Alex-Could we have a discussion category-Special Interests?

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I would love to see a section/category about Special Interests! This way people can talk with others who share in their special interests too. For example, my current obsession is Genealogy. Would love to chat with others about their discoveries about their family trees.

Last edited by Momofblue on 28 Apr 2012, 3:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Oh, looking at the thread title, I thought this would be about Sensory Integration.
I think that would make an even better subforum.

Sorry about that! I have updated the subject line...wish it gave me more space to type a longer line.

As far as special interests go, I think people should just join forums/communities that are centered around that interest. On a site like this, the only thing that brings us all together are ASDs and other psychiatric/psychological conditions.

(Thread moved from Autism discussion to WP.net discussion)

Hmmmm, I think I would like it better to discuss my special interests with other fellow Aspies since they understand the "obsession" part of the interest more then NT's do.

Thing is, people with AS won't necessarily know much about it. I think it would be better to go to a forum centered around the interest and be thought of as knowing tons about it than talking about an interest to a great extent without people really replying back. I'm not saying this to you individually but really to the request of having a subforum devoted to special interests. It's too broad.

I feel that we should all feel free to post about our special interests.

You could post anything related to your special interest in the Random Discussion forum.

I support the idea of a subforum for Special Interests. It wouldn't have to be just about the interests themselves, but it could also be about the experience of having special interests - for example, threads like "how did you discover your special interests", "do you feel depressed when you don't have a special interest", "how long do your interests last" etc. could also go there. I'm tired of wading through General Autism discussion to find threads like these, because the experience of having obsessions is the AS symptom I enjoy discussing the most.

But wouldn't that mean losing a lot of the forums related to interests, such as the film and TV forum, etc.?

I believe that you took what she said out of context.

Or just read the first sentence.

She was saying that it wouldn't necessarily have to be about the interests themselves, but they can talk about how they obtained the interest, what they like/dislike about having special interests, if they have long-term special interests or not, etc.
It's more like a subforum to discuss the experience of having ASD-related special interests.
I kind of agree with her about that, but it's quite narrow.

Why not just create a thread in (say) Members Only and see how it goes for popularity and contributions?
I suggest Members Only because it's private and will allow you to get quite specific without risk of exposing your identity to the world - but feel free to choose Random Discussion instead.

If it proves popular I don't see why it couldn't be made into a sticky - but I'm afraid we won't be able to make it a sticky in General Autism Discussion because Alex has asked us not to create any there.

I think it's unlikely to be granted a whole unique forum status because the existing forums already cover the main topic groups quite well without becoming too finely-grained or over-complicated.