Text books should educate, not indoctrinate
It's time neurodivergent authors were permitted to write text books
Several years ago, an international study tried to replicate the findings of 270 recent findings from highly ranked psychology journals and by one measure, only 36 percent turned up the same results. That means that for over half the studies, when scientists used the same methodology, they could not come up with the same results. And these papers were taken from the best journals - the hardest ones to get published in. If the studies were taken from all available psychology journals, the results would probably have been even worse.
If you’re reading one of these papers, or reading a textbook that cites one of these studies, are you thinking, “hey, these are falsehoods spun as facts.” Probably not. You would expect to find truth and fact in your text books and journal articles. Yet, reviewers and editors don’t take the time to try to falsify the evidence or claims prior to publication. It’s just not done.
So much for rigor?
When it comes to autism and neurodivergence, controversial topics are often covered in one-sided ideological terms, and scientific urban legends are repeated as if true. For example, the pseudoscientific categorization of peoples’ differences into distinct “disorders” is justified by what’s known in logic as a “converse error.” “Science involves categorizing” is used to mean “categorization is science”—an obvious fallacy since we can create any number of nonsensical ways to organize information.
Textbooks typically present several chapters discussing the brain and mental health. But the research is presented in a factually misleading way. They may used brain scans to illustrate their points. But brain scans show correlation, not causation. When we think, feel, move, speak, or emote, it will show as brain activity on functional imaging (not to be confused with neurological diagnosis). The brain is simply processing the information of the mind. “Scientists” propose certain theories as to what they’re observing, how it might be disordered, then categorize it according to their arbitrary rules.
They leap to the reductionist, cause-and-effect conclusion that the disordered brain is “causing” one’s autism, depression, anxiety, attention issues, etc. Yet they simply have no empirical evidence to back it up.
Again, text books often speak in absolutes. Autism IS a disorder. Depression IS caused by chemical imbalance. They leave no room for discussion. Divergences are presented as concrete disorders. Students are not permitted to question the idea, for example, that antidepressants correct a “chemical imbalance” by increasing serotonin. They may not stray from orthodoxy to a realization that, in fact, some antidepressants increase serotonin, some decrease it, and some don’t target it at all. These facts nullify the “chemical imbalance” theory. Then what?
As time goes on, such inaccuracies make their way into the public domain as virtual truisms. You’re left with the undeniable truth that psychology textbooks don’t educate, they indoctrinate. The “establishment” has certain goals in mind and they will indoctrinate the next generation of practitioners in order to assure certain outcomes. From statins to stimulants, when big Pharma comes up with a lab test for some new “condition,” they quickly follow up with the “treatment.”
It’s no different with autism. “Treatments” are a multi-billion dollar industry.
There has to be another way …
Thankfully, there is.
I’ve been contacted to write a textbook on what we call autism for a college-level Disability Studies collection.
Here’s what I proposed:
Title: No Place for Autism? Exploring the Solitary Forager Hypothesis of Autism in light of Place Identity.
Abstract: Guided from a lived experience point of view, No Place for Autism explores how what we consider to be autism can vary from place to place. Is it a disability? If it is a disability, what is the better model for which to frame the authentic autistic experience: the medical model, the social model, or the Ecological-Enactive model of disability? If it is simply a difference in the human experience, what about structural supports and accommodations? The answers might surprise you.
Working from the premise that the autistic system is the result of 50k years of natural selection, the author posits that the autistic system works as designed, then unpacks the design in a highly detailed fashion; diving deep into questions of autistic identity across time and place. Noting that autism as both a set of traits and an identity, implications of this design-centric approach are given from the standpoint place. That is to say, are there places and spaces where one might feel more or less disabled? If so, why … and what can be done to give place for autistic people and autistic communities?
To my eternal surprise, the publisher accepted my proposal!
This certainly won’t be my first book. I’ve published several. But this will be my first college text book. And, more importantly, it represents what I hope will be a turning point in the War Against the Weak. It’s time that those of us who can, do take the time and effort to reframe the narrative and discussion - to take charge of our shared identity - to take it away from big Pharma and the eugenicists.
I’ll update you as it progresses to publication. The draft is due in the late fall.
Let me know what you think in the comments below. And thanks again for reading today.