PACLA Community Guidelines…

When commenting on this page, you agree to adhere to the following guidelines:

1. This is an Autistic safe space. Posts which are considered offensive to Autistic people, at the discretion of Admin, will be deleted.

2. Advertising is not allowed on this site. Linking to other pages, for-profit companies, charities, fundraisers or fundraising events is not allowed under any circumstances.

3. Linking to off topic articles, blog posts, etc. is not allowed in the comments sections under posts made by the page or others.

4. Linking your own blogs and articles is permitted. Your own work must honor the intention of our page or it will be deleted.

5. Changing the subject of a post, or derailing, is not allowed. Comments that are off topic to the original purpose of a post will be deleted.

6. We reserve the right to delete any comment on this page, at any time, for any reason.

Possible reasons for the deletion of comments:

• Comments which promote/encourage/advocate/ for the use of unproven alternative therapies. These include DAN Diets, Chelation therapy, etc.
• Comments which imply that the level at which an Autistic person functions is relevant to his quality of life or his value as a human being. Using functional labels is not allowed ie “severe”, “high functioning”, “low functioning”
• Comments which are dismissive of the opinions of Autistic people by non Autistic people when discussing Autism.
• Comments which imply or state that Autism can or should be cured.
• Comments which promote or link to Autism Speaks.
• Comments which promote or link to Generation Rescue.
• Comments which promote or link to Age of Autism.
• Comments which promote Autism as a tragedy, a disease, disorder etc.
• Comments which imply that vaccinations are the cause of Autism or that vaccinations are unsafe for the general public.
• Comments which use language like “lost”, “stolen” “alien” trapped” etc
• Comments which sympathise with, defend or justify in any way people who tease, bully, abuse, harm or kill Autistic people
• Comments which promote anti-vaccination
• Comments which justify harming or murdering Autistic/Diasabled people because caregivers didn’t have enough support or because of the disability.
• Comments which claim the murder or abuse of Autistic/Disabled people proves that there are not sufficient supports.

7. Standard procedure is to issue a warning as to why a comment has been deleted. If the same poster does not adhere to the warning/requests of admin, that poster will be banned from the page.

8. Parents’ questions received may be edited before being reposted on the page, in order to remove potentially offensive language. This will include – but is not limited to – references to functioning labels (eg “high functioning” “severe” etc)

9.  We are dedicated to the principles of peaceful parenting.  Comments which do not honor these principles by promoting/endorsing corporal punishment, deprivation of needs, degredating/humiliating punishments, or are, at our discretion, otherwise abusive or contrary to the intent of our community will be deleted.

10. Admin reserves the right to ban any commenter without warning, for any reason, at its discretion.

11.  When a question is directed at a specific subset of our community, ie “Autistic people”, if you’re not Autistic, DO NOT answer the question. You don’t need to have a formal diagnosis to be Autistic.  If you self-identify as Autistic, we respect that.  If you are Autistic but answering the question with information about your Autistic child, please clarify, in your answer, that you are also Autistic.  If you would like to answer the question without disclosing that you are Autistic, you may contact us privately and we will post your answer anonymously.

These rules are not intended to intimidate people from having conversations. We understand that everyone is at different stages in their thinking and that for some the attitudes expressed on this page may be new and confronting. We consider open minded discussion along these lines to be highly valuable. If you have questions, please feel free to contact admin privately.

If you wish to make a comment about community standards, please make that comment on this page or via private message, rather than adding it to a post that is there to answer a question on a different topic.

Please be aware that these community standards have been compiled deliberately and with much thought in order to foster a community that is an Autistic safe space and encourages acceptance of Autistic people. If you object strongly to any of our community standards you may prefer to unfollow this page and find others that suit your preferences better.