One of the top podcasts in the world—even beating out Rogan for a few hours—is popularizing a well-meaning intervention for non-speaking autistic people. Unfortunately, that intervention happens to be a proven failure, and may set autistic and disability rights discourse back by decades. 

Filmmaker Ky Dicken’s The Telepathy Tapes podcast delves into the world of Facilitated Communication, in which non-speaking people are believed to miraculously gain access to complex written language after lives of silence. According to Dickson, non-speaking people can also gather in transdimensional spaces and channel spiritual knowledge.

But there’s a problem. Every controlled test shows that the messages produced through letterboards and iPads are coming from the facilitators—not the non-speaking persons.

In this episode, Matthew interviews experts in pseudoscience and autism, including Janyce Boynton, a former (now dissident) practitioner of Facilitated Communication who explains how seductive and promising it was to practice, but how it ultimately steals agency and dignity from the autistic client.

And... this is also a story about parents dealing with crushing levels of unpaid and invisible labour. They are already doing miraculous work. A fantasy is no replacement for true support and recognition.

Show Notes

Podcast About 'Telepathic' Autistic Children Briefly Knocks Joe Rogan Out Of No. 1 Spot  

Ky Dickens Director | Filmmaker 

Facilitated Communication—what harm it can do: Confessions of a former facilitator

MD25438 - Powell, Diane Hennacy, MD - OR License Verification - 01/12/2025 11:07:47 AM 

The Telepathy Tapes: Separating Science From Pseudoscience In Autism Communication 

Stolen Voices: Facilitated Communication Devalues Autism | Psychology Today Canada

Multiple method validation study of facilitated communication: II. Individual differences and subgroup results - PubMed  

The Telepathy Tapes Prove We All Want to Believe

"The Telepathy Tapes" is Taking America by Storm. But it Has its Roots in Old Autism Controversies. 

Mixed Messages: Validity and Ethics of Facilitated Communication | Disability Studies Quarterly 

Is There Science Behind That? Facilitated Communication 

Controlled Studies — Facilitated Communication

Served people with severe communication impairments — Obit for Rosemary Crossley

More Doubts over Disability ‘Miracle’ 

Katharine Beals

Jonathan Jarry MSc - Science Communicator  

FCisNotScience - YouTube — Janyce Boynton’s awesome YouTube channel

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices