TW: prenatal screenings for autism, eugenics.
Apparently people are further along on this prenatal testing for autistic spectrum disorders than I thought. If I actually thought that this testing was going to be used by parents who want to line up all the supports they can using the couple months notice before their kids are born, I would actually find this awesome. I just don't believe that.
That's because I know the statistics for what happened once they could do prenatal screenings for Downs. More than 9 in 10 fetuses that screened as having downs get aborted, and you're kidding yourself if you don't think that autistic ones would get aborted any less.
It's also because I know how autism is portrayed. It's the destroyer of families, a their of children, right? At least, that's how it's painted. And that's scary enough without there being a way to make us never have existed. It's more than scary enough to realize that's what people think when they hear my neurology without knowing that the next generation may well be aborted, and that I will likely face pressure to abort my children. (I have no illusions that my children won't screen as likely to be autistic, since, you know, I'm autistic.)
And it's because I know what that people think I shouldn't have kids because of my being autistic, when they know about it, that is. So... if something that does not guarantee autistic kids but does make it more likely is a reason not to have kids, what would we do with the knowledge that a kid will be autistic before xe is born?
At the end of it, yes, this scares me. And it's apparently on the way, since they're working on a screening method now in Australia based on brain development in utero and on making a method used for testing for genes in kids usable on fetuses here in the US. So be warned. It really is coming, and it may be the cure- no need to cure something that's already here if you can just make it not be here in the first place!
Apparently people are further along on this prenatal testing for autistic spectrum disorders than I thought. If I actually thought that this testing was going to be used by parents who want to line up all the supports they can using the couple months notice before their kids are born, I would actually find this awesome. I just don't believe that.
That's because I know the statistics for what happened once they could do prenatal screenings for Downs. More than 9 in 10 fetuses that screened as having downs get aborted, and you're kidding yourself if you don't think that autistic ones would get aborted any less.
It's also because I know how autism is portrayed. It's the destroyer of families, a their of children, right? At least, that's how it's painted. And that's scary enough without there being a way to make us never have existed. It's more than scary enough to realize that's what people think when they hear my neurology without knowing that the next generation may well be aborted, and that I will likely face pressure to abort my children. (I have no illusions that my children won't screen as likely to be autistic, since, you know, I'm autistic.)
And it's because I know what that people think I shouldn't have kids because of my being autistic, when they know about it, that is. So... if something that does not guarantee autistic kids but does make it more likely is a reason not to have kids, what would we do with the knowledge that a kid will be autistic before xe is born?
At the end of it, yes, this scares me. And it's apparently on the way, since they're working on a screening method now in Australia based on brain development in utero and on making a method used for testing for genes in kids usable on fetuses here in the US. So be warned. It really is coming, and it may be the cure- no need to cure something that's already here if you can just make it not be here in the first place!
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