The Standard Review

What They Don't Say About Us

The most important thing I've learned from newspapers, television, and the Internet is that only a few people are being discussed. Most are thereby defined by this discussion as insignificant. Of course, the standard for a persons significance is constantly changing because the people which have the distinction of being important need to maintain the illusion by exclusive means.

In the discussion regarding diagnosis such as autism, I believe that nothing is more important than finding more ways to include the voices of people who have been disenfranchised. As I see the leadership in the United States has recently voted to launch more powerful weapons in the war against the poor, I'm reminded that nothing defines the economic poverty more than disenfranchisement, and a behavioral diagnosis is similar to a box that allows others to place you on a shelf where you can be more easily criticized and ignored.

The most critical problem I see with this exclusion is that when people begin to advocate against it, they tend to set up a similar standard. This becomes even worse when the methods of exclusion are copied from those who are described as opponents of their goal. Political agendas often become more important than the people the agenda's leaders claim they are aiming to help.

So much of our culture influences the belief that success is always earned.The way this is taught tends not to include the details of how our standards of success are based on commercial branding.Too often the belief leads to the humiliation and distrust of people who fall below the standard. Most are even ignored altogether as a result. Unfortunately, the standard is rarely explored and criticized, and therefore, many myths are maintained and used as weapons.

This makes learning how to encourage each other very difficult. We tend to imagine a commercial price tag on every human attribute and expression and rank each other accordingly. Many expressions which could be accepted and even celebrated as eccentricities are instead judged as substandard. This encourages recovery and overcoming of too many aspects of the human experience. It even happens to such a degree that it can lead to us forgetting how to enjoy life and appreciate each other.

Our guidebook of standards is like a product catalog that ranks our worth similarly to the way price tags are used. We then can't appreciate each other appropriately and because the value is seen in such a narrow context, our communication is very limited. Therefore, since we tend not to trust what we don't understand, we become unnecessarily defensive rather than empathetic and compassionate.

The cultural divide many of us experience is very real. It's important to recognize how these divisions occur so that realistic solutions can be found. To avoid acknowledging this often encourages simply another political agenda that widens the gap even further and excludes those who are in the biggest need of inclusion. The problem with identity politics isn't identity, it's the politics.

Human communication always includes labeling and ranking. Although the writers of the DSM and the industry that supports them cannot be trusted to do what is in the best interest of the people who are diagnosed based on their suggestion, I can't think of any system of labeling and ranking, which deserves unreserved and unregulated loyalty and trust. We can, however, use any label far beyond the intentions of those who have formed standards, which create harm.

Too often, people who are caught by the predominant labeling and ranking systems get ranked as insignificant and are therefore ignored by people with an anti-labeling political agenda. This is very unfortunate as well as unnecessary. Advocates can instead use what others meant for harm (or what became harm due to negligence) to empower an otherwise disenfranchised (and unrepresented) group.

Being involved in a society that is so driven by consumerism and bombarded with commercial images has a way of teaching us as individuals that we are also products. What is implied indirectly is that our cultural standard for significance defines most people as less valuable than the food and water we consume. If we as a culture don't begin to recognize the standard and the subtle ways it's taught, we can't begin to combat it.

Viewing things in a different way shouldn't lead to being excluded from discussions. In order to have a more inclusive society, we need to encourage more people to express themselves in diverse ways and thoughtfully consider a broader set of options. In this way, we can begin to introduce new ideas and show less interest in standards, which are designed to empower only an elite few. What these few would like to hide about the rest of us is important to understand, and we are important to everyone's future.

Activists Compromising Everything

 

Every time activists in the U.S. have sought to reform the mental health/developmental disabilities/ mental retardation/etc. system, their efforts (which always became compromises) ultimately strengthened the system and made it more difficult to stop.

Dorothea Dix came along when a change was obviously needed and set a president for how reform was to take place. Mainly, this reformation put the determination of rights for those mainly affected by the system in the hands of political opportunists.

 The response to the public recognition of the abuses in places like Willowbrook included the creation the Protection and Advocacy agency which protected the system from being independently investigated.

In the same way, that sterilization was originally sold as a right, forceable institutionalization law are sold as the way to ensure that those who were in the most need of care could be assured adequate support.

Today it's obvious to those who are treated the worst by this system that it was never designed for their benefit but is instead an unfair weapon in the class war for allowing the judicial system to incarcerate misfits and promote the careers of politicians.

There is no mystery in why such low standards are used to evaluate science regarding autism or why the pharmaceutical companies have  started a new propaganda campaign to promote their new products due to the ritalin campaign getting old.

Of course the behaviorists are getting away with more abuse than ever (including murder) and the solution is described as impossible due to the severity of the behavior problems. The abuse is being exposed mainly by those who are advocating more formal integration of standard behaviorism in schools by using laws that claim that children will be safer.

A class war is determined by hierarchy. The people at the bottom of the ladder know very well how the system works and are listened to the least. If you don't yet see that compromise is not an option it's mainly because you aren't at the bottom yet. However, if you review the history of the system and analyze how quickly the system is expanding to include you, you'll understand that either you or someone very close to you soon will be.

Dunking Autistics

 
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Though the ideas from early American Putirtan culture are hundreds of years old, some of that type of thinking can be found in today's culture as well with regard to how disability is viewed and more specifically how autistics are treated.

The authority during the Salem witch trials was practically in a state of paranoid frenzy due to the fear of having their authority challenged. They were not only concerned with punishing the accused but wanted no trace of them if the accusation proved false. This would prevent the potential for them being charged with falsely arresting people or with abusing their authority.

 It says here:

"Dunking is a form of torture and punishment that was applied to scolds and supposed witches.

In a trial by ordeal, supposed witches were immersed into a vat of water or pond, and taken out after some time, thus and given the opportunity to confess. This process was usually repeated until the victim drowned or gave up and confessed, leading to them being executed in another way, usually hanging or, more rarely, burning. Also, if they had their hands/feet tied, they would be left under water. If they floated they were guilty of witchcraft, if they sank they were innocent but would have usually drowned anyway."

 
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After the notorious Salem witch trials:

"Reversals of attainder and compensation to the survivors and their families

Title page of A Modest Enquiry Into the Nature of Witchcraft by John Hale (Boston, 1702)The first hint that public call for justice was not over happened in 1695, when Thomas Maule, a noted Quaker, publicly criticized the handling of the trials by the Puritan leaders in Chapter 29 of his book Truth Held Forth and Maintained, expanding on Increase Mather by stating, "it were better that one hundred Witches should live, than that one person be put to death for a witch, which is not a Witch".[67] For publishing this book, Maule was imprisoned twelve months before he was tried and found not guilty."

 

Although, today's courts are often described as favoring the presumption of innocence, factors such as economic status, race, and the presumption of ability and competency heavily influence the outcome of a court trial (being viewed as less competent encourages a guilty verdict). Even social skills and how likeable someone is cannot be ruled out as being influential.

With the overwhelming influence of modern technology and the opportunities that present for networking, communication on the Internet largely impacts cultural views as well as how people vote on public policy. Furthermore, the fear encouraged by eugenist in the past century has greatly influenced our cultural bias against disability. This bias is even more pronounced with a disability relating to competency and mental stability. All this combined with the fear-mongering recently from autism advocacy groups such as Autism Speaks, causes autistics to receive a lot of negative attention.

Similar to the ways supposed witches were presumed guilty of crimes and sentenced without an opportunity to defend themselves, autistics who assert themselves on the internet regarding public policy which affects them are often treated with no respect and little if any opportunity to express themselves.

With that in mind I've written some ideas/questions regarding cultural views about disability and more specifically how this influences the experience of autistics that advocate their rights on the Internet. Here are the questions:

 

 

How often has the person living with someone who has a disability ( a parent, caretaker, etc.) had more opportunities to voice their view about the disability than the person most directly affected?

How often have non-disabled people been justified in harming a disabled person due to the public's empathy of what is seen as the able person's burden? How often is this done in relation to the frequency of the disabled person having the way they were being abused, understood and validated?

How often are the expressions of frustration from the abused disabled person accepted in a public discussion? How often is it ignored? In contrast how often does the person living with someone with a disability (parent, caretaker, etc.) express frustration for their perceived burden and have that be accepted and validated? What crimes against the disabled has this acceptance led to?

Based on what is known about something, in particular, that can be called autism (that which can be cured/removed/fixed), how often are people with conditions with a similar amount of information known about that solution (or the lack thereof) asked if they want that condition cured?

How often does a discussion that involves issues that are most relevant to a particular group of people include having them provided the least opportunity to express their views and have that view be respected? How much more often does that happen when this is related to a disability?  What about with a developmental disability? How about in relation to autism?

How much is understood about the lives of adult autistics when they were children? How much effort goes into learning about that and how much is simply presumed? How do convenient presumptions affect communication? What does making convenient presumptions reflect  about the person making them when someone they live with has a communication disorder? How much better could they (the person with the disorder) communicate with the people in their lives if those people weren't making convenient presumptions?

What role does shame play in someone's emotional development? What about academic development? How much is being done to ensure that autistics will not need to be ashamed in the future no matter how competent they are perceived? What are children learning about the importance of competency and will they feel proud when they arrive at the standard cultural expectations (or the ones of their family) or will they always be ashamed of what they haven't achieved and try to degrade others in order to achieve that sense of pride? Who is ultimately served by this striving to achieve?

What do the money and time spent on the gambling everything on the fix or cure in relation to what is spent on encouraging self-esteem and empowerment reflect about the value others place on these people? What does the money and time spent on the gamble to fix them in relation to what's spent on education and vocational training reflect? What about nationally? globally? community efforts? individual households?

Note: Nothing encourages injustice more than the false claim that justice is being served.

Intelligence Required

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People receiving accommodation and accessibility pursuant to policy changes regarding disability does not negate that the intention of the original policy design was meant to provide a convenience for what gets described as the "general public" more so than for aid to those who receive the label. This is especially true for disabilities that refer to intellect and behavior.

The increase in the number of people labeled is in direct proportion to an increasingly exclusive and bigoted society as well as an increase in population. It doesn't seem productive to me to protest the labeling except for the purpose of opposing the harmful treatment. Usually though, such objections are more geared toward the ideal of encouraging people to overcome weakness.  Unfortunately, the language associated with overcoming is often used more to promote the derogatory stereotypes than it is anyone's empowerment.

There is not much of a dividing line in regard to cultural understanding between intellectual deficit and mental instability. The judicial system has greatly influenced these beliefs. The majority of people are hurt by these assertions and are either institutionalized or completely ignored and denied any type of aid as a result.

Since the broader awareness and understanding of deficits are not creating better accommodation and accessibility for the majority of people(and often the bigotry encouraged from broader awareness causes the opposite response) the goal of  promoting the more positive cultural perspectives is essential to inclusion and acceptance. It's irresponsible to attempt policy changes without the preservation of dignity for the person labeled with the deficit being the top priority.

The current cultural understanding of behavior in the U.S. as it relates to intellect, mental stability, and character was greatly influenced by the Eugenics movement and more specifically by the efforts of the American psychologist Henry H. Goddard.

 
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 "Henry Herbert Goddard (August 14, 1866 – June 18, 1957) was a prominent American psychologist and eugenicist in the early 20th century. He is known especially for his 1912 work The Kallikak Family: A Study in the Heredity of Feeble-Mindedness, which he himself came to regard as deeply flawed, and for being the first to translate the Binet intelligence test into English in 1908 and distributing an estimated 22,000 copies of the translated test across the United States; he also introduced the term "moron" into the field.

He was the leading advocate for the use of intelligence testing in societal institutions including hospitals, schools, the legal system and the military. He played a major role in the emerging field of clinical psychology, in 1911 helped to write the first U.S. law requiring that blind, deaf and mentally retarded children be provided special education within public school systems, and in 1914 became the first American psychologist to testify in court that subnormal intelligence should limit the criminal responsibility of defendants."

 

However later,

 

"By the late 1920s, Goddard had reversed many of his early opinions, declaring in multiple public forums that he had been gravely mistaken in many of his most famous conclusions (Zenderland, 1998, pp. 324-326). He had begun to question the validity of the tests that were used to detect morons, and he stated emphatically that his former belief that morons could not be educated satisfactorily was wrong. In addition, he frequently voiced his new opinion that feeble-minded people should be allowed to have children, if they choose to do so. He asserted in a 1927 article for Scientific Monthly that the concept of segregation colonies had been a bad idea (Zenderland, 1998, pp. 324-326).

However, Die Familie Kallikak was printed in Germany in 1914 and reprinted in 1933 shortly after the Nazis came to power. Goddard never intended for his book to be connected with Hitler, Nazism, and the Holocaust. In 1938 and 1939, he tried unsuccessfully to use his influence to help the daughter of a Jewish colleague escape from Austria (Zenderland, 1998, pp. 333-335). Subsequently, a psychology text by Columbia University psychologist Henry Garrett (1961) provided a brief, and rather embellished, overview of the Kallikak study to bolster his eugenicist arguments. Although these interpretations stood at odds with Goddard's opinions later in his life, these and related events have helped to paint the rather negative picture many people still hold of Goddard and his work."

I think it's very important to understand that the most prevalent views regarding these issues are anything but liberating.

Bigoted views result from people's dependence on convenience, their unwillingness to explore the history of language, and the constant submission to shame-based behavior, which encourages us to seek ways of belittling rather than empowering each and rather than staying focused on doing our individual best.

There are people who are so removed from the majority of people and have therefore become completely indifferent to common struggle that they intend to relieve hardship (their own hardship, but it's conveniently described as ours) by eliminating part of the population. Too often people continue to echo the language which was designed by them as well as encourage their agenda without paying much attention to how the attitude continues with a snow-ball effect.

The way we use language regarding intelligence and mental stability is very important and oppression would never survive if the people behind oppressive agendas were unable to depend on the ways we encourage language subtly that support their efforts. If we were more careful to watch the way we contribute to our own demise, their efforts would not be nearly so successful.

MacNeil and the Unawareness of Autism in 20011

 

During Autism Awareness month of April 2011, Robert MacNeil promoted his perspective of autism on television. I'm sure Mr. MacNeil's views on autism will be popular and well received but unfortunately there will be little if any nuance added to this mainstream view that traditionally prevents the educational and vocational opportunities for autistics and promotes the fear campaigns that encourage the worst stereotypes.

In the same way that the views of groups like Autism Speaks and the funding campaign efforts of the Jerry Lewis marathon are exploitive and disabling, the oppressive nature of the psychiatric industry and other medical abuses will go practically unchallenged due to the influence of commercial advertising. Anyone presenting rational alternatives and attempting to discuss practical ideas in a non-threatening environment will be either attacked or co-opted so that the issues which are important remain polarized.

Politics, political agendas, and bullies (and the politics and political agendas of bullies) consistently discourage rational views from being expressed on the internet whenever issues that concern disability are discussed.

This is a tradition that has always provided an ample opportunity for greedy politicians and corporate executives with an insatiable apatite for power to determine the policy that affects people with disabilities and encourages exclusion and negative stereo types.

My impression of online discussions is that we as a society are losing our ability to trust our neighbor, and we often tend to objectify and stereotype each person we meet. This begins by polarizing every discussion and seeing alternative viewpoints (however slight) as a threat to our self-esteem. It's difficult to know what we really believe because our thinking is so attached to the image we display and who we are that an objective view of our expressions is impossible.

Of course there will always be a mainstream view of what autism is ( MacNeil is just one celebrity who will present this narrow view) and due to unregulated commercial advertising and the impact it has on the views of people who want to "make a difference", nuances that are more accepting of diversity will be practically absent from the discussions where that view is presented. However, commercialism and mainstream politics is not what determines the truth. If we truly are interested in becoming a more accepting culture that is promoting diversity, we will find more ways to encourage the voices of individuals without regarding their category or status to determine the value of their expressions, and we will find value in what we hear them say.

Important People

 

In order to create and/or maintain a closed society the people in command must control the information AND the entertainment. The messages that get regularly reinforced will teach people to believe that there are limited resources which more important than many of the people who use them. In other words, that some people are worth more dead than alive.

One group need to believe that they are entitled and therefore become active in their community and in politics so that what they see as their rights will be preserved.  The other group needs to be shamed into believing they are unworthy and taught shame-based behavior. This confirms the beliefs of the first group and keeps the second fighting among each other rather than uniting and working for change.

If exclusion was just the result of flaws in the system, the plans for change would be practical and possible and more of them would be implemented. Until more people who aren't being favored are allowed to make unique contributions to society  so that they believe they are worthy of inclusion and the rewards that follow, they won't honor and respect any of their so-called provisions. Even worse, they won't feel that way about themselves or anyone else.

The People's Choice

 

Of course bussiness as usual in the U.S. must be disrupted because it's corrupted and the stagnation that has resulted is stinking.

The folks at Pennsylvania Ave. don't need to hear more from U.S. citizens or from more of U.S. citizens in order for needed change to happen. We can't make them care. Our society is trapped by some kind of pathological belief that we can and should change politicians, and that is accompanied by a co-dependent slave mentality that makes us fear challenging the status quo.

This combination glorifies bullies and gang wars, which are politely described in terms of identity politics. It encourages everyone to micro manage each other based on standards dictated to us by corporations (mainly the psychiatric industry which coordinates efforts with our judicial system) and be disgusted by the diversity we're taught is a weakness while apathetically awaiting a miraculous savior to grace the oval office.

The method of operation in our current government is such that the corporations in command of our political system have a responsibility to their stock holders to  oppose caring when it interferes with profits.

The people who care are the people who can change things, and they don't have those financial and political limitations. They are the ones that need to hear our voice and the disenfranchised need to be empowered with something as old-fashioned and trite as kindness at every opportunity. That kind of change doesn't come from Washington.

If you don't see how you've been held hostage, pimped out, or otherwise exploited by the Democratic party based on Republicans being worse then you are either part of the problem, or you aren't paying close attention.

Change happens in the minds and hearts of people. When people are empowered to think they change what they believe, how they feel, and ultimately how they act. When enough of that happens the government will have no choice  but listen but until then they have nothing to listen to.

Autism and Imagination Deficits

 

When evaluating how well people are able to perform, behave, or learn it would be practical to include an evaluation of the teachers and those who are available to provide an example. These factors are typically not included in the evaluation as much as they need to be and the cycle of burdening those who are most convenient continues to harm everyone's future.

For several decades a community established by and for persons with disabilities has attempted to raise awareness that disability is natural. The alternative view has been the standard and continues to stifle the growth of our communities as well as the broader society.

It would be helpful if labels that describe deficits or a stage of someone's learning was used to provide more support and accommodation. Unfortunately, however, instead the growing industry of psychology(which encourages the psychiatric industry and adds to their corporate earnings) does more to isolate, disenfranchise, and prevent opportunities for the people who are labeled.

This article " Social skills in autism 'improved when patients choose own activities" indicates that research shows the child with autism benefits from choosing their own recreational activities. As simple and obvious as this sounds, the fact that it is even researched and reported is a reminder of how the public is unaware of the dehumanization mainstream commercial autism campaigns are encouraging.

Psychology is a product of the glorification of societies scholastic achievement process and is used to rank people accordingly so that the people who are already powerful pursuant to the advantages this system has provided can be portrayed to the public as having earned this elevated status.

People are not ranked as having a disability, deficit, or less than the standard rate of learning so that society can be altered to provide them with more opportunities. Instead the ranking (whether expressed as pity for their inferiority, disgust for their character flaws, or it's used to blame someone or something for making people appear less valuable or more by the contrast) of people by psychologist and school officials is a method of exclusion.

 
 

Much of the inappropriate behavioral treatment for autistics is not understood as being that due to false impressions pursuant to fear campaigns that justify teacher abuse and advocate their less severe forms of punishment and restraint rather than to abolish them.

This accompanies claims that most treatment deemed inappropriate is excessive rather than unnecessary. This prevents people from looking very closely at the core issues which need radical alteration and encourage them to make the unnecessary political compromises as though that's their only choice.

As a society, we seem to overlook the futility and often destructive results from our constant commercial based ranking of everything  and every person as well as every aspect of them.

The majority of people compete for a small fraction of the world's resources based on claims that we are either more deserving of privilege or accommodation due to our superiority or the severity of our need while allowing a greater percentage of resources to be hoarded and wasted by an elite few who then use their advantage to exploit us.

Insults, bullying, and most of the unnecessary fighting that results from our futile system of ranking is not due to any one being superior or even believing themselves to be. It is instead due to the fear of our own inability and weakness that we have been fooled into believing we can hide from.

We're taught to avoid the competition that causes us shame by making someone else look worse so we don't have to risk the defeat which is possible with attempting to become better. This is similar to accusing others of something that appears worse than what we've done in order to avoid appearing guilty. This is completely unimaginative as well as counterproductive.

Weakness and vulnerability in others are not what stagnates human progress. It is also not the weakness and vulnerability in ourselves. It is instead the needless fear and shame we associate with having to face our weakness and the risks involved with trying to do better.

Of course autistics do better when provided with choices and opportunities. Everyone does.

Others may claim they choose someone's (child, student, disabled, elderly, etc.) activities because that someone needs it and isn't wise enough to make their own choices, but it's often just more convenient to do so. Being given an opportunity to make choices lead to better understanding, more confidence, empowerment, and ultimately better choices.

Furthermore, when people use clinical evaluations to describe a behavior without considering how the language is insulting it alters the direction of future research as well as shape public opinion, and the group being researched is less empowered as a result. No one is helped by that.

The claims that autistics are less imaginative have been associated with similar claims that we lack a theory of mind and even empathy. Rather than seeing how different sensory experience might make people even more sensitive (although expressed differently) to the emotions of others, society's commitment to ranking has instead encouraged negative stereotypes. This has led to unnecessary blame in relationships and even unjust suspicion of violence when statistics don't support the claims.

The survival of our species is dependent on the acceptance of diversity, which includes weaknesses in others as well as ourselves. People are weaker or stronger, younger or older, and have a variety of different symptoms and deficits that range in severity. We as humans are perfectly capable of making decisions as to how we can accommodate and empower each other (and protect ourselves if necessary) by evaluating any given situation with any number of diverse human expressions that are present at any given time. Too often our judgement is impaired by attempting to apply a fatally flawed system of ranking to a situation rather than accepting what intuition would otherwise make clear.

When we choose to face our weakness, we are better able to appreciate all the good and bad that life has to offer and by accepting life on life's terms, we can enjoy living, laughing, and loving a lot more. Fear and doubt are what inhibit an imagination and circumstances are not what decide those things. We can all do better by making better choices.

Smart Enough to Avoid Punishment

 

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In an ideal society, a label that indicated an intelligence deficit would be beneficial. It could be used to provide either accommodations or more realistic and focused expectations. However, the way these labels have been used by the compulsory school system in the United States has taught us to relate this to a value system that can be quite harmful.
 

 The method used for making this judgment is severely limited in both accuracy and practicality. The American justice system depends on such arbitrary evaluations to provide more latitude within law enforcement, which leads to agents having more unlimited control. If this system's leadership were challenged more so that they were required to explain the reasoning behind punishments for the population labeled (either by formal diagnosis or socially acceptable insult) as stupid, crazy, and immoral/lacking in character development, this would ultimately encourage everyone to take more responsibility. It's difficult for people to understand a responsibility and the benefits for accepting it when their leaders aren't willing to.

Thinking skills typically have much less to do with brainpower and formal training than the advertising for academia would lead people to believe. The tests to evaluate aptitude and academic progress provides advantages for a small number of people. The rest is shown  to instead be inferior and taught to be compliant.

The problems faced by business owners during the industrial revolution were met by them claiming that unnatural and inappropriate breeding was a threat to necessary progress and the future of the human race. These claims were used to justify their scientific proposals for population control, which continues to play a dominant role in politics and the judicial system.

Francis Galton called the science eugenics.

"Galton invented the term eugenics in 1883 and set down many of his observations and conclusions in a book, Inquiries into human faculty and its development.[13] He believed that a scheme of 'marks' for family merit should be defined, and early marriage between families of high rank be encouraged by provision of monetary incentives."

Here is some of what has been said by respected people who have influenced the public perceptions of this supposed problem.

This is one example:

“It is better for all the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind...
Three generations of imbeciles are enough.”
[1.1] Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. in Buck v. Bell

 
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And here are others:

"It does not, however, seem impossible that by an attention to breed, a certain degree of improvement, similar to that among animals, might take place among men. Whether intellect could be communicated may be a matter of doubt: but size, strength, beauty, complexion, and perhaps even longevity are in a degree transmissible... As the human race could not be improved in this way, without condemning all the bad specimens to celibacy, it is not probable, that an attention to breed should ever become general."
- Thomas R. Malthus. An Essay on Population. 1798

 AND

"In order to stabilize world population, we must eliminate 350,000 people per day. It is a horrible thing to say, but it is just as bad not to say it."
- Jacques Cousteau,  1991 UNESCO courier

And here: 

Margaret Sanger, the Founder of Planned Parenthood, advocated eugenics, describing it as a way to eliminate "human waste" from society.

"Everywhere we see poverty and large families going hand in hand. Those least fit to carry on the race are increasing most rapidly. People who cannot support their own offspring are encouraged by Church and State to produce large families. Many of the children thus begotten are diseased or feeble-minded; many become criminals. The burden of supporting these unwanted types has to be bourne by the healthy elements of the nation. Funds that should be used to raise the standard of our civilization are diverted to the maintenance of those who should never have been born."

 

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And here:

 
In support of the eugenics movement, (Theodore) Roosevelt wrote that

"it is obvious that if in the future racial qualities are to be improved, the improving must be wrought mainly by favoring the fecundity [fertility] of the worthy types... At present, we do just the reverse. There is no check to the fecundity of those who are subnormal..."

 
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And here:

John Harvey Kellogg (1852-1943) a major figure in the eugenics movement founded the American Medical Missionary Board (but soon changed its name to the Race Betterment Foundation). Kellogg himself was an important and respected figure who authored numerous medical and eugenics treatises in order to lobby for policy of "national eugenics." Kellogg, who launched the breakfast cereals industry by introducing granola to the American public as a health food.

The corporate experiment established by Americans (known as the United States) has traditionally attempted to divide and conquer the unwanted public. One method for achieving this is by encouraging confusion over the meaning of personal responsibility. Rather than encourage each other and work together to challenge unfair elitist domination,  society is instead obsessed with following the traditions of unreasonable standards for critical evaluations.

In this video, State Controlled Consciousness, John Taylor Gatto explains how compulsory schooling is used to provide an expanded military that protects the rules which are decided by the state. The United States adopted this tool of government from Prussia, which encourages us to believe that there is little or no value to an individual human or their creative process. Since the rules can be taught by motivating people to avoid punishment, the rules don't get challenged and the elite who possessed the power is allowed to preserve it.

When the government control becomes an unregulated obsession for an elite few, the remaining public is following standards that they instinctively know lacks the sound judgment. At this point, they can either choose to revolutionize the system, or they can instead become apathetic and frustrated from being unable to trust their neighbors or even themselves and their own judgment.

The advances in technology are now accelerating dramatically pursuant to the insatiable appetite of consumers. This appetite was encouraged so that the market could be deceptively described as the answer to the world's problems. This provided industry leaders with more power and ultimately more authority. Most all scientific discoveries are encouraged and glorified based on the establishment of the same misplaced faith in an unregulated market. This creates advantages for a few people and is used as the justification for excluding the majority for being invalid.

An appetite for technical accuracy has been established in accordance with the encouragement of the myth that we can decide the accuracy of information based on the same rigorous scientific evaluations. Due to the lack of ethical regulations that would encourage us to evaluate ideas, we are accepting commercial brands of truth and hyper critically micro managing each other in a depressingly hopeless and fatal way.

Psychology is a brand of processing ideas. It is promoted in order to encourage the validity in scholastic pursuits. The academic industry advertises that those who achieve their awards are superior in  ability, judgment, and character. The science of human behavior(as it's described) is mainly used as a political tool for controlling the public. It's used more as a method for controlling thoughts and behaviors than  for understanding them. It enslaves consumers by outwitting them rather than teaching productive ways for evaluating and using information.

A society that was truly concerned with justice and human rights would not be allowing the continuing abuse of people based on a punitive justice system deceptively defined as the mental health industry. In such a society, the abuses associated with Applied behavioral analysis (ABA)  (originally researched to determine methods of manipulating prisoners of war) would have been enough to warrant an appropriate investigation. Instead, the harmful traditions of the public school system (which have gotten worse since the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was established) continue so that radical change is not seen as necessary. The leadership along with their past misdeeds continues to go unchallenged while voters continue to be taught that most all political compromise is necessary.

Since the state agencies defined as Protection and Advocacy have become practically as ineffective as those that serve vocational rehabilitation needs, the concerned parents of schoolchildren who are being abused are deceptively provided with a substitute solution. Rather than look at how the nature of Applied Behavioral Analysis will likely be implemented in an abusive way, the bureaucratic leaders look for ways to justify and protect their reputation. Instead of admitting their mistakes and making the radical changes which are needed, they instead direct the public's attention to teachers being inadequately trained in the proper use of this supposed "discipline".

A newer and better type of ABA described as Statewide Positive Behavioral Support has been substituted for the important regulation that is needed for teachers abusing authority. The goal of the school system (despite the way typically presented) is to reestablish behavior standards as the focus of compulsory education for most students so that federal laws are easier to enforce.

A society that was truly concerned with justice and human rights for everyone would be able to look at the origins and traditions of the public school system and find better ways to help more students become prepared for adulthood. This would include of course addressing the problems presented by intelligence quotient (I.Q.) test, which were based on eugenic goals and finding more appropriate means of evaluating students.

However, in order to avoid accepting this responsibility, the lack of student achievement was used to explain the need for more exclusive standardized test, which was sold by legislation called No Child Left Behind. (Of course this achieves the opposite goal from the one that the name suggests.)

 

Apathy and hyper criticism is two sides of the same coin. Both encourage an attitude that impedes progress and promotes dependence and oppression. Commercial advertisement provides a constant source of frustration and dissatisfaction by teaching people to evaluate their worth in relation to the type of people they can never become who own things that they can never afford.

"The Master's Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master's House"~ Audre Lorde

Blaming each other only weakens us so that we are vulnerable to deception. The majority of people are not empowered by standard evaluations, and, unless we challenge those standards we will never recognize and trust the value in our neighbors and in ourselves and we will destroy ourselves in the process.

Personal responsibility should not divide and weaken us so that we can be manipulated by fear and doubt. People don't need to be convinced of the rewards which come from the achievement of truly worthwhile goals. When people believe in themselves and their own ability, they find ways to do things and naturally avoid the punishment which comes from either failure or cheating.

 The value in ourselves which we need to recognize in order to be more successful becomes more apparent when we are willing to accept the same in others. This kind of experience is what will sustain humanity and ultimately the human race.

 

Obsolete

In the past half-century, technological advances have become an increasingly dominant aspect of the global economy. As technological manufacturers have taught us it is impractical to repair our networking devices, we have adopted the belief that humans are composite of efficient or defective independent parts, and that we can be evaluated accordingly as valid or invalid.

Now that the majority of people are serving the enterprise known as science, in one way or another, the corporations which dominate this field have become a political force that works together with government to control as many aspects of our behavior as possible.

We are taught the central nervous system which is most active within the space between our ears is an end unto itself, and that we must submit to the scholastic theories of psychologist and psychiatrist so that our thought processes will be adjusted properly. We've learned to hyper-critically micro manage each other and quickly devalue any diverse expression that deviates from what the current leadership has determined to be the norm.

Medical models are dependent on behavioral treatments that propose to chemically alter the brain structure. These are researched by using the least valued public as expendable products (human lab rats) so that valued workers are more easily manipulated, and the elite are provided with more comforts.

In addition, many among the labeled community aren't exposed to the way that all these specific labels of a learning disability, developmental disorder, psychiatric condition, or psychobiological disorder practically vanishes for most people who are among the class which is least valued once they are institutionalized. In such environments the abuses of control are justified either by the person in care being considered unable to control their actions or unwilling to submit to authority.

Most of what we are taught are cures to the incorrect configuration of our brains or the maladjusted way we respond to our environment doesn't exist in any other way than how close our expressions come to a standard that was set to glorify the characteristics which are most comfortable to the people in positions of leadership. All sorts of atrocities are committed and justified by the claim that it is done in the name of science, progress, and the common good.

The most outrageous and harmful treatments and attempted cures are justified through the sophisticated fear-based advertising campaigns that describe cases of severity. The biggest deception of these campaigns is the exploitation of severe problems. While people with the most severe cases are shown as the reason for more research into cures and treatments, they are not the ones who benefit from scientific discovery.

Instead, in addition to the exploitation, they typically get described as beyond repair, aberrant and unwilling, too old, or that the main problem is due to poor character.

The way severe neurological disorders may contribute to a violent response has never been advertised in order to provide a better understanding or treatment for the people who have them. Instead, in a very few cases it gets accepted in the judicial system as an excuse (which then gets little if any attention or aid) and the belief that these disorders are associated with violence mainly provides justification for incarceration and harmful treatments based on the presumption of guilt for the undesirable and inconvenient public.

If our attitudes about people don't change so that we accept more diverse expressions as valid and important the sophistication of our technology and scientific research will go to provide worse treatment and even more widespread abuse. This is the current trend despite claims that science is leading us away from our barbaric ways.

The design for the cure attitude exhibited in the way it's advertised was never meant to provide more people with aid or understanding and eliminating competition certainly won't make the already accepted any stronger. Unless we focus on acceptance first and gear scientific research toward helping people whom we are already willing to accept as valid regardless, the result will be more expressions, which are shown to be inappropriate and more people who are thereby defined as obsolete.