When the President and his top health officials stand in front of the nation and say that autism is destroying America and we must eradicate it and cure it, that’s eugenics. Because people with autism are people. People with families and jobs and hobbies and skills and talents. Not one word of the press conference where Tylenol was identified as the “cause” of autism acknowledged this. It was utterly dehumanizing.
And look, Tylenol doesn’t exactly have an unblemished past.
In 2013, This American Life and ProPublica put together a report about how a shocking number of people in the U.S. die of acetaminophen overdose. Listen to the podcast or read the report. The makers of Tylenol and the FDA don’t come out looking great to say the least.
Another bad look? The 1982 Tylenol murders, the subject of a recent Netflix documentary and examined by Gardiner Harris in his excellent book No More Tears: The Dark Secrets of Johnson & Johnson. While most people remember this case as a textbook example of corporate responsibility, it’s actually a story of corporate cover-up and law enforcement tunnel vision. The case is still unsolved.
Medicine’s long, sordid history offers many good reasons to be skeptical of pharmaceutical companies (this is especially true for Black people in the U.S.).
But that doesn’t mean we should believe the Trump Administration when it says Tylenol causes autism. Especially since they offered no evidence to back this claim up. None.
Trump stood before the press and told pregnant women that they should not take “Acedor… Well, let’s see how we say that. Acidum… minofen. Acetaminophen!” That they should just “fight like hell” not to take it and just “tough it out.” He said, over and over, that there’s “no downside” to not taking it.
Except for the fact that acetaminophen is the only thing pregnant women can take to relieve pain and bring down a fever. It’s considered safe by actual doctors and people with degrees in science and medicine. But Trump and RFK Jr. say it causes autism, so no more acetaminophen for preggos!
This announcement is problematic in so many ways. For one thing, it lays the blame for autism not just at the feet of Tylenol, but at the feet of women who selfishly took medicine recommended by their doctors instead of, like, just praying their pain away or something.
But the biggest problem is the framing that there’s nothing worse than being autistic. That it’s a disability worse than death.
This did not come out of nowhere.
RFK Jr. has been obsessed with autism for years. He sees it as so odious and undesirable that it turned him into an anti-vax crusader. He believes, despite the fact that there is no evidence, that vaccines cause autism. Using that logic, he thinks it’s better for children to get measles (“They won’t all die,” he essentially said) than for children to be autistic.
Back in April, Kennedy said, “Autism destroys families, and more importantly, it destroys our greatest resource, which is our children. These are children who should not be suffering like this. These are kids who will never pay taxes. They'll never hold a job. They'll never play baseball. They'll never write a poem. They'll never go out on a date. Many of them will never use a toilet unassisted.”
The majority of kids with autism will do all of the things he’s listed and more. Kennedy is describing a very small percentage of autistic kids with disabilities who will need support their entire lives. Many people felt like Kennedy was saying that their lives weren't worth living.
In additon, Trump has made it very clear that he sees people with disabilities as lesser, whether they were born that way or lost a limb while wearing a U.S. military uniform. And who could forget when he mocked Serge Kovaleski, a reporter with arthrogryposis?
This is dangerous. Dehumanization always is. It often sets the stage for violence and plays an important role in conditioning the public to support that violence or to at least ignore it.
Fascism thrives on fear. It depends on denigrating people outside the sphere of power. When it comes to the Trump regime, this includes people with autism, people with disabilities, LGBTQ people (with transgender people singled out for extra oppression), immigrants, asylum seekers, women, people who aren’t white, people who aren’t Christian, the poor, doctors, scientists, protestors, the courts any time they don’t rule in his favor, left-wing groups, teachers and college professors, college administrations, unions, anti-fascists (which Trump calls antifa even though it is not an organized group), liberals, Democrats, and no doubt more that I am missing.
When you add all of these people together, that’s a huge chunk of the country’s population. If everyone who Trump hates voted against Trump, he’d never win an election.
And yet, he did win an election. Two (2) of them.
There is no easy answer here, no magic pill. Not even Tylenol. But if you are one of the people wondering whether or not the U.S. has entered our fascism era, I can at least put that to rest. Yes.
But you’re not powerless here. One thing you can do is to make your support for the vulnerable groups Trump’s administration is targeting loud and clear. Do not assume people know where you stand. Do not assume the people around you share your views.
Neurotypical folks, make it clear that neurodivergence is a good thing, actually. Talk about how the administration’s myopic focus on rooting out autism, as if it’s some kind of plague, is messed up. How it’s dehumanizing. How it puts public health at risk by pushing anti-vax bullshit and ignoring real health threats.
Cis men who support transgender people: Say so. Write it on Facebook so your Aunt Linda—you know, the one who stocked up on horse dewormer during the height of Covid—sees it. Convey it to your fellow gym bros in between chugs of Muscle Milk. Start introducing yourself like, “Hi, I’m Chad and trans rights are human rights.”
Cis men also need to speak out about women’s rights. Disavow rape culture. Support reproductive freedom. Talk to women about their lived experience. Actually, no. Don’t talk. Listen to women talk about their lived experience. And believe them.
White people: for the love of all things holy, admit and acknowledge that racism is a real thing and causes real harm. Listen to Black people, FFS.
If you have any privilege under this system, use it to help the people who don’t. To be silent about dehumanization is to participate in it and to tacitly approve any violence that follows.
The bottom line: care about other people. Even when it’s hard. Especially when it’s hard.