We’ve all seen the clips from President Trump’s commencement speech at the United States Military Academy on June 13. One clip of Trump drinking lasts approximately three seconds, while another of him walking down a ramp lasts 15 seconds. In no time, then, the truth is out: Trump is not well. The evidence can be… Read more →
The recent movie Me Before You, based on the best-selling book by Jojo Moyes, has been marketed as the tearjerker romance flick of the summer. The film stars Emilia Clarke (of Game of Thrones fame) and Sam Claflin (The Hunger Games). But the movie has drawn fierce protests from disability rights activists, who say that the… Read more →
The interwebz have been abuzz this week, debating Moises Velasquez-Manoff’s editorial in the New York Times on autism and immune function. Although Velasquez-Manoff is a little late on the autism/immune function thesis (which has been posited in research projects since at least 2005), it’s his use of autism stereotypes and ableist language that put this article on my radar. It’s the assumption that autism is a sign of a broken or damaged child that has made me question both his interpretation of that thesis and the implications for the families of children with autism – and the autists themselves.