8/3/2019 The Advocate Love Autism is a World

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OPINION

 April 11, 20074

Titan Editorial  Providing insight, analysis and perspective since 1960 

Damn at DNA 

 The AdvocateBY Robert Moran

Being autistic, the world re-volves around me. I say that tobe understood, not to use my disability as a crutch or to blameif for who I am or can still be.I make personal choices and amresponsible for my actions andattitudes. No matter what thechallenges in life are, they canbe overcome.

Ever since I started workingat the Daily Titan, I have begunto learn what camaraderie is and what teamwork is.

  We autistics are people thatspend a lot of time by ourselves.is is mostly due to shame andembarrassment caused by teas-ing and ridicule at an early agebecause our social skills havebeen delayed or impaired

One thing we need to realizeis that we are not the center of the universe. But on the otherhand, those we work and social-ize with need to understand thatthese behaviors, while causedin part by our disability and by people that we have previously known, are not caused by you. We are also working hard, try-

ing to unlearn these behaviors.  A friend once told me that

life is about perceptions. If we,as people with Asperger’s, view people as our enemies, they willbe our enemies. at also appliesto people who are not disabled.If we let our perceptions get thebest of us, no matter if they arebased on ethnic, religious, cul-tural, behavioral or appearance, we become truly disabled.

Still, considering the roots of 

the word autism, our self-cen-tered way of thought is under-standable but not excusable.

 Autism can be broken downinto the prefix “auto” and thesuffix “ism”. “Auto” is definedas self while “ism” means “thestate or quality of being like.” Inother words autism means theself-state.

I sometimes feel that this self-state is a world where we don’tfollow the rules of proper be-havior.

Teamwork and camaraderieare rules that everyone must fol-low. e need to be the shiningstar is not conducive to theserules. It can lead to conflict andto the false perception that weare arrogant and uncooperative.

Since people who are autistichave so much attention devotedto them throughout their life,the adjustment to the real worldis difficult for those who do ven-ture outside their doors and out-side themselves.

Many people have asked  where my impairment lies. Itlies in one simple phrase: Au-

tism is a world.My suggestion to the friends

and co-workers of people whohave Asperger’s is to be patient  with us. Be cognizant of thefact that we are trying to learn toadapt to the rules of your world.Don’t react to us with the scornand disdain that is common inyour world.

e best defense for those of us with Asperger’s/autism is theother people around us.

 Autism is a World

Robert Moran writes a weekly column on life as a disabled student living with Asperger’s Syndrome. He is available to answer all questions  for those interested in. Email him at opinion@dailytitan.com

BY CHRISTINA SUAREZ

Daily Titan Freelance Writer opinion@dailytitan.com

Why is it that everyone on planet

earth seems to have an Apple iPod? All of my friends have them andeven most of my professors, yet I donot. People think I am absolutely crazy when I tell them I don’t havean iPod.

ey ask me, “Why?” ey ask me how I listen to music if I don’thave an iPod? As if the iPod createdmusic!

 While standing in line on campusto get food one day, I looked aroundand realized I was the only one with-out ear buds in my e ars and an iPodin my hand. I felt like I was an out-sider because I was not following thetrend. A girl standing in line behindme was humming away to a tune. A guy in front of me was standingthere with no emotion listening tohis iPod. It was there in line that Irealized we have become the “iPodgeneration.” But I am not a part of this generation and it is my own de-cision.

I refuse to become so addicted to

a device.One of my nearest and dearest

friends has to have her iPod with her24 hours a day, seven days a wee k orshe feels “incomplete.” She even hasto have it in class, on her desk or inher pocket, so she feels whole.

 What kind of a society have webecome if we are so dependent andaddicted to such devices?

In most of my classes the profes-sors are putting their lectures up onpodcasts. Lookout, there may bea big drop in attendance for many classes. Why do I need to go to class when I can just download the lectureonto my iPod?

Students, go to class.  An iPod cannot give us every-

thing.I think we should put down our

iPods for a minute and retreat back to the way life used to be beforethese things. Remember when westood in line on campus without thehumming and clicking of an iPod?

 An iPod does not complete youand you will not die if you do nothave it with you at all times.

is may sound surprising, butmusic exists outside of your iPod.Try and remember that thing in yourcar called a radio, it plays music too. When you start to feel incomplete without it, please do not forget thatyour iPod does not complete you!

 Are You Plugged In? We are a generation of iPod users, we’re losingourselves in the process.

So Anna Nicole Smith’sbaby’s daddy was unmasked asLarry Birkhead.

  Watching the whole pro-ceeding was a little like a re-verse Scooby Doo episode.Instead of meddling kids un-masking the Phantom Duck Hunter or what have you, ev-eryone wanted to be unveiledas Smith’s daughter’s father by that meddling DNA.

 And you know what?Big deal.Here’s a list of news stories

that got bumped off eveningnewscasts by the pressingquestion, “Which hanger-onhad the most virile sperm?”:

– e president of theUkraine dissolved the coun-try’s parliament.

– e Bush administrationmay have been using a privatee-mail system to illegally talk shop, sidestepping federal dis-closure laws.

– Prison guards in Guan-tanamo Bay are force-feeding

inmates to keep them aliveduring hunger strikes.

 We’re all a little used to me-dia circuses now. From Jackoto O.J., the media waves havebeen saturated with absolutefilth for long enough.

Even on 24-hour news net-  works, there’s only so muchtime in a day. When importantstories, ones that may have adirect impact on how you andI live, are being bumped off the air over incidental fluff like  who gets Anna Nicole’s kid,there’s something wrong.

 When the nation was ga-gaover the O.J. Simpson trial,the Rwandan genocide wasoccurring. e death of twopeople somehow trumped thedeath of millions.

is isn’t the public’s fault,but it falls to all of us to affectchange. Demand that mediacovers real news first and fore-most.

Don’t settle for reality Scoo-by Doo.