Do you have non autistic siblings who talk like this to you?

Post Reply New Topic

My NT brother often talks to me like this and it makes me feel like really harming someone: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_sGAKy-4oU

Well, your sibling (?) was very quiet in the video, so I couldn't really hear anything until:
1:"That's your opinion"
2:"No,-"
1:"Yes, it is."
2:"No, see-"
1:"Yeeeehs, it IS." (spoken as if to a naughty toddler)

And yeah, especially if this sibling is younger than you, I don't know where they learned that it was okay to talk to you like that, but my younger siblings would never (not even the non-autistic one), they respect my older age and experience, no matter what my autistic traits are, they have nothing to do with it. And they shouldn't. It sounds to me like your sibling is talking down to you like they think you are less intelligent or something, which I imagine they must have picked up from your parents or caretaker or something? Either that or they just have an attitude problem, and don't understand the immorality of ablism or elitism. Honestly your parents/staff/caretaker/anyone should be talking to you just like to any other young adult, not talking down to you just because you're autistic (ablism/elitism). That is unequal treatment based on your condition and is clearly wrong.

I always wish other people good interactions with their siblings, because closeness with siblings can be so great for us when we don't fit in easily, but sometimes it just isn't possible, either because the parents are doing a poor job (showing favoritism, teaching ablism, etc), or in the case of my two younger sisters, such differences in personality they are unable to reconcile. It really is too bad, but if your sibling can't treat you with respect, then that relationship is best kept at arm's length.

I am never treated as an equal in my family, even at 53 years of age.

I have never been treated as an equal by my family as well and they still basically slag me off if I do not let any allistic person take advantage of me or be a 'soft touch'. I am also accused of being tight for not allowing profiteers to financially exploit me. I know my mum has a mental condition perhaps borderline personality disorder and even my brother still treats her delusional attitudes as fact.

Yes though some patronize and some outright call me r-----.

my parents don't really do too much about it though. they don't punish him enough. they just say they will and they don't

i still, through all this, do not believe that autism is a disease and i don't believe that it is the cause of my family not respecting me like they should. if i were to somehow "cure" my autism, they could still be very rude to me. it won't necessarily take away my problems nor could it take away any other autistic people's problems.

I have for a long time regarded autism as a "condition" rather than a "disease" (sort of like how being "alive" or "dead" or "hungry" or "asleep" are conditions, not diseases), but it never occurred to me how I might be treated differently if my condition were allistic instead of autistic, and I think you might be right...I'm not sure I would be treated differently, either. Then again I would be an entirely different person, so maybe I would be really assertive and DEMAND respect like some allistic people I know (my sister, my stepgrandmother). But possibly I am being treated as an inferior because I am gay, or feminine, or impoverished, rather than because I'm autistic.

Then again, AGAIN...maybe the people in my life who treat me poorly just have some kind of psychological need to put others down, and I am only a target because it is easier to mistreat me without consequences, because it takes me so long to process and respond to it. And also people are not likely to take me seriously because I am autistic.

I don't know. But mistreatment is wrong regardless of the reason. Younger kids may not know better, but that doesn't give them a free pass. If your parents won't punish your sibling for his rude behavior, can you withhold some privilege you normally grant him? For example, would he dislike it if you stopped having discussions with him altogether? You could tell him that if he can't treat you with the same respect you show him, you won't discuss things with him anymore. Or let him borrow your stuff, or whatever.

I think my brother may have gotten this attitude from my parents who often call attention to my stimming.

It's bad when siblings treat you like this----I know, I've experienced it, TOO------but, it's even worse when PARENTS do it. My mother would point to her temple, "saying" (not audibly) "mental problems'. The reason, I feel, that my mother did this was because she was all about keeping-up appearances----and I didn't fit-in with what she wanted to portray, because it made our family look "less than".

Camp, I have noticed that the people who always treated me the worst were like that - people who always wanted to keep up appearances. But that's just prejudice coming out to play...you would think that prejudice would be considered "less than" instead of disability, but apparently some people don't see it that way.

Calling attention to stimming is rude and in a way, kind of an act of violence against us. Because violence is defined as using force on a person, or threatening to use force: putting pressure on us about something we NEED to do, to make us stop, even when we don't want to and in fact shouldn't stop, is a threat of force. Like saying "stop or I will make you stop." It may not be as bad as hitting, but it is in the same vein of behavior and it's wrong.

I often think about what it would be like if it were the other way around, because my family has more autistic members than not, and allistic people could be disabled in our household, if we wanted it to be that way (we don't!). How would it be if we autistic people made fun of allistics for their differences from us? If we poked fun at them for wanting to go out every single weekend, or for talking about nothing all the time (the weather, sports, celebrity scandals - what if we just laughed and said "No one cares, chatterbox!"?), or any of their other differences? What if we imposed rules on them that they had to stay in their rooms and entertain themselves, and not be allowed to talk on the phone, and be assigned "special interests" to be more like autistic people? It would be rude, and mean, to abuse them like that. And it is rude and abusive to do it to us, too. If our families can't think of anything nice to say, they shouldn't say anything at all. That's what they expect of us, isn't it?

I just try to stay away from my sibling. I used to try to joke around and be funny and he would just ignore me or get really pissed and make me feel bad. So screw it.