My NT mother was the extremely abusive parent with me and my seven siblings, not my Aspie father. And my five NT children are some of the most normal kids (and young grown ups) you'd want to meet. No sign of depression in any of them (or social dysfunction). Their NT father is the one they need protection from!
People constantly tell me how beautiful my kids are, everybody loves them. All through their childhoods I have heard what a great mother I am.
Some Aspies make terrible parents, so what. I doubt that the percentage of awful Aspie parents is any higher than the percentage of awful NT parents. But they don't blame being an NT when a parent is rigid, controlling and plain unreasonable (like my husband), and a bad parent.
This site makes it look like ALL Aspies make bad parents. Are they trying to say that in contrast, all NTs are good parents? :roll:
So I guess aspies aren't fit to be parents and the authorities should take our kids away.
I assume you meant that ironically.
Mish, do you mean Judy Singer?
Supposedly she coined the term neurodiversity, I didn't know she was involved with that group.
Was just looking at it, and Judy Singer is involved, I saw the AS parents behaviour checklist. I have seen it before but it still sickens me.
http://www.aspar.klattu .com.au/checklist.htm
Is the AS parent ...
able to recognise that children of different ages have different needs?
eg. will they insist on discussing politics with a 5 year old, or want to talk baby talk to a teenager?
able to recognise when the child is bored, unhappy, distressed, etc.
Will the naive AS parent expose their children to risky situations with predatory adults?
constantly rehearse their suspicions, "pseudo-paranoia" with the child?
require the child to constantly reality test for them?
My version to make a point
Is the NT parent ...
smoking around the child and risking its health and safety by doing so?
leaving the child with babysitters every weekend to go out and party?
encouraging the child to choose popular people as friends in order to increase their own social standing?
being critical if the child appears unusual or shy?
So yes,, whats the compromise?
I think the compromise lies in acknowledging that AS and in particular lack of empathy, if present, can increase certain tendencies in people, but also trying to explain how some of the things that may appear malicious etc. to them are actually not, and can be helped in many ways.
Also, making it clear that a lot of the time, people are just nasty and that AS merely flavours their nastiness, it doesn't cause it.
I look at it this way -
If there was a site and its basis was for any minority, ethnic, or disabled group, such as 'wheelchair users are bad parents', 'hispanic people are bad parents' that group would be very unhappy. And it had a checklist like -
Wheelchair parent couldn't take the child for a walk in the park
People would rightfully be offended, and say hey, thats not fair, I may be different, but I care for my child well.
Now if there was a site for people with serious mental illnesses or drug addictions such as 'alcoholics are bad parents', 'psychopaths are bad parents' most people would say that was fair.
So it comes down to, how is aspergers being categorised on that site and how are we being presented? The same for ASpartners.
I think it is unfair, and we have a right to be unhappy.
Thanks for showing us.
She said "My aim is not to prevent Aspies from having children, but to get them appropriate services so they can make informed decisions about having children, and if they do have children get whatever assistance they need."
Unfortunately, I don't know of any service that would help an aspie adult 'make an informed decision'. I do know that they would most likely be told 'don't have kids' if enquiring with social services or similar.
"New movements always need a bogey(wo)man to unite around opposing so I guess I'm it."
I certainly wouldn't say bogeywoman, I think the parts of the site and contents are the problem.
the dark side of AS
The dark side of AS hmmm How about the dark side of NT!!!
i feel like my head is literally about to explode.
be back later
Great letter! Aspies have the right to decide for themselves whether or not to have children. It's bigotry, pure and simple. In reality, Aspies are more likely to be victims of abuse or violence than they are to commit such acts. I'm actually more empathetic, in spite of my NT parents telling me that it was wrong to show emotion when it was appropriate such as having my brother in a coma after a car accident. It still affects me 10 years later because they accused me of having no empathy for him.
Quote:
By Aguna ("Jokes" forum)
"So many Aspie pedestrians. So little time."
Is that really there???? :shock:
I broke the link to avoid helping their google rating, as they appear to be VERY sick :evil:
We have a policy to break links to negative sites.
Alyric, as an aspie who was raised by an NT parent, I found your article about the parenting deficits of Neurotypic Disorder sufferers to be highly amusing, but also incomplete.
You forgot to mention the huge lack of awareness that so many parents with the Neurotypic Disorder have about the differences between their own neurotype and that of their aspling offspring. Indeed, this lack of awareness can be so striking and resistant to correction that it can justifiably be considered a form of delusion. Some autistic intellectuals have described this essentially neurotypical form of delusion as "a lack of a theory of other minds". Having been raised with the belief that there is only one kind of mind that can be considered healthy and functional, those with ND are blind to evidence that others have minds that work differently to their own, unless those others are proven to be dysfunctional or ill in some way. Thus they assume that their aspling offspring are able but unwilling to excel at sporting activities or make sustained eye contact, and they also assume that their aspling offspring enjoy being at noisy parties full of strangers as much as they do. It isn't hard to see how the deluded thinking of the neurotypical parent directly causes harm and distress to any offspring that they have of a different neurotype.
Another serious form of harm that can be inflicted by the neurotypically ordinary parent on the autistically gifted child is the splitting of the aspling's personality into two discrete selves; the authentic autistic self (which is often severely neglected, denied, punished or repressed), and the emulation of neurotypical self that is used by the aspling in the presence of neurotypical people. After years of parental rewarding of the fake self and punishment of autistic-type behaviours, the child's autistic personality does not wither and die, it just gets more and more pissed off. Snarl or look bored whenever your aspie child talks about any unusual topic in depth, and your child is sure to learn how to hide their autistic light under a bushel. It is no wonder that the final reward for this style of parenting for the neurotypic parent is often angry outbursts, alienation and deep resentment from their autistic offspring.
It is no surprise to me that ASPAR stinks and is totally biased, I have been saying as much myself for years.
I had a look at the Linehan woman's piece, and I've got to say, it isn't any accident that most pieces of writing about autism that take a negative view of it overlook and fail to mention the most up-to-date, scientifically valid and positive theory of autism, the systemising theory of autism, while trotting out a bunch of discredited and incoherent theories about autism that are way past their use-by date.
This Lineham woman cites a pop psychology bestseller by Daniel Goleman to support her points. I am sure the "bored housewife" set will think that looks very scholarly, but the fact is that Goleman and his book have no credibility in the world of real science and academia.
I'm glad that Lineham woman is practicing in Canada, not where I live, but I am concerned for Canadian aspies.
I do wish I had more time to spend reading the work of people like the Diva and Dawson, but a baby and family (who have to deal with some of the disadvantages that come with AS with no concessions from the govt. or anyone else) take up a lot of my time.
Alyric wrote
The one thing that Mixchelle has really made me think about is the idea of linear spectrums - it sounds like a reasonable idea - autism one end, Asperger's the other- but if you really look at it it doesn't make sense and it's a flaky way of describing autism, if you want to be accurate.
I use that idea myself but it is obvious that the idea of the linear spectrum doesn't take into account realities such as personalities, "comorbidities", other genetic syndromes and variations in IQ among autistics. Is autism with Tourette's different to non-Tourette's autism? The experts do seem to by trying themselves in knots when they try to explain the relationship between the linear spectrum and IQ. I maintain that our family is full of people who have at least a few significant autistic traits, but I recently discovered a set of diagnostic criteria in a book for the "Broader Autistic Phenotype" and no one in our family met the criteria, not even the scariest aspie in the family, so I give up!
Another quote
... what gets written about autism is by people who are really good empathisers - but can they empathise with spectrumites? The answer is IMO almost definitely not. This is a really important point and one I think should be broadcast far and wide. A very odd thing, but two days before you wrote that, I wrote something similar - must be something in the water!
I had a look at your interesting commentaries, and I was also pleased to note that someone intelligent has been thinking along the same lines as myself. Having read "The essential difference" by Baron-Cohen it did appear to me that he had the idea that people who might score high for empathy on his tests are good all-purpose empathisers. I would have expected S B-C, with his obsession with sex hormones and gendered thinking, to have realised that the idea of misandry, or at least gender incompatibility, could have some application to the way that the predominantly female workforce of people who work with (predominantly male) autistic children deal with or think about the people who they are being paid to help and understand. Unfortunately I was the person who was left to ask this question. Has anyone else raised this issue?
This week I watched a doco on TV about Australian parents of autistic kids and the lives of their kids, and I noted that all but one of the army of people paid to work with autistic kids shown in the doco were female, and most of these women were the kind that fall into the Baron-Cohen stereotype of high empathisers - obsession with others, permanent smiles, constant over-the-top body language and contrived, cutesy voices. The one male person working with an autistic child was a "minder" for a boy who had violent tendencies despite being drugged. I think a male might have been chosen for this role simply because of his physical strength rather than any other reason.
Alyric, I noticed that there is one point on which you and I disagree - twice in your writing you expressed the view that AS does not alter the personality, or something to that effect. I don't see how it couldn't. For example, aspies are thought to lack a sense of humour. I can see where this idea comes from, but I think it is more the case that aspies usually have idiosyncratic senses of humour that often aren't easily shared with others. If AS modifies a person's SOH, how can you say it doesn't alter personality? I personally don't draw much of a distinctin between "mind" and "personality". What's the difference? I recently read an article about "affective computing" in which it appears that computers are being programmed with a few cheap tricks to display "personality" and "empathy". Is personality really some complex, personal and mysterious thing?
It looks like the AFF forum is close to 1,000 members. :grin: More than that other aspie forum that I used to haunt.