“Autistic People Should….” A Collective Action That Helped Change the Internet

About the Author

Maxfield Sparrow is a non-binary/metagender middle-aged Autistic writer, self-advocate, jewelry maker, and support group facilitator at AANE. Most recently, Max edited the poetry and essay anthology Spectrums: Autistic Transgender People in Their Own Words. Their Pride-themed jewelry is available on Etsy in their shop, Unstrange Talismans.

In early 2013, the Autistic community came together for a grassroots political action that would ultimately shift the behavior of one of the most powerful tech companies in the world.

The event—a flash blog campaign called Autistic People Should…. began as a response to Google’s autocomplete feature, which at the time filled in the phrase “autistic people should…” with horrific suggestions like “die,” “be exterminated,” and “be killed.” These weren’t stray incidents. They reflected an algorithm fueled by the popularity of hateful searches. The results caused real harm—both to Autistic people encountering them, and to those of us harmed by others emboldened to hate by seeing that hate reflected in a Google search. 

I participated in that flash blog campaign (as Sparrow Rose Jones, my name back then.) Now, over twelve years later, I turned to those I blogged alongside to gather others’ memories about the action. No one remembered who had first raised the alarm about Google’s autocompletes, but Alyssa Hillary Zisk of the blog Yes, That Too organized the collective action and documented our work on a blog hub they created. Alyssa coordinated the flash blog, set the tone of the campaign, and chose the date. The idea was simple but powerful: dozens of Autistic writers would publish blog posts on the same day using the title “Autistic People Should…” followed by affirming, truthful, or deeply personal endings to that sentence. By flooding the web with positive, authentic content under a unified title, the community aimed to shift Google’s search results—and public perception.

The blog posts were aggregated at autisticpeopleshould.blogspot.com, which became the hub of the action. The bloggers were diverse in voice, background, and writing style, but we were united in our shared outrage and determination. Kassiane Asasumasu, an Autistic Woman of Color and long-time activist who coined the word ‘neurodivergent’, participated through her blog Radical Neurodivergence Speaking. Non-autistic parents of Autistic children joined in the action: Brenda Rothman added her voice through Mama Be Good, and Beth Ryan contributed through her blog Love Explosions. Beth also played a vital behind-the-scenes role by getting a collectively-written press release onto the Associated Press wire. I took point on writing the press release. (Gonzo journalist Bill Cardoso taught me how to write press releases, so I suggested we write one to increase the impact of our flash blog event.) I spoke to a reporter from the New Jersey Star-Ledger when she contacted us for an article.

The strategy worked. Within days, the violent autocompletes began to disappear. In a March 5, 2013 article in the Star-Ledger, journalist Kathleen O’Brien reported that Google was “changing the phrases that pop up automatically when searching about autism,” noting that only one of the violent suggestions remained just four days after the flash blog launched (O’Brien). The change came not from lobbying by nonprofits, but from the power of Autistic people speaking together. Nevertheless, another organization attempted to claim credit, despite having had nothing to do with our action. In response, the community created a second wave of blog posts titled “Autistic People Are” to reclaim the narrative once again, this time with affirmations like “Autistic People Are Loved” and “Autistic People Are Speaking.”

The impact of our grassroots blogging campaign extended far beyond the Autistic community. Though the changes to Google’s algorithm were not implemented globally at the time, our action was part of a larger pattern of marginalized communities pushing back against algorithmic harm. In Algorithms of Oppression, Dr. Safiya Umoja Noble discusses how, in the early 2010s, searches beginning with “Black girls” yielded violent and pornographic autocompletes and results. She notes that by 2012, those results had changed but admits, “I often wonder what kind of pressures account for the changing of search results over time” (Noble 21). She did not know that the Autistic community had also launched our own pressure campaign. Other marginalized groups were likely taking similar actions. I hope those stories come to light soon, too. Our Autistic People Should…. movement forms a vital piece of the larger story of marginalized people fighting back against algorithmic injustice—a detail often missing from the dominant narratives.

From a pro-neurodiversity perspective, the significance of this moment is hard to overstate. The Autistic community is far more often spoken about than given the microphone. In this case, we seized it ourselves. We didn’t wait for institutions or charities to protect us. We protected ourselves, and in doing so, made the internet safer—not only for Autistic people, but for everyone. As I said to the Star-Ledger in 2013, Google wasn’t censoring anyone: “They’re not keeping anyone from searching for anything. You can still complete the phrase yourself… The changes merely eliminate a platform for people to find hate speech” (qtd. in O’Brien).

The Autistic People Should…. flash blog campaign was spontaneous, decentralized, and unfunded—but it was also strategic, well-timed, and emotionally powerful. It was led by Autistic people and our allies across a wide spectrum of identities, including women, people of color, LGBTQ+ individuals, and multiply marginalized voices. It succeeded not by playing by the rules of respectability politics or aligning with major organizations, but by speaking truth to power in the language of our own lives and stories.

Today, many of the original blog links are still live, standing as a record of that moment when a community came together and changed the internet. Our story is a vibrant part of the history of digital civil rights.

Works Cited

Noble, Safiya Umoja. Algorithms of Oppression: How Search Engines Reinforce Racism. NYU Press, 2018.

O’Brien, Kathleen. “Google eliminates ‘die’ search suggestion for autism ” NJ.com, 27 February, 2013. https://www.nj.com/parenting/2013/02/google_changes_policy_for_auti.html

O’Brien, Kathleen. “Google Slowly Eliminates ‘Die’ from Autism Search Results; Shift Praised by Autism New Jersey.” NJ.com, 5 Mar. 2013, https://www.nj.com/news/2013/03/google_slowly_eliminates_die_f.html .

Autistic People Should. autisticpeopleshould.blogspot.com

Autistic People Are. autisticpeopleare.blogspot.com