The Citadel.

This September may be the first time in 8 years when I am no longer able to record my status anywhere as a student (at least officially anyhow) in that personally I have little hope of actually continuing my studies even if the PhD proposal I completed today and submitted is accepted.

Indeed for I would be banking on rather a lot to expect it will be, never mind that I am still way behind in the completion of my PGCert

So rejection will be my fate, some things are insurmountable.

It shouldn't matter, because I won't be the first, indeed there have to be thousands of us who are academically able who can't study, indeed thousands who don't have my abilities who should not be denied the right to study at the level that is right for them either.

Why does it matter?

Well it has been my objective, to give academia a kick up the backside too - for being too busy doing something about us without us. So that when I ceased to study those things I am most able at, in the realm of the senses, art, video, music etc. and turned to autism itself, I wanted to change the way that autism is taught about, to deconstruct the very writings and learning materials themselves to expose that they are not objective, that they do come from a perspective.

The day I yelled at Amaral not to use the cure word, I hope he got some sort of a message. It was not a scientific deconstruction of the work of MIND for sure, because that was even easier to accomplish than shouting at him, being as his methodology did not stand up to scrutiny any more than his obliviousness to the offence of his terminology.

However I would much prefer to challenge the ignorance, the 'para science' of these esteemed self perpetuating monarchs of the genre, on their own ground through the peer reviewed journals, but to do that I have to establish myself by the same standards, and that takes not only ability but serious money.

Yes sometimes credibility is the name of the game (unless your name is Geier that is), and it is something you have to earn playing by a set of rules that has you 'handicapped' in the old original sporting sense, from the outset.

If you google on my name, the para scientist Larry E Arnold is chasing my tail. I am in the wrong game for sure.

I have said in my DVD that beyond the so called Triad of Impairments, there is a sociological Triangle with autistic people at the base, parents on one side and academics/professionals on the other.

Now in the war of words, the talk about autism, the parents and professionals alike owe there right to speak on the subject to our existence, for if we were not, what would they have?

I am at the base so I can kick away at the two sides equally. Yes I have kicked at the patronising assumption that parents have as much right to this debate as we have, and yes I also kick at the ignorant assertion that the professionals and academics have any more rights than the parents to define the phenomenon of autism and how it should be studied.

Nothing about us without us. Dr Temple Grandin has her doctorate in Animal research. I want mine in Autism itself.