#autism service dog

The impersonation of disabled people for personal gain is a serious problem that needs to be addressed.

I am writing this post in lieu of two events: my witnessing of an interaction between a student who was faking a service dog and a university employee; and the release of Sia’s trailer for the film “Music.”

Those events may seem disconnected at first, as they did to me. But as I thought more deeply about both situations, something big stood out to me: in both cases, a nondisabled person was temporarily assuming the identity of a disabled person in order to generate some form of personal gain or profit.

I’ll go over the “service dog” interaction first, because it’s a story I haven’t told yet. Basically, last Tuesday I went into the Covid testing center on UVM’s campus. In line ahead of me was a fellow student who had a small lap dog on a leash. The dog was barking, yapping, running around, and jumping on the legs of workers at the testing center. It was incredibly disruptive, and honestly very irritating, especially since the student wasn’t doing anything to try and correct the dog’s behavior.

Nobody said anything to the student at first (the worker whose legs the dog jumped on didn’t even react), so I considered the possibility that pets were allowed in the building. The dog was so clearly not a service animal (bad behavior, lack of other identifying markers) that it just didn’t seem possible that people could notice and still do nothing to reprimand the student, if pets weren’t allowed in the building. But apparently someone eventually noticed, and called over an employee.

This was the conversation I observed between the student and the employee:

Employee: unless your dog is a service dog, it’s not allowed in the building. We don’t allow pets.

Student: oh I’m leaving anyway, so don’t worry about it.

Employee: okay but I’m just letting you know for future reference that unless your dog is like, a registered service dog, it’s not allowed in the building.

Student: she’s in training, does that count?

Employee: I don’t know the rules about being in training, I would have to ask, but-

Student: she’s also a registered therapy dog, if that helps.

Employee: I don’t know, I think it’s just service dogs but I’d have to check.

At this point in the conversation, I left the building. There were so many things wrong with this interaction, and there was so much ignorance on both sides, that I couldn’t handle it. I thought about going up to educate both of them, but that prospect was too overwhelming. I was obviously disabled at that moment, because I was using my forearm crutches. That made what I witnessed even more painful. This student felt comfortable impersonating someone like me, right in front of me.

And for those who aren’t aware of the laws around service dogs, here are all of the things that were wrong with that conversation:

1. In the United States, there is no such thing as a federal registry for service dogs. Organizations that claim to provide registration papers are fraudulent. So the employee was wrong to say that a service dog would have to be “registered.”

2.Legitimate service dogs (in training or not) can legally be kicked out of establishments if their behavior is disruptive (as this dog’s behavior was- barking and jumping on people), so the employee could have just told her to leave point blank.

3. Service dogs in training have full public access rights, but therapy dogs do not.An actual service dog handler would be aware of these laws and would not ask an employee questions about if they were allowed in the building or not. Additionally, this dog was clearly not being “trained” by the student in any way.

So from every available external indicator, this student was flustered when confronted about bringing her pet dog into the building, and therefore decided to pretend that she was disabled & had a service dog “in training.” The student benefited personally from implicitly lying about being disabled; avoiding the potential consequences of her actions by exploiting the ignorance and good nature of the employee.

Because disability is more fluid and often less obvious than other characteristics like skin color, body size, etc. it is easier for nondisabled people to impersonate us when it’s convenient or it benefits them in some way (with the assistance of plausible deniability).

Bring your pet dog into a building even though you’re not supposed to? It’s okay, just pretend to be disabled and say it’s a service dog. Want to make lots of money on a film about autism but can’t bother to spend time working on accommodating an autistic actor? It’s okay, just hire someone to pretend to be autistic instead. (/s)

The trouble with all of this is that disabled identity is being appropriated and used by nondisabled people to generate personal benefit and/or capital, all while actual disabled people remain marginalized. And the mis-appropriation of disabled identity creates false ideas in the public consciousness, about what disability is and how disabled people act.

People who fake having service dogs create situations in which actual handlers have trouble being taken seriously or gaining access to establishments. People who create films about the disabled experience without including disabled actors & writers create situations in which misconceptions and stereotypes about a certain disability are perpetuated and exaggerated.

The most disturbing thing about this dynamic is that disabled people are oppressed. It’s not like abled people are pretending to be us because they want to enjoy the sociocultural “benefits” of disabled life (there are none). We’re not an exalted category. We’re not nobles, or members of a high class. Rather, our lives and stories and meager legal protections are exploited by those who have no need to do so. Abled people are already advantaged, and they use our existence to further widen that gap in status.

I can’t stop being autistic when it’s convenient. I can’t stop being chronically ill when it’s convenient. I can’t stop having mobility issues when it’s convenient. This is my life every day. So to the student at the testing center, to Sia & Maddie Ziegler, and to every other abled person who’s put on a disabled persona: stop acting like this is your life when it’s not.

~Eden

Reasons that an autistic person might have a service dog (and, some general service dog education)

First, let’s establish what a service dog is and is not. A service dog is a dog that is trained to perform specific tasks to mitigate and assist with a person’s disability. A service dog is not an emotional support animal, or a therapy dog. ESAs are not trained to perform specific tasks, and therapy dogs are basically ESAs for more than one person in a professional setting.

You can’t have a service dog if you’re not disabled, and a dog isn’t a service dog unless it is trained to perform tasks that help the disabled person in ways that are directly related to their disability. Autism is officially classified as a disability, and it can cause significant challenges in daily life. As such, autistic people often benefit from having service dogs.

In the United States, under the ADA, there is no federal registry for service animals. This means that there is no documentation required to “prove” that a dog is a service dog. Any company or organization that tries to give you documentation or request that you provide it, is either fraudulent or not acting in accordance with the ADA.

Service dogs are allowed into all public and private establishments, provided that they are well behaved.

The only two things that a business owner can ask a service dog handler are: “Is your dog a service animal required because of a disability?”and“What tasks has your dog been trained to perform?”

If a dog is being disruptive (aggression, loud unnecessary barking that isn’t part of an alert, not being toilet trained, etc.) then it is within a business owner’s right to ask that the dog be removed from the premises.

There are very high standardsfor behavior among service dogs that all owners, handlers, and trainers are expected to reinforce. Therefore, if a service dog is being disruptive in public, it is not ready for public access.

And remember the golden rule of service dog etiquette: no touch, no talk, no eye contact. If you see a working dog in public, don’t interact with it. Distracting a service dog can be extremely dangerous for the handler. So don’t pet a service dog, no matter how cute it is, unless you’re friends with the handler and they tell you that you’re allowed in that moment.

Now, let’s get into some of the tasks service dogs can perform to help autistic people:

• Deep Pressure Therapy: lying on top of the person to provide sensory integration and relief from meltdowns & panic attacks.
• Alerting to the onset of meltdowns, shutdowns, and panic attacks. This can help in situations where the autistic person might be unaware that they’re starting to get overwhelmed, and can make it easier to stop meltdowns before they happen.
• Going to get help, for example if the autistic person has entered a shutdown state and is unable to move from an unsafe location, or has self-injured during a meltdown.
• Leading the person to an exit and/or out of a crowd. This can be extremely useful in situations where the autistic person has become overstimulated/disoriented to the point of being unable to orient themselves in space or initiate the process of movement.
• Interrupting self-injurious stims like skin picking, hair pulling, hitting, biting, etc. This can help reduce harmful stimming by physically blocking the action and encouraging the person to pet the dog instead.
• Reminding the person to take their medication. This task is really useful, especially for people who have comorbid ADHD and are often forgetful.
• Interrupting episodes of “spacing out” that often come along with executive dysfunction. This can help an autistic person ground themselves and be able to get tasks done more effectively, by having consistent physical reminders from their dog to continue doing a planned task.
• Picking up and retrieving items that the person has dropped. This is particularly useful for autistic people who have comorbid dyspraxia and/or ADHD, who often misplace things or drop things due to low muscle tone in their hands.
• Performing crowd control, by circling around the person as they walk. This is especially useful for autistic people who get overstimulated in large groups of people. The dog walks around the person, which in turn creates a barrier between the handler and the crowd.
• Anchoring, to prevent elopement in dangerous situations. If an autistic person tries to elope (run away) and they are connected to the dog’s leash/harness, the dog will lay down firmly and prevent the person from running away. This is especially helpful for autistic people who often run into traffic, into the woods, or into other potentially harmful situations.

As you can see, there are many reasons why an autistic person might have a service dog. Some autistic people also have co-occurring medical conditions, which might make having a service dog a more obvious choice.

Not all autistic people need service dogs. In fact, it’s probably the case that most autistic people don’t need service dogs. Service dogs require a great deal of time, energy, and resources. Some autistic people might not have the money or executive function required to adequately care for a service dog. That’s okay, too!

If you’re an autistic service dog handler and you’d like to share your experiences, please DM us at @the.autisticats on Instagram :)

~Eden