Super Urgent? Really?

Recently, in the WrongPlanet group on Facebook, the phrase, “Super Urgent – Need Your Help Now!” was posted on the latest bit of spam to hit the group.  Spam isn’t an uncommon situation.  It happens on social networking sites on a regular basis, in fact.  In this case, someone thought they could ride the autism coattails to fame and fortune and, unfortunately, that, too, is not an uncommon occurrence. 

Here’s what happened.

You see, this most recent person had recorded and just released a “Christmas” song.  She wanted everyone in the autism community everywhere to help her promote it so it would get lots of radio airplay.  She made a big deal about the fact that all the money from downloading the song from iTunes was being donated to autism groups.  However, she didn’t mention which autism groups would benefit from the fundraiser.  That in itself struck many as odd.

She wanted people to call up their local radio station and insist that they play her “Christmas” song.   Her daily spam messages to the group seemed strange to those of us who have an understanding of marketing, promotion, fundraising, staging awareness events and the music/arts industry.  Two questions were put to her:  Was she also donating the royalties from airplay to autism groups as well as the money earned from downloads?  Was this a one-time fundraiser or was this philanthropy an ongoing fundraiser until copyright runs out on the song and it enters the public domain?

She claimed her youngest child had Asperger Syndrome and her oldest child had PDD-NOS but made no mention either way as to whether her middle child was on the spectrum.  She claimed she worked for the Canadian National Autism Foundation (CNAF) and when she was caught in that lie, she claimed she didn’t know how to “edit” the information off her Wall (it was suggested to her that she look for the word EDIT, click on it and correct the information).  She claimed to be passionate about autism and yet, she knew nothing about the autism community past spamming people with her holiday season song.  She claimed she had dedicated her life to the autism cause and yet she had no idea which autism groups would be benefiting from her philanthropy.  And she kept asking people in the group to tell her who was worthy of receiving money from her fundraiser.

In fact, her exact words on the matter were:  “I am NOT asking for money…. I have money to give to Autism groups. I need help in how to distribute it.”

One member in the group wrote that s/he didn’t see what the song had to do with promoting autism past promoting a stereotype of autism.    To that member, and to many members in the group, the song seemed like a gimmicky version of “Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer.”  What’s more, it was pointed out to her that people with autism didn’t need a commercial song about a cutesy elf that appeared to have Rett Syndrome doing cutesy little things.  

After that, when respected and well-known autistics dared question her motives, she turned on them and attacked.  In fact, she wrote to one particularly well-known Autistic:  ” … [snip] People on the spec are persistant [sic] and so are their mothers….. that’s what makes all of us successful…… Are you a phony? If you actually donated your money to the Autism cause then you of all people would understand another trying to raise monies for charity…… but you are not relating…. why….because you have not raised money for Autism…. have you [name removed]? Your whole web site is a scam….. isn’t it….“

While it’s true that most mothers who have children on the spectrum are passionate about autism causes, it’s equally true that those mothers take the time to research autism spectrum disorders, and most specifically, the brand of autism their child has.  They take the time to decide for themselves if they are cure or anti-cure people.  They take the time to decide for themselves if they are anti-vaccine or pro-vaccine people.  They take the time to decide for themselves what they believe to be true about autism.  Not so with the recording artist who was using autism as a springboard to greater notoriety.  She had absolutely no views and no opinion with regards to autism spectrum disorders.

Now, there’s quite a bit I could say about this person – which would make for one very long blog article indeed – so I’ll just keep to a few very pertinent tidbits so readers and blog visitors can see how it is that some people pretend to be sincere when they are busy using someone else’s diagnosis to take them into the limelight.

She pretended to be nothing more than just a mom.  Someone posting as her youngest son posted that music was his mom’s hobby while the woman was busily posting that it was her career. 

What she didn’t share with members in the WrongPlanet group is that she co-owns a record label along with Eddie Hedges who was part of the American Idol house band.  She didn’t share that she released the first of four albums in 2001 which  means she’s been in the business for at least a decade, and most likely quite a bit longer than that since Indie recordings prior to 2000 were prohibitively expensive for singer-songwriters with no band to call their own.  Of course, seeing as her two youngest children are 8 and 14 years of age according to her current website, a decade ago she was the mom of three very young children (her daughter is currently 19 years old according to another website and appears to be an employee of her mother’s record label).

The marketing angle this woman took was to present herself as a mom with no understanding of the music industry, with philanthropy being the core of her efforts because her 8 year old son has Asperger Syndrome and her 19 year old daughter has PDD-NOS.  What it now appears to have been – now that all of this important information has been discovered – was a sure fire media hook that would put her ahead of others in the promotion game in an extremely competitive market and an extremely competitive industry.  It appears that this was the best way she could think of to promote her latest recording effort.

As people continued to ask her pertinent questions about the project and her motives, she became more and more aggressive and abusive towards them … many of whom she knew had a diagnosis of Asperger Syndrome.  In the end, she decided to send a few snippy private messages to a few members and blocked most members who had asked questions she refused to answer.

Shortly after that, it wasn’t long before people purporting to be this woman’s mother as well as her two minor sons along with a couple of friends were spamming the page, outraged that anyone would have questioned the discrepancies and contradictions that she had posted. 

This is a case where many within the autism community stood together and refused to allow someone to misuse autism or Asperger Syndrome for their own personal gain.  At face value, those who are not aware of how prevalent this sort of thing is, may think that those in the Wrong Planet group on Facebook were wrong to treat the woman in this way.  What they don’t realize is that it’s people like that who have a way of twisting facts in order to make themselves look like the victim of a group of autistics.  It’s the other way around: people like that seem to purposely target autistics because they know that autistics are, for the most part, naïve and willing to take people and situations as they are presented.  It’s only when things don’t add up that many spectrumites begin to question the veracity of the situation and once on the trail, the logic is impeccable.

Super urgent? Well, maybe … if someone’s trying to run a numbers game.  Not so super urgent if the fundraising effort is pulled together ethically and with great care and attention to detail, long before the Christmas season is upon us.

Elyse Bruce
Founder and Creator
MIDNIGHT IN CHICAGO

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