Replying to Uta Frith's views, one by one.

[katyelphinstone@mas.to]

@CuriousMagpie

Hm I think I should add to the beginning of the thread that is quite upsetting... A CW.

I probably should have done that to start with! Sorry about that

[katyelphinstone@mas.to]

@adelinej

Thank you for everything

I've also added a proper content warning at the beginning of the thread now.

Thanks to the post on your page that told me how to do it

Apologies as I should've thought of that - after all, I found it upsetting

[seconduniverse@autistics.life]

@KatyElphinstone @adelinej These "theory of mind" types seem to be fighting a long bitter retreat. But they seem to be fighting it in the right wing press, as the scientific world has moved on.

[arisummerland@beige.party]

@KatyElphinstone thank you for doing this point by point. I read her article and I was incensed!

[katyelphinstone@mas.to]

@arisummerland

Wasn't it awful?!

[katyelphinstone@mas.to]

@SecondUniverse

True
And that's a good point.

@adelinej

[petraphoenix@beige.party]

@KatyElphinstone

Thank you for this. I was FURIOUS when I read her article. She clearly thinks that the lived experience is purely anecdotal.

I was only diagnosed 2 months ago and this sort of article will only get in the way when I tell certain family members.

[joshsusser@autistics.life]

@SecondUniverse @KatyElphinstone @adelinej Why do these highly-educated academics always get Theory of Mind wrong? ToM is not the ability to read minds. It is the awareness that other individuals have their own thoughts and perceptions that will be different from your own, not the ability to know what those are.

[seconduniverse@autistics.life]

@joshsusser @KatyElphinstone @adelinej What they actually mean is the the autistic person does not have a mind. Sure they can think but they lack the essential "puzzle piece" that would make them human.

The Theory of Mind researcher doesn't have a theory of mind about their autistic research subjects.

[zigi_now9@autistics.life]

@KatyElphinstone Prof. Uta is a disease

[staceycornelius@zeroes.ca]

@KatyElphinstone THIS.

Thank you

[gooba42@mastodon.social]

@KatyElphinstone If the population changes then the systems built to serve it must change too.

You don't change people to suit systems, you change systems to serve people. Always. Unconditionally.

How are so many people just absolutely wrong?

[panda@assemblag.es]

@CuriousMagpie @KatyElphinstone Just happened to me. I couldn’t be bothered to read Uta Frith’s article but just saw this.

<https://www.aims-2-trials.eu/2026/03/10/roche-and-aims-2-trials-receives-eurordis-black-pearl-award-2026/>

Disgusted. This world is really upside down.

(For a rather different understanding see my page <https://gizmonaut.net/autism-documents/>)

[katyelphinstone@mas.to]

@PetraPhoenix

Oh no! And yes, that's exactly my worry. That many people will now be invalidated by those close to them, having read the views of 'the expert' 🤨

[katyelphinstone@mas.to]

@SecondUniverse

Good point. The autistic subject must be dehumanized at all costs.
Ironic.

@joshsusser @adelinej

[katyelphinstone@mas.to]

@gooba42

Exactly

[joshsusser@autistics.life]

@KatyElphinstone @SecondUniverse @adelinej so if they cannot recognize autistics as having our own minds, they are bad at Theory of Mind. definitely ironic.

[katyelphinstone@mas.to]

@panda

Omg

Interesting as I contacted one of the major funding organisations for autism research, to try to get funding for my own study.

(If I didn't laugh I would cry)

I really just thought, why not, since they're based at Edinburgh University which is where I'm doing my PhD.

@CuriousMagpie

[katyelphinstone@mas.to]

@panda

I had just seen in the papers that they had received another 87 million on top of the 145 million pounds they already receive annually.

They answered saying they didn't think my research was relevant.

On their site, it say they fund the search for 'treatments' and 'biomarkers'.

I refrained from answering them 'good luck w that one' - but I did write a reply email saying I thought they were barking up the wrong tree (to paraphrase). For my file. They never answered.

@CuriousMagpie

[katyelphinstone@mas.to]

@joshsusser

Right?

Is it like the part where she says it's ridiculous to take lived experience as any basis for 'serious' research.

Interesting that so much of the behavioral autism research investigating all of our deficits and impairments is based on the lived experience of non-autistics, of us. Yet I never heard her speak out against that ‍️

@SecondUniverse @adelinej