Aspies For Freedom

I was casually browsing the Youtube awards when I saw this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rbgUjmeC-4o

I wouldn't be surprised if this video has been posted before (It does have near a million views, after all), but currently you can vote for it for best commentary. I haven't watched it all so I'll reserve judgement for now.

I can relate very much to this statement.

Also - I can relate  a lot of what this guy says to myself and my son -  Maybe all people can - I'm not sure.

Even the rubbing of the nose.

I liked some of what he had to say--especially the part about having two personalities... that is spot-on.  A lot of you on AFF can't figure me out, I seem to contradict myself in numerous ways... watch this video and listen to what he says about the "two personalities."

Perhaps you will gain better insight into my behavior.  I have never felt like a "whole" person, but rather someone broken up into a bunch of fragments.

I'm not the greatest fan of the AS comparison to 6-yr-olds, etc, but I admit that some of our behavior can be quite decidedly youthful.  On that basis, I will accept his comparison.

It is very common thing for autistics to be perceived as, and to internalize it, that we are very contradictory. There is a great video on Youtube (look up silenmiaow's videos) that deals with this. In ninth grade I described myself as "a walking contradiction".

As for the 6-year-old thing, I don't care for comparing adults and older children to young children. You are what you are, no matter what age.

Although, I do relate to what Einstein described as a childlike perception of the world (childlike, not childish) in that (in the context of what he wrote) that questions about the world that most people think about briefly as children then forget, that he only began to wonder about them as an adolescent and adult, and studied so intensively what most don't give another thought to. I believe this idea has farther reach than physics and other such academic pursuits.

Especially in the first few years upon finding that you are autistic (or, tt least, at the start of the investigation of this idea, and what it means to be autistic), it is really common for people to latch onto the studies and the assumptions made about us, and why we do things the ways we do.

I did a fair share of this, mostly I was interested in the ways we tend to process things differently, and what things are different in our brains. I still am interested in this, but not obsessively anymore, and I realize that it's less important than things like securing services and advocating against prejudice and the maltreatment that results.

But I am contradictory.  My personality has contradictions.  How else can I explain myself to other people?

Sometimes I don't feel as old as my biological age; 42. More like 4.2yo going on 4.3yo; sometimes is sometimes far too often.