Autism Acceptance Month in April is a flawed name for an identity month. Many autistic people view the word the use of the word “Acceptance” as implying merely tolerance rather than a true sense of belonging and pride. Queer folks have Pride Month in June, Disabled folks have Disability Pride Month in July, and Black folks have Black History Month in February, but autistic people merely have Acceptance to look forward to in April. The implication is that autistic people must rely on others to accept them, while those of the aforementioned identities get to assert their own pride and history in their identities.

We the undersigned, both autistic and non-autistic people, seek to change this, by calling on Autistic Self Advocacy Network and other institutions and similar advocacy organizations to adopt a new name for Autism Acceptance Month. It could be Autistic Pride Month, it could be Autistic History Month, it could be Autistic Pride and History Month, or it could be another name not mentioned, but we believe that a better and more empowering name other than Autism Acceptance Month should be chosen for the month of April. We believe that this new name should be chosen in a deliberative and democratic fashion that involves the grassroots of the autistic community in a bottom-up way, where the autistic community can feel confident about a new name to carry forward as autistic advocacy continues to evolve into the future.

Put differently, imagine if Pride Month in June suddenly had its name changed to be Queer Acceptance Month. Would that be received well by the queer community? The author of this petition thinks not. Same question for other months; if Disability Pride Month or Black History Month were suddenly changed to Disability Acceptance Month and Black Acceptance Month, would those name changes be received well by those respective communities? The author of this petition thinks not.

Autistic people and their month deserve a similar level of respect as other similar identity/advocacy months, and so we intend to make that change happen by presenting this petition to ASAN and other relevant institutions and organizations and calling on them to adopt this change. While we call on all relevant organizations and institutions to adopt a new name for Autism Acceptance Month, such as Autism Society of America and other similar nonprofits, we are seeking to influence ASAN first and foremost, because ASAN was the group which first started the change from Autism Awareness Month to Autism Acceptance Month in 2011 by way of using its influence to successfully convince other organizations to adopt Autism Acceptance Month as the current name.