CN: ABA, violation of privacy, ableist slurs
Today I had an um, interesting, encounter with an Autism Mom(tm).
She runs a page where she has a GoFundMe asking people to donate for ABA (Applied Behavioral Analysis) therapy for her daughter. If you google the Actually Autistic hashtag you will find stories from autistic adults recounting the horrors they survived from ABA, they also talk about being autistic adults and you should really seek them out if your child is autistic. Actually, just seek them out anyway because they need to be heard. Many suffer from PTSD because of ABA therapy. Which if you aren’t aware is just gay conversion therapy with a different name.
I was made aware of this page by a friend. I left a review which is in purple. I’m leaving her first name and page name partly visible becuase she runs those publicly, however I am covering her daughter’s name and avatar. I was originally going to post the screenshots not covering Vikki’s full name but I do not want to risk this blog getting accused of harassment. Not that this is harassment by the way, but Autism Moms are perpetual victims.
Calling a therapy ABA when it isn’t is insurance fraud. There are other things to call the therapy if it isn’t ABA. If she is just using it to be “catchy” then she is defrauding her followers
Vikki isn’t shy about sharing videos and photos of her daughter on her public page. This is a violation of privacy. This may be shocking but children are people and as such deserve the same level of respect and dignity that you’d afford an adult. In this blog, I’ve talked about how society doesn’t respect children. The above is a perfect example of this.
Vikki balks at the idea that children (or for that matter, people in general) deserve to consent to things. She could not believe that I had asked my fiance if I could post the picture. Let me blow her mind further, I also asked them if they wanted to take a selfie with me. Astounding. She calls this idea “new age shit” which she deems “dumb”.
It’s called respect. How can we expect children to respect us if we don’t model that for them? Quoth Vikki, “That’s like saying our parents should have gotten our consent to show the photo album”. Oh you mean, that ridiculous “rite of passage” where parents embarrass their children in front of dates and other people? Yeah, parents should definitely ask before sharing any photos, digital and otherwise, to others.
But I can’t expect her to understand that children deserve a right to consent if she thought it was okay to go to my personal page and then search for an old selfie to try to prove her point. In case you weren’t aware, that shit is creepy as hell.
