Tony Mantor: Why Not Me the World
Areva Martin: How One Mother Became an Everyday Autism Advocate
Fri, 25 Apr 2025
Send us a textCNN contributor and civil rights attorney Areva Martin shares her personal journey of raising an autistic son while becoming a powerful advocate for disability rights and creating systemic change.• Son Marty's autism diagnosis at age two prompted an intensive learning journey• Navigated overwhelming and often inaccurate information by applying legal training to seek evidence-based resources• Witnessed evolution from stigma and "cure" focus to greater acceptance and integration of neurodivergent individuals• Founded Special Needs Network, California's largest social justice organization for special needs children• Advocates for reform in criminal justice system to better serve autistic individuals• Uses multiple platforms including social media, television appearances, and legislative testimony to raise awareness• Emphasizes grassroots advocacy to influence elected officials and policy decisions• Trains parents and organizations in effective advocacy strategies• Hosting annual Tools for Transformation Conference on April 26th in Torrance, California• Pink Pump Fundraising Gala on May 18th to support summer camp and wildfire victimsVisit tonymantor.com/contact if you'd like to share your story on the podcast.https://tonymantor.comhttps://Facebook.com/tonymantorhttps://instagram.com/tonymantorhttps://twitter.com/tonymantorhttps://youtube.com/tonymantormusicintro/outro music bed written by T. WildWhy Not Me the World music published by Mantor Music (BMI)
Chapter 1: Who is Areva Martin and what is her background?
Hopefully you gain more awareness, acceptance, and a better understanding for autism around the world. Hi, I'm Tony Mantor. Welcome to Why Not Me? The World, Humanity Over Handcuffs, the Silent Crisis special event. Today, we're joined by Areva Martin, a passionate, outspoken, and insightful leader who's making a significant impact in media.
She's a CNN contributor, an award-winning civil rights attorney, a civic leader, and a television host. Areva is also a prolific writer and best-selling author with notable books like The Everyday Advocate, Standing Up for Your Child with Autism, and Make It Rain.
She's here to share her personal story about raising her autistic son, as well as details about her foundation and upcoming speaking events. With a wealth of knowledge and experience, we're truly honored to have her here with us. Thanks for joining us. Oh, thank you. Thanks for the invitation. Oh, it's my pleasure.
With all the different things that you've accomplished, what led you to advocating for autism and special needs?
Chapter 2: How did Areva Martin become an autism advocate?
My son, Marty, he was diagnosed with autism when he was two, and it was really a devastating diagnosis for us. I didn't know much about autism. No one in my inner circle had ever had or at least shared with me that they had a child on the spectrum. So as I was trying to get information to help Marty, I kept running into a lot of brick walls.
I kept running into folks who had more questions than they had answers. And it was very frustrating for me. It became clear to me that there was not going to be anyone that would save me, that I had to become the answer to my own questions first.
And that led me on a journey to learn as much as I could about the diagnosis, the treatment, the services, to learn what the federal and state law had to say about children with special needs, to learn what legislation was out there, what funding was out there. So it just made me become an expert.
How old is your son now?
He's a young adult now. He is 25.
So along this journey, how has your approach evolved as you've navigated the unknown, learned, and grown over the years? What significant shifts have you observed in your perspective, methods, or growth along with working with others compared to where you first started?
Well, I definitely have seen the industry evolve. I've seen people be a lot more open and honest and transparent, less stigma, less secrecy, less negative association with individuals on the spectrum, more acceptance. I've seen self-advocates get heavily involved to speak up for what's important to them. So it's not just parents speaking on their behalf.
I've seen more funding pour into nonprofits and community-based organizations. I've seen more research, not so much around cure, because when I started my journey, all the focus was on how do we cure this? Now the focus is much more on how do we integrate individuals on the spectrum into our community? How do we make them feel loved and welcomed?
How do we adjust our movie theaters, our workplaces, and other community public spaces to accommodate people who are neurodivergent? So I've seen the language change. I've seen the symbolism change. There have been massive changes.
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Chapter 3: What challenges did Areva face when seeking autism information?
I did. I wrote a book called The Everyday Advocate, and my book is really a practical guide. It took everything I'd learned as a parent, plus my knowledge as a civil rights lawyer, and it was walking parents through the journey, letting them know, if you're looking for a trusted source of information, here it is. You don't have to Google and dig through 5,000 articles.
I've done that research for you. And I only use those trusted researchers and scientists and, you know, provided that information. Here's what the leading researchers are saying about autism. Here's what you should know. Now, whether you decide to follow something else, that's okay too. But at least I wanted folks to have access to that kind of information.
Sure, I think that's great. Now, with all those powerful tools and resources right at your fingertips, have you found ways to harness them to advocate for your autistic child and extend that support to others across the spectrum as well?
Oh, absolutely. I used my lawyer skills to negotiate IEPs, not only for my son, but I actually started a disability rights practice in my law firm several years after my son's diagnosis. And I went to IEPs with hundreds of different families. I advocated for families in their school meetings. I filed lawsuits. on behalf of families who were in conflict with their school districts.
I filed federal civil rights disability lawsuits against kids, against school districts where there had been discrimination or even physical injury that kids suffered in classrooms. So absolutely, I've used my legal background to, one, represent families in federal court and state court,
in administrative hearings, to testify before legislative bodies, to help write and shape legislation at the state and national level.
I'm hosting a special this month featuring 30 straight episodes on autism and the legal system. It features CIT trainers, judges, former legislators, of course this episode. It's a silent crisis. Many do not realize the immense legal challenges faced by autistic individuals. Have you encountered this at all?
Well, be more specific when you say legal challenges. Do you mean individuals on the spectrum having their legal rights violated? What do you mean? Because that's kind of a broad statement.
Sure. I've had in-depth discussions with numerous parents who've recounted the profoundly distressing and often traumatic experiences of their autistic children becoming entangled in the complexities of the legal system. Many ending up incarcerated and enduring an excruciating and traumatic ordeal. They've expressed to me with...
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Chapter 4: How did Areva apply her legal expertise to autism advocacy?
Oh, it's education and awareness. I mean, that's how we change perceptions. It's narrative change, right? It's helping those judges and district attorneys. In the same way, we've had a lot of awareness campaigns around mental health, and we've seen changes around addiction. We now have addiction courts.
We have individuals who may be involved with some kind of petty theft or so, and they have a substance abuse problem. We realized locking those people up was not the answer. Those people needed drug rehabilitation.
So a lot of district attorneys and courts around this country have set up those kind of, you know, substance abuse courts and systems so that anybody that does have a substance abuse is looking at a different form of, you know, they have a different experience in the criminal justice system. And likewise, that's been very effective.
I know people who've gone through those kinds of rehab programs and therefore have not been time in traditional jails or prisons. And we need something very similar when it comes to neurodivergent people. It's changing that narrative, lots of education, lots of awareness, looking at alternative ways in our criminal justice system to deal with those individuals.
How can we effectively expand awareness and understanding of autism, especially regarding legal challenges? There was an incident where an autistic young man was nearly arrested in a park due to an officer mistaking his behavior for drug use.
So how do we get the information and education out there so that we can drive systematic change, influence national policies, and create a meaningful impact across the country?
Well, a lot of it is funding. And we know budgets, whether it's at the state level or the local level, are a statement of a community's priorities. So we changed those budgets. We saw after George Floyd's murder where many local police departments, local cities, local municipalities were looking at how they spent their money. Did they spend more money on police budgets?
budgets than they did on social services. They spend more money on police than they did, you know, health care and health resources. So it's a bottom-up approach. We can't expect legislators to be responsive to the needs of people with autism unless they know that the people who vote for them, their constituents, want prioritized. They want to see this issue prioritized.
So that's what this advocacy is about. It's about galvanizing people, in their local communities so that they can bring awareness even to their elected officials. I talk to folks in elected office all the time and they had absolutely no awareness of this. So they clearly aren't going to go and advocate for a piece of legislation or for funding if they're not made aware of it.
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Chapter 5: What legal challenges do autistic individuals face in the justice system?
I'm frequently on our local news stations talking about autism, talking about the programs that my nonprofit run. I use my social media accounts. I use op-ed pieces. I use my voice in as many places as I can. I'm frequently testifying before legislative bodies. And then my nonprofit, we use, again, our platform through our website, through social
against social media and outreach community, boots on the ground outreach efforts to raise awareness.
I'm glad you brought that up. I'd love to dive into your foundation. What's it called and can you expand on what you do to help people within your communities?
It's the Special Needs Network. It's the California largest social justice and disability rights organization, and we work on behalf of kids who have special needs, neurodivergent kids, their families. We provide direct services as well as legislative advocacy.
How long has it been established and actively making an impact, and how have you seen it grow?
We are in our 17th year, and we have six offices across the state of California, and we serve tens of thousands of families each year.
So having the platform you have, you likely have countless people reaching out to you. What are some of the challenges you've encountered while working with them? And what are some of the successes you've achieved in helping them along the way?
Well, a lot of the wins come from helping families get services. So whether I'm directly involved or getting them connected to my nonprofit or getting them connected to professionals in their own community, the challenges are, again, sometimes depending on the community that they live in, they may not have robust services. We're in California.
States like Massachusetts, there are some states that have really robust social service agencies. There are other states that don't do as well. So the challenges are, unfortunately, so much of this is geographically based. And just depending on where you physically live can dictate what the quality and quantity of service is available to you.
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Chapter 6: How can the legal system improve its approach to autism?
That's just so good to hear. Now, a lot of people do not understand or realize how difficult it is to get a bill through the House or through the Senate. I have a couple of former House of Representatives coming on my podcast later this month, Tim Murphy and Patrick Kennedy. They both talk about how they got bills passed through and how difficult it was in getting that done.
It's a real tough issue to get these people to get this done. So how do you tell people or inform people on what to do to put the pressure on these representatives to help get this passed, to help the people that need it?
Elected officials respond to their constituents. So this has to be an issue that is where you're able to galvanize constituents who then put pressure on their elected officials. You show up at their town hall meetings. You show up at rallies. You make appointments to go in to speak with their aides, to speak with them. You email them. You call them.
They've got to know that people in their districts, the people that elect them, expect them to prioritize this as an issue.
But if they don't hear from constituents, if they're only hearing about immigration issues and they're only hearing about economic issues or gun control issues, abortion rights, reproductive rights, all the various issues that elected officials have to contend with, if they're not hearing about the issue of autism, the criminal justice system, they're not going to make it a priority.
Yes, that totally makes sense. I've also heard, and I'm sure that you've probably helped people on this as well, I've heard that if one person goes in to see their representative, they tell them their story, then they leave, the representative says, oh, that's nice, we'll see what we can do. But...
When they have people that show up in groups that continually keep it in front of them and they're consistently hearing about the issue at hand, then that will keep it on their mind more often than not and consider helping. So do you put together groups like that or do you help put together groups like that so they're more informed on what to do with their representatives?
Yes, we've actually done training for other nonprofits. We've taught other nonprofits how to build capacity, how to develop and execute on an advocacy campaign and strategy. So we've been heavily involved in helping grassroots activists.
That's really good to hear. Now, are there other things that you do as well to help these activists or people in general so they know the direction to take?
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Chapter 7: What strategies can expand autism awareness and influence policy?
Well, I definitely have provided a lot of assistance and consulting and advice to organizations trying to do that. But I don't know if I agree that the funding is only for individuals who maybe present with some kind of visible disability. Autism impacts one in 34, one in 36 people. So you're going to be hard pressed to find someone whose life has not been touched by autism.
So I don't think people should be deterred by what I'll call antiquated notion that because autism doesn't present, you know, like someone who has a limp or someone, you know, who has a cane because they're visually impaired, that they can't get the attention of elected officials, funders and others who will support them.
Oh, I agree that they need support and it will not stop some from supporting them. I've just heard from organizations that it has been tougher because one person told me that he had an autistic child and another one that was autistic with Down syndrome and the money came pouring in for the one with Down syndrome more than the autistic one. So unfortunately, that's just one challenge they face.
So now I understand that you also do a lot of public speaking.
Yes, I do.
When you travel to different places and do your speaking, what are some of the common things that people will talk to you about after you've finished?
Things I hear a lot from parents is they're in search of community, that they feel isolated, that they don't know other parents. They don't know where to go for resources in their community and that they are in search of community. They're looking for connections, both for themselves as parents, as well as for their child, teen or young adult on the spectrum.
So what would you like to tell the listeners that you think is very important that they need to know about what you do and what you're trying to do to help everyone you can with your foundation?
People should know that people with autism have tremendous potential. They can work. They can get married, have children. They can be incredibly productive members of society. And so as a society, we have an obligation to them to accept them, to include them, and to learn from them. as much as we can about how they move about the world, how they learn, how they communicate.
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