Ignorance, science fiction and self-delusion: Jim Fisher on Ulysses Stable and the response to the autism phenomenon
“I’ve terminated the life of my autistic child,” Jose Stable told police on the morning of November 22. Writes Jim Fisher at dotCommonweal:
Delete “autistic” to contrast the derangement of the alleged killer of his own child with the innocence of the victim. Re-insert “autistic” to learn that the child ate grass, weighed 280 pounds (a likely side effect of medication) and tried to touch neighbors in the elevator “in an agitated way, not a friendly way.”
That one word—”autistic”—says too much. It says it all.
And indeed:
As the parent of an autistic child and an historian there’s quite a lesson in humility here. We can so readily size up the goofs of the past but you just know that in 10, 30, 50 years from now books and documentaries will find in our collective response to this autism phenomenon……….. much ignorance, science fiction and self-delusion. But we do the best we can with our very poor human tools, as Dorothy Day liked to put it, quoting Eric Gill who surely was quoting someone else again. Just as Dorothy also liked to say she longed and worked for a world where it was a little easier to be good; so too must we work for a world where it’s a little easier (and safer) for autistic persons to simply live, which is why we remember each day Katie McCarron; William Lash; Ryan Davies; Christopher DeGroot. And Ulysses Stable.
Jim’s post on Ulysses Stable can be read here.
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POSTED IN: Crime, Disability Rights, Legal Issues, Religion, Weblogs
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