Quote: WaaksianSee, I can understand why you may think that, but take it from me. I grew up with a brother who was diagnosed with severe autism, so I'm very familiar with the way people with that disability behave. I can spot it from yards away, and I know how to interact with people who have it.
But when I went to high school, I realized that it wasn't the case with everyone. There was a special needs class that my brother when to in the same school as me. And when I heard some of the other students talk about these kids, they talked about how strange and unnerving their behavior was to them. Like, "Oh, this autistic kid kept making the same weird noise across the hallway," and, "Oh, this autistic kid took his pants all the way down in the bathroom when I was a freshman, and it freaked me out, and I thought, 'This isn't a normal school!'"
So it occurred to me that not everyone knows why autistic people act the way they do, or that they even exist at all, until they meet one and are completely thrown off. I was normalized to autism, but a lot of other people aren't. So having an autistic character in a children's show can help normalize the existence of people with autism. This clip showed that, despite the differences, you can still play and interact with them, even though you probably can't the same way as you can other kids. It'll teach them that you don't have to avoid them out of fear of the unknown, because now they know how to be around them.
Am I making sense, or am I just rambling now?
No, you're making sense and it's a good endeavor, but my point was that this isn't going to have the desired effect.
I just don't think that a muppet is ever going to provide people with enough anecdotal evidence to form an opinion on autistic people. Especially to a young enough person (the age of the supposed target audience of Sesame Street is about 3 years?) that they won't understand what they see without someone making sense out of it for them.
That's why I think Julia was created to please certain adults. Essentially, she's a character that was made in an attempt to
represent autism, and only people older than kids will acknowledge it and see it that way.
I also can't believe that the change was an entirely altruistic one. For all I know it might as well be an attempt to appeal to people's sensibilities in order to increase sales.
I did also say that I don't mind the change, as it's not really detrimental to the show or anybody's well being (I also don't really think about Sesame Street a lot in general), but I do think that it is a bit redundant. At the very least people seem to have unrealistic expectations on how much it will actually matter.
Quote: CAVI want to think it's a positive to show from early on that it's perfectly fine and acceptable even if they're just a little different. The alternative is that they don't know anything about it until they get older and see their parents see them refer to autistics as weirdos or, worse, go onto the internet and see autism used as the new "retard" (as in, a generic catch all insult to refer to someone seen as stupid).
See also LGBT groups. Yeah kids won't really give a **** at that age but it's still nice to further reinforce that it's ok, rather than let them not give a **** then, but then grow up around volatile people who insist it isn't.
Is it positive? Well.. Yeah? What I meant was that it won't really matter or change anything, so any positive impact it would have would be diminished greatly. The experiences that the kids will grow up to have will overrule whatever attitude they might have formed while watching Sesame Street.
That's not to say that this thing is bad. It's a noble attempt, even if it was just a marketing-thing. I just don't think it will do all that much.
Quote: HIRI understand the reasoning you guys are given, but I'm kind of in Samius's boat of "I'm not too sure about this." On the one hand I do think it's a good idea to introduce young TV viewers to the concept of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) since, along with ADHD, it is a neurodevelopmental disability that the average kid is likely to encounter at multiple points in their lifetime.
However, I think there are potential drawbacks to this. The first is, of course, the creation of a stereotype. Now of course this is just Sesame Street. But remember that there's already an extraordinarily popular CBS sitcom out there (not gonna mention names) with a main character that ticks off every checkbox on the ASD list. And I know for a fact that members of the Autism community (at least that I know) have gotten a fair amount of ribbing comparing them to said character... and not in a good way.
The other problem is that, for this gig to work, Sesame Street is anticipating the kid watching will have a parent/sibling/guardian/etc. who is accepting of the autism spectrum and can help explain things to the child. Sadly, not every kid will have something like that... so the intended effect could be lost. Or, worst case scenario, the adult encourages the kid to be antagonistic toward people with autism and the kid accepts it.
Hey, it can happen. It's TV, man. <.>;
And yeah, then there's this. Given that it can make an actual change, the "positive reinforcement"-part is still not automatic. It relies heavily on the attitudes of the people that the kids grow up around.
Therefore, you could argue that if a parent has a positive view on autism their kids will grow up accepting it regardless of what they see on TV (assuming that the subject is ever brought up, which -I will give it that- this new character at least guarantees to some extent).
Also, usually when people create characters to represent certain misunderstood identities, it doesn't really go as planned because they're already being used as a butt of numerous jokes. There is really no short-term fix for anything like that, and the more these things are pushed forward the more people will have enough of them.
Gems: 8226
Gems: 12119
Gems: 2156
![[User Posted Image]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/e/e7/Animal_(Muppet).jpg)
Gems: 9016
Gems: 9242
Gems: 4422
Gems: 10076
Gems: 1424
Gems: 2137
Gems: 2583
Gems: 2956
Gems: 5099
Gems: 6345
Gems: 4276
Gems: 4906
Gems: 5528
Gems: 6253
Gems: 4745
Gems: 4833
darkspyro
net