Muhsin Abdul-Hakim '24
Autistic people have always been misunderstood and mistreated by people and it has not really been covered by the media at all. Stories like the one I’ll highlight in this story are just stories I have found. There are many other stories like this that may not be known about or covered by the news. The discrimination goes from simple things, such as being ignored, to major things which could lead to the harm of autistic people.
One case regarding this mistreatment occurred around a month and a half ago when a mother of an autistic child pressed charges on a center for autistic children in Warren, Rhode Island. Her child was left in a bathroom for hours at a time and was only allowed to leave after using the restroom. This process would continue for 8 hours a day, which was the entire time the child was at the center. The center denied the allegations even though there were several outside witnesses and employees confirming that this was true. The case is still ongoing, and for that reason, I won’t harp on that story.
For something that has already been wrapped up, I’ll go to the electric shocking of autistic children. In an educational center for children with mental conditions in Massachusetts, there were several children being treated using shock therapy with some even dying because of it. This method is looked down upon by every autistic center besides this one, but it is not illegal to practice. Even though there is proof that this method is extremely harmful, courts in Mass recently overturned a ban that was created by the FDA. Naturally, the autistic community was extremely horrified by the news, and rightfully so. Because of the overturned ban, the sometimes lethal practice of electric shock therapy continues to harm children.
There is yet another story that happened only last month. An autistic man in England was finally let out of a mental hospital after spending almost half of his life there. He was sent there due to concerns about his health, but when he was in the hospital his condition did not improve. He was stuck there for 15 years and eventually developed unhealthy coping mechanisms such as repeating phrases several times. He was not diagnosed with autism until 28 years old, as he was previously misdiagnosed with schizophrenia. According to the BBC, his case is not unique. The number of autistic people detained in mental hospitals has grown to 1,205.
Now, let’s go to a place back in the U.S: Dayton, Ohio. A nine-year-old child was having a meltdown and meltdowns can descend into chaos very quickly. There are several ways to handle this situation well, such as being calm and empathetic and just reassuring the child that they are okay. However, the teachers did not handle the meltdown well and instead resorted to restraining the child like he was an adult. The mother was not notified of the occurrence until after the meltdown occurred. When the mother reported previous incidents, no one in the school listened, which caused her to eventually report it to the news. An investigation followed and it was determined that there was indeed wrongdoing by the school.
These were all the accounts that I could find in my research, however, there are certainly other children and adults who are being abused and discriminated against. I can tell this is the case due to personal experience. Autistic people can be subject to bullying which can lead to severe mental trauma and questioning of themselves. To sum it up, autistic people have been mistreated and discriminated against for years and it is likely that even more cases like the ones I shared are probably happening as I write this article. I wanted to bring cases like this to light in order to possibly educate about what is happening in the world and I hope this article is good at doing that.
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