Yeah. It's a free ticket for acting out and causing disruptions. Where do they come from? When I was growing up there weren't any autistics. And there weren't any kids allergic to peanut butter. Now those types are everywhere. I never even heard of autism until I was in my 20s, and I don't think I ever met one until much later.
“When I was growing up there weren’t any autistics”
I used to think that :-) ...
My son was diagnosed as “high functioning autistic” ... Overall, his speech is delayed. He will say things here and there (mostly repeating things he hears), but he won’t have a conversation with you :-). I mean, he’s only 4 going on 5, but he’s certainly waiting to start talking.
He’s frigging smart though :-). He’s been reading since the age of two, knew all of his letters before he was two (I swear he taught himself lower case letters), knows some Russian letters (he’s a BOT!), knows all of his numbers from 1 to 100 ... knows shapes (even knows dodecagon) ... seems intrigued by bisecting squares into triangles ... and is a pinball addict :-).
While I didn’t have delayed speech, I do notice a lot of similar “quirks” I had when I was young. People called me “weird” though, not autistic :-).
I think the reason you see more of the “autistic” diagnosis is that it’s understood a bit better than it was as recently as the 1980s. In the case of “high functioning”, they simply want to make sure he gets more focused training to break some habits that are linked to things like OCD and anxiety later in life (I suffer from anxiety ... tough to explain to people that don’t have to deal with it). He also gets assistance with speech development.
That’s about it in our case. No drugs, no cash prizes from dear old gubbamint ... just some help and guidance to make sure he doesn’t wind up with some of the bullcrap his dad had rattling around in his head :-).
The human brain takes 20 years to develop overall ... some are going to take a different path :-).
They've been there, but only now is there a medical decision on their behavior and how it can be handled and coped with.
I know of them. I'm married to one. I have a family member who is one, too. You'd never know unless you live with them since acting out is the last thing they would want to do.
Those of you making fun of kids with disabilities make me ill. Lots of parents including me and other FReepers here are raising kids with neurological problems like autism.
Just because there is an epidemic of autism currently, and there was not one when we were kids, doesn’t give you the right to act haughty about this. Environments change. The prenatal and the infancy environments definitely have in the last 40 years. It’s a sad thing to see a child look so sweet and try so hard but not pick up any of the signals humans need to interact.