PornAccount62001 #ableist

PornAccount62001 #ableist reddit.com

I don’t like autistic people, and would choose to never associate with them if I had the choice

On the high functioning side of the spectrum, they are tiring to be and annoying and weird. I’m tired of having awkward conversations because they don’t know how to read human interactions or don’t enjoy the conversation topic. I don’t like having to carefully plan out what I say because they don’t understand human inflection or body language.

On the lower function side of the spectrum are the non-verbal ones who I don’t know how to interact with at all. Am I supposed to try and treat them like a baby? Do I ignore them? Do I treat them like a functioning person despite not being one? To what level am I supposed to help with basic tasks?

In the middle functioning side are people who have both issues. They can try and maintain basic conversation but may require almost babying or extreme care when it comes to social tasks. I have to try and help them while also not seeming to patronize them

There are also issues with almost everyone on the spectrum as well

A lot of autistic people are extremely passionate about a small selection of topics, and can’t maintain conversations or such well of it doesn’t relate to these topics

I also don’t like how the media portrays autism. Hardly anyone is a rain man type virtuoso genius, and most are like I have previously described. But a decent amount of higher functioning autistic people or parents seem to have a since of superiority because maybe one or two important/interesting people are autistic as well.

And don’t say “blah blah blah you’ve only met one or two people like that” cause I haven’t. My brother is mid functioning so for years I had to go to special education events and was even forced to ride the short bus because we went to the same school. I have plenty of experience dealing with people from the highs and lows of the spectrum

8 comments

This boils down to this jackass not feeling special. And that's sad.

oh, fuck off you little snowflake. So, you might have to deal with people who ain't exactly like you? Oh, how horrible....

A lot of autistic people are extremely passionate about a small selection of topics, and can’t maintain conversations or such well of it doesn’t relate to these topics

At least I, as an autistic person, can speak better damn English. "or such well of it"? WTF even is that?

I’m a high-functioning autistic person (or asperger, depending on who you ask) myself. And I admit it can be a burden both to me and people around me. But at least I try to grow into a better person. And tell you what? Since it’s likely my autism that makes me such a rational, intelligent, and honest person, I’d rather keep it (warts and all) than take the chance of turning out like the myriads assholes quoted here. And that’s saying something, considering some of the worst moments of my life are associated with my autism(*).

(*)Mostly my school life, where I was bullied by both students and teachers alike for the crime of being “different”. And that was before I was even officially diagnosed, so I had no idea why.

I think if you edit it to “or such well, if it”. As in:

A lot of autistic people are extremely passionate about a small selection of topics, and can’t maintain conversations or such well, if it doesn’t relate to these topics.

Of course, he’s pretty well described the vast majority of humanity, which is why most people in conversations involving things they know nothing about shut up and listen. You find someone talking about things he obviously doesn’t know about, expect things to get more stupid from there, because it always does.

I don’t like bigoted people, and I’d choose to never associate with them if I had the choice.
Bigotry is voluntary, autism is not.

I’d say it’s you that has a problem how to read human interactions.
Human inflection and body language can’t be understood in writing either.

If you were born like that, how would you have liked to be treated? I think I would have liked to be talked TO, even if I couldn’t answer on my own.

There are issues with almost everyone, spectrum or no spectrum.

Since =/= sense.

Practice makes perfect, they say. If you, with a brother on the spectrum, can’t manage, then the problem is you, not them.

Someone on the spectrum isn't liked, and nobody associates with that person.

Said person? Stephen Wiltshire:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Wiltshire

Oh yes. So hated & detestable is he that he doesn't make a good living by looking at a building for a few minutes at different angles, then drawing such in precise detail (without drafting tools) purely from memory: thus so many companies refuse to commission him to do visualisations of their corporate HQs etc for their boardrooms. Nor has he been awarded an MBE: or made an honorary Fellow of the Society of Architectural Illustration.

...amirite, o OP?!

Bigotry is voluntary, autism is not.

I’m going to be controversial and object to the statement that “bigotry is voluntary”. Most people don’t choose their beliefs, let alone reason themselves into or out of any particular one; it’s formed by one’s subconscious, based on one’s innate personality and many years of social influence, most of which is subtle and unnoticed. (Or, you know, kids parroting their parents’ blatant bigotry. But even that doesn’t always stick.) Reasoning does not create belief, merely justifies (or de-justifies) it.

Being self-aware enough to realize that one’s own beliefs are going to a dark and ugly place and then gradually self-correcting is either rare talent or a very underutilized ability.

Once fully established, *changing* one’s beliefs can theoretically be voluntary, but is not mentally or emotionally cost-free. Sometimes there’s also a social cost, though there can also be a social cost to not changing as well. On one end of the spectrum are beliefs, which, once consciously examined, don’t fit well within the rest of one’s worldview, and have a social cost to keeping them; these have low mental and emotional costs, yet still aren’t necessarily easy - one can always fall back to old patterns of thinking, especially if the old patterns are subtly reinforced.

At the other extreme is beliefs which form the bedrock of one’s identity and worldview. Trying to unravel those leads to Iä Cthulhu Fhtagn - in other words, severe psychological distress which may require long-term therapy and effectively having to rebuild one’s identity and worldview from the level of a young child. In most cases the cost is not nearly that high, but high enough that it can be a privilege to seriously contemplate rewiring one’s own subconscious. That’s assuming they even consciously desire to, which most don’t. And the vast majority of people definitely won’t just because some strangers said so.

(I’m not counting things which are not sincerely believed, but say that you believe out of social pressure. Those can be changed fairly easily, if you’re not sure what to believe otherwise.)

None of that is meant to suggest that the behavior of bigots is excusable, only the beliefs driving the behavior is nowhere near as “voluntary” as some people seem to think. And it doesn’t mean that bigots can’t *be* changed - provide high enough social costs, and provide enough visible counterexamples which render their beliefs untenable, and some of them will. But it won’t be voluntary on their part.