Father of an autistic teen here - very good chance that kid couldn’t even begin to understand that the police gun would not only harm him, but kill him dead.
He possibly didn’t understand or was too deep into an autistic meltdown (overstimulated fight or flight response) by that point to possibly comply with the commands from the officer, and (looking at my own son as an example) I doubt that he comprehended the seriousness of wielding such a weapon at the cop or at anyone.
My son knows he has to be careful with knives, and that he generally shouldn’t touch them unsupervised.
Does he know he could hurt someone with it? Yes I think so.
Does he know it’s even possible to stab someone to death with it? He doesn’t even have a concept of “dead” vs “asleep” and has never witnessed a wound that couldn’t be healed with a bandaid. Explaining these concepts in abstract is of very limited value with him.
They need to send more cops, and with nonlethals less lethals, and try harder not to kill these kids - many of whom exist in a world that almost entirely works in a way they don’t understand, no matter how intelligent they may be otherwise.
Elijah McClain
Linden Cameron (not dead, but not for lack of trying)
Ryan Gainer
My list of “names of autistic kids shot or killed by cops” that I can list off without trying is slowly getting longer.
As I always say - I can’t imagine more a of a nightmare than my son interacting with police while neither me nor my wife is present. I’d be less worried if he was playing in traffic. At least I can count on people driving down the street trying not to kill him. And that’s really sad because I wish I could count on the help of police if ever he would need it.
Father of an autistic teen here - very good chance that kid couldn’t even begin to understand that the police gun would not only harm him, but kill him dead.
He possibly didn’t understand or was too deep into an autistic meltdown (overstimulated fight or flight response) by that point to possibly comply with the commands from the officer, and (looking at my own son as an example) I doubt that he comprehended the seriousness of wielding such a weapon at the cop or at anyone.
My son knows he has to be careful with knives, and that he generally shouldn’t touch them unsupervised.
Does he know he could hurt someone with it? Yes I think so.
Does he know it’s even possible to stab someone to death with it? He doesn’t even have a concept of “dead” vs “asleep” and has never witnessed a wound that couldn’t be healed with a bandaid. Explaining these concepts in abstract is of very limited value with him.
They need to send more cops, and with
nonlethalsless lethals, and try harder not to kill these kids - many of whom exist in a world that almost entirely works in a way they don’t understand, no matter how intelligent they may be otherwise.Elijah McClain
Linden Cameron (not dead, but not for lack of trying)
Ryan Gainer
My list of “names of autistic kids shot or killed by cops” that I can list off without trying is slowly getting longer.
As I always say - I can’t imagine more a of a nightmare than my son interacting with police while neither me nor my wife is present. I’d be less worried if he was playing in traffic. At least I can count on people driving down the street trying not to kill him. And that’s really sad because I wish I could count on the help of police if ever he would need it.