Create the Hopelessness
These are some stills from NAA's "Escape the Hopelessness" Public (dis)Service Announcement. The whole feel of this video is sad and hopeless. In the end, even though the child does not get chelated, he turns into a flying insect, a butterfly or maybe it's a moth. There's nothing happy about this "story." It's quite creepy. Perhaps they don't want people thinking that there is anything good about autism because it would damage their legal case.
The audio includes the boy saying a few words and then the sound of flapping as the butterfly flies out of the frame.
"I thought I'd never escape."
____________
The following advice comes from the webpage that NAA created to spread the word that autism is hopelessness. It goes with the butterfly video, it is supposed to show how they can help your child fall out of his dark, cramped chrysalis-like cage, and turn in to a yellow butterfly with black spots, and accompanied by lots of flapping, take off. Flapping? Isn't that supposed to be a sign that the kid is still autistic?
Amy Holmes' study showed autistic kids had normal amounts of mercury in their hair and the normal kids had massive amounts of mercury in their hair, pointing to some kind of problem with contamination of the sample or a problem in the measurements, which were done by... Doctor's Data Inc. mail order lab.
Why in the world would they say that autistic kids should not be given most over the counter medications? Since when?
This video was supposed to be sent out to lots of television stations to be played during National (make everyone terriified of) Autism Month. The accompanying bad advice was supposed to make it easy for mercury parents to share the "basics" of autism quack medicine with parents who might not know that their child is autistic. There are instructions on how to do a sort of family intervention where you sit down with a neighbor couple and break it to them that you think their kid is autistic or mercury poisoned or something.
Autism Diva
metamorphose
The audio includes the boy saying a few words and then the sound of flapping as the butterfly flies out of the frame.
"Once upon a time..."
"I opened a door of darkness"
"I thought I'd never escape."
"ESCAPE THE HOPELESSNESS" CAMPAIGN
...
So many parents experience it everyday: hopelessness. It can come from being told that their child will not progress. It can come from being overwhelmed. It can come from being confused. So many things...
That's why we need your help. The National Autism Association is offering a high-definition and state-of-the-art ESCAPE THE HOPELESSNESS Public Service Announcement designed to spread the message of HOPE, while providing a place to
gather information.
The following advice comes from the webpage that NAA created to spread the word that autism is hopelessness. It goes with the butterfly video, it is supposed to show how they can help your child fall out of his dark, cramped chrysalis-like cage, and turn in to a yellow butterfly with black spots, and accompanied by lots of flapping, take off. Flapping? Isn't that supposed to be a sign that the kid is still autistic?
1.) Find a doctor ... who has recovered children with autism. ...
Your [child's] doctors do not have to be located in the same city or even the same state. .... Conference calls, emails, instant messaging, and faxes facilitate real-time communication.
Work with a variety of professionals including allopathic, naturopathic, chiropractic, Ayurvedic, homeopathic and Traditional Chinese Medicine practitioners. For instance, children with autism should not take most over-the-counter medicines. Instead homeopathic remedies can be safely used to treat all the cuts, scraps, coughs, insect bites and other minor maladies our children are susceptible to. Ayurvedic and Traditional Chinese Medicine botanicals are marvelous for treating fevers, yeast, and parasites. Many chiropractors are trained in cranial sacral therapy, a form of manipulation which has been very helpful for many children with autism.
Vitamin Diagnostics is a good lab for testing for deficiencies in vitamins, minerals, essential fatty acids, amino acids, and neurotransmitters as well as testing for heavy metals and other problems associated with autism. ... Other good labs include Doctor's Data, Immunosciences and Great Smokies.
...
A hair-sample study by Amy Holmes, MD found strikingly lower levels of mercury in the hair of children with autism than neurotypical children. Dr. Holmes collected samples of baby hair, the first haircut, of 43 boys with autism and 14 neurotypical boys
Amy Holmes' study showed autistic kids had normal amounts of mercury in their hair and the normal kids had massive amounts of mercury in their hair, pointing to some kind of problem with contamination of the sample or a problem in the measurements, which were done by... Doctor's Data Inc. mail order lab.
Why in the world would they say that autistic kids should not be given most over the counter medications? Since when?
This video was supposed to be sent out to lots of television stations to be played during National (make everyone terriified of) Autism Month. The accompanying bad advice was supposed to make it easy for mercury parents to share the "basics" of autism quack medicine with parents who might not know that their child is autistic. There are instructions on how to do a sort of family intervention where you sit down with a neighbor couple and break it to them that you think their kid is autistic or mercury poisoned or something.
Autism Diva
metamorphose
posted by Autism Diva at 8:15 PM
21 Comments:
How (un)helpful... I hope my friends and family don't see this on TV.
Yeesh...I saw that ad earlier today, posted to a community elsewhere online. My first thought on seeing it was, "Eh? So, we're supposed to go from being autistic to being half-insect mutants?"
Anne Geddes meets Edward Scissorhands or something else from Tim Burton?
Hello, Kafka? This makes my skin crawl. How dare they? Also, where do they get the money to make an ad? Is anyone making an ad for our side?
I, for one, do not want my son(s), autistic or not, to morph into anything except their best selves. I'd like to morph into my best self, too, while we're at it.
In Hi-Def too. Did they hire Industrial Light and Magic for that spot? Bizarre!
Where is the giant Bradstreet near-IR buglight waiting to zap the unwary moth who flies in close to the DAN! clinic to investigate the sparkling brochure?
Susan,
As to where they get their money...I think three things are in play.
1. There are some well-off people within the autism-mercury crowd. J.B. Handley's a partner in a VC firm. Sallie Bernard owns a marketing company. Mark Blaxill's some kind of executive as well.
2. They've convinced celebrities that there's some kind of connection between autism and mercury - or at the very least convinced them that autism is a hellish abyss that needs curing. (without, of course, identifying a cure that actually works) I'm sure the Doug Fluties and Don Imuses of the world contribute nicely to these organization.
3. I'm sure plenty of the quacks and lawyers contribute as well - gotta keep people convinced that there's an epidemic of autism in order to drum up business.
If I remember reading something about the NAA and SafeMinds' tax forms a while back, they generate about 300-500K a year. They're tax-exempt organizations (which is kinda odd since SafeMinds especially does a lot of political lobbying which is NOT tax-exempt) which means they're keeping the lion's share of it. I believe they spend a considerably amount of their money on "educational" materials like these.
It'd be interesting to see their tax forms (which are publicly available since these organizations are non-profits) for the coming year to see how their donations have risen/decreased in 2005.
Here's the breakdown from my nephew (who used to work for Industrial Light and Magic and is currently working on Spiderman 3)
I asked him what he figured it cost to make - he gives a good breakdown on what it would take - if done on a shoestring, and what he figured it cost to make:
"First off, let me say that it looks pretty slick. Not very
cheap.
I think this would've taken a crew of 10-20 poeple a month
to do, from conception to completion.
We both took a look at it, and we really don't know how much it
would cost.
We can tell you what they did, and how.
But we guess that it would be 20-30 thousand?
We're artists, not accountants, unfortunately.
Let me break it down:
We figure you could do it in your basement, with actors you know, for almost nothing. It'd take a bunch of time with limited amounts of people.
You'd want to storyboard it first to keep the experimentation cheap! The best way is pencil on paper. Comic-book style!
That'll tell you
what you're going to shoot before you rent/buy actors, directors, costumes, computers etc.
You'd need a good quality digital video camera, and some kind of stage with a green screen so you can extract the actor with a clear outline so you can layer him in that surreal background, which looks
like a matte painting or a model set. Which you'd also have create.
It'd take 1 day to shoot the actor we figure.
Then you'd have to get your personal computer gassed up and raring to go,
You'd have to model the the tree, cacoon, the butterfly wings.
After that you'd need to colour them so they look pretty and realistic so
they all blend in together.
Then you'd need to create a matchmove where you create a 3d
version of the set and actor. Lots of people use a 3-d animation software called "Maya", Basicly
re-creating what you filmed, in the computer. That way you can animate the tree and cacoon shaking before
he comes out and then track and animate the buttefly wings
onto his back.
Then you render out those elements
the tree and cacoon shaking and breaking open (without the
actor) and the butterfly wings (without the actor)
You'd want to get a compositing program called "Shake" so you
can put all the peices together.
You'd take your background and put that down first then put in
the tree/cacoon elements in next.
then add the butterfly wings down next and lay the kid on top of
that so they are behind him, stuck on his back.
The only tricky part is when he jumps/falls out of the cacoon.
For that you'd have to do a bit of compositing to have him appear to break out of it (but "Shake" is built to do all those cool tricks!)
After that it's a simple step to add music, and edit the whole thing
together with titles and text (which you could also create in either
"Maya" or "Shake" or "Photoshaop"
and you're good to go!"
First, some of these people make me wonder if they're on acid. Now they make me wonder if they're reading Kafka under the influence.
The National Autism Association is offering a high-definition and state-of-the-art ESCAPE THE HOPELESSNESS Public Service Announcement designed to spread the message of HOPE
The message I got was: This looks like an awesome horror movie. When's it coming out?....oh. WHAT!?
Don't get me started on the NAA's "advice" that it's okay to have doctors not in the same state.
Ms Diva,
A Medscape article. Not scientific or even rigorous, but a gentle plea from a pediatrician on behalf of neurodiversity.
http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/529208?src=mp
Someone pointed out on another blog that there are some sort of grunting sounds of struggle that are supposed to be coming from inside the cocoon and the cocoon shakes as the child supposedly inside bumps around in there... then a foot sticks out the side and is pulled back in, then the kid falls out the bottom of the cocoon. He then stands up gracefully and walks ballerina style to the center of the frame.
I heard they were going to go with this but the test audience said it was too bright and cheery.
Just looking at the stills there gives me the creeps. That black background, the insect wings, all of it... argghhh! Oh, I may have figured out how to leave a comment here! I think it has to do with turning on the cookie acceptor in my browser.
It's absolutely disgusting. It's not only creepy, but juvenile and just plain stupid.
Good title, Diva, for this post. It says everything.
amazing the deliberate lack of understanding ...
i can't begin to tell you what this imagery makes us feel personally. it's like a living blasphemy.
i have read all your mercury & chelation myth articles .. these people are giving a bad rep to alternative and herbal medicine and even vitamins.
but anything to put us through the sausage grinder ... have us come out all exactly alike ...
astraea^jason
It's creepy, silly and insulting.
But perhaps the little boy enjoys pretending to be a butterfly ;-)
My happy little autistic son loves dressing up as a knight, cat, princess, angel, butterfly, you name it! Then he flaps and jumps about as much as he likes.
O.k. that was too freaking weird! Creepy freaking weird.
emily-
I can totally relate! My son loves to dress as a 'pretty princess' much to his dad's horror. After Eli dressed as a princess at one of the neighborhood potlucks, my husband went out and bought plastic army men, power rangers toy, batman, etc. I cracked up and said, "So. How much did it cost to reinforce our son's heterosexuality?"
Funny thing is, one of my best friends, a wonderful gay man, stated that HE had played with plastic army men as a child.
Eli also loves bugs and will pretend to be a 'beautiful butterfly', a cricket, praying mantis, whatever.
Regardless--the ad is completely out of line and can only do more harm than good. What is with these people?
It's funny that "the experts" say that autistic kids can't do pretend play. Dr. Gernsbacher's case study describes a little autistic boy who is taken to a daycare-preschool and dropped off. He takes his Bert and Ernie dolls with him. The staff take them away from him for some reason. The little boy goes and picks up a yellow marker pen and an orange one and carries them around and makes them "walk" like little people.
Bert and Ernie in case you don't remember what they look like.
I never got around to saying...
I always liked caterpillars better than butterflies. I have a "thing" about butterflies (I really like them for motifs and stuff), but caterpillars are way cooler in real life! :) (Talking here about actual caterpillars and butterflies, not about autistic children in weird ad campaigns.)
notmercury: That sh-t was too funny!
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