Âûtistic News Feed

04/09/2025

Alligator Alcatraz is closed, but Robert Farqhym Kennedy Jr can be deported to Hell.

As national medical, scientific, public health and patient organizations, we call for the resignation of HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to ensure the health of the American people.   

29/08/2025

Send a message to learn more

27/08/2025

The dictatorship in the USA has weaponised ignorance and conspiracy manufacturing to such a degree that they are taking progress back 40 years, leaving all autistics exposed to quackery, coercion, punishment, hate. The world would be so much better-off without these fascist monsters.

27/08/2025

AAC FOR ANDROID DEVICES

An introduction on striving for a no-pay start

----- also ask at

If you have any questions more than the most basic-of-basic, please ask them in a FB group called
"Ask Me, I’m an AAC user! (24 Hour Rule!)" at
https://www.facebook.com/groups/456220758119314

First join. Await approval. Respect rules about only AAC users to comment for first 24 hours. SEARCH on 'Android' before asking your question - if still largely unanswered.

----- major complexities to consider

Some will select from visuals, selecting pictures.
Some will select from words, tapping sentences/phrases.
Some will select from letters, typing words/sentences.
Some will choose a mix of these.

Each AAC will have strengths and weaknesses in relation to the autistic's choice or their personal mix of choices.

----- secondary complexities to consider

Availability of languages
Customizability
Growth/Scalability with ages/stages over years
Commitment to development by maker
Intuitiveness/Predictionality
Voice availability/authenticity/age-appropriateness
Range of symbol sets
Touch-screen usability

----- quick intro for android users

Speech Assistant AAC - customizable, free basic version, best place to start for text

----- next level recommendations

Spoken - free version
My Voice - build-your-own, no pre-made sentences, use Google Speech pack also, free basic, cheap full version
Choard - lightweight stop-gap app
LetMeTalk - pic-based, free
JABtalk - older, free
CoughDrop - free trial, problematic, clunky, slow, yet has fans
TypingTalk - free, mainly text, autistic-made
Weave Chat - symbols, free
Asterix - grid format
Tell Me - [no comments yet]
Vocable - [no comments yet]
Emergency Chat - [niche]

----- pay-to-use recommendations

Avaz - customizable, quick phrases, costs
TouchChat - customizable boards, predictive, costs
TalkTablePRO - costs
oice4uAAC - [no comments yet]
TD Snap - [no comments yet]

----- mentioned in passing

NaturalReader
Acapela TTS Voices - download more suitable voices for some Apps
Predictable - [no comments yet]
Vocable - has head-tracking (tracks one's nose in this case)

----- warning

My recommendations above are dependent on ages/stages and all-important AAC-method choices of individuals.

My recommendations are from a small group of just 60 AAC users and AAC-iser parents at Kotiri/Coterie. Much much bigger groups give better and broader advice.

My recommendations STOP at 13 January 2023. Advice elsewhere will inevitably be more current.

Ask me to correct or add-to anything in this document.

~ ʎllɐǝɹƃ uɥoɾ

26/08/2025

Please sign and share far and wide! Thank you :-)

26/08/2025

Lexi Jones, artist, 25, autistic daughter of David Bowie, shares an oftentimes-heard message regarding late discovery of being autistic, of past masking, of gaining self-knowledge, of relief.

For those unaware - being autistic is a natural valid equal human way of being, one that is 100% genetic/genomic in nature.

Art works: https://www.alexandriazahrajones.com/

Article: https://evoke.ie/2025/08/25/entertainment/david-bowie-daughter-autism

25/08/2025

There is an increasing focus on research exploring autistic communication and community. In this review, we systematically collate and analyse how autistic adul...

23/08/2025

The phrase “challenging behaviour” was invented nearly 40 years ago, in 1987, in a King’s Fund Centre report. Only two editors were named. The true authors were never made public. No disabled voices were credited.

And yet this "UK-made phrase", never recognized in the DSM or ICD was adopted into policy, training, and guidance worldwide.

Over time, it became a label pinned on children and adults. A tool to stigmatize. A justification for restraint, seclusion, and exclusion.

So the question isn’t just where did this phrase come from? It’s:
👉 Who created it?
👉 Who benefited from it?
👉 And why has it been allowed to shape decades of harm?

Since 2019, ICARS has been uncovering this history — mapping the UK entities, individuals, and networks behind the spread of this language, recovering out-of-print reports, analysing historic restraint training and ‘reduction’ manuals, and tracing how it shaped today’s culture of restraint and seclusion in education.

Our research shows how a phrase with no science behind it, no collaboration with the disability community, and no disabled expertise has become embedded in policy and practice — propping up the very systems tied to the Restraint Industrial Complex.