Autistic Quotes - Page 3

• I have no affinity for animals. I don’t hate animals and I would never hurt an animal; I just don’t actively care about them. When a coworker shows me cute pictures of her dog, I struggle to respond correctly, like an autistic person who has been taught to recognize human emotions from flash cards. In short, I am the worst.

  Tina Fey

  Cute, Dog, Hurt

  Tina Fey (2011). “Bossypants”, p.134, Hachette UK

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• A woman told me her child was autistic, and I thought she said artistic. So I said, 'Oh great. I'd like to see some of the things he's done.

  George Carlin

  Children, Done, Artistic

  George Carlin (1998). “Brain Droppings”, Hyperion

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• The blackness he woke to on those nights was sightless and impenetrable. A blackness to hurt your ears with listening. Often he had to get up. No sound but the wind in the trees. He rose and stood tottering in that cold autistic dark with his arms outheld for balance while the vestibular calculations in his skull cranked out their reckonings.

  Cormac McCarthy

  Hurt, Dark, Night

  Cormac McCarthy (2007). “The Road”, p.13, Vintage

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• In fact, there are autism clusters, you know, around some of the big tech centers. You take two socially awkward computer programmers and put them together, that can kind of concentrate the autistic genes.

  Temple Grandin

  Two, Autism, Awkward

  "Autism & animal welfare activist Temple Grandin". The Tavis Smiley Show, www.pbs.org. July 5, 2013.

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• In the 50s and 60s, kids were taught how to shake hands. They were taught how to have manners. There needs to be a lot more of that kind of stuff because the autistic mind doesn't pick up social things and subtle cues.

  Temple Grandin

  Kids, Hands, Mind

  "Autism & animal welfare activist Temple Grandin". "The Tavis Smiley Show", www.pbs.org. July 5, 2013.

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• You take somebody - one person has definitely got autism, you got another person that maybe has some of those traits and maybe there's some anxiety, depression, some epilepsy or something in the family history. Put them together, you're more likely to have a severely autistic kid than if you don't have any neurological problems in the family history.

  Temple Grandin

  Kids, Epilepsy, Autism

  "Autism & animal welfare activist Temple Grandin". "The Tavis Smiley Show", www.pbs.org. July 5, 2013.

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• My brother is severely autistic, so when I was a kid I spent a lot of time as a teenager in camps and programs for autistic kids. When I went to McGill as an undergraduate, I figured I'd be a therapist working with these kids. The truth is, and I knew this even back then, I'm just not good at this. I'm too empathic to do this sort of thing.

  Paul Bloom

  Brother, Teenager, Kids

  "Paul Bloom: The Trouble With Empathy". Interview with Allyson Kirkpatrick, www.guernicamag.com. February 1, 2016.

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• If a person calls themself 'autistic' and you tell them they have to use 'person first language'... you're not putting the person first.

  Stuart Duncan

  Use, Firsts, Language

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• I don't know of any neuropsychiatric disorder other than an infection that has been cured. But the goal is to improve the quality of life of people who experience autistic symptomology and I just think we will make progress on that.

  Gerald Fischbach

  Thinking, People, Goal

  "Big Think Panel Discussion on Autism". Interview with Susan Wilczynski, bigthink.com.

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• There's no doubt having an autistic child represents tremendous challenges for both the children and their parents, but in my experience, it has brought me closer to my family and has given me an appreciation for how the human brain develops and the uniqueness of each child it afflicts.

  Manny Alvarez

  Appreciation, Children, Parent

  Source: www.foxnews.com

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• Many autistic people have this ability to learn weird foreign languages, and I think I've heard of autistic Americans who have been obsessed [with] Icelandic and learned it and speak it fluently, and I've seen it done in interviews on television.

  Jon Gnarr

  Thinking, People, Done

  Source: therumpus.net

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• Basically when it comes to autistic kids and animals there's kind of three ways that they work, some of them are instant best buddies, they understand a cat, they understand a dog - they're best studies with it, they just know how to communicate with it. Then there's other kids that begin with a little bit of fear of the cat or the dog, but then they begin to like it and then there are other kids where you have a sensory problem - the cat meows and it hurts their ears, so they want to stay away from the cat because you never know when he might meow.

  Temple Grandin

  Dog, Hurt, Cat

  Interview with Jenny Dean, www.floppycats.com. May 23, 2012.

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• I don't define myself as autistic first. I don't want to be a professional autistic. I think it's important to have a real job.

  Temple Grandin

  Jobs, Real, Thinking

  Source: www.sfgate.com

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• We are convinced, then, that autistic people have their place in the organism of the social community. They fulfil their role well, perhaps better than anyone else could, and we are talking of people who as children had the greatest difficulties and caused untold worries to their care-givers.

  Hans Asperger

  Children, Talking, People

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• I think that autistic brains tend to be specialized brains. Autistic people tend to be less social. It takes a ton of processor space in the brain to have all the social circuits. I mean after all, the first stone spear was not designed by the totally social people.

  Temple Grandin

  Mean, Thinking, Space

  "Talk of the Nation" with Ira Flatow, www.npr.org. January 20, 2006.

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• Some autistic people have savant skills. All autistic people do not have savant skills. Autism is a very variable disorder varying all the way from Einstein, emollient scientist, just a little bit of the trait, many scientist and engineers, down to somebody that's going to remain nonverbal.

  Temple Grandin

  Skills, People, Autism

  "Talk of the Nation" with Ira Flatow, www.npr.org. January 20, 2006.

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• Some of the old diseases that we think are gone - case in point, measles - are back, now that somebody has spread around, in a very wicked way, the idea that these inoculations were making children autistic. Now we're getting outbreaks that are killing children. The end result is, if you create a population that lacks immunity, and diseases are still there, you're going to get outbreaks and you're going to get death.

  Margaret Atwood

  Children, Thinking, Ideas

  Source: www.macleans.ca

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• A lot of the moms of autistic kids I met are so consumed with being their child's advocate that there's no room for anything else - least of all themselves. It's why so many marriages end in divorce, when a child is diagnosed on the spectrum.

  Jodi Picoult

  Mom, Children, Kids

  Jodi Picoult (2010). “House Rules: A Novel”, p.593, Simon and Schuster

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• I both didn't know Owen [Suskind] beforehand and didn't have any connection to the autistic community. But Owen wasn't really a problem, because he participated in the writing of the book and wanted people to see him as he truly is. As far as the cameras, Owen lives in the moment and the cameras really didn't distract him.

  Roger Ross Williams

  Book, Writing, People

  Source: www.hollywoodchicago.com

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• Well the dog that is the most is the a Labrador retrievers because they tolerate kids tugging on them and things better than other dogs. They are a real good natured. They’re also real calm and sometimes when working with autistic children that’s probably more popular dog breed - now there are different ways to use service animals.

  Temple Grandin

  Dog, Children, Real

  Interview with Jenny Dean, www.floppycats.com. May 23, 2012.

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• There are three basic ways [to use a dog to work with autistic children], one is just to be companion person and I'm thinking now more of autistic kids not somebody in a wheelchair or the dog belongs to a therapist and then it's used as an ice breaker to get the kid talking and get the kid interacting.

  Temple Grandin

  Dog, Kids, Thinking

  "Interview with Dr. Temple Grandin" by Jenny Dean, www.floppycats.com. May 23, 2012.

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• There is three different ways that autistic kids will interact with animals.And they also need to make sure that they're not getting too rough with their animals - they need to learn how to pet the dog properly, they can't be pulling its ears and things like that.

  Temple Grandin

  Dog, Kids, Animal

  Source: www.floppycats.com

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• You try to sit down at approximately the same time every day. This is how you train your unconscious to kick in for you creatively. ... You put a piece of paper in the typewriter, or you turn on your computer and bring up the right file. ... You begin rocking, just a little at first, and then like a huge autistic child. ... Then your mental illnesses arrive at the desk like your sickest, most secretive relatives. And they pull up chairs in a semicircle around the computer, and they try to be quiet but you know they are there with their weird coppery breath, leering at you behind your back.

  Anne Lamott

  Children, Typewriters, Trying

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• Animals are like autistic savants. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that animals might actually be autistic savants. Animals have special talents normal people don't, the same way autistic people have special talents normal people don't; and at least some animals have special forms of genius normal people don't, the same way some autistic savants have special forms of genius. I think most of the time animal genius probably happens for the same reason autistic genius does: a difference in the brain autistic people share with animals.

  Temple Grandin

  Animal, Thinking, Differences

  Temple Grandin, Catherine Johnson (2009). “Animals in Translation: Using the Mysteries of Autism to Decode Animal Behavior”, p.8, SUNY Press

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• The autistic personality is an extreme variant of male intelligence.

  Hans Asperger

  Personality, Males, Extremes

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