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Dear Bay Area autism families,
We wanted to let you know about an extraordinary, unprecedented lawsuit against a local family that could have profound implications for all of us affected by autism.
In June 2014, two Sunnyvale couples, whose homes on Arlington Court flanked a home occupied by a nine year-old autistic boy and his parents, sued the autism family in Santa Clara County Superior Court, alleging a smattering of incidents that had occurred sporadically over the span of about six years. The incidents sound much like those that happen with many autistic children, and include, for example, that the boy had entered a neighbor's garage, had taken a neighbor's banana, had sought out neighbors' sweets, had kicked a car (no damage), had tossed some objects over a fence, had pulled a child's hair and had on occasion kicked at people (no injuries), and had tossed a bicycle helmet. The boy was between 3 and 9 years of age, and weighed less than 60 pounds, at the time of these alleged actions.
To us, as autism parents, caregivers, and professionals, the alleged incidents seemed relatively unremarkable, a series of minor impulsive acts of a small boy with a significant neurodevelopmental disability, resulting in little, if any, measurable damage. Indeed, no actual damages to property or person are alleged in the Complaint. Moreover, the alleged acts were not so different from those often seen in rough-and-tumble neurotypical boys his age.
Comment: An interesting justification. So let us get this straight, to "protect some human's liberty" a pig has to be shot in the head just to see which way the blood "spatters". And this relates to a human being how exactly? But perhaps this forensic science manager is referring to a pig-headed human? Otherwise, what kind of court would accept evidence in the form of the claim that the spatter pattern made by a bullet fired into a human head was identical to that made by a bullet fired into a pig head?
If this is the level of development of human science, then it barely reaches beyond that of the hypothetical 'science' that a group of pigs could plausibly conjure up.
But progress is always possible, and perhaps in some Utopian future time we will see such advances in human civilization and scientific knowledge that human subjects will used in this way, rather than pigs. At the very least, we look forward to the day when human cadavers might be temporarily revitalized, perhaps with a pig blood transfusion, for just such a purpose. Surely that would be more humane (if somewhat less considerate of human sensitivities) all the way round and at least put on the first rung of the ladder leading towards real civilized behavior.
Whatever the case, human beings better hope that they really are the 'top of the food chain', because if we aren't, we can be sure that those 'above' us are treating us with exactly the same level of cruel indifference as we extend to defenseless animals.
In case you ever wondered...