The Sun Also Rises, I am very interested in what you are saying and the models you have proposed, however I do not understand what you are meaning? Can you or someone please explain?
By any chance, are you a Star Trek fan ? Let me give you a visual aid to explain *a* bullying situation between a Non-Autistic and 'other' neurological difference. I want you to pay close attention to the dialogue and reactions between the two main characters.
I think it makes more sense to think in terms of the models NTs operate on. Not just because NT vary from each other. But because individuals vary from one situation to another in how they act. NTs being more prone to that than those on the autistic spectrum.
Understanding the NT ability to mold oneself (subconsciously) to fit into a group is a key important difference that helps in understanding NTs. But it won't help in understanding one's NT friends, as far as interacting with them. Because it's not a situation that brings that out. _________________ not aspie, not NT, somewhere in between
Aspie Quiz: 110 Aspie, 103 Neurotypical.
Used to be more autistic than I am now.
This is going to be a long one, I'm afraid, but I need to clarify what I talked about in my previous contributions. First and foremost: I agree with Mysty. My point is that it is almost meaningless to talk about NTs as a “group” of people. NTs, defined as people not on the autistic spectrum, constitute the majority of the planet’s 6 billion people. That’s an astounding number of different individuals. The fact that people around the world regard it as more or less meaningful to form communities of varying size and functions and that they find that it is more or less useful and meaningful to relate to each other (socialize, if you will), says very little about the individuals (the NTs, if you will) forming those communities. And the communities, too, are vastly different.
Allow me to refer to a video published by Berkley Media, produced by professor Dane Archer. It is called “A world of differences: Understanding cross-cultural communication”:
“When we encounter people from other societies or cultures, we may fail to understand them for many reasons, including differences in language, values, gestures, emotional expression, norms, rituals, rules, expectations, family background, and life experiences. This extraordinary video shows that cross-cultural communication can be successful if we manage to understand the powerful differences that separate people who come from differing cultures.”
If non-spectrum people were as alike and homgenous as one might be tempted to think, then we wouldn’t need to study each others’ communities and cultures, because we would have the same models of perception, expectations and behaviour. We would “get” each other. But we don’t. People from, say, the US, Mali in Africa, Norway, North Korea, Britain, Polynesia, you name it, have quite different ways of relating to the world around them. Imagine living in a tribe in Mali where people aren’t allowed to ever be on their own! From a Norwegian’s perspective this sounds downright awful. And NTs all over the world find each others' styles and ways puzzling and weird. As a Norwegian, I often find Americans puzzling, and there's much about their communication I find weird. In some cultures people do not make eye-contact with people they don’t know intimately, while in other cultures not making eye-contact is a sign of disrespect. In some cultures teasing kids is an accepted way of toughening them up to stand the hardships of life; in other cultures this type of child rearing is so unacceptable that it’s almost regarded as a crime. The examples of differences are countless. And these facts also build upon generalizations again. Within the multitude of cultures, there are many, many nuances.
That’s why I believe that the main question asked in this debate is almost impossible to answer. It is too big and all-encompassing. There is no one good answer to it. Non-autistic people do not operate on one model, or think, feel and behave in one given way, we are simply too many and to different. I understand that many autistic people become frustrated and maybe confused as to how to react to certain things, how to understand certain things in the world. But I just don’t think it is rewarding to divide the world into “NTs” and “aspies”, or “them” and “us”. Such a distinction may create the extra burden of feeling that the whole world of “the others” is different from you, they can never understand you, and they are against you and never wish you well. It may make it more difficult and frightening to try and reach out than it really is. The world isn’t full of bullies. The world is full of humans. Concentrate on figuring out the ones in your proximity that you care about. That is my best and most well meant advice.
I think it can be answered BUT i believe most things can BE. We simply don't know the answers at any given point in time.
Autistics gravitate toward plants, objects, buildings, animals, academic subjects, etc....virtually all things Non-Autistic people do except for Non-Autistic people as a whole.
A planet birthed out of cyberspace suggests that Autists even gravitate toward......
The core differences manifest themselves in development which has a profound effect upon socialization.
John Scott Holman has done several videos. In one particular video, he was having a meltdown. He was agitated, stimming, volatile, and a bit out of control BUT he was lucid. I could follow his rationale. He had thought back on a situation...reviewed the body language, what was said, how it was said, and the motives behind what was being done to him. Classic Non-Autistic thinking BUT laced with exaggerated facial expressions and many of the behavior patterns THAT come with ASDs.
I have my theories on meltdowns.....
*Just an opinion and should be taken as such
TheSunAlsoRises
Joined: Jul 02, 2011 Age: 47 Posts: 3682 Location: UK
Posted: Tue Apr 10, 2012 6:54 am Post subject:
Jtuk wrote:
nessa238 wrote:
The part of my post that you have quoted was about NTs not aspies. I never said aspies weren't into facts and passing on information - I was actively saying they were.
So you've misunderstood what I was saying.
And NTs are predictability personified in my opinion - they are practically like robots!
You can mess with their circuitry by asking them an unexpected question - their whole system goes 'Does not compute!' and they can't give an intelligent answer as the majority of their opinions come from their group, not from working it out for themselves.
People can only speak from their own experience of the NTs they have interacted with anyway and this is mine.
So please don't tell me I'm 'wrong' as it's all purely subjective anyway
No, I haven't misunderstood. You are generalising about NTs, where we can only generalise (with limited reliability) about aspies.
Could you give an example of an unexpected question? I know that a lot of aspies on this forum would struggle to answer expected questions, such as those given in a job interview.
Jason.
I can generalise about who I like just as you can not generalise if that's your choice
An example of an unexpected question:-
A conversation is taking place about 'The X Factor' between an NT and a person with Aspergers. They are both discussing how nasty Simon Cowell was towards a particular contestant.
The person with Aspergers says 'Don't you think programmes like 'The X Factor' are directly responsible for both the dumbing down of society and the bullying behaviour that is so prevalent in society today? How can we be horrified at the amount of bullying that occurs in schools these days when people like to watch 'bullying as entertainment' in programmes like this?
And before you say you don't agree (as most people wilfully refuse to acknowledge the obviously detrimental effect of such programmes as they've been conditioned to like them or more likely just don't care enough) fair enough but those are my thoughts on the matter.
I can guarantee that the majority of NTs would have a look of Huh? and be stuck for words initially as they just don't tend to do this type of social analysis whereby you step outside of society and observe what's happening. They would have difficulty coming up with a decent reply as they just don't think like this.
To be honest though I've come to the conclusion that a hell of a lot of people with Aspergers don't think like this either and that this phenomenon is more linked to a lack of intelligence than being NT. With so many people being unintelligent it's easy to conflate this lack of intelligence thing with it being about the person being NT but I've met enough thick aspies in my time to realise now that I feel so alone in my opinions because most people around me are just plain stupid - NT or Asperger/ASD
So you may be right and the problem I have is with stupid people as opposed to NTs - it's just that 99% of people on the planet seem incredibly stupid to me, so I'm f-ked!
That's how life feels for me anyway and it's not arrogance either - most people couldn't formulate a well-thought out opinion if their life depended on it and I spend all my time having to humour them and talk on their level.
I must say I can understand the model NTs seem to operate on. Get up, go to work, repeat ad nauseum.
Sadly I just can't do it. I think inevitably that's where we differ. They can do the same thing in and out without thinking about it where as I spend my life thinking about it. Too much.
The part of my post that you have quoted was about NTs not aspies. I never said aspies weren't into facts and passing on information - I was actively saying they were.
So you've misunderstood what I was saying.
And NTs are predictability personified in my opinion - they are practically like robots!
You can mess with their circuitry by asking them an unexpected question - their whole system goes 'Does not compute!' and they can't give an intelligent answer as the majority of their opinions come from their group, not from working it out for themselves.
People can only speak from their own experience of the NTs they have interacted with anyway and this is mine.
So please don't tell me I'm 'wrong' as it's all purely subjective anyway
No, I haven't misunderstood. You are generalising about NTs, where we can only generalise (with limited reliability) about aspies.
Could you give an example of an unexpected question? I know that a lot of aspies on this forum would struggle to answer expected questions, such as those given in a job interview.
Jason.
I can generalise about who I like just as you can not generalise if that's your choice
An example of an unexpected question:-
A conversation is taking place about 'The X Factor' between an NT and a person with Aspergers. They are both discussing how nasty Simon Cowell was towards a particular contestant.
The person with Aspergers says 'Don't you think programmes like 'The X Factor' are directly responsible for both the dumbing down of society and the bullying behaviour that is so prevalent in society today? How can we be horrified at the amount of bullying that occurs in schools these days when people like to watch 'bullying as entertainment' in programmes like this?
And before you say you don't agree (as most people wilfully refuse to acknowledge the obviously detrimental effect of such programmes as they've been conditioned to like them or more likely just don't care enough) fair enough but those are my thoughts on the matter.
I can guarantee that the majority of NTs would have a look of Huh? and be stuck for words initially as they just don't tend to do this type of social analysis whereby you step outside of society and observe what's happening. They would have difficulty coming up with a decent reply as they just don't think like this.
To be honest though I've come to the conclusion that a hell of a lot of people with Aspergers don't think like this either and that this phenomenon is more linked to a lack of intelligence than being NT. With so many people being unintelligent it's easy to conflate this lack of intelligence thing with it being about the person being NT but I've met enough thick aspies in my time to realise now that I feel so alone in my opinions because most people around me are just plain stupid - NT or Asperger/ASD
So you may be right and the problem I have is with stupid people as opposed to NTs - it's just that 99% of people on the planet seem incredibly stupid to me, so I'm f-ked!
That's how life feels for me anyway and it's not arrogance either - most people couldn't formulate a well-thought out opinion if their life depended on it and I spend all my time having to humour them and talk on their level.
I think you'll meet a lot of smart Aspies who aren't full of it as you hang out here more but I'm not gonna pretend I haven't noticed what you're talking about.
I've actually seen it said here that in some European countries AS is given as a diagnosis to elementary school children with IQs around 70 or 80 even if they don't have it. because it's less stigmatizing or at least will give them an "excuse", if you will
I can't say the same thing is starting to happen in the US because I don't know or if it has been happening for years but I wouldn't be surprised. _________________ AD/HD BAP.
Joined: Jul 02, 2011 Age: 47 Posts: 3682 Location: UK
Posted: Tue Apr 10, 2012 1:40 pm Post subject:
EXPECIALLY wrote:
nessa238 wrote:
Jtuk wrote:
nessa238 wrote:
The part of my post that you have quoted was about NTs not aspies. I never said aspies weren't into facts and passing on information - I was actively saying they were.
So you've misunderstood what I was saying.
And NTs are predictability personified in my opinion - they are practically like robots!
You can mess with their circuitry by asking them an unexpected question - their whole system goes 'Does not compute!' and they can't give an intelligent answer as the majority of their opinions come from their group, not from working it out for themselves.
People can only speak from their own experience of the NTs they have interacted with anyway and this is mine.
So please don't tell me I'm 'wrong' as it's all purely subjective anyway
No, I haven't misunderstood. You are generalising about NTs, where we can only generalise (with limited reliability) about aspies.
Could you give an example of an unexpected question? I know that a lot of aspies on this forum would struggle to answer expected questions, such as those given in a job interview.
Jason.
I can generalise about who I like just as you can not generalise if that's your choice
An example of an unexpected question:-
A conversation is taking place about 'The X Factor' between an NT and a person with Aspergers. They are both discussing how nasty Simon Cowell was towards a particular contestant.
The person with Aspergers says 'Don't you think programmes like 'The X Factor' are directly responsible for both the dumbing down of society and the bullying behaviour that is so prevalent in society today? How can we be horrified at the amount of bullying that occurs in schools these days when people like to watch 'bullying as entertainment' in programmes like this?
And before you say you don't agree (as most people wilfully refuse to acknowledge the obviously detrimental effect of such programmes as they've been conditioned to like them or more likely just don't care enough) fair enough but those are my thoughts on the matter.
I can guarantee that the majority of NTs would have a look of Huh? and be stuck for words initially as they just don't tend to do this type of social analysis whereby you step outside of society and observe what's happening. They would have difficulty coming up with a decent reply as they just don't think like this.
To be honest though I've come to the conclusion that a hell of a lot of people with Aspergers don't think like this either and that this phenomenon is more linked to a lack of intelligence than being NT. With so many people being unintelligent it's easy to conflate this lack of intelligence thing with it being about the person being NT but I've met enough thick aspies in my time to realise now that I feel so alone in my opinions because most people around me are just plain stupid - NT or Asperger/ASD
So you may be right and the problem I have is with stupid people as opposed to NTs - it's just that 99% of people on the planet seem incredibly stupid to me, so I'm f-ked!
That's how life feels for me anyway and it's not arrogance either - most people couldn't formulate a well-thought out opinion if their life depended on it and I spend all my time having to humour them and talk on their level.
I think you'll meet a lot of smart Aspies who aren't full of it as you hang out here more but I'm not gonna pretend I haven't noticed what you're talking about.
I've actually seen it said here that in some European countries AS is given as a diagnosis to elementary school children with IQs around 70 or 80 even if they don't have it. because it's less stigmatizing or at least will give them an "excuse", if you will
I can't say the same thing is starting to happen in the US because I don't know or if it has been happening for years but I wouldn't be surprised.
Are you saying that Children with a learning disability are being given Aspergers diagnoses? This wouldn't surprise me at all. In my opinion there's no logical reason on earth for there being some random cut-off point of 'average to above average IQ' when a person has Aspergers. Neurology does not run parallel to intelligence. I think there's likely to be loads of people with Asperger's and a learning disability. Why should the Asperger's chatracteristics ONLY be found in people with a specific IQ?! That's a ridiculous idea, like saying only people with a learning disability can have epilepsy or schizophrenia.
The Aspergers diagnosis was evidently created to make rich parents feel better about their child being relatively bright but 'not normal' It's a way for the middleclasses in particular to pretend their child doesn't have a learning disability; a way of redefining learning disability out of the picture.
I might be of average to above average IQ but I know for a fact that aspects og my neurology mean I have what is effectively a learning disability. My intelligence mitigates for this but the majorit of the NT population still treat me as if I do have some kind of learning disability/difference from the norm - why would they do this unless my manner gave that impression?
Aspergers is just a more subtle form of learning disability in my opinion and learning disability has little to do with IQ!.
The average person with a normally defined learning disability has far more friends than me and far more acceptance from society so who is the more disabled? All autism is a form of learning disability and those who can't deal with that probably don't even have Aspergers.
Last edited by nessa238 on Tue Apr 10, 2012 1:45 pm; edited 1 time in total
The part of my post that you have quoted was about NTs not aspies. I never said aspies weren't into facts and passing on information - I was actively saying they were.
So you've misunderstood what I was saying.
And NTs are predictability personified in my opinion - they are practically like robots!
You can mess with their circuitry by asking them an unexpected question - their whole system goes 'Does not compute!' and they can't give an intelligent answer as the majority of their opinions come from their group, not from working it out for themselves.
People can only speak from their own experience of the NTs they have interacted with anyway and this is mine.
So please don't tell me I'm 'wrong' as it's all purely subjective anyway
No, I haven't misunderstood. You are generalising about NTs, where we can only generalise (with limited reliability) about aspies.
Could you give an example of an unexpected question? I know that a lot of aspies on this forum would struggle to answer expected questions, such as those given in a job interview.
Jason.
I can generalise about who I like just as you can not generalise if that's your choice
An example of an unexpected question:-
A conversation is taking place about 'The X Factor' between an NT and a person with Aspergers. They are both discussing how nasty Simon Cowell was towards a particular contestant.
The person with Aspergers says 'Don't you think programmes like 'The X Factor' are directly responsible for both the dumbing down of society and the bullying behaviour that is so prevalent in society today? How can we be horrified at the amount of bullying that occurs in schools these days when people like to watch 'bullying as entertainment' in programmes like this?
And before you say you don't agree (as most people wilfully refuse to acknowledge the obviously detrimental effect of such programmes as they've been conditioned to like them or more likely just don't care enough) fair enough but those are my thoughts on the matter.
I can guarantee that the majority of NTs would have a look of Huh? and be stuck for words initially as they just don't tend to do this type of social analysis whereby you step outside of society and observe what's happening. They would have difficulty coming up with a decent reply as they just don't think like this.
To be honest though I've come to the conclusion that a hell of a lot of people with Aspergers don't think like this either and that this phenomenon is more linked to a lack of intelligence than being NT. With so many people being unintelligent it's easy to conflate this lack of intelligence thing with it being about the person being NT but I've met enough thick aspies in my time to realise now that I feel so alone in my opinions because most people around me are just plain stupid - NT or Asperger/ASD
So you may be right and the problem I have is with stupid people as opposed to NTs - it's just that 99% of people on the planet seem incredibly stupid to me, so I'm f-ked!
That's how life feels for me anyway and it's not arrogance either - most people couldn't formulate a well-thought out opinion if their life depended on it and I spend all my time having to humour them and talk on their level.
I think you'll meet a lot of smart Aspies who aren't full of it as you hang out here more but I'm not gonna pretend I haven't noticed what you're talking about.
I've actually seen it said here that in some European countries AS is given as a diagnosis to elementary school children with IQs around 70 or 80 even if they don't have it. because it's less stigmatizing or at least will give them an "excuse", if you will
I can't say the same thing is starting to happen in the US because I don't know or if it has been happening for years but I wouldn't be surprised.
Are you saying that Children with a learning disability are being given Aspergers diagnoses? This wouldn't surprise me at all. In my opinion there's no logical reason on earth for there being some random cut-off point of 'average to above average IQ' when a person has Aspergers. Neurology does not run parallel to intelligence. I think there's likely to be loads of people with Asperger's and a learning disability. Why should the Asperger's chatracteristics ONLY be found in people with a specific IQ?! That's a ridiculous idea, like saying only people with a learning disability can have epilepsy or schizophrenia.
The Aspergers diagnosis was evidently created to make rich parents feel better about their child being relatively bright but 'not normal' It's a way for the middleclasses in particular to pretend their child doesn't have a learning disability; a way of redefining learning disability out of the picture.
No, I meant that some kids who are just genuinely not bright get the label even if they aren't really autistic and have no positive traits of AS.
I actually know someone with an IQ of 74, PDDNOS but she works in a scientific field and seems smarter than a lot of people. You can definitely see her autistic traits manifesting in a positive way even though she has a lot f difficulties with functioning. _________________ AD/HD BAP.
Joined: Feb 14, 2012 Posts: 2093 Location: The Akuma Afterglow
Posted: Tue Apr 10, 2012 2:26 pm Post subject:
Emotional music. It reveals a lot about people's subconscious motivations and how they just want acceptance more than anything else. _________________ My music at: http://www.youtube.com/user/SanityTheorist5/videos
Currently working on getting in a studio to record my solo album 40+ tracks written.
Joined: Jul 02, 2011 Age: 47 Posts: 3682 Location: UK
Posted: Tue Apr 10, 2012 2:28 pm Post subject:
EXPECIALLY wrote:
nessa238 wrote:
EXPECIALLY wrote:
nessa238 wrote:
Jtuk wrote:
nessa238 wrote:
The part of my post that you have quoted was about NTs not aspies. I never said aspies weren't into facts and passing on information - I was actively saying they were.
So you've misunderstood what I was saying.
And NTs are predictability personified in my opinion - they are practically like robots!
You can mess with their circuitry by asking them an unexpected question - their whole system goes 'Does not compute!' and they can't give an intelligent answer as the majority of their opinions come from their group, not from working it out for themselves.
People can only speak from their own experience of the NTs they have interacted with anyway and this is mine.
So please don't tell me I'm 'wrong' as it's all purely subjective anyway
No, I haven't misunderstood. You are generalising about NTs, where we can only generalise (with limited reliability) about aspies.
Could you give an example of an unexpected question? I know that a lot of aspies on this forum would struggle to answer expected questions, such as those given in a job interview.
Jason.
I can generalise about who I like just as you can not generalise if that's your choice
An example of an unexpected question:-
A conversation is taking place about 'The X Factor' between an NT and a person with Aspergers. They are both discussing how nasty Simon Cowell was towards a particular contestant.
The person with Aspergers says 'Don't you think programmes like 'The X Factor' are directly responsible for both the dumbing down of society and the bullying behaviour that is so prevalent in society today? How can we be horrified at the amount of bullying that occurs in schools these days when people like to watch 'bullying as entertainment' in programmes like this?
And before you say you don't agree (as most people wilfully refuse to acknowledge the obviously detrimental effect of such programmes as they've been conditioned to like them or more likely just don't care enough) fair enough but those are my thoughts on the matter.
I can guarantee that the majority of NTs would have a look of Huh? and be stuck for words initially as they just don't tend to do this type of social analysis whereby you step outside of society and observe what's happening. They would have difficulty coming up with a decent reply as they just don't think like this.
To be honest though I've come to the conclusion that a hell of a lot of people with Aspergers don't think like this either and that this phenomenon is more linked to a lack of intelligence than being NT. With so many people being unintelligent it's easy to conflate this lack of intelligence thing with it being about the person being NT but I've met enough thick aspies in my time to realise now that I feel so alone in my opinions because most people around me are just plain stupid - NT or Asperger/ASD
So you may be right and the problem I have is with stupid people as opposed to NTs - it's just that 99% of people on the planet seem incredibly stupid to me, so I'm f-ked!
That's how life feels for me anyway and it's not arrogance either - most people couldn't formulate a well-thought out opinion if their life depended on it and I spend all my time having to humour them and talk on their level.
I think you'll meet a lot of smart Aspies who aren't full of it as you hang out here more but I'm not gonna pretend I haven't noticed what you're talking about.
I've actually seen it said here that in some European countries AS is given as a diagnosis to elementary school children with IQs around 70 or 80 even if they don't have it. because it's less stigmatizing or at least will give them an "excuse", if you will
I can't say the same thing is starting to happen in the US because I don't know or if it has been happening for years but I wouldn't be surprised.
Are you saying that Children with a learning disability are being given Aspergers diagnoses? This wouldn't surprise me at all. In my opinion there's no logical reason on earth for there being some random cut-off point of 'average to above average IQ' when a person has Aspergers. Neurology does not run parallel to intelligence. I think there's likely to be loads of people with Asperger's and a learning disability. Why should the Asperger's chatracteristics ONLY be found in people with a specific IQ?! That's a ridiculous idea, like saying only people with a learning disability can have epilepsy or schizophrenia.
The Aspergers diagnosis was evidently created to make rich parents feel better about their child being relatively bright but 'not normal' It's a way for the middleclasses in particular to pretend their child doesn't have a learning disability; a way of redefining learning disability out of the picture.
No, I meant that some kids who are just genuinely not bright get the label even if they aren't really autistic and have no positive traits of AS.
I actually know someone with an IQ of 74, PDDNOS but she works in a scientific field and seems smarter than a lot of people. You can definitely see her autistic traits manifesting in a positive way even though she has a lot f difficulties with functioning.
Yes but this is my point. This idea of people with Aspergers all being 'little professors' is very spurious. Hans Asperger was only working with a small group of children and I think they were mainly the children of rich middle class people, as they would be the only ones able to afford his fees probably! So for ever after the world has this mistaken idea that a person with Aspergers is above average bright with a love of knowledge/detail. I think this is rubbish. Aspergers just denotes a certain type of disfunction and has no link at all to IQ/intelligence in my opinion. Some people with Aspergers might be intelligent but many are not; there is no link between having Aspergers and likelihood of intelligence. Many seem to obviously have a learning disability to me through their lack of self-awareness alone!
