High Social Status

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It is, though, still entirely possible to not give a crap about social whatever, and have nothing at all against NTs. That's the case for me: When it comes to NTs, I have nothing against them. They can be good, they can be bad... just like anyone else. My only real thought about them is.... I *really* just dont care. They can do whatever damn stupid thing they want, just keep away from me if you choose to do such a thing. Well, keep away from me most of the time regardless. I say the same thing about other autistics as well; just stay away much of the time, as I'm probably not interested in.... whatever, and be sure to do dumb things anywhere that isnt wherever I am.

And of course even without anything directly against anyone, I just dont care about the social whatever. It can go away too. Just because someone doesnt like social whatsits doesnt mean they have an issue with any specific group of people.

Likewise, you probably shouldnt be making blanket assumptions like that here either; the one about people here having such huge issues with NTs.

Understand, that venting FRUSTRATIONS about dealing with NTs is entirely seperate from and different from having actual disdain towards them as a group. Because the frustrations dont come from the people themselves, they arise as a result of the lack of understanding or knowledge that tends to appear and cause those situations. Simply because someone is rambling about that sort of thing doesnt mean they have something against NTs. These very same misunderstandings and such can appear between autistics as well, since symptoms and such vary so wildly.

In addition, disdain is often felt not towards NTs, but "society" as a whole... which autistics can be just as big a part of, depending on the person, and which NTs can sometimes seperate from as well.

Granted, I'm sure there are some instances where they really do have disdain towards NTs as a group. But I've seen few of these.

It's not about spectrumites against nt's, (I had that social-hierachy-thing approach before thinking I could be on the spectrum,) if you don't try to place yourself, but are more of a drop-out or not caring about this hierarchy you're going to be punished. How dare you not give a damn about what is a hard lifetimejob for them(the footsoldiers).
Just my thought, ofcourse
It's obviously easier to not care about your status if you have one, then the fs will not come after you. You're sort of protected by your status.

Your descriptions of "awful" and "poo pooing" are applying your own value judgments here.
Obviously people will often include their own opinions within posts, and that's the nature of forums.
You should be able to sort through this without a problem. If you can supply information and logic to validate or invalidate what you see posted, then all the better.

When I speak of NTs I do not use absolutes, because (and this should be easily assumed by all) that it's usually foolish to apply absolutes to such a large and diverse group of people.

However, the article I posted here does in fact apply an absolute to all people, which is why it got my attention, and is likely why it is getting some counter opinions from others posting here.

Generalizing is common and useful if not accurate. Generally, the article is correct. A lot of generalizations that are made about NTs on this forum are also correct. I think we all know that exceptions exist ranging from trivial to significant.

Personally, I don't think this forum is primarily for promoting NT characteristics or behaviors, and so I don't really expect to find that here. However, if you think there is a need for that in order to counter what is posted on this forum, then you might ask Alex to create another subsection for that.

I know that pointing out differences does not automatically imply stratification into hierarchy.
Individuals apply their own personal value judgments to the information, which then forces it into the context of hierarchy. That's not something I control.

I also know that pointing out differences can provide valuable information to others, and especially so if they do not assume absolutes, and if they do not force the information into an artificial context like a hierarchal structure when it is not necessary to do so.

So, I'm going to continue to point out differences that I observe in both ASD and NT people. If you want to call one good and one bad then that's your choice.

I read it. Since I see no room in that description for "bathing in the blood and dancing with the entrails of those who have wronged you" there is absolutely nothing in social status that holds even the slightest bit of interest for me.

This thread wasn't meant to be a "what's wrong with NTs" topic.
My view of reality is different from NTs, so from my point of view they seem delusional, but that doesn't mean I automatically don't like them. If there is a group I would say that I do not like it's the psychopaths, and they are not NTs. That's not to say that I can't like any psychopaths, but I do have a bias against due to very bad experiences.
I can generally say that NTs are far better to be around that psychopaths.

To relate this back to this thread, psychopaths have exceptional ability to both create and navigate social hierarchies.
Some people think that they are the ones who primarily create and enforce stratification in social structures in order to secure power and keep most NTs in line, - controlled/manipulated. I have been trying to learn more about this process lately.
There's a ton of information to be deduced from the Stanford Prison Experiment. It is relevant to several topics in psychology including social status and hierarchy. It also shows how an otherwise NT individual can become a proto-psychopath when embedded into certain environments. It's disturbing but very interesting to observe at the same time.
It brings to light what some people are willing to do for the sake of a status, and the pressures that imaginary structures can have on individuals. The more important status is for an individual the more susceptible they are to these pressures and of course the more extreme the behaviors they are willing to perform.

If you want to get defensive, twist things around in your head as if I'm attacking you, instead of pointing out the logic flaw that you are blinded to the idea that what this community does is create a social environment, that's on you.

If you're going to be prejudiced by convoluting one idea with another and then dumping it on a whole group of people, don't be pissy when someone calls you out on it.

You see other people doing it and call it artificial, then when you do it yourself it's entirely natural.

WTF is your 'hierarchy' anyways?

Then why are you posting here??????

Of course it's a social environment. What's your point? Is it that you think that this proves the need for social status?

If so, I disagree instantly. I cannot speak for others, but on here just as with basically everywhere else, I dont give a flying fart about "status" or what anyone thinks of me. As usual, I'll do as I like regardless. I'll ramble on about whatever I happen to feel like rambling about... even if nobody's going to listen to any of it. Overall, this is a place I come to simply for answers and discussions about the often difficult topics that go with autism... I can get info here to use in my daily life. Or to vent a little, though that's rare. In addition, it has a pleasant "gaming" subforum. ....and that's all. I have no social status here and no real presence. Dont want any. I just come here when I happen to feel like it or if I'm really bored. Or, again, if I have a direct question.


And I also say to everyone: No need to get heated here. It's not the sort of topic that really deserves that.




It's the internet, and a forum... posts like that are inevitable. Nonsensical, but inevitable.

With a comment like that, it's best not to question it... just smile and nod, and back away slowly.

So you're attacking me?
I thought at most you may just be intentionally trying to disrupt my thread.

I'm pretty sure I never claimed that this community doesn't create a social environment.
I'm not sure where you got that from aside from just fabricating it.

This makes me wonder if understand the logical arrangement that defines hierarchy, as you seem to be assuming that anything that can be defined as social also assumes status/hierarchy.

If you do understand, but are posting here just to be disruptive, then please discontinue that activity.

Seeing as one of the points that the study defined as social status was that people listen to you, the fact that you are openly and freely involved in communication, you are being completely and totally ignorant to what the original post was about.

Not that, like, most of this thread had anything to do with the OP...everyone just saw 'social status' and droves of people felt the need to tell everyone else that they don't value it.


As to the idea that I'm attacking it, I don't know because I clearly have no f*****g idea what anyone means when they use a word. Maybe I'm attacking it, maybe I'm discussing it, maybe I'm just angry and discussing it, does that meet your definition of attacking? I don't know, why don't you tell me, since you so like to assume things about people.

I am posting because you are wrong and it is f*****g irritating the level of blindness there is to that. You posted a laughing smiley that implied "I don't value social status so this study is bogus" when by the definitions of that study, your actions support what that study says.

Speaking about hierarchy has nothing to do with in-group, out-group, it's all about power distribution in a group-- how is power distributed, how is that power governed, what does that power influence, who has access to power, who doesn't etc. Virtually any organizational group humans conceive has a hierarchy behind it: at work the hierarchy is Owner > Manager(s) > Customers > Workers, in government it's President>Congress>Courts>State government sub-hierarchies> Local government sub-hierarchies> Voters. Any time you've placed one thing above another by nature you've created a hierarchy.

To dovetail that into the current conversation: The way the current hierarchy operates is based heavily on social status. Social status is the way you purchase keys to the next level of the hierarchical pyramid. When the article says it's necessary, it's not actually necessary, it's only necessary to improve upon one's position in the hierarchy. This has nothing to do with ASD vs. NT, and everything to do with what the hierarchy values. True most NTs have no problems fitting into a hierarchy whereas a lot of autistics do-- but that's not say autistics can't, several on these forums fit into the hierarchy just fine, and several NT's don't as well. The ASD vs. NT thing gets old, there's no need to dump it into a philosophical conversation that's only marginally related.

I'm primarily motivated (not just in posting here but in general) by acquisition of information.

While passively gathering information tends to be safer, there exists information which cannot be accessed passively; it requires an interactive process to acquire. Posting here is partly an exercise in interactive information-acquisition in a particularly accessible-to-me context; and partly practice at same in order to become more capable of interactively acquiring information in less-accessible contexts.

Which you can't get without respect and people listening to you, so 2/3 of how the article defined social status.



"When the article says it's (social status) necessary, it's not actually necessary, it's only necessary to improve upon one's position in the hierarchy."
No, that's you using your own definition of social status, not the OPERATIONAL DEFINITION OF SOCIAL STATUS that the article CLEARLY DEFINES.

Furthermore, you haven't even defined social status. Olymp seems to have defined social status as being high in a hierarchy, which if I use your definition of hierarchy, is entirely circular reasoning.

"Their research showed that those who felt low on the totem poll personally, professionally or within their community were more likely to suffer from chronic conditions, including depression, anxiety, and cardiovascular disease."

Quote from the article which is completely in-line with the idea that if you have opted out of even having a group, you won't feel the negative or positive affects of social standing. I suggest that people who claim to have no feelings around social status are not in a group in the first place. Also, this doesn't mean that if you were to participate in this study and answer questions about where you fell in your personal group, professional group, or community, if you were answering truthfully, since you are told to compare yourself to others within that group, you MUST make yourself a part of that group. That doesn't mean that in your daily life that you ever consider where you sit within a group.

1st, the entire quote intimates that low social status causes these illnesses, but all they provide is correlation. For all they know it could be that chronic conditions cause low social status inside a group.

Yes, because social status isn't a real physical object, it's a concept, and therefore if you don't believe the concept it affects you in no way.


Another classic hallmark of a hierarchy, the need for order and stability: if the hierarchy says there are groups then there shall be groups and you MUST be a part of one. Opting out is a threat to the hierarchy, it is after all just a concept of power and if too many don't believe the concept then said hierarchy has no power.

What has been brought up here by several posters, e.g. olympiadis, is supported by both studies (e.g. Milgram) and eyewitness reports. I'll give a one studied real life example that I read some time ago (hence the details might not be completely accurate).

In World War II a German paramilitary Reserve Police Battalion 101 was ordered to commit massmurders of jews in Poland. These men were given a chance to refuse without punishment, for many of these men ordered to kill whole families and communities were family men themselves. Small minority of men indeed refused, somewhat over 10%, if I remember correctly. As the opposite of deniers another clear minority formed: men that volunteered for the massacres and seemed to even joyfully enjoy perpetrating such acts (psychopaths?).

The majority of the Battallion 101 positioned somewhere in between these two minorities, sort of forming a Bell curve, a continuum of moral behavior. They took part in the killings, some of them denied after killing some, but most took part. They wanted to keep their social status in the group and especially in the eyes of those who were perceived to be in the leading positions - whether in the ranking or socially.

I assume that both of the minorities were probably in these same exact ends also in their life outside the war. The other end lead by a strong moral compass and the other (psychopathic?) end probably perpetrating immoral acts just in a "lesser scale" (scams, lies, abuse, bullying, violence). The middle group on the other hand probably lived a fairly moral life. This group is in my opinion most prone to movement from one side to another depending on circumstances, social pressure, status and so on. It seems majority of people will easily write new moral rules for themselves depending on what suits the best. The "best" can be defined by social status, personal gain, social conformity etc.

I very much agree with the division Aristophanes presented between attachment and social status. They are two totally different motivators, though may in some ways come in the same "package". Also in the light of this discussion I think it is worth noting that in many eyewitness accounts of massacres those who denied to take part, e.g. in My Lai massacre in Vietnam (if that account truly is true), had joined the group later and thus were somewhat outside the social pressure and "group psychosis" that had already formed.

As it seems human being's moral behavior is tightly linked to both intrapersonal and interpersonal attributes. When a person has a very strong sense of self they aren't as inclined to succumb to the values of their surroundings and thus are also more prone to following their inner compass. Psychopathy and narcissism on the other hand are rooted in my opinion in a very weak sense of self, no matter how grandiose it may seem to the outside observer. For such a person "the outside" means everything, for there is almost nothing inside. A psychopath strives for outer power, praise and gratification (whether money, leading position or sadism), for there is no inner gratification or power. Most people will sway in between these and even though one single person in these extreme ends can do alot of damage or good during their life time, it is these in between people who make the difference.