Kennedy’s remarks about Autism are harmful and go against reality | Opinion

Health Secretary Robert Kennedy’s comments about autism are uneducated and harmful to individuals with autism and their families. While he believes individuals with autism won’t amount to anything significant, my experience as a parent of a child with autism, health care professional and college professor says otherwise.

Poor research led to unfounded fears about autism and safe vaccines. Rushed studies commissioned by Kennedy will lead to more unfounded fears. Decades of studies illustrate the multifactorial nature of autism, which someone with no training or credibility in science or medicine cannot appreciate.

I’m curious how many individuals with autism he has met. Certainly not my son, who pays taxes, has a job, plays baseball, wrote poetry, goes on dates and has used a toilet unassisted for years. Certainly not health care workers with autism I’ve trained who provide exceptional care. Certainly not artists with autism who fill our lives with beauty.

The most important message is that my son and others with autism don’t have to do any of these things to deserve dignity, respect and love.

Michelle Hartman, Durham

Durham dilemma

As a Durham resident and negotiation coach, I’ve watched with concern the public conflict between Sheriff Clarence Birkhead and commissioners Nidar Allam and Wendy Jacobs. This isn’t just a funding debate, it’s a communication and trust breakdown.

I urge them to sit with a neutral mediator for a solutions-focused conversation. In a recent presentation, where I introduced the AGENT negotiation framework (Awareness, Ground, Empathize, Negotiate, Tie it together), I emphasized how conflict, when handled constructively, can actually strengthen relationships and lead to win-win outcomes.

Durham deserves collaborative leadership. If we want a safer, healthier community, we must show that disagreement doesn’t mean division. Let’s be the city that chooses connection over crisis.

Sam Bayer, Durham

Swim league

The decision by the Tarheel Swimming Association to require swimmers to compete according to their biological sex and not their gender identity is to be applauded. The advantages of biological males are significant as shown by swimmers in NCAA events. These advantages are not fully erased by hormone and other treatments.

It is perfectly understandable for a transgender girl to want to compete on the girls’ team, but this would be unfair to her teammates and competition. Hopefully a trans swimmer’s sense of fairness and sportsmanship will outweigh personal desires.

We should all wish our trans friends and neighbors good lives free of discrimination. But it is not discrimination to take biological facts into account when organizing fair athletic events.

Peter Aitken, Chapel Hill

Deportation

America is heading towards autocracy, where laws and rights are selectively applied and diversity is not honored. Kilmar Abrego Garcia was scooped up and delivered to El Salvador’s notorious prison, where detainees suffer egregious human rights abuses.

Garcia has not been charged. Access to family, his lawyer and due process have been denied. No steps have been taken to return him home. Nor has the Trump administration followed federal court orders. Is this the America we know and want?

Do we think this can only happen to an immigrant or to a grad student on a green card? Watch what’s done, not just spoken.

Rosemary McGee, Chapel Hill

Books

North Carolina Republicans want to ban Shakespeare. House Bill 636 expands existing prohibitions against obscene content in school libraries to any sexual content. This is to silence LGBTQ+ and other minority voices.

The wording is so broad it captures works foundational to Western literature and culture. Shakespeare’s plays, Chaucer’s poetry, the Odyssey, The Great Gatsby, works by Hemingway, Faulkner and many other southern writers could be banned. The Bible, particularly the Old Testament, wouldn’t pass muster. Texts assigned through scholastic programs could be challenged by any resident. Schools that don’t comply could be sued.

Librarians are professionally trained to select materials within established guidelines. It is telling that statements by the bill’s sponsors give little to no time to public school parents, teachers, students and library professionals who overwhelmingly oppose this bill. Students should be encouraged to read broadly without unnecessary restrictions.

Maggie Fyfe, Raleigh

Courts

I hope in future elections N.C. voters will vote out state Supreme Court justices Paul Newby, Philip Berger, Jr, Tamara Barringer and Trey Allen and N.C. Appeals Court judges Jefferson Griffin, John Tyson and Fred Gore. They are all complicit in trying to retroactively change election rules and proved their inability to be impartial judges.

Naomi Slifkin, Chapel Hill

This story was originally published April 20, 2025 at 5:00 AM with the headline "Kennedy’s remarks about Autism are harmful and go against reality | Opinion."