Thread by @AutSciPerson

So uh,

I just got a very interesting email in my inbox.

It was an ABA therapy service asking to be added to my resource page on my blog. 😂

Here's the scary part though:
The way their website is setup is real sneaky.

1/13

I went to their website. They boast about providing online services. It seems like a relatively new businesses, as they're also hiring ABA therapists of course!

So if you go to the main "new to autism" for parents kind of page, you get a lot of relatively harmless info.

2/13

They use person first-language throughout, but they do talk about how autistic people should be supported and not everyone can be independent. And at one point they even mention creating a safe sensory space for the autistic kid!

Great, right?

Well I kept scrolling..

3/13

They also talk about how autism is genetic and a few other things, like drugs, but nothing about environmental toxins at least.

Then I get to the "How ABA Will Help" part, and again it starts off innocuous, about how kids need structure & lots of warning if things change.

4/13

This is the sentence that told me that everything above it was a lie -

"For example, you may have to physically block a child from engaging in aggressive behavior while depriving them of the attention they are seeking. Instead, reward positive behavior with attention."

5/13

And then it goes on to get worse and worse. They explain discrete trial training. They even say that they make things challenging on purpose,

and they want kids to be in 25-40 hours of ABA a week!

Above that, they talk about how they want to let a child be a child..

6/13

They even point out that ABA therapy isn't trying to teach "emotional skills."

However they continually say it is the "gold standard" for autism treatment and the earlier you have your child in ABA, the better the outcome.

Nonsense.

7/13

And although they have other therapies listed at the bottom of the page,

the website itself has a little assistant in the bottom right corner and the first thing you can click on is "My child needs ABA therapy."

They don't offer any other therapies!

8/13

Their website is so, so sneaky. There are so many things that autistic people would think are good and/or updated information on autism.

But it doesn't matter what you say on your website if you're still doing ABA therapy on autistic kids.

9/13

And I have no idea how they define "success" in this post -

"While it’s never too late for a child to develop skills, the earlier they can begin this skill development, the greater levels of success they will see in life."

To think I could've had a PhD if I'd gotten ABA!

10/13

One of the sources they reference is a Medium article that says this:

"With depression affecting 26% of autistic adults, therapeutic solutions such as ABA can minimize the effects of autism symptoms from an early age."

You can't make this up. I mean really. What?!

11/13

Oh wow. The ABA service website has a glossary of ABA terms and it's real dark. It's honestly disturbing to read the definitions and what ABA therapists are willing to do to "fix" autistic kids.

12/13

And two more upsetting things ABA therapists do -
"consequence" & "deprivation."

"When you're denied access to something, that item often becomes more attractive. An ABA therapist might use this tool to encourage a behavior."

Yes, that's how to treat children, riiiight..

13/13

And as always,

a trademark of ABA "therapy" -

No discussion about the consent of the child to be touched. Nothing.

Because ABA therapy doesn't care about consent! And it never has! It's about "behavior" and "success" on neurotypical, ableist terms.

14/

So, this is not how human behavior works.

You can't just redirect someone who says "No!" over and over again and expect them to be totally okay. Like maybe figure out why the kid is saying no? They talk about hunger and tiredness in their main page of course, but not here..

15/

Oh, they didn't just say this.

They didn't really just say they regulate autistic children stimming. I can't. #SayNoToABA

They think this is OKAY?!!

Autistic children never have consent in ABA. It is compliance. It is "training." And it is traumatizing to that child.

This is the icing on the cake, I'm just going to quote it:

"As ABA therapy became one of the more popular approaches to treating autism, programs were criticized for how they punished clients, especially children."
[cont]
17/

"Modern ABA therapy does not punish, but instead simply fails to reward maladaptive responses to antecedents and uses rewards to enhance positive behavioral change. Children with autism respond well to operant conditioning..as repeated sessions encourage adaptive behaviors."
18/

Oh, and I've found the part for why the "therapy" looks totally fine and harmless at the beginning of it:

"Treatment plans in ABA therapy often start with providing rewards to encourage learning a positive behavior while ignoring maladaptive behaviors."
[cont]
19/

"Over time, the therapist must implement an extinction plan, in which rewards or reinforcers are removed."

ABA therapy is constantly sneaky.

We'll trick you into thinking we're going to be nice to you!

After we gain your trust, we'll "shape" your behaviors!

#SayNoToABA

20/

I'll try to stop adding to this,

but just to bring it home,

This is what their "Manifesto" is:

"Mental diversity does not need a magic pill or miracle cure. Rather, we must all work together to find strategies to embrace it. We are honored to serve you and your family."

21/

One of the co-founders describes themselves as having "severe ADHD." 😭

Why?!!

Of course they don't say they were "fixed" or "cured" through ABA therapy, or that they have ever had ABA therapy before.

Either way, it's really quite sad. Ugh. I hate this.

22/

So the person who made this company is legitimately a young big shot entrepreneur who has made other companies completely separate from anything about autism.

How in the hell is this not a cash grab?

23/

Can someone stop me from listening to an interview with this person and continuing to do a deep dive into the ridiculousness of this start-up?

I guess it doesn't matter because my brain's not going to go to sleep after absorbing this information anyway...

24/

This person is a failed pre-med student.

"You don't really need to be a clinician, or someone with 2 decades worth of experience, to start something in an industry like healthcare, from scratch. You can find people through the internet to help you along your journey."

25/

Why autism, they get asked, oh no:

"When I was very young I had a form of therapy called ABA. It's a therapy that's sometimes used to help ADHD kids, like severe form that I had.. I had that therapy growing up when I was really young. It was really effective." 26/

"What I learned recently is that it's predominantly used for child autism care and the clinical outcomes for this therapy for child autism care are really really impressive actually, and it's just a matter of getting it in front of these autistic kids as quickly as possible."
27/

"These families are really hurting and really struggling. They can't live their lives and these kids are really struggling too, so that is a main driver.."

What is ABA therapy?
"Basically this applied practice of behavior analysis. It's actually a relatively older field"
28/

"if you will, but it's the use of different methods and tactics, experimentation with teh trial, to understand what the triggers for certain behaviors are, and hwo we can use the environment around this child to basically, change those triggers,"
29/

"and get rid of these negative behaviors that this child is exhibiting. It started out with experimentation, humans and actually animals, dogs, and trying to modify the behavior of mammals shall we say, to have them act a certain way."
30/

"Old behavioral analysis actually had these negative feedback loops - you know, take away food from a dog..close off a dog from the environment around it.. what modern ABA therapy is all about is all about positive reinforcement. They've create positive loops to behavior."
31/

"Training a child not to have a meltdown when a certain channel is turned on the TV, or when a certain sound goes off, like a doorbell sound for example, or with a piece of candy, or with a little bit of playtime with mom and dad."
32/

"And just making sure the child understands that if I exhibit the behaviors that are not destructive, but productive, I'll be rewarded by my environment. That's what basically modern, child-focused ABA therapy is all about. There are a lot of misconceptions out there,"
33/

"just like misconceptions about vaccinations. But we feel we can really bring this into a digitized world today. "

Then talks about digitized diagnostics/therapeutics. Create more telehealth/telemedicine.

"A parent talking about their child doesn't have to be in person."
34/

"There are certain physical responses to stimuli that these children exhibit that you can also track through computer vision at this point - eye gaze, eye attention and movement to create cheaper, and more outcomes-driven ABA experiences for autistic children."
35/

"Autism care we realized takes a couple years to get started with, which is pretty crazy, considering it takes me 5 seconds to order an Uber. What you do in the early stages..when they're 2/3/4 years old could impact their entire life. I thought that was shocking."
36/

"We could access an experience that on average could take a couple months to get started, instead of a couple years...having a faster onboarding experience for the families."
37/

"The mission definitely helps. Doing something that's good for the world, it's always easier to raise money for that thing, than doing something that's agnostic or not adding any value to the world. I think people want to be around a strong mission."
38/

"The catalyst.. was the traction, that we are basically well-positioned to take the entire in-home chronic care market even beyond autism care..dementia, dialysis care, not even children-focused necessarily."

So they started with the cash grab first? ABA? Cause it's the fastest?