- Parents and others demonstrate outside KNEW radio station in San Francisco, calling for the firing of talk show host Michael Savage
Posted on 07/28/2008 7:49:59 AM PDT by SmithL
Parents of children with autism, along with politicians and other protesters, convened Sunday in front of a San Francisco radio station and renewed calls for the firing of talk show host Michael Savage, who recently suggested that most autism diagnoses were fraudulent.
A crowd of 50 to 60 people gathered in front of KNEW radio's Townsend Street offices Sunday to protest the decision by KNEW and Talk Radio Network, the company that syndicates Savage's shows, to keep him on the air despite his controversial statements.
"Michael Savage's remarks were hurtful to the safety and the well-being of vulnerable children and we want him off the air," said Evelyn Ain, president of Autism United in Long Island, whose 8-year-old son has autism. "If this (KNEW) and other radio stations don't stop carrying Savage's signal, then we will pursue every advertiser until they drop him."
Ain was joined at the protest by Craig Johnson, a New York state senator from Long Island, who has advocated for spending on autism issues and education, and by Alice Lai-Bitker, an Alameda County supervisor, and others.
As part of his July 16 conservative, nationally syndicated talk-radio show, "The Savage Nation," Savage said that autism is being over-diagnosed and actually is a result of parental failures.
"They don't have a father around to tell them, 'Don't act like a moron. You'll get nowhere in life,' " Savage said during his show. " 'Stop acting like a putz. Straighten up. Act like a man. Don't sit there crying and screaming, you idiot.' "
Representatives of Talk Radio Network could not be reached Sunday. In a statement, the company said it would not fire or suspend Savage and was satisfied that he did not mean any disrespect to autistic children or their families
...Savage has not apologized.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
- Parents and others demonstrate outside KNEW radio station in San Francisco, calling for the firing of talk show host Michael Savage
The 1st Amendment, which gives them the right to demonstrate, of course does not apply to Michael Savage. Hypocrites.
Ping...
A protest in San Francisco of all places. Who would have ever guessed...
What don't these morons understand?
Savage didn't criticize Autism. He criticized bad parenting and the doctors who mis-diagnose the disease.
This comment was, well, lol, stupid:
"Michael Savage's remarks were hurtful to the safety and the well-being of vulnerable children and we want him off the air," said Evelyn Ain, president of Autism United in Long Island,
She's interviewed all children and has already seen that they're being attacked by total strangers. I guess she presumes the autistic children are seeing "dead people" as a result of Mike Savage's comments.
i think their point is not his right to say it, but it's more about him getting paid by these sponsors to say it. well, that and they think he's simply wrong.
i think he's wrong but would never call for his firing. that is why God made little knobs on radios that change stations.
I was listening to savage when he said it. I also have an autistic grand son. Make no mistake, he offended me and everyone in my family. He implies that most autistic kids act the way they do because parents allow it! I will never listen to savage again, nor purchase a product from a company that supports this jerk....
This is like trying to deny that Ritalin is being overprescribed by TEACHERS who are classroom failures.
I don’t know what exactly he said, but there’s been a lot of intelligent commentary in the past year or so, about the increasing practice of diagnosing kids as being “on the autistic spectrum” (also called “pervasive developmental disorder”), resulting a huge number of kids being labelled “autistic” who certainly wouldn’t have been given that label 20 years ago. Now a large majority of kids with this diagnosis and it’s shortened label are kids who wouldn’t have been called “autistic” in the past. While the majority certainly do have some genetic/physiological disorder, it’s entirely possible that some of the ones on the very mild end of the “spectrum” are indeed kids whose parents’ permissiveness and other poor parenting practices fully account for the child’s symptoms.
I also suspect that some of these kids would instead be labelled “ADHD” if the diagnosis happened to be made by a doctor who prefers that label. Both groups of labelled kids surely include a lot who simply don’t care to sit still through hours of academic-oriented preschool classes, or to follow orders through hours of “enrichment” activities their parents drag them to (musical instrument lessons, foreign language lessons, regimented sports instruction, etc).
Yeah, 99% of us are bad parents, and our kids are brats, morons and idiots that need to snap out of it. I already knew Savage was a blowhard and an intellectual lightweight. This episode merely confirmed it.
don’t these people have JOBS?
If you’re one of those “bad parents” and have had someone alleviate your blame by diagnosing a disease and drugging your children into submission, requiring no more hard word on your behalf,
perhaps you’d be offended if someone called you on it and would seek to silence them?
(you, in the generic sense)
Now, the illness du jour is autism. You know what autism is? I’ll tell you what autism is. In 99 percent of the cases, it’s a brat who hasn’t been told to cut the act out. That’s what autism is.
What do you mean they scream and they’re silent? They don’t have a father around to tell them, “Don’t act like a moron. You’ll get nowhere in life. Stop acting like a putz. Straighten up. Act like a man. Don’t sit there crying and screaming, idiot.”
Autism — everybody has an illness. If I behaved like a fool, my father called me a fool. And he said to me, “Don’t behave like a fool.” The worst thing he said — “Don’t behave like a fool. Don’t be anybody’s dummy. Don’t sound like an idiot. Don’t act like a girl. Don’t cry.” That’s what I was raised with. That’s what you should raise your children with. Stop with the sensitivity training. You’re turning your son into a girl, and you’re turning your nation into a nation of losers and beaten men. That’s why we have the politicians we have.
Now you know exactly what he said.
is autism over diagnosed?
that is a very serious question.
In a time when an opinion diagnosis can mean extra benefits for a student, (tutors, time on tests, grants) it is very hard to deny manipulation of the system.
Imagine a student who gets all these benefits just by a mere diagnosis and then just before graduation is able to simply skip any negative consequences by stating “oops misdiagnosed” but they get to keep all the GPA and test scores.
Is Savage a jerk? yes, no denial.
Is there a point to the statement that Autism is over diagnosed? (just like Ritalin is overprescribed) I would hazard a guess that it is.
It is the overdiagnosis that hurts those children who have a genuine problem.
This was on SUNDAY. Many people have Sunday off. Even Michael Weiner.
If these are real cases, why didn’t they use this as a chance to get help for the real cases and help weed out the fake cases?
You would think that the resources wasted on the fake cases could be a massive help to the legit cases.
The “fake cases” absolve parents of their duty to confront their child at his point of rebellion.
They aren’t going to give this absolution up.
Sounds like a garden variety hyperbolic rant, hardly worthy of an organized protest. 99% is obviously will exaggeration, but it wasn’t phrased as if it was meant to be taken as a serious statistic. Methinks everybody who’s upset about it should calm down. I’ve actually read some things where parents of truly autistic children were upset that huge amounts of money were being diverted to children on the dubious mild far end of the autistic “spectrum”, leaving very little for the profoundly autistic children and adults. Savage rant isn’t really inconsistent with that concern.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.