Thread by @ekverstania

PRACTICAL PROJECT FOR REFORM-MINDED BCBAs WHO WORK WITH AUTISTIC PEOPLE [THREAD]

#BehaviorAnalyst #BCBA #ABA

I'm a member of the #BanABA movement. We believe that Applied Behaviour Analysis should not be the basis of any nonconsensual therapy for autistic people. We want this type of therapy to be declared unlawful.

Some of us who are part of the #BanABA movement do also talk to ABA professionals who are interested in reforming ABA (even though we believe that ABA-based approaches like EIBI are fundamentally flawed, rather than just broken).

In a discussion group specifically focused on REFORM, some of us were told that we don't focus enough on that subject, and keep veering off to talk about ABOLISHING ABA.

At the same time, we don't see significant action towards reform being led by BCBAs or other ABA professionals who say they're keen on reform.

It would appear that perhaps BCBAs don't know where to begin, and that they are pottering around with tweaks to how they deal with individual clients.

These types of small actions are not reforming ABA. This is just improving your personal practice in a niche of a niche.

So I decided to go there. I decided to propose a practical project that reform-minded ABA professionals could undertake, since they believe that their field can be reformed.

In the light of what I perceived to be an unspoken 'OK, so tell us what reform you want then', I have a recommended reform project for BCBAs which I describe below.

This is the kind of action that we would expect from real reformers who are serious about changing the profession.

Thousands of autistic people (including myself) would still like to see the abolition of nonconsensual ABA-based interventions for autistic people.

However, if BCBAs were to undertake this reform project, there would be great and encouraging changes in the lives of many people. They can expect some support from autistic people even if we agree to disagree on many other things.

(To autistic people: Feel free to propose a different project if you think there is anything more important or impactful that BCBAs should be working on right now to bring about reform—more important than the project I describe below.)

Here are the high level tasks and guidelines for the project. Focus items/actions are numbered for ease of reference.

1 - Lobby for the banning of skin shock torture at the JRC. Have a campaign for this, e.g. "BCBAs Against Skin Shock (BASS)". #StopTheShock

2 - Write a personal position statement or manifesto, or a position statement on behalf of your organisation and publish or circulate it.

3 - If you're American, contact senators to vote against CESS. Hold Webinars to encourage other BCBAs to join the campaign.

neuroclastic.com/justice/ban-el…

4 - Expose the people involved in this—the torturers, the torture designers, the people lobbying to retain the torture.

4 continued - Name them, but don't dox them. Expose their affiliations, influences and conflicts of interest in ABAI, SABA, the Accreditation Board, and various academic institutions where they work.

4 continued - Question their academic works, especially their studies involving the use of extreme punishment.

4 continued - Write critiques, citing human rights standards, and also focus on effectiveness of punishment-based interventions, referencing existing papers from other disciplines (e.g. on the problems and relative accuracy of the results obtained via torture research).

5 - Question their other research in the light of their ethics. Write essays in journals, write Twitter threads, write public statements on Facebook or blogs.

5 continued - Cite formally published works, such as the work of Dr. K. Bottema-Beutel (@KristenBott). You could also read up about the Doogri method developed by Dr. H. Kupferstein (@HennyKtweets) for critiquing autism research, to see if it would help.

6 - Expose the tacit supporters of the torturers, such as prominent academics in ABA who feel that there cannot be a pronouncement on the effectiveness of extreme punishment until there has been more research.

6 continued - Expose the institutions that stand neutral at a time when people should choose a side. Do not use ad hominems or other forms of slander against the torturers and their supporters.

7 - Propose changes to regulations and ethics frameworks introduced to the ABA profession via its various affiliate and commercial bodies (ABAI, QABA, BACB, CARD, etc.).

7 continued - Propose explicit consequences for the perpetrators for officially or unofficially implementing extreme forms of punishment in their personal or institutional ABA practices.

8 - Write statements against seclusion and restraint. If you don't know much about what to say here, contact ICARS (@ICARSBanRandS) or the Alliance Against Seclusion and Restraint (@endseclusion). They'll gladly help you.

8 continued - If you need training in alternatives to seclusion and restraint, consider Studio III (@studioIII) and Foundations for Divergent Minds (@FDMorg) for ideas to inform your own approach.

@studioIII @FDMorg 9 - Lobby the BACB to strip all BCBAs, BCBA-Ds and other BACB-credentialed professionals at the Judge Rotenberg Center of their credentials.

10 - For 50 years, the ABA industry and its professional bodies have proven themselves incapable of self-governance to protect human rights. This is YOUR industry, BCBAs. If you want to reform it, it's up to YOU. We can support and encourage you, but we can't do this for you.

Who is going to stand up to lead this powerfully?