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Hostile environment to autistic people

AGXStarseed

Well-Known Member
(Not written by me)

The abuse hurled at a cinemagoer was shocking. How much are people’s attitudes shaped by government policy?

A couple of years ago my brother, who has autism, was confronted by an angry audience member at the theatre. Or rather, his care worker was. “You shouldn’t let him out if he can’t behave,” the man said. My brother’s carers insisted he had as much right to be there as the aggressive man did, and it was the latter who eventually left, to a round of applause from the rest of the audience. When my brother’s carer told me the anecdote, it made me smile. People are kind, I thought.

Unfortunately, things don’t always happen this way for people with autism-spectrum disorders (ASD). On Sunday night, for instance, Tamsin Parker was thrown out of the British Film Institute (BFI) cinema in London for laughing “too loudly” during The Good, the Bad and the Ugly while she protested “I have Asperger’s.” Other audience members had called the 25-year-old “retarded”. Witnesses described themselves as “shaking with anger” and feeling “sick to my stomach” at the scene. It was Tamsin’s birthday, and she loves the film, which she has seen eight times.

“A couple of audience members were yelling, ‘Shut up...’ and ‘It’s not that funny!’” said Tamsin, an artist and animator. “The thing is, it was funny. It was Eli Wallach playing with parts of guns, clearly improvising. Wallach hated guns, and he had no use for them, so it seemed like he had no idea what he was doing … I was distraught that I wasn’t able to watch the film the whole way through. This was a film that was very personal to me, because I first saw the film during a rough time in my life and it made me feel better about myself.”

The BFI has since apologised to Tamsin, and has offered her a private screening. The manager on duty, one witness told me, was “visibly upset” and said that had she known Tamsin had Asperger’s, she would never have let that happen.

This sad incident should be an opportunity to learn, not hound someone out of their job. Clearly, much better training is needed here for staff. But Tamsin’s mother, Lydia, is rightly furious that she was humiliated in this way. “Even if she were not autistic, no one should be treated as she was. All audience members deserve respect,” she told me.

Autism inclusivity in cinema and theatres has come on in leaps and bounds since my brother, who is also 25, and Tamsin, were small. Relaxed performances are now widespread, not only at the Globe and the National Theatre but in cinemas and theatres up and down the country, and are great for those who get sensory overload and as a result need sound and vision to just be a little bit less intrusive.

But people with ASD should not feel limited to these, segregated from the rest of society. They have as much right to attend an ordinary performance as anybody else. I admit that I have felt on edge taking my brother to the cinema before. You steel yourself for people’s reactions. When we took him to see Shaun the Sheep, he announced loudly: “SHEEP, BAAAAAAA!” whenever Shaun came on screen. People were lovely, but it was mostly children and parents in the audience. Would you be so tolerant?

It was the attitude of the audience members who abused Tamsin that really shocked me. The lack of humanity and compassion: the anger, where there is really so little to be angry about. Much has been made of the “hostile environment” Theresa May has tried to create for immigrants, but one wonders whether it exists for disabled people too. This is not a case of me being dramatic: the UK was last year criticised by the UN for failing to uphold disabled people’s rights. It pointed to the high levels of poverty for disabled people and their families as a result of benefit cuts. An earlier report by the same committee condemned “systemic violations” of people with disabilities. People who are ill and disabled are being sent to work, and some of them are dying.

To what extent have some of these policies, and the media coverage around them, seeped into the national psyche? Reported hate crimes against disabled people are rising even faster where children are the victims, a BBC investigation found late last year, with children and their families verbally abused in the street. These acts do not occur in a vacuum.

There is so much innovation occurring in film and theatre when it comes to disability. Madhouse re:exit, a performance by five artists with learning disabilities from the Access All Areas theatre company, recently took spectators at Shoreditch Town Hall on a fantastical tour through the history of the institutionalisation of disabled people. It’s currently in Manchester. Our Country’s Good, at Theatre Royal Stratford East, has a mixed cast of 17 disabled and able-bodied actors telling the story of their journey to a penal colony in Australia.

Productions such as these do crucial work in shifting attitudes. But it is our government’s policies, not to mention our media coverage, in which we truly need a shift, or disabled people will continue to be abused for having the audacity to exist in public; or, as in Tamsin’s case, for simply wanting to watch her favourite film, with her friends, on her birthday.


Source: The BFI Asperger’s incident shows disabled people face a ‘hostile environment’| Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett
 
Here is my honest opinion:
No one in the dark movie theater knows about autism or cares at th time the movie is playing - annoying distractions are just that- ANNOYING. It could be rude teenagers, Tourette’s, drunk sailors, old people with hearing deficits, of just rude people. People just wanna see the movie with no drama.


I cannot stand people making noise in libraries or movie theaters. I can’t stand the chewing of popcorn, slurping of soda, jiggling the box of candy, the cracking of cellophane wrappers, or the crunching of ice being chewed. I cannot stand cellphone screens blinding my eyes from some a-hole several seats down. I cannot stand whispering. I cannot stand people’s knees pushing into the back of my seat. I certainly detest it when babies cry in the theater. I seldom go to movies. When I go, it’s because I truly want to see a particular film. I really want to see it badly, and I try and go when the least amount of people are attending.

I am sorry, but my sensory issues would have been triggered by all her behaviors. I love that movie too and have seen it many dozens of times since the 1960s. It’s a cult classic, and I aspie, am a HUGE fan! It is a movie that needs quiet and reflection- not “boisterous laughing.” in the 30 plus times I have seen this movie, I can’t recall ONE time anyone in the theatre laughed. That alone would irked many people who love this movie.

I also would have been intensely annoyed from her initial repeated ranting of, “I am so excited!” Repeated over and over. I think I would have had to leave the theater, because she would have upset me so much. It doesn’t matter why she upset me. It matters only that she did. I would not have hung around to know more. It would not have lessened my anger to have it explained. It would have ruined my day. I am easily triggered by this kind of behavior. Again, to me, it would not have matter why that behavior was going on. I think I would not have been alone in these feelings. I can understand why some people were triggered and behave very badly.

If she has aspergers shouldn’t she know already that her reactions “might” annoy others????
 

It says that she was watching her favorite film, which is also probably my favorite film, “The Good, The Bad and The Ugly”

I don’t know, this movie has very funny parts but, it’s not a comedy, and it is disruptive if someone is laughing so much that it distracts everyone else from watching the movie.

They shouldn’t by any means have been remotely so cruel to her, but also maybe she could have just walked out on her own before it got to this point. You can’t exactly expect everyone else to do nothing because you are laughing somewhat uncontrollably over a movie in a theater.
 
It's unclear whether or not they made her aware that her laughter was disruptive before the confrontation that resulted in her being dragged from the theater or not.

This makes a big difference.

Was she asked politely to be quiet, then became rude and disorderly? Did she refuse to leave? The way the article is written, they just walked up to her and grabbed her, dragging her out of the theater as she screamed. But I have a hard time believing that's exactly what happened. If it is, the condemnation brought upon them is entirely appropriate. Because it's not OK, ever, to approach a patron, whether they're being intentionally rude or not, and grab them by the arm, dragging them out of the theater, without some attempt at peaceful resolution (unless they are actively assaulting someone, which clearly wasn't the case here.) It doesn't matter if she is autistic or not, at that point - that's just not acceptable, no matter what.

I suspect that the entire story isn't being told here. If it did happen exactly as written, shame on that theater and everyone involved should be fired.
 
It's unclear whether or not they made her aware that her laughter was disruptive before the confrontation that resulted in her being dragged from the theater or not.

This makes a big difference.

Was she asked politely to be quiet, then became rude and disorderly? Did she refuse to leave? The way the article is written, they just walked up to her and grabbed her, dragging her out of the theater as she screamed. But I have a hard time believing that's exactly what happened. If it is, the condemnation brought upon them is entirely appropriate. Because it's not OK, ever, to approach a patron, whether they're being intentionally rude or not, and grab them by the arm, dragging them out of the theater, without some attempt at peaceful resolution (unless they are actively assaulting someone, which clearly wasn't the case here.) It doesn't matter if she is autistic or not, at that point - that's just not acceptable, no matter what.

I suspect that the entire story isn't being told here. If it did happen exactly as written, shame on that theater and everyone involved should be fired.

In the article on the other tread I linked to in my previous post, she admitted she was "whooping and cheering and yelling 'I'm so excited!' before the programme started", was "laughing very loudly" during the movie, admitted, "I made fun of one the men who had verbally abused me by mimicking him and ""Staff came to ask me to leave but I wouldn't"

Autistic woman removed from Cinema and called "retarded"
 

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