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Ugh.
Well, apparently closely-spaced second-born children are more likely to be on the spectrum than first-borns or those spaced further apart.
The comments are a morass of "FOOD COLORING! DOES ANYBODY REALLY KNOW ANY GRANDPAS WITH AUTISM???" (Hi, I do!) and "TV WATCHING! THAT STUDY WAS SOOOOOO WELL DONE!" (No, it wasn't!) and "OMG, VACCINATIONS, BIG CONSPIRACY!!! (Uh-huh, you keep saying that!) but this one takes the cake:
There was study conducted to understand the risk of autism based on genealogy. The researcher chose to examined Amish people since they live in a closed society. In case you didn't know, roughly 65% of Amish have the same surname. When they first came over, their were about 300 families. Since their lifestyle isn't that appealing they rarely get new blood. They try not to get closer than 3rd cousins, but still they all pretty close. This of course increases the chance of defects greatly. So reason dictates they would have a greater percentage of autistic children.
S/he goes on from there with the same-old, same-old "Oh, the Amish don't vaccinate and they don't have autism and it's so not a coincidence!" line.
To all this, I can only say the following:
A. Logic doesn't work like that.
B. Genetics doesn't work like that.
C. YOUR PREMISES ARE ALL WRONG! Why do people have this asinine idea that the Amish don't vaccinate, or that they don't have any autism? It's not because they bothered to look up the facts for themselves - you'll notice this person has no idea what study or researcher they're talking about. No, they just repeat the same old tired lines that were worn out the first day anybody ever said them. (And they weren't true then either.)
Oh, and she also goes "As you may know, Autism was unheard of prior to 1900 (right around vaccines were widely introduced). Though many would simply say that it existed but people were simply unable to spot it back then, riiiight. "
That doesn't even merit a response. I mean, I have a few (and they're longer than two words!), but she doesn't deserve the energy.
The comments are a morass of "FOOD COLORING! DOES ANYBODY REALLY KNOW ANY GRANDPAS WITH AUTISM???" (Hi, I do!) and "TV WATCHING! THAT STUDY WAS SOOOOOO WELL DONE!" (No, it wasn't!) and "OMG, VACCINATIONS, BIG CONSPIRACY!!! (Uh-huh, you keep saying that!) but this one takes the cake:
There was study conducted to understand the risk of autism based on genealogy. The researcher chose to examined Amish people since they live in a closed society. In case you didn't know, roughly 65% of Amish have the same surname. When they first came over, their were about 300 families. Since their lifestyle isn't that appealing they rarely get new blood. They try not to get closer than 3rd cousins, but still they all pretty close. This of course increases the chance of defects greatly. So reason dictates they would have a greater percentage of autistic children.
S/he goes on from there with the same-old, same-old "Oh, the Amish don't vaccinate and they don't have autism and it's so not a coincidence!" line.
To all this, I can only say the following:
A. Logic doesn't work like that.
B. Genetics doesn't work like that.
C. YOUR PREMISES ARE ALL WRONG! Why do people have this asinine idea that the Amish don't vaccinate, or that they don't have any autism? It's not because they bothered to look up the facts for themselves - you'll notice this person has no idea what study or researcher they're talking about. No, they just repeat the same old tired lines that were worn out the first day anybody ever said them. (And they weren't true then either.)
Oh, and she also goes "As you may know, Autism was unheard of prior to 1900 (right around vaccines were widely introduced). Though many would simply say that it existed but people were simply unable to spot it back then, riiiight. "
That doesn't even merit a response. I mean, I have a few (and they're longer than two words!), but she doesn't deserve the energy.
Re: The Amish
Of course, the differences re: Autism in the Amish community couldn't have anything to do with the fact that they eat almost exclusively local, or that they're a genetically different population from the rest of the Western world, or that their use of other technologies that could be contributing factors is far, far more limited than ours.
*facepalm*
Oh, also, the same surname doesn't necessarily mean two people are closely related. Names like Schlabah and Yoder are more or less the Amish equivalent of Smith and Johnson.
Re: The Amish
That's what I've heard as well... along with the fact that they're less likely to get their kids diagnosed. But that doesn't mean they don't have kids on the spectrum.
Of course, the differences re: Autism in the Amish community couldn't have anything to do with the fact that they eat almost exclusively local, or that they're a genetically different population from the rest of the Western world, or that their use of other technologies that could be contributing factors is far, far more limited than ours.
You're expecting the fools to understand something so basic as logic?