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Hello, everyone.
My name is Eli Hardwig.
I'm ten years old, but I'll be eleven this Sunday.
I love to read and draw comic books, and I collect mustaches.
(Laughter)
I am here tonight to talk about autism.
As I'm sure you know, autism is a condition
that changes the way
the parts of people's brains act in relation to each other,
which may cause them to act in a different way
than we consider "normal".
Anyway, autism can affect people in three main ways:
strengths, weaknesses and theories of mind.
Let's focus on strengths and weaknesses for a moment.
You see, autism can affect people's senses or their mind,
making strengths and weaknesses different from ours
common in autistic people.
Touching anything might bring them pain;
they might hear every sound magnified by ten,
or they might eat anything, including rocks,
dust bunnies, or even – (gasps in surprise) brussel sprouts,
because it all tastes the same to them.
(Laughter)
On the other hand, many autistic people are incredibly neat and hardworking,
and, even occasionally, an autistic person
will have savant abilities.
I'm sure many of you remember or have watched the movie "Rain Man".
Remember the toothpicks scene?
The autistic man, Rain Man, has counted 246
spilled toothpicks, in a matter of seconds.
That's a savant ability.
Temple Grandin and Natalie Flanagan were also autistic savants.
So, these are a few ways autism can affect people.
What about the other way – theories of mind?
I'm sure you all are asking yourself, "What's a theory of mind?"
Well, a theory of mind is the ability to credit others
with characteristics that you, yourself, don't possess;
also, to feel others' pain, which is empathy.
Many autistic people are lacking a theory of mind.
So, here's an example.
Look at this boy.
What do you think when you see him?
I assume that most people will think that he plays tennis.
If that's what you think, say "I".
(Audience and Eli Hardwig): I.
EH: Ok. Good. That's most of us.
If you do not think that, if you think something else, say "nay".
(Audience): Nay.
EH: Ok. Well, too bad for you.
(Laughter)
But, what if you're autistic and don't have a theory of mind?
Next slide, please. Jolly good.
If someone doesn't,
they would most likely look at this boy and see his shirt
or some other physical aspect of the boy.
So, now you know a little more about autism
and, hopefully, why an autistic person might act the way they do.
I say "might", because no two autistic kids,
or autistic people, are the same.
There's a saying about this,
"If you know one person with autism, you only know one person with autism."
(Laughter)
But I digress.
My point, dear people,
what I want you to do is two things.
The first of these two, when meeting an autistic person,
put his autism second.
View him not as an autistic person, but as a person who is autistic.
Now, this may be a little hypocritical of me,
as I've been calling people with autism "autistic people"
throughout this whole speech,
but, nevertheless, this is what I want you to do.
People with autism are different from us, that's true.
But that's OK.
If everybody was the same, this would be a very boring world.
And, although some autistic may act in a way that we consider to be bad,
often they can't help it.
And, second of all,
we should teach our children about autism early in life.
In 2009, 1 in 91 people were diagnosed with autism.
This makes it much more common than
a lot of the diseases and conditions
that we want to teach our children about.
Learning about autism could be done in a classroom or at home.
Perhaps, people could
even watch movies about people with autism,
like Rain Man and Temple Grandin.
I watched one of these movies
and it helped me understand autistic people better.
But, anyway, these are the things I hope we can do. Thank you.
(Applause)
But, one more thing.
I would like to thank Ms. Herley,
the awesome teacher who helped us with these speeches,
making suggestions and giving encouragement all the way.
I would like to thank Ms. Jackie Romanos,
my topic mentor, who helped me refine this speech.
A lot of the best ideas came from her.
And I would like to thank my dad, Jay Hardwig,
for helping me choose this topic,
watching the movie with me
and making sure this speech didn't offend anybody.
He may be in Colorado right now,
but that doesn't make him any less deserving of my gratitude.
And, thank you, audience, for listening to me.
I'll be going now, but please remember my words.
(Applause)