Recently, I've seen where autistics have been abused by police, and it has been reported and even published in newspapers and magazines. As much as the stories themselves are horrible to think about I'm encouraged by the exposure since reports of abuse are almost nonexistent.
In a recent Facebook discussion, the topic was the importance of helping the police to become more aware and educated about autism. While I believe this is important, the tragedy is that the police are only doing something illegal based on disability law. The laws which have been made so that a person with a disability is not exploited by law enforcement and the legal system has been of little value to the majority of people.
At this point, I believe that asking the police to handle such situations differently is contradictory to many of the public views and trends, which are mainly affecting how they do their job. They are, after all, considered servants of the people(although the people they serve are in the elite minority) and can only be expected to follow the guidelines the public (the voting and vocal public) provides.
This is some of what I believe influences this problem:
#1 The history of psychiatry and it's affect on cultural values
Benjamin Rush, one of the signers of the Declaration of
Independence is considered the "Father of American
Psychiatry", published the first textbook on the subject
in the United States, Medical Inquiries and Observations
upon the Diseases of the Mind (1812).
Wikipedia says this about him:
"In 1792 Dr Benjamin Rush, one of the 'Founding Fathers' of
the USA, presented a paper before the American
Philosophical Society which argued that the 'color' and
'figure' of blacks were derived from a form of leprosy. He
was convinced that with proper treatment, blacks could be
cured (i.e. become white) and eventually... assimilated
into the general population" (Omi & Winant 1986: 148). Omi,
M. and H. Winant (1986). Racial formation in the United
States : from the 1960s to the 1980s. New York ; London,
Routledge & Kegan Paul."
AND:
"He proposed that being black was a hereditary skin disease,which he called "negroidism," and that it might be cured.
Rush drew the conclusion that "Whites should not tyrannize
over [blacks], for their disease should entitle them to a
double portion of humanity. However, by the same token,
whites should not intermarry with them, for this would tend
to infect posterity with the 'disorder'... attempts must be
made to cure the disease."
One of the men who studied under Dr. Rush was Dr.Samuel Cartwright.
His contribution to psychiatry was, drapetomania,
a mental disorder akin to alienation. He said that slaves should
be kept in a submissive state and treated like children, with
"care, kindness, attention, and humanity to prevent and cure
them from running away." If they nonetheless became dissatisfied
with their condition,they should be whipped as a prevention
against running away.[2] In describing his theory and cure for
drapetomania, Cartwright relied on passages of scripture
dealing with slavery.
Cartwright also described another disorder, "Dysaethesia
aethiopica", a disease "affecting both mind and body."
Cartwright used his theory to explain the apparent lack of
work ethic among slaves.[3] Dysaethesia aethiopica, "called
by overseers 'rascality'," was characterized by partial
insensitivity of the skin and "so great a hebetude of the
intellectual faculties, as to be like a person half
asleep." Other symptoms included "lesions of the body
discoverable to the medical observer, which are always
present and sufficient to account for the symptoms."[4][5]
According to Cartwright, dysaethesia aethiopica was "much
more prevalent among free negroes living in clusters by
themselves, than among slaves on our plantations, and
attacks only such slaves as live like free negroes in
regard to diet, drinks, exercise, etc." — indeed, according
to Cartwright, "nearly all [free negroes] are more or less
afflicted with it, that have not got some white person to
direct and to take care of them."
This leads me to reason that from the beginning when
the United States became established as an independent
and supposedly free nation, industry, politics, and psychiatry
formed a partnership that encouraged the legal means for
abuse against the majority who made up the lower class.
#2 The effect the eugenics movement has had on how our
current laws are structured.
This says of the eugenics movement:
Eugenics: Semester Research Project -Spring,2002 By Lora Judge
"The Eugenics movement won substantial recognition in early
20th century America. By 1941, 33 US states had endorsed
sterilization policies. The movement was social, political,
and scientific. It reflected the fears of many whites that
their once-great nation was threatened by demographic and
economic change. Their understanding of the principles of
genetic inheritance led eugenicists to conclude that
genetically defective members of society were rapidly out-
reproducing the "normal" members of society at an alarming
rate. These defectives included the "feeble-minded,"
criminals, the sexually wanton, epileptics, the insane, and
non-white races, and they were passing on their
"deleterious" genes at the expense of the "normal." The
social cost of such a situation, they feared, would be
devastating."
AND:
"Using the argument for national efficiency, eugenicists
successfully lobbied for the passage of a number of state
eugenical sterilization laws in the 1920s and 1930s.
Eugenical sterilization was aimed specifically at those
individuals in mental or penal institutions who, from
family-pedigree analysis, were considered likely to give
birth to socially defective children. Sterilization could
be ordered any time after a patient had been examined by a
eugenics committee that was composed of a lawyer or family
member representing the individual, a judge, and a doctor
or other eugenic "expert." More than 30 states had
enacted such compulsory sterilization laws by 1940. Indiana
was the first with a eugenical sterilization and it went
into effect in 1907. By 1941, more than 60,000 eugenical
sterilizations were performed in the United States. Most
state sterilization laws were not repealed until after the
1960s."
In this:The Fascist Origins of the SAT Test by Rich Gibson,
San Diego State University, April 2001, it says:
"The frantic rush to high-stakes standardized testing in the
US costs one-half billion dollars annually in directexpenditures, probably double that in indirect costs. The
chief fetish of the testing movement is the SAT, long known
as the Scholastic Aptitude Test but now known, on the
insistence of the test's owners, the Educational Testing
Service, as just "The SAT."
The SAT measures, above all else, class, sex, and race.
(Fairtest, Roney). The SAT, like every similar test, is
designed to divide people with razor sharp precision, to
enumerate human value and to track people's futures under a
veil of objective science. The SAT is a commodity itself,
for sale to every student, school, and college in the
world. It also commodifies people, attaching worth to
individuals, but more pointedly drawing the lines of what
can only be called class warfare. The impact of the SAT is
to create the logic for a more deeply stratified society,
divided primarily by issues of inherited income, sexism,
and racism. The fraudulent claims of the SAT to promote a
more equitable and meritorious society have been thoroughly
revealed elsewhere. (Lemann, Fairtest, Roney). This
analysis is a brief history of the SAT, unmasking the
politics of the people who designed it, and those who
promote the SAT and similar exams today .
The genealogy of the SAT is far more authentic than the
importance attached to the test's scores. The SAT was born
from the initial IQ tests, written by French psychologist
Alfred Binet. In the US, Lewis Terman and Robert Yerkes
promoted the IQ test and made it a popular instrument to
determine who should be an officer, in a segregated
military, during WWI . Their IQ test was designed to prove
the genetic advantage of races they had already identified
as superior. Terman and Yerkes were executives in the
American Eugenics Society (Mehler)."
The standardized test which is used in accordance
with the No Child Left Behind act promote what the ACLU
calls the school to prison pipeline. This article explains:
"The school-to-prison pipeline is one of the most important
civil rights challenges facing our nation today.
• The school-to-prison pipeline refers to the national
trend of criminalizing, rather than educating, our nation’schildren.
• The pipeline encompasses the growing use of zero-
tolerance discipline, school-based arrests, disciplinary
alternative schools, and secured detention to marginalize
our most at-risk youth and deny them access to education.
Zero-tolerance disciplinary policies are often the first
step in a child’s journey through the pipeline.
• Zero-tolerance policies impose severe discipline on
students without regard to individual circumstances. Under
these policies, children have been expelled for giving
Midol to a classmate, bringing household goods (including a
kitchen knife) to school to donate to Goodwill, and
bring¬ing scissors to class for an art project."
#3 The laws which provide comfort for elite criminals
Today we have white-collar prisons. Wikipedia describes
white-collar crimes and the idea behind them like this:
"The term white-collar crime only dates back to 1939.
Professor Edwin Hardin Sutherland was the first to coin the
term, and hypothesize white-collar criminals attributed
different characteristics and motives than typical street
criminals. Mr. Sutherland originally presented his theory
in an address to the American Sociological Society in
attempt to study two fields, crime and high society, which
had no previous empirical correlation. He defined his idea
as "crime committed by a person of respectability and high
social status in the course of his occupation" (Sutherland,
1939). Many denote the invention of Sutherland's idiom to
the explosion of U.S business in the years following the
Great Depression. Sutherland noted that in his time, "less
than two percent of the persons committed to prisons in a
year belong to the upper-class." His goal was to prove a
relation between money, social status, and likelihood of
going to jail for a white-collar crime, compared to more
visible, typical crimes."
#4 The industry of juvenile detention
One example of how disenfranchised youths are being
mistreated by our justice system is evident in this
story Pa. judges jail youths for profit
"A case of judicial
corruption in Pennsylvania has once again exposed the
true nature of the profit-driven prison industrial complex
and the warehousing of poor youth.
Two Pennsylvania judges, Mark A. Ciavarella Jr. and his
predecessor, Michael T. Conahan, received $2.67 million
over the last seven years from a private juvenile detention
center. In exchange, federal prosecutors allege, the two
helped the center secure lucrative contracts from Lucerne
County, then sentenced youth to detention for the mildest
of infractions.
For participation in this scheme—which damaged the hopes,
expectations and futures of hundreds and perhaps thousands
of youth—the two judges were given a plea agreement that
will see them serving a modest 87 months in federal prison.
In addition, the owners of the detention facilities have
not yet been charged with any crime."
The article also points out:
"The New York Times described Luzerne County as “an area in
northeastern Pennsylvania that has been battered by a loss
of industrial jobs and the closing of most of its
anthracite coal mines.” (Feb. 12)
As unemployment increases because of the global economic
and financial crises, it can be expected that more youth
across the country will be thrown into juvenile detention
facilities for petty crimes of survival. Made to pay for
the crimes of capitalism that they did not create, these
youth will face increased hardship in the future."
#5 The defense of bigotry and strict class division
known as the drug wars
Today's law enforcement is heavily dependent on the
prohibition of marijuana. Here's something that points out the
history of the prohibition:
HOW DID "REEFER MADNESS" GET STARTED?"During Prohibition - an era also referred to as
The Roaring Twenties - government corruption was rampant and
police - a huge portion of them on "the take"--had no desire to see
Prohibition end. The booze ran free at speakeasies, morals were
loose, and jazz was the music of choice, performed predominantly
by African-American musicians who also had a
penchant for marijuana.
As the 1920’s moved into the 1930’s with gang wars becoming
commonplace and public dissatisfaction with Prohibition at it’s
peak, it became clear to even the most corrupt government officials
and even organized crime that the Volstead Act had to go. But it
would not go quietly, and something had to be created to take it’s
place to keep law enforcement funds rolling in and organized crime
in business.
Local and federal policing agencies had grown fat during
Prohibition, and a repeal would put many of them flat out of work.
At the same time, the tyrannical William Randolph Hearst, the most
powerful newspaper owner in America, began printing falsified and
exaggerated stories about the "evils of marijuana". A blatant racist
who despised Hispanics and Blacks, Hearst used his vast newspaper
empire to create hysteria among white parents, alleging that
"pushers" - most of them from the lowly ethnic minority class
that Hearst despised-- would be dealing marijuana to high school
kids, turning them into addicts who would quit school, commit
violent crimes like murder and rape as depicted in the laughable
film "Reefer Madness", produced in 1936."
#6 Autism awareness campaigns
What is considered mainstream autism awareness campaigning is being defined by the fear-mongering of groups like Autism Speaks who are mainly interested in eradicating autistics.
Among other myths the so-called awareness campaigns perpetuate is the idea that autistics are lacking in empathy and compassion.
#7 Identity politics
There are Aspie supremacists tearing apart the ideals of the disability community which has made progress in teaching people how supremacy values, bigotry, and the unwillingness of our society to accommodate those who are considered invalid is responsible for the problems we face.
In conclusion:
In such a society as this, how can we expect law enforcement to have a better understanding of what autism is in relation to how an autistic person may present in public?
Stopping the abuse of law enforcement against autistics will require a radical approach, and it needs to include some understanding on our part of the mindset behind how officers are encouraged to do their work. Without that we won't have the necessary tools to adequately describe what the abuse is and the necessary approach for stopping it.
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