Autism organizations to donate to11/23/2023 A majority of the budget for most autism charities goes towards cure and treatment research, administration, and conferences that support the medical model of disability, advertisements that spread autism “awareness” through pathologizing autism and fear mongering such as the “I am Autism” advertisement from Autism Speaks. They may pathologize autism or compare autism to a disease by using language to describe autistic people such as “people touched by autism,” “people impacted by autism,” or, “people affected by autism.” They may use symbols that depict autistic people as broken, missing links or infantilize autistic people, such as the puzzle piece symbol. They often have minimal, if any involvement of autistic people in their organization. They may use outdated or falsified research to support their statements of autism being a tragedy or being caused by environmental factors or vaccines. They characterize autism as a tragedy or something undesirable, and may compare it to diseases and disorders. They are centered on the medical model of disability, and often include the notion of curing, treating, preventing, or combating autism in their mission statement, or otherwise looking for “answers” to solve the “puzzle” of autism. Funding may also go towards funding conferences that feature autistic speakers and researchers that support autism advocacy.Īutism charities, on the other hand, are more geared towards families of autistic people, such as parents and relatives of autistic people. Most of the funding for autism advocacy organizations are geared towards services that benefit autistic people, such as for communication, education, housing, healthcare, and for advocacy itself. They do not present autism as something that is wrong or undesirable, but as something that should be understood and socially accepted. They use preferred symbols and language of the autistic community, such as identity first language (“autistic” rather than “has autism”) and using the rainbow infinity loop as the symbol for neurodiversity rather than a puzzle piece, which has a bad and ableist history. Autistic advocacy organizations are centered on the social model of disability that supports the notion that autistic people are more disabled by physical and cultural barriers than they are by their disability or neurodiversity, rather than the medical model of disability, which asserts that autism and related conditions are undesirable and should be treated or cured. From the very beginning, autistic advocacy organizations are made for autistic people, by autistic people, and their missions are focused on improving rights and opportunities for autistic people. What is the difference between autistic advocacy organizations and bad autism charity organizations? True autistic advocacy organizations involve autistic people, and are created by autistic people themselves. Some organizations appear to be autistic advocacy organizations, when they are in reality harmful to autistic people. There are a lot of autism organizations out there, and it can sometimes be difficult to tell which ones are worth supporting, and which are worth boycotting. Unfortunately, the bad autism organizations significantly outnumber the good autism advocacy organizations. Image description: Examples of good autism advocacy organizations at the top, such as the Autistic Self Advocacy Network, Autistic Inclusive Meets, the Autistic Women and Nonbinary Network, and Autistics for Autistics, compared to examples of bad autism “charity” organizations, such as Autism Speaks, TACA, Autism One, the Autism Society, the National Autistic Society, and Generation Rescue.
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