Why there is an Autistic Lives Matter Movement
Details: We are not trying to co op the Black Lives Matter Movement. We are trying to draw attention to our dead children, murdered, now gone from us. Because we have Autism. I want you to read about these children. About this underground, covered up tragedy and then I beg you, don’t look away. Don’t forget us!!
Name: Leslie Ramirez
Died: August 29, 2016. . Age at death: 3. Cause of death: Heat stroke. Location: Durham, North Carolina, USA. Details: Leslie was one of five siblings. They lived with their parents and grandmother. Leslie’s mother left her in the family van at 3 p.m. on a summer day. At 7 p.m., Leslie’s father returned home to find her still in the van four hours later. She was dead.
Name: Austin Anderson. Died: August 29, 2016. Age at death: 19. Cause of death: Medical neglect, exposure, dehydration. Location: Aldrich, Missouri, USA.
Details: In addition to autism, Austin was blind in both eyes and had adrenal insufficiency, so that he depended on steroid medication to replace the hormones normally produced by the adrenal glands.
Austin’s mother got high on meth and took him out to a field in the middle of nowhere. For two days, she withheld his food, water, and medication in the summer heat while Austin begged for her help and she refused to help him. He died from dehydration and from being refused the medication he needed to live.
His mother was charged with second-degree murder and abuse of an elderly or disabled person.
Name: Joseph Nathaniel “Joey” Weber. Died: August 18, 2016. Age at death: 36. Cause of death: Police shooting. Location: Hays, Kansas, USA.
Details: Joey Weber was an active member of his community. He was a church member and in the Knights of Columbus. Along with other people in New Age Services, a social group for people with disabilities, he worked at Joe Bob Outfitters.
Joey had a driver’s license and was out driving one day. He probably broke a traffic rule, because the police tried to stop him. But being stopped by the police was an unfamiliar situation Joey did not know how to handle. Luckily, he was on the same street as the New Age Services building. Confused and having trouble communicating, Joey drove down the street and toward the New Age Services building, where he knew he could get help.
However, police saw only a man who was refusing to obey their commands and driving away from their officers. They called for backup. When Joey arrived at the building and got out of his car, they shot him. At the time, Joey Weber was probably upset and confused, but he was unarmed.
His friends held a candlelight vigil for him. It was attended by over 100 people from his community. Name: Abdirahman Abdi. Died: July 24, 2016. Age at death: 37. Cause of death: Death in police custody; during beating/restraint. Location: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. Details:
Abdirahman was a Somali-Canadian Muslim. Along with his family, he had traveled to Canada as a refugee from Ethiopia in 2009.
Abdi kept to himself. He was shy, especially around women or people he didn’t know well. He had worked at a car wash, but lost the job when the business shut down.
On the day he died, Abdi went to a coffee shop he often visited. He approached a couple sitting at a table and began to talk to them, then reached out toward the woman to shake her hand. When she drew back, Abdi left, and she called the police, apparently unnerved by his odd behavior and thinking that Abdi had intended to assault her.
Police arrived and Abdi ran from them, trying to get home. They chased and caught him, using batons and pepper spray and beating him with fists and billy clubs. Abdi began begging, but he spoke in Somali and the police could not understand him and most likely did not care to listen even if they could have understood. A bystander tried to tell the police that Abdi was mentally disabled, not a criminal, but because he was also Somali, he translated the Somali “mentally ill” incorrectly and told the police officer that Abdi was “a crazy man”. What he had meant to say was that Abdi was only confused, not a criminal; the officer heard that Abdi was dangerous. Despite the bystanders’ attempts to help and Abdi’s pleading, the officers continued to hit him.
Abdi passed out from the beating after about ten minutes, and instead of administering first aid, the officers handcuffed him. Another ten minutes passed before they tried CPR, but Abdi was already dead. An ambulance was called to take his body to the hospital, leaving blood stains on the pavement.
Abdi’s probable autism was never publicly acknowledged because people from Somalia, where he comes from, often don’t openly talk about mental health. Socially awkward and disabled, he always greeted people with the exact same “Hi, how are you today?” He was polite and quiet. He was variously described as “mentally ill”, “mentally disabled”, and “autistic”.
Abdi’s Somali Muslim community has held vigils and protests and placed memorials to him. They report they have become more afraid of police since Abdi died.
“He was very nice, very peaceful,” a local shopkeeper said. “I think he will go to heaven.”
This is not even half of the story. My brothers and sisters and dying by the droves, by police, by siblings, by parents. And we feel so alone because nobody seems to care when we die. We have no voice, no cameras, no one wants to hear our story. When we hit the news, we are lucky if we get five minutes. We need you to read the stories. We need for you to see the faces of the dead. We fight for the right to breathe!!! TO LIVE!!!!
So no, we are not trying to take over or co op any movement. We are trying to survive in a world that is trying to kill us.
We are every nationality and are own are dying. I will not be silent and I will wake you up. Whatever the cost may be.