A thought about the MMR vaccine and autism.

RFK Jr, the Nazi in charge of US health care, is what I call him because he advocates publicly for the elimination of autistic people from human society.

He positions autism as a condition so devastating that the person will have no life whatsoever, will only be a "burden" to the state. He's hunting for the so-called "causes" of autism, so he can eliminate it, and by definition, us.

I want to push back on this in a very specific way. The anti-vax movement, which infects the left as well as the right (pun intended), is fundamentally an ableist movement. It's based on fear and disgust of disabled people.

First, they wrongly consider all autistic people to be disabled. We are not. While there are a portion of autistic people who experience it as a disability for them, the majority of us just live our lives, in our own ways, as we always have.

Second, disabled people have equal value to people who are not disabled. We are not worthy because of how much we can produce in the widget factory. We have value because we're human beings, just like anyone else.

This is the basis of the anti-vax opposition to the MMR vaccine: that it causes autism. Usually, we focus on this as a flaw in reading the data: it is a wrong idea.

I want to focus on it in a different way: *what if it were true*? What if, in some rare cases, autism was found in someone after vaccination that hadn't been like us before?

Do we throw out the entire concept of vaccination, because a few people will live a slightly different life than neurotypical people? Because that's what we're doing. We're saying that being autistic is so inherently awful that it would be better to catch measles AND DIE than have it happen to you.

This is insidious. It's dehumanizing. And it's meant to soften the ground for eugenics. And then to use the same argument to go after queer folk, and non-Christians, and so on, and so on. Accept it once, you'll never be rid of it.

How beautiful is this?

I learned today from the ‘You’re wrong about ADHD’ podcast that the Māori word for ADHD is aroreretini which means attention goes to many things and that the word for autism is takiwātanga meaning in their or my own time and space.

How beautiful are they? No disorder, no pathology, no judgement, just description.

Gabrielle Treanor, The Haven

#adhd #autism #labels #inclusivity #nojudgement

https://substack.com/@gabrielletreanor/note/c-114421379?r=i0l1d

“Pope Leo XIII was the last to use this name nearly 150 years ago after today's election of Leo XIV, and was the earliest-born person ever captured on film.

He was born in 1810 and filmed in 1896.”

- @rainmaker1973@threads.net

#PopeLeoXIV #PopeLeoIII #pope #film #MotionPictures #history

Bananas without the “B” is just…

Pineapple.

Pope Leo in a nutshell:

Pope Leo holds citizenship in Peru. Considered to be a centrist, progressive on marginalized groups, more conservative than Francis on church doctrine (like formal roles for women in the church). Not one of the arch conservatives who had been discussed, however.

De wereld kan me een potje duwen. 😜🎵🎶

Bron: Marijke van Veldhoven / https://www.messageinadrawing.com/blog/

When he died, there were no flags, no procession, no cannon fire. William “Billy” Lee was always there—riding with Washington in war, walking beside him in peace. He served at Cambridge, Valley Forge, Yorktown—silent, indispensable. But when the story of Washington was told, Billy was left out of the frame. His life was one of duty without recognition, loyalty without reward.

1/20

#history #histodons #education #Politics #BlackMastodon
"Billy Lee, Portrait in Tar." 2016. Titus Kaphar.