things as I am of the opinion that you seem to be doing, is just as dangerous as saying it happens without much if anything more then a correlation between the two.

Now there IS a correlation, but scientifically correlation does NOT imply causation.

 

[Liquid155]

You may say that, but my brother changed dramaticall when he had his MMR injection. Before he had it he would babble away and was able to say "Kelly good girl" (we would say that to our dog when she was around him as a baby) "dada" "mmmm" and "ssss" for my parents and myself and generally acted like a 'typical' baby.

After he had his MMR jab all of this stopped. He was hyperactive. He actually learned to walk before he crawled, and later would spend most of his time running around in circles in the living room, fall down asleep and within 2 hours be up and he would do it all over again.

I'm a linguistics major in college and one of the areas I've studied is language impairment in a range of conditions including autism.

Normal language development continuing to a certain point and then abruptly stopping is very common in Autism. When language is affected in Autism, this is usually how it happens. The age when it stops just happens to correspond with the age most children get vaccinated.

It's unusual, and still not completely understood, but despite the correlation there really is nothing to link vaccines to Autism.

Thank you very much for the depth of your post and the information. I will take it to heart and I appreciate it, but I suppose it will probably take me a while to acquainted with the idea, especially when you believe something (even if it is wrong) for such a long time.

Thanks again

I'm not going to write you a paper on language acquisition in normally developing and Autistic children. You wanted an explanation for what happened other than vaccines and I was simply pointing out that that's what normally happens whether the child has been vaccinated or not.

If you want to understand it better, look it up. There has been plenty written on the subject. If not just blame whatever you like.

I wasn't being sarcastic or offensive - I genuinely wanted to say thank you for the insight :/

Whoops, apologies =/ It's internet discussions...I've become predisposed to reading sarcasm in replies, evidently even when there is none >.< Sincerely sorry man.

 

[DSK-]

You may say that, but my brother changed dramaticall when he had his MMR injection. Before he had it he would babble away and was able to say "Kelly good girl" (we would say that to our dog when she was around him as a baby) "dada" "mmmm" and "ssss" for my parents and myself and generally acted like a 'typical' baby.

After he had his MMR jab all of this stopped. He was hyperactive. He actually learned to walk before he crawled, and later would spend most of his time running around in circles in the living room, fall down asleep and within 2 hours be up and he would do it all over again.

I'm a linguistics major in college and one of the areas I've studied is language impairment in a range of conditions including autism.

Normal language development continuing to a certain point and then abruptly stopping is very common in Autism. When language is affected in Autism, this is usually how it happens. The age when it stops just happens to correspond with the age most children get vaccinated.

It's unusual, and still not completely understood, but despite the correlation there really is nothing to link vaccines to Autism.

Thank you very much for the depth of your post and the information. I will take it to heart and I appreciate it, but I suppose it will probably take me a while to acquainted with the idea, especially when you believe something (even if it is wrong) for such a long time.

Thanks again

I'm not going to write you a paper on language acquisition in normally developing and Autistic children. You wanted an explanation for what happened other than vaccines and I was simply pointing out that that's what normally happens whether the child has been vaccinated or not.

If you want to understand it better, look it up. There has been plenty written on the subject. If not just blame whatever you like.

I wasn't being sarcastic or offensive - I genuinely wanted to say thank you for the insight :/

Whoops, apologies =/ It's internet discussions...I've become predisposed to reading sarcasm in replies, evidently even when there is none >.< Sincerely sorry man.

No worries, these things happen

 

[Dragonpit]

I don't think it's good or bad. Sure, there are down sides, but there isn't anything out there that doesn't have them. All it is is a burden to be carried. We don't need to make it any more or less complicated than that.