May 142006
The US Army is the target of much media flak for recruiting 18-year-old Jared Guinther, who has autism. The Army released Jared from his contract, but I’m a little troubled by the way the press is portaying people with autism. Autism is shorthand for describing a whole spectrum of capabilities. Asperger’s Syndrome, sometimes referred to as the Geek Syndrome, is thought to be a mild form of autism. People who fall on the more significant end of the autism spectrum are not necessarily any less intelligent than the rest of us. Autism generally describes how a person perceives and interacts with the world; it doesn’t say much about one’s cognitive functioning.
If I was the parent of this kid, I would certainly not want him shipped off to Iraq. But I’m willing to bet thousands of people with autism have served in the military over the decades, many of them quite capably. We should not assume that people with disabilities should be automatically excluded from any facet of public life in America, including service in our armed forces.
Yes Mark, but keep in mind this is the U.S. military where discrimination based on disability, gender and sexual orientation is par for course.
I’m Jared Guinther, the one who signed up for the military then got booted out, due to my so-called “disability”: autism. It is great to hear that somebody is recognizing the fact that autistic people are not stupid, for my mind is intact. In fact, all of my friends were surprised when they found out that I have autism, for I do not show it. And when they read about me on the newspaper, they thought it was bullshit. I like the way way you wrote that the asperger syndrome is referred to as the “geek syndrome”, for that is true. However, I am now happy that I won’t be enlisting. I have prior engagements.