We Need Equal Rights: NC House Bill 498

Special interests groups are like bands playing at a music festival. They’re all standing on separate stages vying for your attention. By themselves they all sound good. Yeah, you tell yourself, why not support the cause to stop deforestation in the Pacific Northwest? That sounds like a righteous cause. But when you’re standing in the middle of an open field with eight stages surrounding you, it doesn’t matter if the best bands in the world are playing because it all sounds like crap when it’s mixed together. But if autism affects your life, chances are your ears are already tuned to pick up on that frequency and that frequency alone. Don’t get upset when folks say that you have a one track mind. It’s not tunnel vision; it’s clarity. And if autism affects your children, you better be on one of those stages yourself like the late Peter Tosh demanding your equal rights because no one else is going to fight for your family with that type of gusto. Case in point: NC House Bill 498.

If you live in North Carolina and ASD affects your life in any way then you’ve probably already heard about House Bill 498. It’s a proposed bill that will prohibit insurance companies from denying claims filed by parents of autistic children for therapies proven to enhance their quality of life. If you live in one of the 31 states that specifically require insurers to provide coverage for autistic people then you’ve already fought this battle and understand how difficult and how important it is to the future of our children. If you live in one of the other 18 states that currently do not have laws regulating insurance companies and their policies regarding autism, lace up your boots because it’s going to be a long hard night in the fox hole. If you were wondering, the music festival metaphor has been paused and replaced temporarily with a war metaphor because there’s really nothing pleasant about gorilla warfare. Unless, of course, you have an iPod and then it’s only mildly tolerable.

Why fight at all? you might ask. Well, let me first explain how health insurance works. You, the insured, pay an insurance company thousands of dollars a year so you can get prescriptions drugs and doctor visits at a discount. You’re also hoping that you don’t come down with anything huge like AIDS or cancer, but are confident that your insurance company will foot the bill if you do. Your insurance company feeds off your misplaced confidence in them and, while gladly taking your money each paycheck for some discounted prescriptions, will do everything they can to deny your expensive hospital bills. This gives you the option to either ruin yourself financially or simply lay down and die. So when you make the decision to fight for NC House Bill 498 or some similar bill, you’re not fighting for a government handout. You’re just fighting for what you’ve already paid for. You’re fighting for what you’re entitled to.

Before 1920 women in America were not entitled to vote. They had to fight for it. Genevieve Clark had to fight for her right to vote. She had to plead with her father. She had to argue, to beg, to discuss and to rationalize with him. Her father was the Speaker of the House. Genevieve Clark had to convince him to endorse that bill. Who will you convince? Who will you email? Who will you call? Whose doorstep will you stand on demanding your equal rights? What stage will you be on?

Before 1954 little black children in America had to walk passed schools designated for little white children. Sometimes they would have to walk miles passed these schools. Linda Brown was forced to attend one of these schools. Linda Brown was forced into a sub par school. Linda Brown was given a sub par education. Linda Brown was a third grader in Topeka, Kansas. Her father had to fight for her. Her father had to look his little girl in the eyes and promise to do all that he could to provide her with a decent education. Then he had to live everyday after making sure he didn’t break that promise he made to his little girl. No one gave her those rights. Those rights were fought for. How hard will you fight? How loud will you scream?

Mathew Sheppard was murdered in 1998. Mathew was tortured and murdered by two men. Mathew was homosexual. Mathew was tied to a fence after being severely beaten. He was left there for eighteen hours before being discovered. He died shortly afterwards. The two men told Mathew that they were homosexual in order to gain his confidence and lure him out into the country. Their defense during the trial was temporary insanity. They claimed after convincing Mathew that they were gay, he made sexual advances towards them. It was those advances, they claimed, that drove the two men temporarily insane. They killed Mathew because he was homosexual. The fight for LGBT rights is still being fought. It is being fought for vigorously. It is being fought for by the parents of Mathew Shepard. It is being fought for by any parent who had to bury their child. It is being fought for by anyone being told they can’t marry the person that they love.  It is being fought on a state by state level with the mantra “Are You on the Right Side of History?” Well, are you?

Susan B. Anthony wasn’t born an advocate. Neither were you. She was just a woman who was tired of other people telling her how this life would be for her. Those same people are trying to dictate your life and the lives of your children. Become a parental advocate. If you are an adult with autism, advocate for the next generation. Don’t let this country deny today’s children the same rights that were denied to you. If you live or currently reside or have been even temporarily placed under the umbrella term ‘disabled’, I urge you to stand in solidarity with those fighting this fight. Martin Luther King once said, “What affects one directly, affects us all indirectly.” But when fighting for these rights, be warned, I believe they did the same thing to Peter Tosh that they did to Dr. King. So are you willing to fight? Are you willing to dig deep in the trenches? Always remembering that one voice can ripple through the still waters of humanity, are you willing sing?