US People with autism bristle at continued stigmatization from Trump, RFK

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People with autism say President Trump and Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy's insistence that vaccines or Tylenol cause autism despite contrary evidence further marginalizes them.

Why it matters: People with autism and their advocates told Axios that treating autism as a disease with a single cause that can be cured rather than a condition to be accommodated contributes to social stigma and undermines efforts to incorporate them into society.
  • "That's death by a million cuts on a daily basis from society, and then to have it come from our government with a sledgehammer is very disheartening," Russell Lehmann, an international disability rights advocate at UCLA who has autism, told Axios.
Driving the news: Trump and Kennedy on Monday insisted that acetaminophen use by pregnant women is contributing to autism — a statement the Department of Health and Human Services later walked back, noting some studies have shown an association but not a causal link between the two.
  • However, Trump told pregnant women to avoid taking the medication and instead "tough it out" if they have a fever.
What they're saying: "It's very clear that their goal is to further marginalize people," Eli Brottman, the policy director for a Chicago-based good government organization who has autism, told Axios.
  • "They're not concerned about supporting people with autism, about listening to their concerns."
  • The Department of Health and Human Services referred Axios to the White House for comment. The White House didn't immediately respond to Axios' request for comment.
Zoom in: While some studies have found that prenatal exposure to Tylenol is associated with increased the risk of autism and ADHD, others have not. One large study of more than 2 million children in Sweden in 2024 concluded that there was no connection.
  • "Moms who are pregnant don't want to have unhealthy outcomes," Laura Kennedy, the mother of 43-year-old Julia Kennedy, who has autism, told Axios. "This is fear mongering."
  • "I wonder why the president gets involved with an issue like this in such a blatant way," she added. "We've been working with credible institutions that we trust and admire and welcome guidance — he's diminishing those institutions."
  • "This is dangerous, it's anti-science and it's irresponsible," Mel Merritt, head of policy and campaigns at the UK's National Autistic Society. said in a Monday statement.
  • "Such dangerous pseudo-science is putting pregnant women and children at risk and devaluing autistic people," he added.
Catch up quick: Robert Kennedy, who has long pushed the debunked link between vaccines and autism, has made it one of his central missions to find the causes of and cures for autism, despite the community urging the administration to invest time and money into more productive research.
  • "The fact that they're using the word cure, which conjures up that it's a disease, maybe even contagious, that does a huge disservice and adds to the rampant ignorance out there," Lehmann said.
  • "It's misplaced and it's frightening," Laura Kennedy said.


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Autists aren't bristling, they are too busy looking at trains or bashing their head against the wall and howling. People with poor social skills that claim to be autistic are bristling.
 
I'd say the problem isn't autistics as much as it is parents of autistics who think their children's condition gives them a free pass to bully and control anyone in their vicinity.
 
Do these retards not realize that there are many people with autism that cannot and do not function at all? They live an existence of shitting their pants, violently attacking their caretakers, unable to speak/have limited speech, being complete burdens in both time and money.

It's not some 'cute and quirky' thing for a lot of people. Families have broken up over it, people have gone destitute trying to care for them, parents have gotten so overloaded with the absolute fucked up misery of it all they've killed their own kids because of it.

Fucking dipshits
 
People like this (often not even formally diagnosed) are horribly dismissive of how life-ruining autism can actually be. There are people who can't speak, can't look after themselves, and have zero quality of life because they are severely autistic. Even people who are on the more functioning end of the spectrum have challenges that 'regular' people don't.

Ideally, we shouldn't want anyone to have to go through it if we can avoid it. Prevention is better than management.

This idea that autism isn't even really a disability, it just means you're a bit quirky or whatever, is really harmful. It skewers the perception of autism away from it being a disability (and often quite a severely stifling one) and towards it being a personality trait. All this ultimately does is reduce people's understanding and empathy towards those with complex support needs, all to make the idea of autism more "marketable" (because neurological conditions have to be marketable, I guess?).
 
Funny how all the autism advocacy groups are weirdly focused on making sure autism gets seen as a feature and not a bug. Almost like they know their funding will plummet if autism rates decrease...
 
"insistence that vaccines or Tylenol cause autism"
"treating autism as a disease with a single cause"

Clearly the one writing the article isn't autistic, since they can't count to two.
 
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