Autism, Vaccination and Neurodiversity, A Timeline

Disclaimer: "Although I believe that vaccines caused the autism epidemic of the 90s, I do not believe that all autism is caused by vaccines. Autism is a syndrome, a group of symptoms, that can follow brain injury. Vaccines can cause encephalitis, and the symptoms of post-encephalitic syndrome are identical to autism. I do not believe that the thimerosal/mercury in vaccines is the only culprit. Reducing the amount of thimerosal in vaccines will not make vaccines safe. Removing thimerosal entirely will not make vaccines safe. Vaccines are full of chemicals that should not be pumped ad nauseam into human bodies without any prior research on what these chemicals do, or which organs they target and affect. "

Autism, Vaccination and Neurodiversity - A Timeline
by "Watson"
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There is no doubt whatsoever in my mind that the Neurodiversity movement is being supported by our governments and BigPharma. They know very well that many children were damaged by vaccines in the 1990s and, for once, there was an unacceptable number of casualties.


They have always regarded a few casualties as an acceptable trade-off - that's where "the benefit of vaccination outweighs the risks" comes from. The "benefit" they are referring to is not just the supposed benefit to an individual child, it is the supposed benefit to the entire population. The "risk" is to the child. So the slogan should read, "The benefit of vaccination to the population outweighs the risk to your baby." They are putting babies one at a time in the balance. And they really don't care about individual babies. Our babies.


So they had a real problem when worldwide tens, perhaps hundreds of thousands of parents, like myself, witnessed their babies, toddlers and young children react to vaccines, sometimes severely as my son did, then lose their ability to communicate and go on to develop a cluster of symptoms, defined as autism, and diagnosed as "autism". There was no explanation given for our children's loss in development. They said it was called regressive-type autism that "just happens sometimes". There was no cause. Autism was not a known result of vaccination, therefore "autism" following vaccination, despite severe reactions, was not a known injury and would not be compensated.

Now the first and only priority has always been to protect the Immunisation Programme - at all costs. Even Jenner did it. When children and adults got smallpox despite being appropriately vaccinated, Jenner said that they would have had a much, much worse case of pox if they hadn't been vaccinated, or worse, they would have died. When children became severely ill after smallpox vaccination, or were brain-damaged, or died, 'something else' was always blamed. Vaccination couldn't be associated with failure to protect, injury or death.



Nothing has changed.

Except in the nineties, it was no longer the case of a child sacrificed here and there, and parents believing that their child was one of the unlucky 'one in a million' damaged by vaccines. With the Internet, parents of vaccine-injured children all over the world could now 'meet' and compare notes - and together, try to find out exactly what it was in the vaccines that had caused their children's problems so that they might recover their children.

Faced with many, many children damaged by vaccines, what were vaccine manufacturers and governments mandating those vaccines to do? Parents would lose confidence in vaccination, and that couldn't be allowed to happen.

Fearmongering was one strategy: "If fewer people immunise their children, there will be outbreaks of KILLER DISEASES. Children will DIE!"

And the other was to change attitudes towards autism.

Now, how were they going to do that?

Prior to 1999, few books had been written about the syndrome, all but two that I can think of were written from a parents' perspective, and they were read mostly by parents of children with autism, not the general public who knew next to nothing, if anything at all, about the disorder. Most had never even heard the word. Temple Grandin's 'Emergence: Labeled Autistic' was the first, published in 1986. Then in 1991 Donna Williams' book appeared.

I think it's important for people to realise that Donna did not write 'Nobody Nowhere' as an autistic person writing about autism. At the time of writing, she didn't have a diagnosis of autism. It was her autobiography, but its original title was "Dolly; autobiography of a disturbed child". Donna says that it was packaged by the publishers as 'Nobody Nowhere: Autobiography of an Autistic Girl', as if she had no idea at the time that "autistic girl" was going to be in its finished title.

Then after the thimerosal-autism link started to surface Jasmine O'Neill wrote her book, published in 1999 - 'Through the Eyes of Aliens: A Book about Autistic People'. She claimed to have very severe Kanner's autism and to be a savant in writing, music and art. She was an elective mute. This was the very first book to mention "celebration" and "beauty" in connection with autism, and the one that became Amanda Baggs' bible.

Not long afterwards, O'Neill flew off to settle in Hawaii with "the love of her life". She moved on.

In the same year 1999, an association was made between autism and genius. Speculative articles appeared such as, "Was Einstein Autistic?", followed by articles such as The Little Professor Syndrome, New York Times Magazine, June 18, 2000.

Frank Klein, then aged 29, apparently read the article which he said "explained everything" and led him a year later to Pittsburgh University and a diagnosis of High Functioning Autism.

He then set up his "Asperger's Advocacy" website which he later changed to "Autism Advocacy" when he said he realized he was more High Functioning than an Aspie. And, amongst other articles, such as, "Don't Cure Autism Now!" and "The Truth of The Myth of The Lack of Autism Recovery", he wrote "Autism, Genius and Greatness".

Then after four years of advocacy, he moved on.

In the meantime Judy Singer coined the word "Neurodiversity" and linked autism to "Nerds Wierdos, and OddBalls" in 1999.

Autistics.org was created by Laura Tisoncik, and Amanda Baggs joined her in 1999/2000.

Then Baron-Cohen's Aspie quizzes appeared, and screening for autism and Aspergers in younger and younger children began. The idea of an ASD which soon became "Autism" was extended to include any toddler with speech delay or shyness, and any shy or socially awkward teen with special interests.

Jim Laidler the ex-DAN! doctor who posted on autism support forums that his two sons had been damaged by vaccines and how they had made great progress after chelation - which is why Dr Rimland chose him to write the DAN! position paper on Mercury Detoxification of Autistic Children in 2001 - turned Judas a year later and joined Quackwatch, starting up his own branch of the organization named Autism-Watch. He had recanted and returned to the fold. Had he ever really left?

In 2002 Edan, diagnosed with Aspergers in 2001, created the website "Aspergia".

He writes:

"At school they are often viewed as normal children, if a little awkward or introverted but childhood and adolescence are such turbulent years anyway that many AMs (Aspergian Mutants) are missed completely". "AM children often develop some special powers too."

"When AM (Aspergian Mutant) individuals combine their strong personal focus with their special power, they have an extraordinary potential to contribute to society and develop new and striking inventions and works of art or science. Further research is required in the field of history to find out how many central innovative figures in human history did indeed have Aspergian traits."

In 2004 Edan moved on.

Bonnie Ventura, and many others, who found Edan's site about "Aspergians", and as a self-identified "Aspergian", jumped on board with her ideas, for one - a site for science fiction writers, which generated much more online Aspie traffic.

The idea that a cure for autism would lead to abortion of autistic fetuses and genocide of a whole race (a superior race - the next step in human evolution) was brilliant! It had anti-abortionists and minority groups up-in-arms, and had, and still has, many people who know a child with an ASD concerned, and self-diagnosed Aspies quaking in their boots.

In 2004, the "Aspies for Freedom" forum was created by Amy and Gareth Nelson, which has the wholehearted support of Simon Baron-Cohen and Tony Attwood, the UK and Australasian autism experts.

In the same year, Kathleen Seidel's undoubtedly pro-vaccination, Neurodiversity.com sprang into action with links to Stephen Barrett's Quackwatch and Laidler's Autism-Watch - which has links back to Neurodiversity.com, Autism Diva and other ND sites and blogs. Simon Baron-Cohen is in touch with Seidel, and he has praised her for her efforts. This year in the March edition of the British Medical Journal he said, "I'm very impressed by the scholarship in the neurodiversity.com website".

Now the word "autism" appears regularly in our newspapers, often linked with genius and giftedness. There must be literally hundreds of books about autism, many of them written by "autistics" or parents of "autistics" who are painting an entirely different picture of autism. I hear that Uta Frith and Simon Baron Cohen have enthusiastically supported "autistic" authors.

We have certainly come a long way since 1988 and the movie Rainman. Aspies today are surprised when they discover that the character, Raymond Babbit, was inspired by the life of the real autistic-savant Kim Peek, and that at the time Kim Peek was regarded as a high-functioning autistic.

Since 1999, several films have been made, and others are on the way, such as the Jason McElwain Movie, all depicting a different kind of autism that wasn't familiar even ten years ago.

Ten years ago, who would have guessed that the president of the USA would be photographed with an autistic basketball player? Who then could have imagined that a young man with autism would be able to play basketball - a fast-paced team sport, with the high-level activity and noise that the game entails?

Since 1999, the face of autism has been and is being deliberately changed.

Let's return to 1999. By that time, the rate of autism had climbed to 1 in 166, and many parents of children with regressive autism were waiting impatiently for the rate of autism to drop after the removal of thimerosal from vaccines. They knew it would take a few years, but they were sure that it would happen. To see a decline in the rate would have been positive proof that a substance repeatedly injected into children's bodies had damaged their brains. Unfortunately, for us and our children, that could never be allowed to happen.

The numbers kept rising, and are still rising. Last month Simon Baron-Cohen announced that autism now affects 1 in 58 children.

To the public that means that 1 in 58 children have autism. They don't. Simon Baron-Cohen knows that 1 in 58 children don't have autism. It is a deliberate deception to keep the rate of "Autism" skyrocketing in the public eye.

Joe and Jane Public read their newspaper, see the numbers rising, and completely dismiss the idea that vaccines cause autism. Their doctor has assured them that vaccines are safe, and warned them that without vaccination their baby could die or be severely brain-damaged from "a preventable disease". They've also read that Einstein, Michelangelo and Jane Austin had autism, and they've heard that autistic children are highly intelligent, gifted, and might even have special powers. They wonder what all the fuss is about. There's no question that they will vaccinate their baby.

O'Neill, Edan and Klein have moved on. How many of the current Neurodiversity activists will move on and get on with their lives, leaving their advocacy behind? Parents don't just advocate for their children with autism for a few years and move on. They can't. It's a life-time commitment.


What was and is the Neurodiversity movement's real aim? Looking at the timeline, what do you think?
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