Autism Speaks' Response to Joe Scarborough's Autism Comments

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Rascal77s
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05 Aug 2012, 7:17 pm

Watch this video. Listen to what this as*hole says in response to the CO shooting and AS. This s**t is what many people think but don't say. This is what people connected to autism fear. He even goes on to say something along the lines of 'most autistic people are homosexual causing them to be hated even more'.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MPzaRKGMPok[/youtube]


P.S. Please flag this c**t for hate speech on youtube.



aghogday
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05 Aug 2012, 8:05 pm

Verdandi wrote:
Breivik was not diagnosed with AS. It was a suggested diagnosis, not an actual evaluation. Also suggested was narcissistic personality disorder and Tourette's. And the doctor who suggested it did so by making a false claim about AS (that it left him incapable of empathy or friendship).

Bryant was also diagnosed with ADHD + conduct disorder, which is per Dr. Russell Barkley a very high predictor for psychopathy, and even without the psychopathy is fairly severe and problematic.

Asperger's Syndrome would not explain his decision to go on a killing spree. However, conduct disorder and psychopathy very well could have.



As I stated in my post, experts that have studied the phenomenon of rampage killing, have already come to the conclusion that no one factor explains a rampage killing whether it is mental illness, psychopathy, aspergers, violent video games, revenge, age demographic, a stressful event in life, or a number of other factors. I have provided those links in the thread here questioning whether or not Holmes has Aspergers Syndrome.

While a final evaluation on Breivik is pending, there is definitely the potential that he will be evaluated as having Aspergers along with some of the other current professional analyses that have been provided. My point was that Rachael provided incorrect information in her petition update in suggesting that not a single person committing a mass murder has been diagnosed with Autism.

While I personally question whether or not Martin Bryant was correctly diagnosed with the specific autism spectrum disorder of Aspergers, because of his issue with Intellectual disability, he could more likely have met the criteria for PDD NOS, if Aspergers was ruled out because of intellectual disability, or the issues with language development, and even the potential lack of RRB's, at this point, per Dr. Mullen's criticism of the Aspergers diagnosis. From the 60 minutes report, that does not appear to be the case from the report of his 2008 diagnosis of Aspergers in prison.


And as far as Scarborough's comment he did not assert that Holmes was probably on the spectrum, as quoted below he stated "I don't know if that's the case here", in reference to the potential that this type of incident could have been associated with what he describes as "somewhere on an autism scale" per the general phenomenon that he was describing. And while he associated what he described as the autism scale with mass murder, he did not make the statement that autism explains why anyone commits mass murder.

His point was an issue of the mental health of individuals on what he described as an autism scale, who do not receive the type of love and support that his son receives. Which is how he clarified it in his response to the offense taken from his statement, but he was factually incorrect in suggesting that an autism scale is associated more often than not in this general phenomenon of mass murders. That was the part of the statement that warrants an apology. In addition, while not quoted below from the petition, he again specified later in his original comment that he did not know the specifics about Holmes in this case

So technically the first quote below by Rachel, while her opinion, is not a factual representation of what she quotes Scarborough saying, on the same page, where she quotes his statement. She is attributing an "assertion" to him, that was not made in his actual statement that is potentially additionally stigmatizing to individuals on the spectrum.

So at this point while Scarborough reasonably does indeed owe the autism community an apology, for his non-factual opinion of "more often than not", per what he describes as the autism scale and this general type of incident, it would also potentially be a reasonable expectation for Mr. Scarborough to expect a correction in the petition for the assertions attributed to him that he did not make.

Quote:
On Monday morning, July 23, Joe Scarborough of MSNBC asserted that James Holmes is probably on the autism spectrum, and that autism would explain why he allegedly committed mass murder.



Quote:
"As soon as I hear about this shooting, I knew who it was. I knew it was a young, white male, probably from an affluent neighborhood, disconnected from society -- it happens time and time again. Most of it has to do with mental health; you have these people that are somewhere, I believe, on the autism scale...I don't know if that's the case here, but it happens more often than not. People that can walk around in society, they can function on college campuses -- they can even excel on college campuses -- but are socially disconnected."



Rascal77s
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05 Aug 2012, 8:16 pm

aghogday wrote:

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Most of it has to do with mental health; you have these people that are somewhere, I believe, on the autism scale...I don't know if that's the case here, but it happens more often than not.


After everything you've written about this you're still not seeing this part? Does it happen more often than not that "these people", referring to killers, are on the "autism scale"?



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05 Aug 2012, 8:23 pm

Mayel wrote:
Verdandi wrote:
Asperger's Syndrome would not explain his decision to go on a killing spree. However, conduct disorder and psychopathy very well could have.

In all the descriptions I've read about him he's being described as quiet,reserved, highly intelligent, easy-going and studious. Someone who doesn't break rules or laws. Apparently someone who doesn't even use drugs.
I don't think that sounds like conduct disorder and/or psychopathy but I could be wrong.


This article aghogday linked a few days ago:

http://kildall.apana.org.au/autism/articles/bryant.html

Quote:
Dr Sale, in his report of the 6 August 1996, indicates that in his opinion Mr Bryant manifested severe developmental problems during childhood and that he could be regarded as having shown a mixture of conduct disorder, attention deficit hyperactivity and a rare condition known as Asperger's Syndrome. I am in agreement with Dr Sale that the records indicate that Mr Bryant was grossly disturbed from early childhood.

He can certainly be fitted within the criteria for conduct disorder, but all this amounts to in the diagnostic manual is a list of a range of aggressive destructive and deceitful behaviors during childhood and as such does not advance understanding to any degree. Asperger's Syndrome is a condition which could explain some of the abnormalities in Mr Bryant and in noting this possibility Dr Sale raises a potentially important question.

The section from the text on Forensic Psychiatry convering Asperger's Syndrome appended to his report by Dr Sale though providing a good account of the forensic implications does not adequately describe the critical clinical features (as one of the authors of the chapter I can perhaps be allowed this criticism). Mr Bryant craves the attention of others. He desires relationships but fails to effectively communicate with others unlike the patients with Asperger's who are blandly indifferent to others.

Mr Bryant also lacks, in my opinion, the central features of this condition which are repetitive activities, unusual skills with all absorbing obsessive interests and problems with motor coordination. He also showed marked delay in the acquisition of language skills and required remedial therapy for this language deficit which is contrary to the picture found in those with Asperger's Syndrome.


I didn't debate whether Bryant is autistic (although this description seems to suggest he is not) but pointed out that he was also diagnosed with ADHD + conduct disorder and made my point relative to that.



aghogday
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05 Aug 2012, 9:33 pm

Rascal77s wrote:
aghogday wrote:

Quote:
Most of it has to do with mental health; you have these people that are somewhere, I believe, on the autism scale...I don't know if that's the case here, but it happens more often than not.


After everything you've written about this you're still not seeing this part? Does it happen more often than not that "these people", referring to killers, are on the "autism scale"?


Maybe you missed it in my last post but part of it was specifically directed at that part of the quote, quoted here from my last post in these two statements that I made:

Quote:
but he was factually incorrect in suggesting that an autism scale is associated more often than not in this general phenomenon of mass murders. That was the part of the statement that warrants an apology.


Quote:
So at this point while Scarborough reasonably does indeed owe the autism community an apology, for his non-factual opinion of "more often than not", per what he describes as the autism scale and this general type of incident, it would also potentially be a reasonable expectation for Mr. Scarborough to expect a correction in the petition for the assertions attributed to him that he did not make.


Mr. Scarborough did not provide an opinion of whether or not Holmes was on the autism scale in this specific incident per his actual statement. He made it clear as detailed in my last post, where he stated "I don't know if that's the case here", and again in his statement where he indicates he does not know the specifics about Holmes.

The first quote in my last post is from the petition that claims that "Scarborough asserted that James Holmes is probably on the autism spectrum, and that autism would explain why he allegedly committed mass murder.".

It could be part of why this issue of offense at Mr. Scarborough's statement is as strong as it is, as everyone that has signed the petition has been potentially exposed to a statement that Mr. Scarborough is not evidenced as asserting.

Mr. Scarborough's original statement warrants further clarification and correction from Mr. Scarborough on the "more than often" part associated with the autism scale, as well as an apology, and a retraction of that part of his opinion.

But neither he or anyone else deserves to be held accountable or responsible for a statement that he did not make per the first quote I provided from the petition. Nor is that inaccurate quote reducing the potential stigma associated with this incident, as it puts the focus on the probability that Holmes does have autism as well as autism as an explanation of why he committed the alleged rampage killing/mass murder, which is not what Mr. Scarborough said in his statement, as quoted in the petition.



Verdandi
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05 Aug 2012, 10:02 pm

When he says "I don't know if that's the case here" and then goes on to state a theory anyway, he's drawing that connection and people will latch onto that connection. If he really didn't know, he should not have said anything.

That's one of those weasel phrases people use to mitigate their responsibility for saying something awful. It's not really much different from phrases like "No offense, but..." when used in this context.

In other words, you can remove the phrase and you will see the actual message that people heard when he said it.

aghogday, it's really frustrating when you get into these discussions because you effectively derail and deflect these topics on the slenderest of semantic assumptions. I don't think you intend to, but that is the effect. You essentially take over the thread and argue with people as to how they should react to something without stopping to understand why they reacted as they did.

I specifically asked that this not happen when I linked to Rachel's blog, and you immediately went at it.



aghogday
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05 Aug 2012, 10:07 pm

Verdandi wrote:

This article aghogday linked a few days ago:

http://kildall.apana.org.au/autism/articles/bryant.html

Quote:
Dr Sale, in his report of the 6 August 1996, indicates that in his opinion Mr Bryant manifested severe developmental problems during childhood and that he could be regarded as having shown a mixture of conduct disorder, attention deficit hyperactivity and a rare condition known as Asperger's Syndrome. I am in agreement with Dr Sale that the records indicate that Mr Bryant was grossly disturbed from early childhood.

He can certainly be fitted within the criteria for conduct disorder, but all this amounts to in the diagnostic manual is a list of a range of aggressive destructive and deceitful behaviors during childhood and as such does not advance understanding to any degree. Asperger's Syndrome is a condition which could explain some of the abnormalities in Mr Bryant and in noting this possibility Dr Sale raises a potentially important question.

The section from the text on Forensic Psychiatry convering Asperger's Syndrome appended to his report by Dr Sale though providing a good account of the forensic implications does not adequately describe the critical clinical features (as one of the authors of the chapter I can perhaps be allowed this criticism). Mr Bryant craves the attention of others. He desires relationships but fails to effectively communicate with others unlike the patients with Asperger's who are blandly indifferent to others.

Mr Bryant also lacks, in my opinion, the central features of this condition which are repetitive activities, unusual skills with all absorbing obsessive interests and problems with motor coordination. He also showed marked delay in the acquisition of language skills and required remedial therapy for this language deficit which is contrary to the picture found in those with Asperger's Syndrome.


I didn't debate whether Bryant is autistic (although this description seems to suggest he is not) but pointed out that he was also diagnosed with ADHD + conduct disorder and made my point relative to that.


Just a technical point but Mullen does not provide an argument that Martin is not autistic; he provides an argument that Martin does not have the condition of Aspergers Syndrome that was an extremely rare condition at that point in time, recently added to the DSMIV. In 1996, if Aspergers had been conclusively ruled out Bryant could have potentially been diagnosed with PDD NOS, as the only requirement at that time for PDD NOS was just one of the triads of impairment per social communication, social interaction, and RRB's. With no exclusions for language delays or lower measured levels of IQ.

But, the point remains that he more recently has been reported, with an Aspergers diagnosis in 2008 in prison, on the 60 minutes program.

Strange to me that he would not have been diagnosed with PDD NOS at that point in life, considering the IQ and the serious developmental language problems. Which leads me to question the authenticity of the report of an official diagnosis of Aspergers in prison, in 2008, unless it was only based on his behavior at that point in time, which is possible considering that the criteria, does not suggest that symptoms have to be present in childhood per current DSMIV criteria.

Also, just to clarify, Mayel was referring to Holmes in her description of the reserved behavior, and apparently did not realize you were referring to Martin Bryant in your description of the ADHD, conduct disorder and psychopathy..



Verdandi
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05 Aug 2012, 10:25 pm

aghogday wrote:
Strange to me that he would not have been diagnosed with PDD NOS at that point in life, considering the IQ and the serious developmental language problems. Which leads me to question the authenticity of the report of an official diagnosis of Aspergers in prison, in 2008, unless it was only based on his behavior at that point in time, which is possible considering that the criteria, does not suggest that symptoms have to be present in childhood per current DSMIV criteria.

Also, just to clarify, Mayel was referring to Holmes in her description of the reserved behavior, and apparently did not realize you were referring to Martin Bryant in your description of the ADHD, conduct disorder and psychopathy..


Agreed on the diagnosis side, although from the description it doesn't sound like he really meets the criteria for an ASD.

Thanks for the clarification on what Mayel meant.



TheSunAlsoRises
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05 Aug 2012, 10:42 pm

Rascal77s wrote:
Watch this video. Listen to what this as*hole says in response to the CO shooting and AS. This sh** is what many people think but don't say. This is what people connected to autism fear. He even goes on to say something along the lines of 'most autistic people are homosexual causing them to be hated even more'.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MPzaRKGMPok[/youtube]


P.S. Please flag this c**t for hate speech on youtube.


This video hasn't been brought to the right attention. LoL.


TheSunAlsoRises



Rascal77s
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05 Aug 2012, 11:21 pm

TheSunAlsoRises wrote:

This video hasn't been brought to the right attention. LoL.


TheSunAlsoRises


Well I reported it and I emailed tony attwood about the art. I didn't email autism speaks because this guy is probably a contributor (I'm joking). Can you believe this s**t?



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05 Aug 2012, 11:39 pm

There was a woman on Salon.com when Loughner did his shooting spree who posted that Loughner was obviously AS and that AS children need to be rigidly controlled to keep them from becoming spree killers.



aghogday
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06 Aug 2012, 12:00 am

Verdandi wrote:
When he says "I don't know if that's the case here" and then goes on to state a theory anyway, he's drawing that connection and people will latch onto that connection. If he really didn't know, he should not have said anything.

That's one of those weasel phrases people use to mitigate their responsibility for saying something awful. It's not really much different from phrases like "No offense, but..." when used in this context.

In other words, you can remove the phrase and you will see the actual message that people heard when he said it.

aghogday, it's really frustrating when you get into these discussions because you effectively derail and deflect these topics on the slenderest of semantic assumptions. I don't think you intend to, but that is the effect. You essentially take over the thread and argue with people as to how they should react to something without stopping to understand why they reacted as they did.

I specifically asked that this not happen when I linked to Rachel's blog, and you immediately went at it.



I disagree, Scarborough specifically indicated that he did not know if his theory applied to Holmes in this specific case as well as specifically indicating that he did not have enough information to make an opinion on this specific case.

He was addressing what he described as a general phenomenon that he has derived a personal opinion on from what he has observed from the past, and was careful not to provide an opinion on this specific case, per Holmes. Whether or not his intentions were sincere is something one can speculate on, but never the less he made it clear, in his statement, that he was not attempting to diagnose Holmes, with either mental illness or place him on the autism scale, as he didn't know the specifics about him.

In my opinion, his general theory was the problem in that he generalized that more often than not the individuals associated with rampage killings not only had mental health problems but were on the autism scale, as well.

And the petition statement can potentially be associated with how people view Autism Speaks response to Mr. Scarborough's comment because the petition provided a claim of an assertion he made that did not reflect what he actually said, quoted in that link.

As well as providing an inaccurate statement on the number of individuals diagnosed with Autism who have committed mass murders. Considering the linked petition states that over 11,000 people have signed, and in doing so have had the opportunity to read that inaccurate statement, it is possible that people gathered from that statement that Scarborough was asserting that it was autism that explained Holmes alleged mass murder, which is not an assertion that he made in his statement that was quoted, nor even an assertion of his general theory as he indicated it was mental health and a lack of support for some individuals on the "autism scale", that was a problem in society.

Which that part of his statement that he provided clarification on, outside of the mass murder issue, is a problem acknowledged by more than a few people. I agree that he did not choose a good topic to highlight that issue with.

Also, if you have come across a statement somewhere where I have actually argued with someone as to how they should react to something or argued with someone that they should not dislike Autism Speaks, please provide that quote, as I cannot recollect arguing either of those two personal points with an individual on this site, as I attempt to direct my viewpoints toward the issue instead of the person.



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06 Aug 2012, 12:34 am

aghogday wrote:
I disagree, Scarborough specifically indicated that he did not know if his theory applied to Holmes in this specific case as well as specifically indicating that he did not have enough information to make an opinion on this specific case.

He was addressing what he described as a general phenomenon that he has derived a personal opinion on from what he has observed from the past, and was careful not to provide an opinion on this specific case, per Holmes. Whether or not his intentions were sincere is something one can speculate on, but never the less he made it clear, in his statement, that he was not attempting to diagnose Holmes, with either mental illness or place him on the autism scale, as he didn't know the specifics about him.


I know you disagree, which is why I explained why I think your point is wrong. I tried to explain how a disclaimer at the start is often meaningless and evasive, rather than factual. That he used it means nothing because the actual message he sent was "autistic people are potentially mass murderers." He even used the phrase "more often than not" while stating this. His statement "I don't know" is completely contradicted by the rest of his statement. Hinging your argument on that statement places relevance where there is no relevance. This is not much different from how people would react to me when I said their arguments were stupid - that is, they would react as if I said they were stupid. Both you and I would realize that calling an argument stupid is not akin to calling a person stupid, but people don't see that distinction, they react to the emotional content of the language used.

Quote:
Also, if you have come across a statement somewhere where I have actually argued with someone as to how they should react to something or argued with someone that they should not dislike Autism Speaks, please provide that quote, as I cannot recollect arguing either of those two personal points with an individual on this site, as I attempt to direct my viewpoints toward the issue instead of the person.


You can look at the majority of autism speaks threads in this forum or in the "Autism Politics, Activism, and Media Representation" forum, in which every time someone criticizes Autism Speaks, you repeatedly state that Autism Speaks no longer engages in activities that they are criticized for, until the thread becomes nothing but your arguments and attempts to respond to them, and the original point is lost or pushed aside. You have made it clear on multiple occasions that criticisms of Autism Speaks are incorrect whether the criticism in question is correct or not because you do not see evidence of them having done these things recently. Some of them are incorrect - I won't argue that. But I think that you leave very little room for discussion because it is impossible to have a discussion without the thread getting swamped with walls of text over what Autism Speaks is supposedly like now.

And of course it's not autism speaks. You have, for example, insured that I won't post about the murder of disabled people by their caretakers on this forum because you fill those threads with walls of text filled with excuses and rationalizations for that behavior, and seem to be unwilling to allow any statement that such murders are wrong to go by unchallenged. I know you say that such murders anger you, but I also know that you present fairly voluminous arguments as to why the killers are victims rather than perpetrators.

I've started bowing out of these threads because I don't want to get sucked into trying to pick through hundreds or thousands of words of semantic nitpicking and hair splitting just to clarify my position or counter other arguments. It's exhausting. The main reason I am involved here is because I am frustrated that after I asked that this not happen, you went ahead with it anyway.



Rascal77s
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06 Aug 2012, 1:25 am

TheSunAlsoRises wrote:

This video hasn't been brought to the right attention. LoL.


TheSunAlsoRises


Tony Attwood replied to my email and said he had posted on the video. And indeed he did.

Quote:
Who is the person demonstrating such ignorance about Asperger's Syndrome. And he does NOT have my permission to have the cover of my book included in the video. Having Asperger's syndrome does not render someone as likely to commit murder and such statements as occur on this video are likely to cause those with Asperger's syndrome to be marginalised, shunned and tormented.


Thumbs up for Tony Attwood.



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06 Aug 2012, 1:58 am

aghogday,

The DSM-IV-TR allows mild MR if it's tested as such during the school years and there's no apparent cognitive and/or self-help delays reported during childhood (he has a reported delay of speech though); it states it near the end of the description IIRC. He's most likely one of those cases that border on AS and AD, that improve as they age; Lorna Wing gives a case study on such in one of her original five (I think it was five). Even if you had a speech delay, but you meet all of the symptoms of AS as an adult (and not ones for AD; AD ones are extreme aloofness or passive behavior, constantly rocking, and the usual stereotypical AD symptoms), they give you AS.

The more you read into it, the more stereotypical he is of a certain manifestation of ASD (not the rampage killing. That's totally different, of course, where no one really knows the full reasons for such; lots of speculation. I think perceived persecution might be a big factor. Just saying "psychopathy" like people do isn't it).



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06 Aug 2012, 2:29 am

Dillogic wrote:
The more you read into it, the more stereotypical he is of a certain manifestation of ASD (not the rampage killing. That's totally different, of course, where no one really knows the full reasons for such; lots of speculation. I think perceived persecution might be a big factor. Just saying "psychopathy" like people do isn't it).


I didn't "just say" psychopathy. I pointed out that ADHD + conduct disorder presents a high risk for psychopathy, and violent behavior is consistent with CD and psychopathy.