Would Jett Travolta still be alive if his parents weren't Scientologists?
It was inevitable that this question would get asked: the Travoltas, after all, have long been criticized for rejecting the possibility that their son might be autistic. So, as I asked over at Famecrawler: if Jett Travolta was autistic, and his autism was left untreated because Scientology does not recognize autism as a condition, did the fact that his condition was left untreated factor into his death?
The Church of Scientology rejects the existence of mental illness as
a real medical condition; they argue that such illness is psychosomatic
and that individuals with mental illness or
neurological disorder are defective human beings. As Sandra wrote here the other day, Scientologists accordingly reject the very existence of autism as a medical condition, but
sources close to the Travoltas have long
insisted that Jett was indeed autistic - many forms of which are know
to involve violent seizures such as the one that led to his death. Of course, nobody can for certain whether Jett was autistic - and even if he was, it`s not necessarily true that that condition led to his death (pathologists conducted the autopsy yesterday; results still pending) - but the fact that his parents rejected, out of hand, the very possibility against evidence to the contrary is troubling.
In a way, it doesn't matter: Jett Travolta is dead, and the Travoltas deserve every ounce of sympathy that the world can muster for them. But if this tragedy could serve to remind parents to seek proper diagnoses for their children - even if such diagnoses tell them things that they don't want to hear - perhaps some small good could come of all this.
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