What would an all-aspie society be like?

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Right now, we live in an all-NT society. And it's not very pleasant for most of us. But what if we changed that? What if it were possible to somehow create a society consisting entirely of aspies? What would it be like? Would it be a beacon of kindness, gentleness, morals, loyalty, and order? These are the traits many aspies have, after all. At the same time, aspies aren't without flaws, either. Which would affect the all-aspie society as well.

Also, many of us also enjoy some of the NT things, like alcohol, casual sex, loud rock concerts, etc. Which have to be organized by people capable of tolerating them. Namely, NTs. How exactly would those parts function in the all-aspie society, at least for people who can't live without them? What about policing, if it were needed at all?

While I'm aware that there many conditions under the autistic spectrum, let's limit this thread to Asperger Syndrome as classified under DSM IV, for simplicity. The floor is open!

There's a guy at my work that taps things when he stims, it's really distracting for me and I can't do any work while he's doing it. If everyone in my office was like that I'd never get anything done!

I hate these ignorant posts so much.

An all ASD world would be extremely dysfunctional.

I know for a fact That myself and my ASD friends would be FAR worse off without our Non autistic parents, not just the social aspects but also the executive functioning skills, educationally, ect.

Also we DONT have an all """"NT"""" society, the world is extremely neurodiverse with many different people with different conditions and mental illness such as

Downs syndrome
Social anxiety,
Depression
General anxiety
Dyslexia
Dyscalculia
Codependency
Borderline personality disorder
Fetal alcohol syndrome
Attention deficit hyperactive disorder

And thats just scratching the surface.

People with ASD are not being oppressed! Even though we cant get everything we want, we get a lot of help and support.

And why just an Aspergers Society? Because of the myth that "all people with Aspergers automatically are better than those without AS? We have "higher IQs" when in reality most of us cant even get a job or start a family.

A healthy society requires diversity, an all autistic society lacks diversity, therefore it would not be a healthy society.

I am classic autistic so I guess I would be counted out then!

This is a silly idea, and all-Asperger's society, for the reasons stated above.

Oh, good god!! ! I limited the discussion to AS for simplicity, rather than exclusion. I never said that aspies were better than NTs. Although I certainly felt that way as a kid: I felt like a lighthouse of kindness and gentleness in a stormy sea of cruelty and roughness. To disprove the faulty belief you're attributing to me, I even met another aspie once, and he made me uncomfortable. Read on.

I was on a train, returning from visiting one of my... ahem... "dates". Yeah, let's call her a "date". Which meant I was in a hyper-NT mood, smiling ear-to-ear. Plus I drank a beer before getting on the train at the downtown station. One stop later, a guy my age got on and immediately took a seat next to me, even though there were empty seats. I figured he had Asperger's, more severe than my own, because two things: (1) he talked in monotone, and (2) immediately started showing me "Game of Thrones" snapshots on his cell phone without as much as an introduction. (Which is a show I have zero interest in.) I tried to non-verbally hint that I just wanted to space out (given what I did less an hour earlier ), even telling him outright that I just want to space out, but he wouldn't get the hint. I put up with it for two stops, then moved to another train car.

I commend that guy for being out and about independently, and knowing how to navigate a rail system. (Although aspies are generally good with train schedules.) But man oh man, did his actions make me feel weird and uncomfortable, even if I'm speaking from an NT perspective that's become almost second nature to me. I can imagine myself doing something similar with a stranger when I was a child. It'd be also interesting to see if I'd feel the same way in an all-aspie society, where such actions might be more "normal".

I also had the opposite situation. On another occasion, I sat next to a girl who looked about 25, on the same crowded train. I was heading home seeing a street festival with an interest group. After some chit-chat about work/weather/trains, the conversation topic turned to pets. She showed me a picture of her chocolate Lab on her phone. Maybe it's because I find dogs more fun than "Game of Thrones", but this flow of conversation felt more "normal" to me.

So in the light of those incidents, I'm aware that an all-aspie society wouldn't be a utopia in the slightest. But what if it's because I internalized NT norms to the point of expecting them from people? What if they weren't the norm? So why not speculate?

An all-AS society would be no different from all-AS societies we have today.

We are oppressed not in a systematic conspiratorial way but in a majority rules way. The majority usually decides what is right or wrong and the best way to deal what they decide needs correcting largely based on what is obvoius to them.

Your statement that we get plenty of supports applies to only a small minority of us. This mostly applies to the young in certain locations.

I do not agree with using aspergers only society for simplicities sake. The needs of an all Aspergers-Autism society are going to differ from a society for the entire Autism Spectrum. This is related to what I think is going to be a major obsticle, how is it decided who is Autistic or Aspie? Will we use the disgnosis given by NT clinictions or have spectrum clinitions reassess everybody that wants to immigrate? . We are not close to agreeing on who is autistic, diagnosis given out by spectrum clinitions won't change this

Since autistics will be coming from all over the world what language(s) will be used?

All of this needs to be settled before we decide where we want to put the country, get somebody to give up the land or take it by force.

I wouldn´t be any better. Diversity - and mainly acceptance of same.

I've been in special ed schools for asd my whole life. Being entirely surrounded by asd people on a daily basis is no paradise. Asd people are not that much better or worse to be around than nt people in my experience. Higher funtioning tease lower functioning etc. The reason asd people think only nt people suck is because they have only been around nt people. Asd people suck too sorry to say.

No we don't


Assuming two aspies have a kid that isn't aspie: do the parents/this 'new society' kill the kid?

Like the others stated, this wouldn't work for a variety of reasons.

We have to realize that we NT's, and that NT's need us.

We can't live segregated from the world

You laid out the basis of discussion in the OP, pay those who ignored it no mind.

With the exception of the rock concerts, which is a whole different topic, yes, it would be a quieter society.

Most likely, social rules would be far more codified, which would cut down on what you described above. I suspect personal space would be treated with more cultural and legal deference than now. I can't even begin to predict the complexities of tenant, co-op, and codominium laws.

Bars and nightclubs would be effectively nonexistent, which creates second order effects on travel in general. There are some rather complex and interesting questions on transportation and logistics that are well beyond the scope of this thread.

As for a bastion on loyalty, possibly. It's the atomization of society, along with moving the social safety net to the organized state, that removed historical levels of loyalty. Given that you're dealing with a population less inclined to change and probably with a lower time preference, several of the drivers of social atomization are gone, which may lead to a return to historical levels of in-group loyalties.

Our modern homogenous consumer choices would broaden considerably, most likely going to local regional types of products, as people move to more individualized choices, in large part due to our deep interest in our focused topics. For comparison purposes, look at the specialized choices in upper-end stores, and that's with the demands of a modern mass market consumer economy.

You're right. Threads similar to these come up often. Usually more in the way of AS vs NT as in good vs evil. So it's easy to jump to conclusions before absorbing.

to imagine what that hypothetical world would be like, first we would have to know what kinds of traits would be shared by aspie adults who never had any contact with non-aspies. would they be more confident and capable? would they be completely unable to take care of themselves instead? i have no idea

We can make a few assumptions.

One, yes, they would be more confident and capable. It's unlikely that the absence of social exclusion would make people less capable. Given the documented benefits of regular interaction, it would be a healthier society than what many posters have today, since there won't be the brutal social isolation.

Two, there is no reason to believe that somehow people would be suddenly "completely unable" to do anything in the absence of NTs. The presence of NTs is not some magic elixir of functioning.