A Fundamental Question For Us All
World Autism Acceptance Week (30th March to 6th April) is a vital opportunity to promote the public understanding of autism and celebrate autistic voices. This year, it has taken on even greater significance.
Since the last World Autism Acceptance Week, we have seen a further rise in visibility, in conversation, and in the understanding of neurodivergence. However, across some parts of society there are signs of growing distrust of autism and autistic people’s experiences. Some narratives are being spread by those whose political and financial interests it serves to promote division. Some clinical voices are suggesting a return to narrower views about autism which date back decades.
This is despite the accumulated evidence of the past 25 years that autistic experiences are wider than previously imagined; that the co-occurrence of autism with other types of neurodivergence is high; and that autistic children, young people and adults continue to experience barriers in every area of life.
Why is this change in perception happening? On the surface, the ‘leading cause’ is the substantial rise in autism diagnosis, which dates to the late 1990s and is being brought into focus as a ‘public issue’ now. But like many changes in public perception, it has a range of underlying causes.
More than a decade of austerity and economic decline, the hollowing out of community services, technological change, the shock of the Covid pandemic, and our current global instability, all have a role to play. The society of 2026 is different to the society at the turn of the millennium.
Together, these social and economic changes have amplified a basic human feeling: fear. We are afraid of uncertainty, and right now there is more uncertainty than we have experienced for a very long time. At these times, it is common for distrust to grow and division to take hold. To this extent, the distrust we have seen growing around autism reflects a more general trend across the whole of our society.
Unhelpfully, but perhaps not unexpectedly, we have seen this reflected in public policy. When money is low, it is common to see specific groups identified as ‘less deserving’ and their funding scaled back or withdrawn. Groups facing rising public distrust are often identified first.
But this is both the wrong approach and the wrong starting point. It ignores evidence that many of these groups experience substantial harm, inequity, and exclusion. It ignores evidence showing what works in helping these groups flourish and contribute, and that this is often low cost and straightforward. Most of all, it ignores the simple fact that meeting people’s most basic needs is good for everything: for individuals, for communities, and for our economy.
There is another reason why distrust and division are harmful. They take a huge amount of energy for people to maintain, pulling against the hard-wired human instinct to connect with and understand others. This energy could be re-directed to the greater good. Societies and individuals are stronger when they collaborate and work together.
For autistic people and their families in 2026, the stakes are high. Over decades, autistic people have faced unacceptable and unwarranted levels of stigma, and today the public perception of autism is finely balanced. With careless words and irresponsible media coverage in a charged public environment, we risk sleepwalking into a position where autism understanding and acceptance begins to decline, and the progress of the past 25 years has fallen away.
This prompts a fundamental question for us all: a question that is vital for autistic people and their families but goes far beyond World Autism Acceptance Week.
Is this the kind of society we want?
One in which division and hate grow, more people suffer, and fewer can contribute to our society and our economy?
Or do we want a society that values everyone for who they are and the contribution they can make, lifting our communities and boosting our economy?
It is heartening to see many in our society are driven to take the conversation in a positive direction: towards compassion, understanding and trust. They know, as we all do deep down, that society works best when we embrace diversity: instead of using it to turn on each other for the gain of a few, but at the cost of many.
Employers today have increasingly inclusive attitudes to autism and neurodivergence. They know that getting the most from everybody makes sense, both for the wellbeing of their employees and for their bottom line, whether this is social or financial. They are neuroinclusive in a straightforward way, because being neuroinclusive is a win-win.
In our culture, too, there is continuing positive movement towards neuroinclusion. This year saw Hamnet, directed by neurodivergent Chloe Zhao, win or be nominated for every international film award. The public voted People’s Choice BAFTA went to Robert Aramayo for his moving portrayal of life with Tourette’s Syndrome, showing that society not only sees neurodivergence, but also celebrates it.
This energy to understand, to trust, and to work together, is everything. It is how we can ensure that despite the uncertainty of our world, despite the risks we face across our society and our economy, we can pick up the pieces and move forward together. We can and we will.
This year for World Autism Acceptance Week, we are sharing a collection of short videos and words brought together by the organisations who make up the Autism Alliance UK. They are from autistic people, parents/carers, and people who provide support for autistic people and their families. They are from lived experience, and from the heart.