Love on the Spectrum and Autism Speaks
an autistic perspective on the issues with this series, particularly several cast member's affiliation with Autism Speaks and the infamous puzzle piece
Hi friends! This may be a long one, so make sure you’re somewhere comfortable and that you have a delicious beverage readily available (and maybe even a snack!).
Let me begin by explaining that although I am autistic and my views on these things align with many other autistic individuals’ views, I do not speak for all autistic people. However, Autism Speaks and the puzzle piece symbol are widely accepted to be offensive to the community, as I will explain below.
Let us first take a look at Love on the Spectrum, the US romantic documentary series that follows the lives of autistic individuals on their quests for love. On the surface, this sounds quite lovely. In fact, this show was actually my comfort series after my diagnosis as autistic last year. I found comfort in watching a series with people who exhibited similar traits to me and who were trying to find a romantic connection.
Don’t get me wrong, the concept of this show is important and certain elements of this series are done quite well. Parts of Love on the Spectrum do a great job at crushing stereotypes and tackling misconceptions, which the show claims is its goal. But other parts, well, there are some major issues.
I first started to question the ethicality of this series after the trailer for Season 3 was released. If you’ve watched Love on the Spectrum, you will likely remember Kaelynn from Season 1. After the trailer was released, she made a TikTok video explaining that she wasn’t invited back to the show because the crew believed that her story “had already been told.” This felt frustrating to me as she didn’t find a romantic connection in Season 1 and many of the other original cast members had been invited back for the newest season. So, I went on a scroll through her TikTok to see if she’d made any other videos about the series. What did I find, you may be wondering? I found a video from 2023 of Kaelynn explaining why she wasn’t invited back for Season 2. In this video, she says:
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This was even more upsetting because they’ve told her TWICE that her story has already been told.
When cast members like David and Abbey are invited back (even though they’ve been in a relationship since Season 1), it no longer seems like the focus is telling new stories. Rather, it seems like they’re searching for what makes good television. Which, in my opinion, would be fine if this was reality television. However, it’s important to note that this show is marketed as a “romantic documentary”. Therefore, shouldn’t Love on the Spectrum be showing a variety of autistic people’s experiences? I mean, the literal definition of “documentary” is “a film or television or radio programme that gives facts and information about a subject”. At least to me, this proves that Love on the Spectrum should be more focused on portraying the real lives of many different autistic people, rather than the lives of those who make “good” and “entertaining” television. Anyway, the point here is that this was the beginning of my questioning of this show.
Also, as this series is considered a “documentary”, none of the cast have been paid for appearing on the show (which, in my opinion, is appalling).
I had been sitting down, enjoying the new episodes of Season 3 when I reached Episode 4 and heard the dreaded words “Autism Speaks” coming from my laptop. On their first date, Madison and Tyler bonded over their collections, their strong religious beliefs, and the fact that they’ve both participated in Autism Speaks Walks.
“No!” I exclaimed to my girlfriend. “Not Autism Speaks!!!”
What’s wrong with Autism Speaks, you may be asking? They sound like a great organisation? Wrong.
Autism Speaks, founded in 2005, is perhaps the largest and most well known autism organisation in the world. But the organisation has faced backlash for years for the way that it frames conversations around Autism Spectrum Disorder.
Firstly, Autism Speaks’ logo has always been, and remains, an image of a puzzle piece. See the original logo below:
Their current logo:
The puzzle piece symbol is controversial for many autistic people. The symbol originated as a representation for autism in the United Kingdom when the National Autistic Society began using it in 1963. The original logo also depicted a crying child, which supposedly was meant to show that autistic people were “suffering” from their disorder. However, it feels more like it’s depicting autism as a tragic and life-destroying condition.
The board of The National Autistic Society also believed that autistic people suffered from a “puzzling” condition, hence the use of a puzzle piece. It is also viewed as meaning that autistic people have a “missing piece” *eye roll*.
So, while this may not be Autism Speaks’ current view on their own logo, it’s disappointing that they’ve ignored voices within the autistic community and kept the same symbol for twenty years.
When Autism Speaks was founded in 2005, their mission statement was as follows:
We are dedicated to funding global biomedical research into the causes, prevention, treatments and a possible cure for autism. We strive to raise public awareness about autism and its effects on individuals, families and society: and we work to bring hope to all who deal with the hardships of this disorder.
This is incredibly harmful and although their mission statement has changed over time, it is upsetting that it began by seeking to “end” autism, rather than accepting it and accomodating it. Does this sound familiar? RFK Jr.???
In 2006, Autism Speaks made a short documentary, called Autism Every Day, about the extent to which parents suffer when their children are autistic. If you are autistic, I don’t recommend watching it as it quite distressing. I’m also going to quote some of it below, so please skip this section if these quotes will be triggering for you.
Every single parent in this documentary recounts how their lives are so much more difficult because of their autistic children. They discuss having no social life, arguing with their partners, having to quit their jobs, etc. This would be fine if it wasn’t phrased as if their autistic children are a “problem” that they never asked for.
One mother says that looking after her autistic child is “exhausting”.
Another parent, when discussing how difficult it is to find a school that can accomodate her autistic child, says that she had sat in her car for fifteen minutes and “contemplated putting Jodie [her daughter] in the car and driving off the George Washington Bridge.” She claims that this would be preferable over having to put her daughter in an overcrowded school where she won’t get the support she needs. She also says that it’s only because of her other, neurotypical daughter that she DIDN’T DRIVE HER AND HER DAUGHTER OFF A BRIDGE. Oh, and by the way, the woman saying all of these things is Alison Singer, the former executive vice president of Autism Speaks. There’s also a clip where Alison’s other daughter is sitting on her lap and says “I wish I had a sister without autism.” Alison’s second to last clip involves her saying that she hopes by the time her neurotypical daughter is old enough to have a child (she doesn’t mention her autistic daughter at all here…), there will be a cure for autism… OH ALSO, Alison is currently the president of the Autism Science Foundation, and their tagline is: searching. solving. sharing.
Like, what do you mean “solving”??????
Another parent says that having an autistic child took all of the “joy” out of the experience of having a child…
In 2009, Autism Speaks posted a commercial titled “I Am Autism”. Again, if you’re autistic, I don’t advise watching this as it depicts autism as, well, basically an evil force?? I’ll quote some of this video below. The video begins with depictions of autistic children with a background voice who claims to be autism. The voice, speaking to parents, says things like:
“I work faster than paediatric aids, cancer, and diabetes combined.”
“And if you are happily married, I will make sure that your marriage fails.”
“I derive great pleasure out of your loneliness.”
“I will make sure that, every day you wake up, you will cry…”
The second half of the video is from the perspective of the parents. They speak directly (???) to autism and claim that they will never give up. Nowhere in this video do we get an autistic perspective.
This advertisement was taken down after Autism Speaks faced backlash and while they claim to have distanced themselves from the views in this video, some of their later behaviour questions this.
In 2018, Autism Speaks created a “100 Day Kit”, which the Autistic Self Advocacy Network (ASAN) have claimed is very harmful to the community for statements such as: “When you find yourself arguing with your spouse…be careful not to get mad at each other when it really is the autism that has you so upset and angry”. It has since been updated and had these controversial quotes removed, but here are some other ones that were in the original (as described on this website):
“You want your child to get better so badly that you may feel some of the stages commonly associated with grieving”
“Is recovery possible? You may have heard about children who have recovered from autism. Although relatively rare, it is estimated that approximately 10% of children lose their diagnosis of autism.”
Here is a poster from 2020 that ASAN shared about Autism Speaks:
It’s important to note here that, in 2020, Autism Speaks only had 2 autistic individuals out of 28 on its Board of Directors.
Now that I’ve discussed why I dislike Autism Speaks and the puzzle piece symbol so much, let me tell you what I have discovered about the cast of Love on the Spectrum.
As mentioned earlier, in an episode in Season 3, Madison and Tyler bond over going on Autism Speaks walks.
Madison
Madison has been a part of Autism Speaks for many years:
She also celebrated when Donald Trump came into office for his first term:
If you’ve watched the season, it’s not very surprising that she would be a Donald Trump supporter, but this image is still quite, um… frightening?
Tyler
Tyler is also a very vocal supporter of Autism Speaks:
He also uses the hashtag "“#AspergersAndProud”:
Keep in mind, this was posted on, like, the 4th of April 2025.
Aspergers is an outdated and controversial term due to its association with Hans Asperger. Hans Asperger was an Austrian physician who worked closely with literal Nazis (which, I would argue, makes him directly complicit in Nazism). He believed that some autistic children were more “worthwhile” than others, and he would send those who were less “valuable” to society to a Nazi clinic, where they were murdered simply for existing. As the UK’s National Autistic Society explains, “There had previously been debate about how much Hans Asperger knew about what the Nazis were doing, and whether in fact his work had saved some autistic children from death. However, more recent research has discredited this narrative by showing that Hans Asperger was aware that he was sending children to their death at a Nazi ‘euthanasia’ clinic and had made statements in line with the Nazi regime’s murderous ideology of ‘racial purity’.”
When describing Herta Schreiber, a two-year-old girl who he sent to the Nazi clinic, Hans Asperger said “At home the child must be an unbearable burden to the mother, who has to care for five healthy children. Permanent placement at Spiegelgrund seems absolutely necessary.”
She died from induced pneumonia one day after her third birthday.
She was murdered.
I understand that many people were previously diagnosed with Asperger Syndrome, before it was removed from the DSM in 2013 and combined with Autism Spectrum Disorder. So, I get that it may be a term that people have included in their identity. But, personally, if I found out that something I’d been diagnosed with was related to not only Nazis, but the murder of innocent autistic children, I don’t think I’d want to use that diagnosis anymore.
Abbey and her mother, Christine
Both are literally part of the current face of Autism Speaks:
Tanner
While not Autism Speaks, Tanner works closely with another puzzle-piece-using foundation, the Autism Strong Foundation:
This is the first line of their mission statement: Founded on faith and led by inclusion and integrity, our mission is to provide the strongest support, community and hope for those touched by autism.
To me, at least, the phrase “touched by autism” is quite off-putting. It makes it feel like autism is some kind of monster that reaches out and sinks its claws into your children or something… how absurd!
David
Much like his girlfriend, Abbey, David is a clear supporter of Autism Speaks:
Dani
Another follower of Autism Speaks (on a semi-unrelated note: at least I know, from her TikToks, that she hates Donald Trump):
Georgie
Oh, how I loved Georgie in Season 3. She was a calming force for Connor. But then I found this on her instagram:
The confederate flag! And it was only posted THIS YEAR!
As explained on the APH website:
The flag represents the Confederate States of America (CSA or Confederacy), created in 1861 when 11 states seceded from the 85-year-old nation. This rebellion was prompted by the election of Abraham Lincoln as president. Lincoln argued slavery should not be extended to new territories the United States was annexing in the west. Southern enslavers feared slavery in their established states would be Lincoln’s next target.
The ensuing four-year Civil War between the CSA and US was resolved in 1865 with the defeat of the Confederacy and the near-abolition of enslavement.
I understand that the flag is seen commonly in Georgia, particularly at gravesites, but I don’t believe that this mitigates what the flag means to the wider community, particularly the African American community.
To conclude…
I’m not making this post to say that these people must be cancelled or that they are awful individuals. My point, rather, is that Love on the Spectrum is not including autistic people across the spectrum. Kaelynn should have been allowed to come back on Season 2 or 3. The show should include individuals with all levels of support needs and experiences. We need more diversity. We need people representing us that are not aligned with organisations and/or individuals that have sought to eradicate us.
We deserve to feel like we are all being represented. I feel like the representation on Love on the Spectrum: Australia is more diverse and varied. Take Jimmy and Sharnae for example. They’re both autistic, they’re already in a committed relationship before we meet them, they live together, they’re married, and they support each other. This is a perspective that we don’t get in the US version. It’s nice to see examples of autistic couples in happy, supportive relationships. More of this, please.
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cass 💌