On July 16, the No. 3 syndicated radio talk show host in the country, Michael Savage, made the following statement on autism:
"Now, you want me to tell you my opinion on autism? ... A fraud, a racket."
Savage went on to say:
"Now, the illness du jour is autism. You know what autism is? I'll tell you what autism is. In 99 percent of the cases, it's a brat who hasn't been told to cut the act out. That's what autism is.
What do you mean they scream and they're silent? They don't have a father around to tell them, 'Don't act like a moron. You'll get nowhere in life. Stop acting like a putz. Straighten up. Act like a man. Don't sit there crying and screaming, idiot.'"
OK, so it's not exactly a stretch- and certainly not a state secret- to assert that Michael Savage is an asshole, a blowhard, and a world-class DUMB@$$. How this knuckle-dragging troglodyte still retains his radio gig is something that defies rational explanation. If you or I were to be as agressively mean-spirited and gratuitously hurtful as Savage, we'd be out on our butts...and deservedly so. Savage? Well, the more outrageous he is, the more his drooling band of sycophants seem drawn to his perceived (and self-proclaimed) brilliance.
I don't know enough about autism to offer a reasoned and dispassionate rebuttal to Savage. What I do know is that the man's public persona is that of an asshole. Perhaps if he spent some time walking in the shoes of a parent trying to raise an autistic child, he'd have a better idea of what he's talking about. If Savage seriously thinks that autistic children are somehow playacting...well, he's even more astonishingly ignorant than I'd given him credit for.
Unbelievable....