Thread by @shannonrosa

I’m the mother of a high-support #autistic young adult. I’m going to give it to you straight about antivax disinfo: why it’s nonsense, why it’s dangerous, & why it’s hurtful—especially to people like my son.
This is going to be a thread.

#autism #VaccinesWork #Neurodiversity 1/

I want to talk about a critical aspect of vaccine advocacy, which is understanding how vaccine-autism misinformation hurts the amazing people in the #autistic communities in general, and people like my wonderful, happy, autistic son specifically. 2/

If more people understand that #autism is nothing to be afraid of & is part of human diversity—if we share more messages about accepting #autistic people like my son, who need significant support but also have unrecognized abilities and have always been part of our society… 3/

…and who, frankly are offended when asked if they think vaccines cause autism not just because the science doesn't support the link but because it dismisses their humanity—then that's one more reason not to listen to anti-vaccine misinformation. 4/
#VaccinesWork #Neurodiversity

I really want those of us who are not autistic to to remember that autistic people take part in online vaccine conversations, read what others write, &—if we are invested in the concept of presuming competence, as we all should be—hear everything others say in their presence. 5/

Autistic people are part of our community. Autistic people are not “them.” Autistic people are a part of “us.” #neurodiversity 6/

So please be careful about your pro-vaccine arguments when autism is involved—because when we use our many many mountains of evidence in statements such as “there is NO evidence linking vaccines to autism” without adding the statement “& fear of autism hurts autistic people”… 7/

…then we’re actually contributing to negative stereotypes about autism and autistic people, rather than furthering autistic people’s acceptance and inclusion in our society. Better to say “#VaccinesWork and have nothing to do with autism" (per @epballou). 8/

Another reason autism understanding is so important to vaccine advocacy: Reaching groups like the new parents minted every minute—and who are certainly not always in a rational space, as any overwhelmed and sleep deprived person who has parented an infant can assure you. 9/

If we can incorporate reality-based messages of #autism understanding and acceptance into our vaccine advocacy, make them commonplace, then those new parents, too, will ideally have one less irrational fear fueling their vaccine choices for their kids. #VaccinesWork 10/

Where do we get good info, about understanding, accepting, and respecting autistic people? I think the best resources are autistic people themselves, through organizations like the @autselfadvocacy & @awnnetwork_ & #autistic writers like @slooterman @JHMarble & @JustStimming 11/

I certainly find autistic-led resources invaluable; they have been critical in helping me not just understand but appreciate my autistic son, and move from being one of those credulous “autism warrior” cure-seeking anti-vax parents to an autism & pro-vax parenting advocate. 12/

I certainly wasn’t always a pro-vaccine advocate. In fact, after my son was diagnosed with autism, I became staunchly anti-vaccine and stopped vaccinating him. When his younger sibling was born 4 years later, they received no vaccines. At all. Because I was afraid of autism. 13/

When parents like me fear autism in addition to fearing vaccines, they often retreat even further into denial. It may not even matter if, intellectually, they know better.
#VaccinesWork #Neurodiversity 14/

I used to live in Ghana, West Africa, and I knew university classmates there who were disabled by polio—unlike so many of my American peers, I actually *knew* what vaccine preventable disease looked like, what it could do.

#VaccinesWork 15/

But when my son was diagnosed with autism in 2003, I still went down the rabbit hole of vaccine denialism in order to keep him and his baby sibling "safe." Because my classmates with polio? They were still attending college… 16/

Whereas the U.S. media in 2004—even more than the media in 2020—portrayed autism as not only likely caused by vaccines, but as the Worst Possible Thing That Could Happen. 17/

Those cultural messages of fear and doubt scared the hell out of me, and they sounded like reasonable science at the time. There was no way in hell I was putting my kids at risk. 18/

I want to reiterate: I was afraid of autism because I didn’t know any better. I didn’t know any #autistic or disabled people. I did not have trusted, vetted sources for #autism & vaccine information, & I believed what the media told me about a link between vaccines & autism. 19/

It is my hope that, by spreading understanding about autism, we can erode that fear. If we treat #autistic people like my son with the respect he deserves and do our best to understand that my son lives a full, happy life and is no one’s injury example or cautionary tale… 20/

…if we help our society comprehend that autistic people have always been part of our communities, & that autism is not a disease, then we’ll not only have more acceptance of autism in our society—but as a side effect greater vaccination uptake, and improved public health. 21/

You’re probably wondering what changed my mind, why I am now a vaccine advocate as well as an autism & parenting advocate. And I will tell you what people who study denialism and confirmation bias and social networking will tell you…

#VaccinesWork #neurodiversity 22/

…I changed my denialist, hurtful views about autism and about vaccines because of slow and steady exposure to information from trusted resources — and especially from trusted people.

23/

It became increasingly difficult for me to rail against vaccines and against autism when the people and resources I most respected were constantly posting information that caused me to question my fear-based opinions.

#VaccinesWork
24/

And by the time I started writing professionally about parenting, one of my first posts was titled "My Child Has Autism and I Vaccinate.” 25/

But people who understand autism may still have lingering concerns re: vaccines themselves. Maybe they got chickenpox as a kid,& have pictures with siblings covered in red welts & mugging for the camera, so they think vaccine-preventable diseases really aren't that dangerous. 26/

Or maybe vaccine skeptics believe that our bodies’ natural immunity is all a kid needs to fight disease. These are terrifying positions, frankly. 27/

1) Before vaccines, when kids had no choice but to rely on natural immunity, too many kids got sick from vaccine-preventable diseases, and too many of them died. Yes, some people survived unscathed, but millions didn’t. 28/

2) Vaccine refusal is a privilege of the vaccinated. Only someone who had never lived through vaccine-preventable disease outbreaks could dismiss vaccines as “dangerous” rather than near-miraculous. 29/

3) Vaccine-preventable diseases are just a plane ride away, as we’ve seen with measles outbreaks. And what do you think happens to an unvaccinated child if they are exposed to a disease they have no “natural” protection against? 20/

4) When fewer people get vaccinated, herd immunity—the concept that when enough people in a community are vaccinated, diseases can’t find a purchase—is at risk. That puts babies too young to be vaccinated or others who can’t get vaccines, like the immunocompromised, at risk. 31/

Most parents who express concerns about vaccines and autism just need their questions answered, and are easy to reach. If they weren’t, the US rates for the majority of childhood vaccinations wouldn’t be holding at an average of 90 percent. 32/

So what we can do, what we need to do, to is get as much good friend-of-friend-of-friend networked, trusted info out there as we can. We need to aim for herd immunity not just with vaccines themselves, but with vaccine and autism information. #VaccinesWork #Neurodiversity 33/

It really doesn’t help to tell scared people that they’re misinformed or wrong about vaccines and autism—negative and confrontational approaches usually make people defensively angry and incapable of listening, and can even cause them to dig deeper into denialism. 34/

We need to do our best to spread positive, or at least matter-of-fact messages about autism & vaccines, so that people will listen to us. In the spirit of @DrPaulOffit, people should feel that it’s always okay to ask questions—& fortunately, those questions can be answered. 35/35