Disease Diagnosis & Social Norms

Last week I saw a TV segment (was it ESPN?) on surfer Clay Marzo and his battle with Asperger's Disease. The two pieces of information that struck me the most (and still sticks in my mind) about the story are:

1. When asked looking back now whether she would want to change any part of her son's behavior or who he is (with respect to Asperger's I would assume), Marzo's mom said "no"
2. Marzo still goes to therapy sessions to help him learn how to interact with others

While I can understand that a mother takes and loves her son as he is, going to therapy to cope with Asperger's necessarily implies an attempt to change a person, be it on the superficial behavioral level, or a deeper, more subconcious level. It leads me to thinking about disease diagnoses and how that has changed over time.

People who know me know my view about "recent disease discoveries" (ahem inventions) like ADD, ADHD, Dyslexia, and other learning disabilities. I'm much more fond of the old school diagnosis "I'm just not that smart with books" -- which, really, is OK. Everyone's good at different things. I don't care if there's a physiological (neurological) explanation to this. I am born shorter than average, and there's clear physiological evidence to prove it. If we really choose to go down this road, it would be discriminatory not to give me extra boosts and assistance in sports and gym class because I just naturally can't be as good as and compete with others.

With mental / behavioral diseases, I am much much more sympathetic to people suffering from the diseases, but to a certain extent I still object to the direction we're heading medically. The determination that some behaviors are "abnormal and anti-social" is, well, arbitrary and unfair (for me, anti-social does not mean vandalism or killing people (as it is used sometimes); that's just plain criminal). Whatever happened to the celebration of diversity? Does it only apply to the issue of race?

I know people will throw me studies and evidence suggesting that certain group behaviors, or groups with like-behavior individuals, yield better "group outcomes", and so from a macro perspective, we should set behavioral norms and promote adherence to them. But let's move past this macro let's-treat-everyone-like-numbers approach for a second and really think about what it means for each of us individuals.