14 December 2023 , 14:22
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A neighbour of an autistic teenager has told how his ‘terrifying, macabre behaviour’ over the years has led to a stale-mate and stand-off between the two households. Detailing the situation, she explained how while living in their house for three years and witnessing their neighbour’s son’s increasingly worrying behaviour, including wearing grim reaper costumes and waving fake knives at cars, was unsettling enough, his latest obsession of blowing a ‘chilling Aztec Death Whistle’ morning, noon and night had been the last straw.
Describing the sound as: “Like someone is screaming bloody murder,” the woman told how on one particular day, the Aztec Death Whistle (known as the ‘whistle of death' because historians believe they were used to help guide sacrificial victims on their journey to the afterlife) had been blown all day while she was trying to study for her masters programme from home.
She said: “Tonight at 8:45pm, I went out to the porch while the kid was still blowing the whistle and said to him and his father in a pretty agitated tone: ‘Hey, can we stop with the whistle?’ This is the first time I have ever spoken to these neighbours so I admit it’s not the best first impression.”
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With the dad shrugging off the noise by suggesting it wasn’t that late, she continued: “I said something to the effect of: ‘I don’t think you realise how loud it is’ and he replied: ‘There are so many louder noises going on at any time so what are you going to do?’. I said: “It sounds like someone is screaming bloody murder” and he snapped back: “Yeah it’s supposed to. He is autistic and he likes it.”
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With the woman infuriated and at her wits' end after three days of the continual and harrowing whistle-blowing, she told how both her and her husband threatened to call the police if nothing was done, asking her neighbour: “If you don’t want to listen, I can file a noise complaint, do you want me to just do that?”
With the woman at breaking point, she jumped online to gauge reader response, quick to highlight that while the noise was of course ‘blood-curdling’ the more disturbing part was his father setting no boundaries for his son due to his autism.
With more than 800 comments to her post, many were quick to jump to her defence, with one saying: “I just googled Aztec death whistle and holy f***, that is scary and annoying!” Another advised reporting it: “See if you can video this kid doing this and call the police about it. That noise has got to violate some local noise ordinance.”
Another Reddit reader said that even though their own family had some neurodivergent members: “No one allows them to disrupt the peace or safety of other people,” while another placed the blame firmly at the feet of the boy’s parents: “While the boy has his problems, the parents are responsible for his behaviour.”
Another likened the situation to owning a dog: “Parents who let their autistic children do things that irritate others and hand wave it off with: ‘He's autistic, he enjoys it!’ are the worst kind of people. It's like a dog owner who lets their dog bark at all hours of the day and night.” “It doesn’t matter what spectrum he is on, blowing any whistle like that all the time is wrong. Call the authorities if they do it again.”