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Antreus
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24 Jan 2012, 2:40 pm

I've been curious about this myself but I finally found a decent article. Apparently, Julian talks about having autistic tendencies in his memoir:
http://jezebel.com/5842834/assange-says-hes-a-chauvinist-and-a-little-autistic-in-new-memoir


He's projecting a view that all men are a little bit autistic in regards to understanding the feelings of women. I have a hard time understanding the context perhaps - was it in jest?

Anyways, it's there if you want to read the whole article.

Here's another article rooted in his comment that 'men are all a bit autistic'
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/julian-assange-i-am-ndash-like-all-hackers-ndash-a-little-bit-autistic-2358654.html



Mindslave
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24 Jan 2012, 3:10 pm

Not being psychic like what women want (or what he thinks women want) doesn't imply autism of any sort. This idea that not having 100% empathy proves autism is preposterous. There is a lot more to it than empathy versus no empathy. Then again, I didn't read the article, so yeah.



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24 Jan 2012, 5:17 pm

Everyone is "a little bit Autistic." :roll:

What of it?


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24 Jan 2012, 7:38 pm

Pop culture BS in my opinion, I'd ignore it if I were you.


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Nurylon
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28 Jan 2012, 7:09 pm

I don't know why I was so damn happy when I found out Julian was Aspie. I was looking at Wikipedia's list of people on the autism spectrum, and the FIRST person on the Aspie list was Julian Assange. Had his last name not been Assange, I would not have known. Hey, did you see that video reenactment of him being a horrible house guest that's supposed to be true? :D



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28 Jan 2012, 7:16 pm

Nurylon wrote:
I don't know why I was so damn happy when I found out Julian was Aspie. I was looking at Wikipedia's list of people on the autism spectrum, and the FIRST person on the Aspie list was Julian Assange. Had his last name not been Assange, I would not have known. Hey, did you see that video reenactment of him being a horrible house guest that's supposed to be true? :D


I thought he was just a little autistic... :roll:


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18 Feb 2012, 1:06 am

Nurylon wrote:
I don't know why I was so damn happy when I found out Julian was Aspie. I was looking at Wikipedia's list of people on the autism spectrum, and the FIRST person on the Aspie list was Julian Assange. Had his last name not been Assange, I would not have known. Hey, did you see that video reenactment of him being a horrible house guest that's supposed to be true? :D


I know of at least 200,000 troops that would love to have a crack at Assange. His releases have caused some problems for those who risk their lives in the field and may have gotten a few of them killed. I'd love to see him in Leavenworth with a cell mate named Bubba turning Assange into a "girlfriend"!

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18 Feb 2012, 3:36 am

I wish to send these little bit autistics a nonverbal cue.



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18 Feb 2012, 3:40 am

Antreus wrote:
He's projecting a view that all men are a little bit autistic in regards to understanding the feelings of women. I have a hard time understanding the context perhaps - was it in jest?

I think it's just a pretty stupid thing to say, and probably excusing himself.


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sepia
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18 Feb 2012, 4:39 pm

really, i find that julian has manipulated the press far too throroughly to be a likely candidate for autism. i would have thought narcisistic personallity better fitting the bill. let me explain:
i) whatever his motivation, there is a certain power in releasing potentially damaging secrets?
ii) in the uk he had a new press release almost daily... and this continued was long after he was current news.



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19 Feb 2012, 3:25 am

sepia wrote:
really, i find that julian has manipulated the press far too throroughly to be a likely candidate for autism. i would have thought narcisistic personallity better fitting the bill. let me explain:
i) whatever his motivation, there is a certain power in releasing potentially damaging secrets?
ii) in the uk he had a new press release almost daily... and this continued was long after he was current news.
Just as equally:

i) many Aspies have a very strong sense of right and wrong and speak out against injustices; a lot of Aspies lack a 'normal' perception of risk and potential repercussions to their actions, take action instinctively without thinking things through, and might not realise how things might backfire, i.e. they might wonder how can it be considered wrong to expose war crimes and corruption, when surely that's the right thing to do? Also, putting one's head above the parapet isn't necessarily an act of narcissism, it might be a calculated and logical action taken in order to 'take the flak' or thus ensure that other more vulnerable people don't have to deal with the heat.

(I'm Aspie and recall an instance when I stuck my head above the parapet and it certainly wasn't due to any power trip or narcissism on my part. I had a part-time secretarial job, working for a law firm, and one of the other secretaries was working for a lawyer who was very critical and demanding and she had been given a warning over mistakes and not being quick enough. She was a working mum with a husband, two children and a mortgage and she needed her job. I was single, living in rented accommodation, I had done a lot of temping and knew I could easily find another job if I needed to, I also knew I was a very fast and accurate typist, so I stuck my head above the parapet and offered to swap bosses.)

As for narcissism, hmmm... I think there's no doubt he has a bit of a superiority complex, but is that unjust? I mean, I think most people in his shoes would feel superior, he obviously has a genius level intellect, he's generally been miles ahead of other security experts in the field and also the authorities... I mean, come on, wouldn't you also feel just a little bit smug at having led the authorities on such a merry dance? And so far, all they can get him on is the Swedish sex allegations... it's a bit reminiscent of getting Al Capone on tax evasion.

ii) There were lots of releases of information, because there was lots and lots of data in the cables, which was released in batches, as work had been done on them to redact particularly sensitive information. No doubt there were press releases issued in response to a flurry of media requests on various issues.

You can hardly blame Assange for the fact that the media think him and the Wikileaks project, and what has been revealed, are newsworthy. War crimes, wide-scale corruption... I mean, really, did you expect the media not to cover those stories?

If it wasn't Assange, the media would target someone else to put on a pedestal/used as a whipping boy as the whim took them. As Assange himself has said, he came forward as a figurehead because the lack of one was proving to be a distraction from their work. (It's similar with the Occupy movement and other non-hierarchical consensus-decision making campaigns and protest groups - the media and the authorities all say "Take me to your leader" and when you try to explain that there isn't one it just doesn't compute and they don't let us, and if one person at any one time asks as a spokesperson, they then have the position "leader" projected on to them. You can't be a square peg, they will make you into a round peg to fit into their round holes.)



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20 Feb 2012, 11:49 pm

If you ask me, Julian Assange seems a little bit more than a little bit autistic. And as far as all men being a little bit autistic, isn't that one of Barr-Cohen's ideas: that autism is "the extreme male brain". And it seems like a lot of us female Aspies feel kind of male in our thinking and way we see the world. I do. So maybe there is something to it?



sepia
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21 Feb 2012, 5:15 pm

EnglishLulu wrote:
sepia wrote:
really, i find that julian has manipulated the press far too throroughly to be a likely candidate for autism. i would have thought narcisistic personallity better fitting the bill. let me explain:
i) whatever his motivation, there is a certain power in releasing potentially damaging secrets?
ii) in the uk he had a new press release almost daily... and this continued was long after he was current news.
Just as equally:

i) many Aspies have a very strong sense of right and wrong and speak out against injustices; a lot of Aspies lack a 'normal' perception of risk and potential repercussions to their actions, take action instinctively without thinking things through, and might not realise how things might backfire, i.e. they might wonder how can it be considered wrong to expose war crimes and corruption, when surely that's the right thing to do? Also, putting one's head above the parapet isn't necessarily an act of narcissism, it might be a calculated and logical action taken in order to 'take the flak' or thus ensure that other more vulnerable people don't have to deal with the heat.

(I'm Aspie and recall an instance when I stuck my head above the parapet and it certainly wasn't due to any power trip or narcissism on my part. I had a part-time secretarial job, working for a law firm, and one of the other secretaries was working for a lawyer who was very critical and demanding and she had been given a warning over mistakes and not being quick enough. She was a working mum with a husband, two children and a mortgage and she needed her job. I was single, living in rented accommodation, I had done a lot of temping and knew I could easily find another job if I needed to, I also knew I was a very fast and accurate typist, so I stuck my head above the parapet and offered to swap bosses.)

As for narcissism, hmmm... I think there's no doubt he has a bit of a superiority complex, but is that unjust? I mean, I think most people in his shoes would feel superior, he obviously has a genius level intellect, he's generally been miles ahead of other security experts in the field and also the authorities... I mean, come on, wouldn't you also feel just a little bit smug at having led the authorities on such a merry dance? And so far, all they can get him on is the Swedish sex allegations... it's a bit reminiscent of getting Al Capone on tax evasion.

ii) There were lots of releases of information, because there was lots and lots of data in the cables, which was released in batches, as work had been done on them to redact particularly sensitive information. No doubt there were press releases issued in response to a flurry of media requests on various issues.

You can hardly blame Assange for the fact that the media think him and the Wikileaks project, and what has been revealed, are newsworthy. War crimes, wide-scale corruption... I mean, really, did you expect the media not to cover those stories?

If it wasn't Assange, the media would target someone else to put on a pedestal/used as a whipping boy as the whim took them. As Assange himself has said, he came forward as a figurehead because the lack of one was proving to be a distraction from their work. (It's similar with the Occupy movement and other non-hierarchical consensus-decision making campaigns and protest groups - the media and the authorities all say "Take me to your leader" and when you try to explain that there isn't one it just doesn't compute and they don't let us, and if one person at any one time asks as a spokesperson, they then have the position "leader" projected on to them. You can't be a square peg, they will make you into a round peg to fit into their round holes.)


I guess this is entirely possible: the daily press releases from assange lasting so long after the rest of the news coverage (which is the main thing I noticed), could be him wanting to answer every bit or muck that was levelled at him (to be honest past the initial news story I chose not to read a lot of the muck being thrown at him, since it did feel quite mucky and not entirely anything that belongs outside of a court), could denote an apsie thoroughness.



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07 Mar 2012, 3:34 pm

Assange may have some asperger traits but he will never be officially diagnosed with aspergers. His social skills are simply to good. I have seen a couple of interviews with Assange on tv and I can assure you that the guys loves to talk and he seems very relaxed while doing so.

He probably has an IQ that is way above average and some highly gifted people have some traits that may come across as autistic. That doesn't mean that they really are autistic though. What strikes me is that Assange seems to have some very clear, almost rigid ideas about justice versus injustice and the importance about information which come across as a bit "aspergerlike" but other than that he is okay as a person. And besides, most men are a bit autistic when it comes to dealing with woman.

Julian Assange has a dutch friend called Rop Grongrijp or something. An endearing guy with more than a few asperger traits. I think that there are definitely some real aspergers in his direct environment.