I first heard of "The Autism Health Summit" from a friend of mine and was immediately concerned. Probably because it was in the form of a question: "Have you heard anything about the right [wing] hijacking the Autism Health Summit?"

They shared a couple of screenshots from @neurodivergentrebel on Threads which were… horrifying. Presenters berating "wokeness" and saying "we need to find a way to not have unwed black mothers who have autistic children be a drain on our economy." The screenshots are thumbnails because their recounting of the racist and ableist BS is disturbing; you can click the links to see bigger versions.

It didn’t take a lot of digging to realize the entire event was just a bunch of people looking to "cure", manage, and — most importantly — swindle neurodivergent people and those who love them.

This isn’t just embedded ableism, or even a casual disregard for the neurodivergent voice.

These are profiteering parasites.

Don’t look at the front page of the site for the event. Look at the sponsors.

On that page — including the "Speaking Sponsors" — I found several homeopathy companies and other snake oil "herbal" vendors {1} claiming to have formulas that "help" autists, vaccine deniers, evangelicals pimping their heteronormative "keys for a successful marriage", a site worrying about how "electromagnetic waves" might have led to increased autism diagnoses, an "education" site that has "constitutional law," "Herbology and Health," and "vaccine injury compensation programs" among its offerings, a disaster response team, and "An elite team of highly trained and skilled professionals equipped to assist with private security and paramedic services."

All waiting to prey on the vulnerable — not the autists, so much as the allistic people around the autistic person.

They offer simple — though useless — solutions: Take this pill to make the "problem" go away. Eat our special diet that we sell you. Drink some of our special "homeopathic" water to fix everything. Your marriage is under strain because our society doesn’t support disabled people? All you need is some God — only $20 for the intro course! Your loved one’s neurodivergence is explainable and it is NOT your fault. It’s someone else’s fault — vaccines, 5g networks, those with different colored skin or speaking different languages and eating different foods. And we will teach you how to say those comforting lies with authority in our special classes — again, for a fee. And should you feel threatened, why, we’ll also let you hire some ultra-violence at the same place!

Through half-truths and misleading implications, these charlatans make it appear as though there’s support for neurodivergent people… when really, they’re only interested in (maybe) making us more palatable to allistic people, and mostly interested in swindling people who actually need support.

There is only one real response to such opportunistic parasites.

OUR DISABILITY IS NOT YOUR PROFIT MARGIN.

{1} If you think homeopathy isn’t snake oil, then that’s fine. I’ll sell you "magic" bottled water at half the price they do, and it’ll have exactly the same effect. PayPal link is here: https://paypal.me/stevensaus . Put up or shut up.

Featured Image by Chen from Pixabay