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Yes it's involuntary. But autistic kids can become less reactive with a lot of therapy and interventions.
Which ideally would start very early in life. I find it hard to believe a child gets to be 10 years old without a diagnosis. Ten years is a lot of time ignoring or accepting instead of acting and helping. Unless the parents are uncaring, or have an untreated mental illness or addictions of their own. This is not uncommon at all.
Once destructive and harmful behavior is repeatedly practiced and not redirected through the development years, for some there's really no going back to learning how to fit into society on their own. Now who pays?
Back in my day, kids like that were institutionalized. Why is there anything wrong with that? If they can't operate in society without being drugged to the hilt, they need to live in a specialized place. They simply can't function in a normal atmosphere. If parents are going to insist on calling their kids "special", they need to put them in a "special" place where they won't disrupt the normal flow of life.
This is one reason I'm grateful I'm in my 20s. I was a pretty rowdy kid in early childhood (never violent, but I was disruptive when bored, wouldn't do things I was asked to do without a "good reason", etc), and was diagnosed with and treated for ADD. I grew out of it naturally a few years later, and I'm doing just fine as an adult today.
But in the 50s, I suppose I'd have ended up tossed in the madhouse at 5 years old and given a lobotomy.
This is one reason I'm grateful I'm in my 20s. I was a pretty rowdy kid in early childhood, and was diagnosed with and treated for ADD. I grew out of it naturally a few years later, and I'm doing just fine as an adult today.
But in the 50s, I suppose I'd have ended up tossed in the madhouse at 5 years old and given a lobotomy.
Nope. Not if you had parents who had a clue. You may have been awarded to foster parents if that was not the case. There were no 'madhouses and lobotomies' for rowdy 5 year-olds, even in the 50's. Mental illnes isn't something one just 'grows out of' big difference.
While I do understand that autism has many characteristics and that acting out is one of them, the question I have is, doesn't the teacher deserve a safe work environment? What's going to happen when this kid is an adult and he's doing the same thing? Let's say worst case scenario, he ends up killing someone as an adult. Unlikely I know, but what do we do then? Do we still allow autism to be used as a reason? Arresting him may or may not have been a good idea, I'm not taking a position on that, but what is going to happen when he's older? There are rules in society and everyone does need to follow them. There are plenty of unanswered questions going on here.
While I do understand that autism has many characteristics and that acting out is one of them, the question I have is, doesn't the teacher deserve a safe work environment? What's going to happen when this kid is an adult and he's doing the same thing? Let's say worst case scenario, he ends up killing someone as an adult. Unlikely I know, but what do we do then? Do we still allow autism to be used as a reason? Arresting him may or may not have been a good idea, I'm not taking a position on that, but what is going to happen when he's older? There are rules in society and everyone does need to follow them. There are plenty of unanswered questions going on here.
Mentally ill people are not held accountable for their criminal actions.
If the story as related is true, it's outrageous. I'm not inclined to jump aboard the outrage wagon, though, since there are some inconsistencies in the story, and since the entire narrative is coming from the mother - the school and the kid's docs legally can't talk, and the police haven't talked. While I can't think of many circumstances that would warrant a kid spending overnight in jail, I do think there's probably a lot more to this story.
I'm pretty sure something happens if someone does something like kill someone.
State hospital. Attempted murder? No, nothing. They get taken care of for the rest of their life by the state. You may have a predator living on you block, they have been convicted of nothing, so you don't get the privilege of knowing.
Which ideally would start very early in life. I find it hard to believe a child gets to be 10 years old without a diagnosis. Ten years is a lot of time ignoring or accepting instead of acting and helping. Unless the parents are uncaring, or have an untreated mental illness or addictions of their own. This is not uncommon at all.
Once destructive and harmful behavior is repeatedly practiced and not redirected through the development years, for some there's really no going back to learning how to fit into society on their own. Now who pays?
As I mentioned upthread, Florida has a shortage of behavior analysts. There aren't enough in the schools or in the community. Even people who are caring might not have the resources to go to the bigger cities for treatment if they are in more rural areas as this child was. The rural areas have it the absolute worst.
It's only been fairly recently that behavior analysis has been accepted for treatment payment (under the ACA) for insurance and in FL, Medicaid also just picked it up in around 2011 or so as not being "experimental". However, the rates are now just being increased to try to help the severe shortage for people who might not be able to get therapy through private insurance.
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