Autistic representation: The good, the bad, and the harmful

*Disclaimer: One of the authors is autistic and is sharing their knowledge. Content warnings for death and ableism.

Within the last decade, autistic characters have become more prevalent in books, video games, movies, and TV shows. Their presence has become a way for autistic people to see themselves in the media and outside of their community. 

Autistic characters give media consumers someone to relate to, and this interest could even form friendships. Representation is important, whether in video games or popular films, but to many autistic people, good representation feels like searching for a needle in a haystack.

“There for sure should be more autistic representation in media,” said autistic senior Madelyn Dittmann.

Disability has always had a stigma around it because of how it has been portrayed in the media and how different it can be for everyone. People often hear the term autistic and immediately think of either a nonverbal child with behavioral and “mental issues,” or a social outcast who is strange but incredibly intelligent.

All of these stereotypes lead people to believe it is unrealistic for a character to be autistic if they do not act a “certain way,” or they will refuse to believe they are autistic due to them not being a white male.

Autism diagnoses are becoming more common as the diagnostic criteria include different races and genders since not every autistic person will have the same symptoms. For example, autistic women have fewer social issues. 

“We’re a lot like other people, but we may need help sometimes. See the person, not the diagnosis,” said Dittmann.

Directors and writers tend to struggle with writing autistic characters due to many not being autistic and having pre-existing, ableist biases about how autistic people act.

The characters Raymond from “Rain Man,” Shaun Murphy from the American version of “The Good Doctor,” and Samuel Gardner from “Atypical” have been criticized for being bad representations of autistic characters in the media. The directors and writers often take advice from harmful organizations like Autism Speaks, an organization known for advocating against autistic people and portraying autism as a burden for families.

Older characters like Raymond can be considered a product of the lack of research and knowledge about autism at the time. However, more modern characters like Shaun Murphy and Samuel Gardner do not have an excuse for using neurotypical actors or taking advice from Autism Speaks.

“Good representation in live action is by an actually autistic actor, since only autistic people know the true experience of being autistic,” said Dittmann.

Allowing neurotypical actors to play autistic characters suggests real autistic people can turn their autism on and off. Being autistic is not something someone can turn on and off, it is an inherent part of someone’s life and affects them every day.  

The worst example of autism in media is from the famous musician Sia who made a film named “Music” in 2021. It follows a young autistic woman named Music, her older half-sister, and her new caretaker, Kazu. Throughout the movie, Kazu sees Music as an obstacle to her dream life rather than someone she should love and care for. She even places and nearly leaves Music in an institution, a nightmare autistic people have seen too many times in their history. 

The film received widespread criticism and hate for several issues. The biggest one is having Maddie Ziegler, a neurotypical actress, who was pressured to play a dependent, nonverbal autistic person rather than having a similar actor play her.

Another glaring issue was the way Ebo, Music’s neighbor, and later Kazu ‘helped’ calm Music down during a meltdown through a dangerous restraint. While the film claims it’s meant to help her, the prone restraint is known for being painful and even deadly, leading to tragic deaths like Max Benson, a 13-year-old autistic boy who died after being restrained for two hours.

There is a light at the end of the tunnel, and it’s unintentionally writing characters to be autistic. Characters like Symmetra and Venture from “Overwatch,” Jäger from “Tom Clancy’s: Rainbow Six Siege,” Laios from “Dungeon Meshi,” the Belcher family from “Bob’s Burgers,” and Abed from “Community” were either written by the writer’s personal experiences or trying to write from a new perspective.

Characters like this have been more accepted by the autistic community than intentionally autistic characters. Many say it’s because of how organic and natural the characters feel, rather than a checklist of traits to be deemed inclusive. 

Most autistic people understand how different their needs, traits, and symptoms can be from one another, but they still want to see themselves in the shows, games, books, and movies that they love and they deserve the right to want and see themselves represented accurately.