I get the feeling that the original article was written from too much of an internalised NT perspective. While there are some advantages to the social model of disability, such as workplace accommodations where - or rather, if - you can get them, these address aspects about how autistic people function differently from the culture around them. But cultures aren't set in stone - they change, differ and evolve. Someone who is noticeably on the spectrum (to themselves and others) in one culture could be less noticeably so in another, without any change in who they are and how they function, based solely on the demands of their surrounding culture. Personally, I need an impairment to be more stable across changing and, frankly, arbitrary, circumstances before I declare it fully fledged disability.
Because if we do that, then truthfully, we can apply it to anyone. And that's what this article overlooks. From the article: "Autistic people have impairments, such as in language and sensory processing." There's another side to that coin that would let me say, with some justification, "Allistic people lack singular focus and require too much social and societal input into their choices and thought process in order to function."
Although it almost sounds like it, I am not advocating against the social model of disability. Nonetheless, I don't see the medical and the social model of disability as analogous, and the social model more as an auxilliary concept in order to get what accommodations we need, whenever possible, in an overbearing culture not suited to us. But I think it's a mistake to lose sight of the fact that these accommodations are needed because, and only because, the culture around us is one that prioritises different traits based on what most people can and cannot do. What's a disability and what isn't is a numbers game, in this case. If the tables were turned, then, with a period of adjustment while culture catches up, the other side might be claiming social model disability because, living in a culture not geared towards their strengths and designed to cushion their weaknesses, it would be they would who would find the shortcomings and inabilities of their neurology magnified.
The social model has its use as an auxilliary concept where absolutely needed, but I just can't get behind blanketly calling something a disability if it's as arbitrary as I've described above.
Also, I am not sure where the author of the article got enough of this opionion from in order to find it significant: "Opponents of neurodiversity sometimes describe is [sic] as the idea that autism is ‘just a brain difference’." I suspect a false equivalence, but I can't tell from this quote alone whether the people who described autism as "just a brain difference" really also identified or acted as opponents of neurodiversity or whether the author assumes that that's what they are. Either way, I don't see how you can be an opponent of neurodiversity while you're actually agreeing that there are brain differences, with or without the "just", even though I can see how the "just" can sound flippant.
I'm not willing to agree that I'm disabled under any model as long as I can work under some conceivably realistic circumstances, move without assistance and look after myself and even others without feeling a lack in my life. I'm by no means happy with everything in my life and I do suffer under the demands of the culture surrounding me. But that's where I assign the blame to. Not me. Because it's not directly necessary for survival for that culture to be this way. And it's not directly necessary for my survival to be neurologically identical to most people, even if it's hard. Where's the disability? I'm not ready to base something as big as that on flaky cultural standards.
Of course, as with any spectrum, there comes a point where working and living without assistance and looking after oneself is no longer possible. However, I am veering towards the view that that's where the medical model of disability begins to catch and the social model stops to apply: if one's neurology does not allow self-sufficient living as it is commonly understood (i.e. supporting oneself, not farming one's own food), as in - even if the surrounding culture were adjusted to one's needs self-sufficient living wouldn't be possible - then this would clearly be classified as a disease, and the medical model would apply.
I'm starting to wonder why I differ so significantly in opinion from many in the online autistic community (because online is all I have, I don't know any identified autistic people offline). Because, as far as Asperger's (my adult diagnosis)/HFA (my diagnosis in adolescence) goes, I'm not especially "mild", even if I had to learn to ape well due to the sink-or-swim situation my family of origin put me in growing up. Perhaps it's because I'm not in America (i.e. cultural differences), perhaps my strengths happen to compensate just enough for my weaknesses, perhaps not buying into being defective allowed me to be more ruthless about getting my needs met as soon as this was possible so that I didn't burn out as much as others, perhaps it's the dumb luck of having met mostly the right people and having a live-and-let-live environment, at least privately. The first is certainly true because I can work part-time on a salary with all benefits and a humble pension fund.
But I've also seen enough NTs burn out and get sick from common societal demands and pressures to believe that the tenets of social model disability are something that neurodiverse people have a singular claim to or need for, and that waters down the whole concept itself considerably.