Autism

World Autism Day[edit]

Main article: World Autism Awareness Day

Minnesota governor Mark Dayton declared the World Autism Awareness Day on 2 April 2013

World Autism Awareness Day, sometimes referred to as World Autism Day, is marked yearly on 2 April. It was designated by the United Nations General Assembly at the end of 2007.[144] On 2 April 2009, activists left 150 strollers near Central Park in New York City to raise awareness that one in 150 children is estimated to be autistic.[145] Nowadays, there are many celebrations and activities all over the world on 2 April for World Autism Awareness Day. Autistic people have campaigned to rename it Autism Acceptance Day because of a misconception that the day is affiliated with Autism Speaks.[146]

Autism Sunday[edit]

Main article: Autism Sunday

Autism Sunday is a global Christian event, observed on the second Sunday of February. It is supported by church leaders and organisations around the world. The event started as a small idea in the front room of British autism campaigners, Ivan and Charika Corea. It is now a huge event celebrated in many countries. Autism Sunday was launched in London in 2002 with a historic service at St. Paul's Cathedral.[147]

Autism Awareness Year[edit]

The year 2002 was declared Autism Awareness Year in the United Kingdom—this idea was initiated by Ivan and Charika Corea, parents of an autistic child, Charin.[148] Autism Awareness Year was led by the British Institute of Brain Injured Children, Disabilities Trust, The Shirley Foundation, National Autistic Society, Autism London and 800 organizations in the United Kingdom. It had the personal backing of British Prime Minister Tony Blair.[149] This was the first ever occasion of partnership working on autism on such a huge scale. 2002 Autism Awareness Year helped raise awareness of the serious issues concerning autism and Asperger's Syndrome across the United Kingdom.[150] A major conference, Autism 2002 was held at the King's Fund in London with debates in the House of Commons and the House of Lords in Westminster. Autism awareness ribbons were worn to mark the year.[151]

British autism advocates want autistic people acknowledged as a minority rather than as disabled, because they say that "disability discrimination laws don't protect those who are not disabled but who 'still have something that makes them look or act differently from other people.'"[75] But the autism community is split over this issue, and some view this notion as radical.[75]

Autistic Pride Day[edit]

Main article: Autistic Pride Day

Autistic Pride Day is an Aspies For Freedom initiative celebrated on 18 June each year. It is a day for celebrating the neurodiversity of people with autism. Inspired by LGBT+ communities, Autistic Pride often compares their efforts to the civil rights and LGBT social movements.[75][152][153]

Autistics Speaking Day[edit]

Autistics Speaking Day is a yearly event designated on 1 November, a self-advocacy campaign run by people with autism to raise awareness and challenge negative stereotypes about autism by speaking for themselves and sharing their stories. The first Autistics Speaking Day was held in 2010.[154] According to Corina Becker, one of the early founders, the day is to "acknowledge our difficulties while sharing our strengths, passions, and interests."[155] The idea for the event developed out of opposition to a Communication Shutdown fundraising campaign led by United States charity Autism Speaks. Participants had been asked to "simulate having autism" by straying from all forms of online communication for one day. The event received criticism and accused Autism Speaks of missing the point of what autism actually is, referring to autistic individuals' comfort using other means of communication.[156][157]

Autism Acceptance Project[edit]

In 2006 the Autism Acceptance Project (TAAProject) was founded by Estée Klar, the mother of an autistic child, with help from an autistic advisory board.[158] The project was dedicated to promoting acceptance and accommodations for autistic people in society and was primarily supported by autistic people. The website for TAAProject disappeared a decade later, but the idea of promoting acceptance has now been adopted with other campaigns such as Autism Acceptance Month.[158]

Autism Acceptance Day[edit]

In 2011, the first Autism Acceptance Day celebrations were organized by Paula Durbin Westby, as a response to traditional "Autism Awareness" campaigns which the Autistic community found harmful and insufficient.[159][160] Autism Acceptance Day is now held every April.[159] "Awareness" focuses on informing others of the existence of autism while "acceptance" pushes towards validating and honoring the autism community. By providing tools and educational material, people are encouraged to embrace the challenges autistic people face and celebrate their strengths. Rather than making autism into a crippling disability, acceptance integrates those on the autistic spectrum into everyday society. Instead of encouraging people to wear blue as Autism Awareness Day does, Autism Acceptance Day encourages people to wear red.[161]

Autreat[edit]

At Autreat—an annual autistic gathering—participants compared their movement to gay rights activists, or the Deaf culture, where sign language is preferred over surgery that might restore hearing.[14] Other local organizations have also arisen: for example, a European counterpart, Autscape, was created around 2005.[77]

Scholarship[edit]

ASDs received increasing attention from social-science scholars in the early 2000s, with the goals of improving support services and therapies, arguing that autism should be tolerated as a difference not a disorder, and by how autism affects the definition of personhood and identity.[162] Sociological research has also investigated how social institutions, particularly families, cope with the challenges associated with autism.[163]

A study published on 20 January 2021, by the University of Texas at Dallas suggests that educating non-autistic people about the strengths and challenges of autistic people can help reduce stigma and misconceptions surrounding autism, which may help increase social inclusion of autistic people.[164] The study also found that implicit biases about autism were harder to overcome for non-autistic people.[164]

Media portrayals[edit]

See also: Autism spectrum disorders in the media

Much of the public perception of autism is based on its portrayals in biographies, movies, novels, and TV series. Many of these portrayals have been inaccurate, and have contributed to a divergence between public perception and the clinical reality of autism.[165] For example, in the 2005 movie Mozart and the Whale, the opening scene gives four clues that a leading character has Asperger syndrome, and two of these clues are extraordinary savant skills. The savant skills are not needed in the film, but in movies savant skills have become a stereotype for the autism spectrum, because of the incorrect assumption that most autistic people are savants.[166]

Some works from the 1970s have autistic characters,[which?] who are rarely labeled.[167] In contrast, in the 2013 BBC2 television miniseries The Politician's Husband, the impact of Noah Hoynes' Asperger syndrome on the boy's behavior and on his family, and steps Noah's loved ones take to accommodate and address it, are prominent plot points in all three episodes.

Popular media have depicted special talents of some children with autism, including exceptional abilities as seen in the 1988 movie Rain Man.[168]

Since the 1970s, fictional portrayals of people with autism, Asperger syndrome, and other ASCs have become more frequent.[167] Public perception of autism is often based on these fictional portrayals in novels, biographies, movies, and TV series. These depictions of autism in media today are often made in a way that brings pity to the public and their concern of the topic, because their viewpoint is never actually shown, leaving the public without knowledge of autism and its diagnosis.[169][166] Portrayals in the media of characters with atypical abilities (for example, the ability to multiply large numbers without a calculator) may be misinterpreted by viewers as accurate portrayals of all autistic people and of autism itself.[170] Additionally, the media frequently depicts autism as only affecting children, which promotes the misconception that autism does not affect adults.[171]

Notable individuals[edit]

See also: Retrospective diagnosis § Retrospective diagnoses of autism

Some notable figures such as Temple Grandin, a food animal handling systems designer and author,[172] and Tim Page, a Pulitzer Prize-winning critic and author[173][174] are autistic.

Notable individuals known to have Asperger syndrome include Craig Nicholls,[175] lead singer, songwriter, guitarist and only constant member of the Australian rock band The Vines, who was diagnosed in 2004,[176] and actor Paddy Considine.[177][178]

Swedish environmentalistGreta Thunberg, who in August 2018 started the "School strike for climate" movement, has explained how the "gift" of living with Asperger syndrome helps her "see things from outside the box" when it comes toclimate change.[179]In an interview with presenterNick Robinsonon BBC Radio 4'sToday, the 16-year-old activist said that autism helps her see things in "black and white". She went on to say:[180]

It makes me different, and being different is a gift, I would say. It also makes me see things from outside the box. I don't easily fall for lies; I can see through things. I don't think I would be interested in the climate at all, if I had been like everyone else. Many people say that it doesn't matter, you can cheat sometimes. But I can't do that. You can't be a little bit sustainable. Either you're sustainable, or not sustainable. For way too long the politicians and people in power have got away with not doing anything at all to fight the climate crisis and ecological crisis, but we will make sure that they will not get away with it any longer.

Additionally, media speculation of contemporary figures as being on the autism spectrum has become popular in recent times. New York magazine reported some examples, which included that Time magazine suggested that Bill Gates is autistic, and that a biographer of Warren Buffett wrote that his prodigious memory and "fascination with numbers" give him "a vaguely autistic aura". The magazine also reported that on Celebrity Rehab, Dr. Drew Pinsky, deemed basketball player Dennis Rodman a candidate for an Asperger's diagnosis, and the UCLA specialist consulted "seemed to concur". Nora Ephron criticized these conclusions, writing that popular speculative diagnoses suggest autism is "an epidemic, or else a wildly over-diagnosed thing that there used to be other words for."[181] The practice of diagnosing autism in these cases is controversial.[182][183]