Autism in the army.

Flipping through an old issue of The Week (May 19, 2006), I found an interesting story. It appears that the family of Jared Guinther, an 18-year-old from Oregon, was trying to get him released from the army, which recruited him in spite of the fact that he is autistic. Guinther, who rarely speaks, "wasn't even aware of the war in Iraq until a recruiter enlisted him last fall to be a calvary scout, the Army's most dangerous job". Guinther's mother tried to intervene, but the recruiter told her that he himself was dyslexic and that Jared "doesn't need mommy to make his decisions for him".

Ultimately, the Army did release Jared from his contract, but this raises a host of questions about agency, autism, and Army recruitment practices. Jared's parents believed he could not understand the consequences of making such a decision, and who knows better than the people who raised you? But Jared's parents also had mixed feelings about the war in Iraq. What does a diagnosis like "autism" or "Aspberger's syndrome" mean for legal agency?