I read a piece by a noted skeptic on the recent article about spelling as communication. It's about what you would expect. I don't want to draw attention to it. But I do want to rant.

I've spoken about this before, but it bears repeating: the standard for communicative agency cannot lie in data points. It cannot lie in an unnatural testing environment, using a standardized test of agency, when we are dealing with heterogeneous communication disabilities.

What skeptics consistently fail to consider is practically anything outside of quantitative data found in scientific journals.

In their minds, nothing else matters.

So if a nonspeaking person has decades of interaction with thousands of people, including medical professionals and teachers, it doesn't matter.

If they have had dozens of different communication partners, and have a consistent voice across each of them, it doesn't matter.

If they have passed the equivalent of a message-passing test in real life (i.e., as simple as talking about what happened at school that day; something a parent couldn't have known), it doesn't matter.

If their behaviour has completely changed since being able to communicate their wants and needs, it doesn't matter.

Things like this should be obvious signs of agency, but they don't matter to skeptics. The only thing that matters is standardized testing.

To a skeptic, Larry Bissonnette can be an artist (which is why his Wikipedia page wasn't deleted), but he isn't able to communicate any thoughts about his art (which is why his Wikipedia page repeats that it is "claimed" he can communicate, rather than give him any agency.)

If you step outside the data points, concluding that *every* person is influenced at all times just does. not. make. sense.

If people were controlling every message, then how was it that FC facilitators were able to somehow predict discovery of motor challenges in autism?

If they were controlling every message, how is it that non-autistic communication partners are somehow able to describe what it's like to be autistic in great detail, in ways that are familiar to ME, as a speaking autistic?

How is it that alternative communication methods are capable of getting nonspeaking autistic people to sit still and point to letters to form entire sentences, long enough to *present at conferences* when behaviourists still have trouble getting them to sit and point to colours?

(Gee, it might just be because communicating as an included member of society is a lot more rewarding than being dispensed M&Ms for pointing to the right picture!)

Instead, it's easier for them to believe that hundreds of autistic people are happy to just sit and be cued to point at letters.

Skeptics completely ignore all of the benefits communication brings: accessing wants and needs, forming relationships, and controlling the narrative around one's personality.

They would rather believe that all of the people in nonspeaking autistics' lives have formed (sometimes decades-long) relationships with them based on an elaborate lie (despite being constantly reminded by skeptics that the data doesn't support them).

I keep getting asked, what would it take for me to change my mind about spelling and typing as communication.

It's impossible. It's ridiculous. It's like asking me what it would take to change my mind that non-autistics can learn to type.

And don't cry falsifiability. I could believe that *specific people* were being influenced. That's what's falsifiable.

But when it comes to ANY PERSON... a PERSON, not an inanimate object being manipulated... it's *ridiculous* to say every communication is fraudulent.

It's just that what has convinced *me* is impossible to capture in data points. And data points are apparently the only things that can convince skeptics.

The data points in the recent study should have been more convincing than they were.

We've captured nonspeaking autistics fixating on letters before pointing to them with the speed and accuracy of non-autistic typists. This is good data.

But skeptics are still coming back and claiming that cueing is possible. It's hilarious.

I've seen a fluent letterboard user in action in person, someone who has had years of practice. He's fast. The idea that he's being cued is, again, ridiculous.

People keep saying this, and skeptics are going to catch on eventually (I hope)... but at some point, you're going to have to acknowledge that, given actual context, it would be more impressive for someone to communicate solely through cueing than the truth of the matter.

The piece I read suggested that proponents work with their critics.

....why?

I mean, I understand why. In terms of science, it makes sense.

But you can understand why people wouldn't want to do that, right?

Laypeople don't realize this, but there are certain skeptics who have dedicated their entire professional lives to criticizing alternative communication methods.

They keep tabs on everyone involved with the methods. They show up to their events and report back on them.

If an autistic person who types or spells to communicate is doing a talk, they'll contact the people who are hosting and try to get them to cancel it, claiming that they're promoting dangerous pseudoscience.

...Even if the person is not talking about the method, but simply talking about being autistic! Or any other part of their lives!

Big skeptics have been hired for lawsuits so that any testimony given by someone who spells or types to communicate is dismissed out of hand.

Like, they're literally paid to do this. It's as big a conflict of interest as being someone who teaches spelling or typing.

...And why would the community want to collaborate with people like this?

People who see nonspeaking autistics living full lives of inclusion in the community and try to have them silenced?

Why would we believe that they're concerned about autistic people's well-being?

The most frustrating part about the existence of skeptics is how personhood just flies out of the picture.

All they can see is a person's behaviour and enforce their own interpretations of that behaviour.

They don't see that person's entire lived experience as a human being.

grumble grumble grumble

I'll move on now.

I've learned that it's far more rewarding to engage with nonspeaking people than it is to engage with skeptics who have a vested interest in nonspeaking = nonthinking (whether they believe they do or not).

There's actually a word for their flaw.

Scientism = "the characteristic inductive methods of the natural sciences are the only source of genuine factual knowledge and, in particular, that they alone can yield true knowledge about man and society"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientism