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MimiR
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04 Oct 2011, 7:21 am

90% or more of people with REAL autism are nonfunctional in society and unemployable, and they are unable to have friends. I can't see how this can be considered to be a not-bad thing.

I am adamantly against eugenics and selective abortions. However, if there was a cure--you bet my brother would be first in line for it. He's truly autistic, not I'm-Asperger's-so-that-excuses-me-being-an-a*hole, and he has come far enough to understand just how far behind the average person he is in so many ways that matter. He wants a wife (though I'm not sure how much more than just for having someone there reliably/sex...), but he is incapable of managing to even ask a girl out for a date. He wants friends, but he cannot converse with people outside the family. He wants a job, but unpredictability and the possibility of changes make him dread employment (he is employed now, BTW, and lives in terror of his boss--not because his boss is bad but because he theoretically has the authority to ask something of my brother that he has a mental block against). He's had therapy and anti-depression drugs and has been near-suicidal because he can sense the gap between himself and other people and is incapable of bridging it. He knows he's missing out on most of life but is too paralyzed by disgust, fear, and ignorance that can't be "Taught" away to act. He has to mentally prepare to drive a car to a strange place for DAYS ahead of time, and even then, he has to have someone on the phone talking him through it. He can't even buy things from stores he hasn't been a regular of without a panic attack. is apartment was robbed once in college, and he is so terrified of someone coming in and changing things--far more than the loss of anyone in particular--that it takes months to get him to agree to leave the house overnight.

So, yeah, REAL autism sucks. Fun and quirky "autism"--defend that all you like. But it's not really autism.



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04 Oct 2011, 7:38 am

Well it's harder for someone like me because I feel that I'm sitting on the line between AS and NT. I'm expected to function normally in society because I'm able enough to be independant, but my anxiety and limited social skills are what holds me back from doing things like finding a job, meeting new people, and taking care of money independantly. I am self-aware enough to be able and want to take care of myself and to be able and want to get along with people, but certain aspects of my disabilities stop me, so I've got no choice but to just grin and bear it, otherwise my next option is to lock myself away in my house forever and not ever come out and meet anyone, which isn't really a good thing to reduce to.

Sometimes I do wish I was just very low-functioning. At least I wouldn't keep saying, ''ohh people keep looking at me, do I look all right?'' every time I go out in public, and I wouldn't be expected to have to socially interact with everyone, and I wouldn't be expected to get out there on my own in the big wide world and get a job, and people will guess I'm low-functioning when they look at me. I think people who are ''inbetween'' get judged more. I go out independantly, looking presentable and acting normal, but there's still that look about me, so people stare and stare and they still can't figure out what is odd about me, so they get a little agitated. If you're visually disabled, people take one glance and think, ''right, she must just have something wrong with her'', if you're NT you generally can cover up any weirdness about you, but if you're somebody like me, it's awkward.


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04 Oct 2011, 8:40 am

Burnbridge wrote:
More work interferes with eating chips and watching television while clothed in naught but underpants. When that sacred ritual is threatened, woe betide the world.


i really love this ^^^

but yeah i dont know :( it really upsets me the whole thing......it feels like media have made things worse recently too....
if i say i have aspergers people freak out and change their number, or they start slagging me off about how im attention seeking to get my own way.
most people dont understand, and just because i can type on a computer they think i have no difficulties at all and they thnk im making up excuses for myself or they dont believe it really exists and they think aspergers is a myth. then when they start to see what my autism is, they wont believe it and so they become abusive and i get cast out by the public.
ive given up on society and their ignorance. autism isnt the problem, society is the problem



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04 Oct 2011, 12:27 pm

Joe90, at least you have the advantage of knowing what's going on. I'm straddling the same line. For most of my life, I didn't think there was anything different about me but the high IQ and the cyclical Clinical Depression, and I always thought that, especially with the IQ, (which was made up in the first place to predict success in life) that I should be doing better, at least doing more of what I wanted to do, better. I was ashamed of how well I wasn't doing, thinking I must be lazy or something (I knew I was disorganized, and kept trying to organize better)(the "lazy" idea came from how much time I "wasted" on my Special Interests, "playing", most of which involved sitting down). I thought I had few/no friends because there was some sort of psychic "stink" about me, something Evil, maybe, that other people could "smell". I found out about the Asperger's, and the different wiring, and it was delightful, and a major relief. Suddenly, all the differences all my life made _sense_! There wasn't anything Bad about me at all!



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04 Oct 2011, 12:34 pm

League_Girl wrote:
Because it's a disability and disabilities are seen as bad because of limitations it causes and it makes your life harder because you have to try harder also to get through the limitations.
I agree.



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04 Oct 2011, 1:12 pm

I think some of the reasons that people like Downs people better is that they know about them, understand them. They aren't very complex, are usually happy and sunny and harmless and like everybody and show it. Even if someone mistreats them, unless it's very intense, they still like them, because they haven't caught on that they're being made fun of. The NTs know they aren't hiding anything, any evil intentions, they just are who they appear to be, nothing more. It's like a lot of big, happy children running around.

When I was a child, Downs babies usually didn't grow up. Roy Rogers and Dale Evans had one, who, like all the rest then, died very young. Dale wrote a book about her, after she died, "Angel Unawares". Since that time, the medical people have found out a lot more about their typical Special Needs, and most of them grow up. But not really.



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04 Oct 2011, 1:14 pm

Well it's other people what make me feel bad about myself all the time. The way people stare at me when I know I'm not doing anything even remotely different, it all makes me feel self-conscious. It's easy to just say ''just ignore them'', which I do anyway, but sometimes it gets too distracting and I just wish people would leave me alone and stare at something worth staring at.


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04 Oct 2011, 2:49 pm

MimiR wrote:
90% or more of people with REAL autism are nonfunctional in society and unemployable, and they are unable to have friends. I can't see how this can be considered to be a not-bad thing.

I am adamantly against eugenics and selective abortions. However, if there was a cure--you bet my brother would be first in line for it. He's truly autistic, not I'm-Asperger's-so-that-excuses-me-being-an-a*hole, and he has come far enough to understand just how far behind the average person he is in so many ways that matter. He wants a wife (though I'm not sure how much more than just for having someone there reliably/sex...), but he is incapable of managing to even ask a girl out for a date. He wants friends, but he cannot converse with people outside the family. He wants a job, but unpredictability and the possibility of changes make him dread employment (he is employed now, BTW, and lives in terror of his boss--not because his boss is bad but because he theoretically has the authority to ask something of my brother that he has a mental block against). He's had therapy and anti-depression drugs and has been near-suicidal because he can sense the gap between himself and other people and is incapable of bridging it. He knows he's missing out on most of life but is too paralyzed by disgust, fear, and ignorance that can't be "Taught" away to act. He has to mentally prepare to drive a car to a strange place for DAYS ahead of time, and even then, he has to have someone on the phone talking him through it. He can't even buy things from stores he hasn't been a regular of without a panic attack. is apartment was robbed once in college, and he is so terrified of someone coming in and changing things--far more than the loss of anyone in particular--that it takes months to get him to agree to leave the house overnight.

So, yeah, REAL autism sucks. Fun and quirky "autism"--defend that all you like. But it's not really autism.

How is this you not being an a-hole? Unless it truly takes one to know one, it's unnecessary to knock others to try to prove your point.



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04 Oct 2011, 4:04 pm

MimiR wrote:
90% or more of people with REAL autism are nonfunctional in society and unemployable, and they are unable to have friends. I can't see how this can be considered to be a not-bad thing.


Hello, Im not being rude or trying to single you out, i was just wondering what you meant by this, i dont really understand.



twich
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04 Oct 2011, 6:58 pm

MimiR wrote:
90% or more of people with REAL autism are nonfunctional in society and unemployable, and they are unable to have friends. I can't see how this can be considered to be a not-bad thing.

I am adamantly against eugenics and selective abortions. However, if there was a cure--you bet my brother would be first in line for it. He's truly autistic, not I'm-Asperger's-so-that-excuses-me-being-an-a*hole, and he has come far enough to understand just how far behind the average person he is in so many ways that matter. He wants a wife (though I'm not sure how much more than just for having someone there reliably/sex...), but he is incapable of managing to even ask a girl out for a date. He wants friends, but he cannot converse with people outside the family. He wants a job, but unpredictability and the possibility of changes make him dread employment (he is employed now, BTW, and lives in terror of his boss--not because his boss is bad but because he theoretically has the authority to ask something of my brother that he has a mental block against). He's had therapy and anti-depression drugs and has been near-suicidal because he can sense the gap between himself and other people and is incapable of bridging it. He knows he's missing out on most of life but is too paralyzed by disgust, fear, and ignorance that can't be "Taught" away to act. He has to mentally prepare to drive a car to a strange place for DAYS ahead of time, and even then, he has to have someone on the phone talking him through it. He can't even buy things from stores he hasn't been a regular of without a panic attack. is apartment was robbed once in college, and he is so terrified of someone coming in and changing things--far more than the loss of anyone in particular--that it takes months to get him to agree to leave the house overnight.

So, yeah, REAL autism sucks. Fun and quirky "autism"--defend that all you like. But it's not really autism.


This is really offensive. There are varying levels of ANYTHING, and to say just because some people are more mild than others means they don't struggle or they don't really have whatever you're defending is knowingly being rude and offensive. People on the higher up levels of autism (AS included) do struggle daily with everything your brother struggles with, but you know the difference? People like you expect us to be "Normal" and have no struggles whatsoever so we don't get the help or understanding we need most of the time. Thanks for keeping that stigma alive.

And for the record:
Quote:
I'm-Asperger's-so-that-excuses-me-being-an-a*hole


Anyone who is knowingly an a*hole and uses asperger's as an excuse, they're just a*holes like NT's can be, or some autists can be... But I for one try really hard not to be, and when people who assume things like this don't point out I'm saying something socially unacceptable, I probably don't realize it's not ok, and I can't learn if someone doesn't tell me it's wrong. This note was a little on the rude side for me, not because I have asperger's, but because I'm quite offended- Yours was much more rude.



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04 Oct 2011, 9:56 pm

MimiR wrote:
90% or more of people with REAL autism are nonfunctional in society and unemployable, and they are unable to have friends. I can't see how this can be considered to be a not-bad thing.

I am adamantly against eugenics and selective abortions. However, if there was a cure--you bet my brother would be first in line for it. He's truly autistic, not I'm-Asperger's-so-that-excuses-me-being-an-a*hole, and he has come far enough to understand just how far behind the average person he is in so many ways that matter. He wants a wife (though I'm not sure how much more than just for having someone there reliably/sex...), but he is incapable of managing to even ask a girl out for a date. He wants friends, but he cannot converse with people outside the family. He wants a job, but unpredictability and the possibility of changes make him dread employment (he is employed now, BTW, and lives in terror of his boss--not because his boss is bad but because he theoretically has the authority to ask something of my brother that he has a mental block against). He's had therapy and anti-depression drugs and has been near-suicidal because he can sense the gap between himself and other people and is incapable of bridging it. He knows he's missing out on most of life but is too paralyzed by disgust, fear, and ignorance that can't be "Taught" away to act. He has to mentally prepare to drive a car to a strange place for DAYS ahead of time, and even then, he has to have someone on the phone talking him through it. He can't even buy things from stores he hasn't been a regular of without a panic attack. is apartment was robbed once in college, and he is so terrified of someone coming in and changing things--far more than the loss of anyone in particular--that it takes months to get him to agree to leave the house overnight.

So, yeah, REAL autism sucks. Fun and quirky "autism"--defend that all you like. But it's not really autism.


What is "fun and quirky autism"? I have AS and suffer from many of the same things your brother does. I wouldn't catagorize my AS as fun and quirky.



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04 Oct 2011, 11:41 pm

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Anyone who is knowingly an a*hole and uses asperger's as an excuse, they're just a*holes like NT's can be, or some autists can be... But I for one try really hard not to be, and when people who assume things like this don't point out I'm saying something socially unacceptable, I probably don't realize it's not ok, and I can't learn if someone doesn't tell me it's wrong. This note was a little on the rude side for me, not because I have asperger's, but because I'm quite offended- Yours was much more rude.



I didn't find anything rude in this post at all.



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05 Oct 2011, 12:07 am

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Ummm....I feel like Autism is bad because civilized society is based on cramming a whole crap load of people who hate each other into a small area, called a city. Basic survival method of said occupants is to lie to each other like crazy so that they all think they like each other. To prevent random & chaotic killing sprees.

Seeing as how Autistic Spectromites (Spectrometers?) have difficulty lying, they unwittingly "push people's buttons" constantly, threatening to unleash the mad wave of hysterical violence that ever looms over the psychological horizon. The liars have to work double time to cover the "social gaffs" (aka telling the truth) of the A-Spectrometers, thus resenting said Spectromoters for having caused more work for them.

More work interferes with eating chips and watching television while clothed in naught but underpants. When that sacred ritual is threatened, woe betide the world.


LOL! Best post ever... "spectrometers" made me laugh my ass off.



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05 Oct 2011, 12:09 am

League_Girl wrote:
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Anyone who is knowingly an a*hole and uses asperger's as an excuse, they're just a*holes like NT's can be, or some autists can be... But I for one try really hard not to be, and when people who assume things like this don't point out I'm saying something socially unacceptable, I probably don't realize it's not ok, and I can't learn if someone doesn't tell me it's wrong. This note was a little on the rude side for me, not because I have asperger's, but because I'm quite offended- Yours was much more rude.



I didn't find anything rude in this post at all.



Thank you. I tend to just keep my mouth shut now because of all the times I've been told I'm rude for standing up for something I don't agree about. I can't tell the difference because everyone seems to get offended and call me a jerk if I don't agree. This next part will probably rude and a*holish because I've had time to think and I'm still insulted, sorry.

I'd like to add something. Depression/ being suicidal, anxiety, panic disorder- All of these things are co morbid conditions.. It's not autism, it's anxiety disorder. ANYONE can suffer from these.


My sister won't ever be able to drive, hold down a job, have friends outside her class or family, be a mother which she so badly wants... So, since she's further down the spectrum than your brother, should I write him off? That's basically what you do about people with asperger syndrome. It's like saying someone who is deaf but can hear with hearing aids isn't truly deaf, and therefor shouldn't get any help.



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05 Oct 2011, 1:29 am

The media currently dictates culture and what is the ideal of perfection. Unfortunately autism is perceived as a disability and "imperfection" on one end of the spectrum of "normality" when compared to what media stereotypes of "normal" is.

Even NTs have low self esteem, eating disorders and need plastic surgery to feel better about themselves. The average NT is probably asking the same question, what's wrong with being average? why am I called "mediocre"?



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05 Oct 2011, 1:44 am

twich wrote:
League_Girl wrote:
Quote:
Anyone who is knowingly an a*hole and uses asperger's as an excuse, they're just a*holes like NT's can be, or some autists can be... But I for one try really hard not to be, and when people who assume things like this don't point out I'm saying something socially unacceptable, I probably don't realize it's not ok, and I can't learn if someone doesn't tell me it's wrong. This note was a little on the rude side for me, not because I have asperger's, but because I'm quite offended- Yours was much more rude.



I didn't find anything rude in this post at all.



Thank you. I tend to just keep my mouth shut now because of all the times I've been told I'm rude for standing up for something I don't agree about. I can't tell the difference because everyone seems to get offended and call me a jerk if I don't agree. This next part will probably rude and a*holish because I've had time to think and I'm still insulted, sorry.


I would take it as a compliment. They can't handle that you can stand up for yourself so they must try and make you feel bad by calling you a jerk. Don't believe them. Just wear the J word as a badge. That's what i do with the word bully when people think I am one when I stand up for myself. I decided to just embrace the word and wear it like a badge. Maybe take it as a compliment too.

If standing up for myself is bullying, then bullying isn't always a bad thing because it can be a good thing. So being a jerk can be a good thing too if it means standing up for yourself.