I guess I'm expected to post some kind of response to the Newtown shootings. About how some people say the shooter had autism. About how autistic people aren't any more likely to be violent. About how autism doesn't skew your sense of morality, or cause you not to care about others. I've had a lot of trouble putting my thoughts together, though ( Read more... )

I've been realizing lately that I've been more than a little coddled being part of the online disability community--and, for that matter, the online community in general. Here, we haven't got a problem accepting people who are weird, funny-looking, slower or less coordinated, who need more help than others, or who are just plain different--or else ( Read more... )

I was interviewed for an Internet radio program a few weeks ago; the interview was pretty general, just talking about autism and related topics.

Special Guest Lisa Daxer: Student, Writer, and Person with AutismThe woman doing the program actually gave me the questions ahead of time--that was great, so I wrote stuff up ahead of time and didn't have ( Read more... )

Yesterday at the library I was goofing off instead of doing physics homework, and happened upon the latest issue of Psychology Today. Lo and behold, an article on autism. It's a cute little story about an autistic kid who loves animals; and for a change said kid is in the majority who has got the hang of language. That's a good sign, in general, ( Read more... )

A strategy that some people want to take when they try to increase acceptance is to emphasize the similarities between a minority individual and the "norm"; to try to explain to people that, "He's a lot like you. There's no need to reject him for being different because he's not really that different." It works pretty well with racial minorities, ( Read more... )

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Lindt USA
Lindt & Sprüngli (USA) Inc.
One Fine Chocolate Place Stratham, NH 03885

Dear Sirs:

Over the years I have greatly enjoyed your products.

However, I recently heard about your plan to raise money for Autism Speaks from the sales of your Gold Bunny; and I believe it important to state my feelings on this issue.

I am glad ( Read more... )

A while ago I decided, "Well, Jenny McCarthy's book may be horrible; but  I really don't have the right to say that if I haven't read it ( Read more... )

For those of you who don't know, Redbook is a magazine aimed at women in their twenties and thirties. Most of the articles have to do with the typical women's-magazine things--weight loss, sex, fashion, boyfriends, husbands, and occasionally "serious topics" like breast cancer or sexual harassment. This is the group of women who are at exactly the ( Read more... )

My mom wants me to be a skinny writer with a husband and three kids. I'm a single asexual fat girl who's gonna be an engineer if I can just convince people that my three-year string of F's does not, in fact, outweigh the straight A's before and after it... (Depression's a bitch. Especially when you're in denial ( Read more... )