Well the byelection has been cancelled because Stephen Harper has called a general election for October 14.

Hi Michelle,

It looks like the by-election in the riding of Westmount-Ville-Marie on September 8 is a close contest between Marc Garnier for the Liberal party and Anne Legace Dowson for the NDP. If Ms. Dowson wins it will be a historic victory for the NDP in a riding which has always voted Liberal.

From what I have read of news reports, autism is not an issue in the by-election.

Have you seen any evidence of election campaigning?

With apologies to Helen Murray--I was sick for a while and am just catching up with things (and I tend to forget to check this board, in favour of the much more active TMoB board--sorry again!)

Anyway, this is my much-too late response.

I'm not "disordered," but I am disabled. Autistic traits and abilities are considered at least as being inferior and unwanted, and more commonly as less-than-human and a blight on society (as was stated by the Liberal Party of Canada, e.g.). This is disabling, as it would be to anyone whose traits and abilities were similarly denigrated.

Also, as I've written many times elsewhere, we've mostly gotten over assuming that the ideal life is white, straight, and male. But a lot of people still assume that the ideal life is nondisabled, and that all of us should strive towards this ideal, whichever way it gets defined at any given time or place. I think this assumption, like the assumption that whiteness, straightness, and maleness are the apogee of humanity, should be questioned.

If you're looking for organizations whose goals include making it safe for you to come out of the closet with your atypical neurology, I suggest The Autism Acceptance Project http://www.taaproject.com/ and the Autistic Self-Advocacy Network http://www.autisticadvocacy.org/ .

By the way, many autistics who met DSM-III autism criteria as children went on to considerable achievement as adults, including collecting a lot of university degrees (see Szatmari et al., 1989, e.g.).

Michelle,

I have only recently become aware of you and your voice on behalf of autistics. Bravo!! As an aspie female of the same generation (born 1960) I am heartened by your eloquence, intelligence and tenacity.

Curiously, I was a psych major 20+ years ago and while I recognized that I shared many of the traits required for a diagnosis of "autism" in the DSM-III, my language skills ruled it out. Had the DSM-IV been published by then, I would have immediately made the connection with Aspberger's Syndrome.

I do not, however, view myself as "disordered" or "disabled" in any way other than within the context of survival in our neurotypically governed society. That this presently entails the non-disclosure of my true nature to all but a trusted few casts an enormous pall on the quality of my day to day life as I'm quite certain is true for many of us.

Please let me know how I might involve myself, and with whom, in an effort to eradicate this egregious reality.

with thanks & sincerity,

Helen Murray