Amy Tuteur, MD skepticalob.blogspot.com www.askdramy.com On the surface, the old idea of the “refrigerator mother” causing autism and the new quack idea of vaccines causing autism might appear to have little in common. However, as Dr. Michael Fitzpatrick notes, they both rest on the same deeply flawed belief: it is the mother (through her emotional response or her actions) who causes autism in her child and it is the mother (through her emotional response or her actions) who has the power to prevent autism. Fitzpatrick is the author of Defeating Autism: A Damaging Delusion, a physician and the parent of an autistic child. He writes bitingly about the quackery in the “crusade against autism.” Jenny McCarthy is an obvious target: In the foreword to Louder Than Words: A Mother’s Journey Into Healing Autism, Jenny McCarthy is described as the ‘polar opposite’ of the ‘refrigerator mom’, the quasi-demonic figure blamed by…