Functioning Labels are Misleading and Divisive

A little cautionary point about identifying with the term 'Aspie'.

First of all, and most importantly, Hans Asperger - the paediatrician after whom 'Asperger Syndrome' was named - was a Nazi sympathiser who aided the child euthanasia programme. Invoking his name, applying it to oneself or to one's Autistic child, and linking it to Autistic experience, is not respectable. It's actually quite damaging.

On a medical/diagnostic note (if that's your thing), Asperger Syndrome was added to the DSM-IV in 1994 and was characterised as a pervasive developmental disorder.

A few years earlier in 1991, Uta Frith, developmental psychologist, translated Asperger's article, 'Autistic Childhood Psychopathy in Childhood (originally published in 1944),' from German to English.

As of 2013, following the publication of the DSM-V, within which individual pervasive developmental disorders now come under the umbrella term 'ASD', Aspergers Syndrome has been removed and is no longer an official diagnosis.

I have, however, come across several children in my professional life who have a DSM-V diagnosis of 'ASD' but with an Aspergers profile.

Finally, sub-typing autism based on one's verbal and intellectual capacities lends itself to the use of 'functioning labels'. The extent to which 'High Functioning Autism (an equally unhelpful, poorly defined and problematic term)' and 'Aspergers Syndrome' differ is up for debate. When it comes to speech development, individuals who were diagnosed with 'Asperger syndrome' acquired language skills generally without significant delay, unlike those with 'HFA' whose intellectual abilities were average to above average, like that of 'Asperger Syndrome', but whose acquisition of language MAY have been delayed.

The struggles of individuals in possession of an 'Asperger Syndrome' or 'High Functioning Autism' diagnosis, or individuals who identify as an 'Aspie', may either not be taken as seriously as those who are deemed 'low functioning', or are completely downplayed and overlooked on the basis more is expected from them. Their 'Autism' wasn't considered as 'severe' as those who were at the 'low-functioning' end of 'the spectrum'.

(Sincerest apologies for the hideous language I'm using.)

So, to recap: Functioning labels are misleading and divisive - if people use them, more sympathy and compassion are afforded to those at the 'low-functioning end of the spectrum', and more is expected from those at the 'high-functioning end of the spectrum'.

The term 'Aspie', on the other hand, is not only obsolete in medical and diagnostic terms, but the use of which is also a salute to an individual who was complicit in a Nazi regime.