# Is Autism caused by Tylenol? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 23, 2018, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-autism-caused-by-tylenol/812932 "2018-04-23T02:11:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Showing post:** 84
**Author:** ![DavidwithanR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3bc359/32.png) [@DavidwithanR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DavidwithanR)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2018, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-autism-caused-by-tylenol/812932/84 "2018-04-25T18:40:44Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > Autism is a spectrum disease. It can indeed be a “[nightmare](http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2009/12/kent_state_professor_trudy_ste.html)”. In severe cases, autistic people will engage in [self-harm](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3990505/), are non-verbal, have hours-long tantrums, etc. > > Fortunately, most cases of autism aren’t like this, but yeah, it happens. I know. I’d be interested in a study of how the kids with the “tantrums” were treated (by parents, educators, and caregivers) for the three days preceding the “tantrums”. If I was treated the way I see a lot of autistic kids being treated, I’d have a “tantrum” too. (Translation: if you can’t talk, and powerful people are gratuitously mean to you on a regular basis, what else can you do but act in a protesting manner?) Mostly, AFAICT, the nightmare isn’t being autistic - the nightmare is having to try to learn from those teachers or live with those parents. I have students who are autistic - some with “tantrums” and some without - and I certainly see glaring differences in parenting. It’s hard to grow up autistic if you have mean stupid parents, harder than if you’re not autistic. What a surprise. --- _[View the full topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-autism-caused-by-tylenol/812932)._