Aspies For Freedom

I totally agree with you.  I was talking to the Director where I work yesterday; we'd finished for the day and were just packing away a few toys, enrolment forms, etc and chatting.  (I trust her, so don't clam up like I tend to with some other of my colleagues.) She said that I communicate so well that if I hadn't told her about my dx she wouldn't have believed it.  She also said that maybe people shouldn't attach "labels" to each other as that only emphasizes differences.  I know she meant well, but it was difficult for me to get her to understand that I've learnt over the past 45 years to "pass NT"; but the effort required means that I'm not ever *me* in public, I'm just role-playing.  And the misery suffered in childhood/teenager/early adult years while I learnt to "pass" could have been so much more happy and profitable if others had just accepted that everyone has differences and let me get on with being me, rather than painfully learning to pretend.
Alison

"NT's need..." Okay. But why can't we learn to coexist? Why do people think they have to change everyone into NT's?

I've cried over my parents. When I finally realized what has been going on my whole life, I cried for the very reasons you say. I thought about how hard it must've been for my mother to have a baby who didn't respond, or who cried, screamed, and pushed away from being cuddled.

But you know what? She learned to accept me and love me. When people stopped trying to force me to cuddle and socialize, I began to choose to. I'm sure not everyone does, but I did. Once I could feel like a loved person, instead of someone who does everything wrong, or a partial peson, I was inspired to continue growing and learning.

My parents never wanted me to change (maybe they did sometimes, deep down, when I was having tantrums, but they never ever let it show to me--the kids in this film of which we speak are SITTING RIGHT THERE hearing people say these horrible things about them), they just wanted to help me develop my strengths and cope with my weaknesses.

If being autistic is part of the person, and not a disease, then wishing for a cure is wishing that person to be someone other than who they are. That is wishing for the death of me, and for me to be replaced with someone who looks like me but acts "normal."

When I suffer from cruel remarks or treatment from other people, I am suffering as a result of their cruelty, and not as a result of autism.

I'm pretty sure it's well established that autism is associated with a genetic difference. Some people in history thought that having brown eyes was associated with a genetic abnormality. When did biodiversity become something to fear?

I could quite easily take a video over a week with my preschool class and show: temper tantrums, food being thrown on the floor in a fit of pique, other children being hit/bitten/pushed, adults such as teachers and parents getting hit/kicked/screamed at, teachers being ignored (ie don't climb on the book case it will fall over...don't climb...CRASH!) full flat-out-on-the-floor spit the dummy type rages; in short, everything that was shown in that other video.  But apart from two kids in my class who are Aspie (and generally are better-behaved so long as they're *listened* to and their needs met!) the kids in the video would be all NTs!  My point is, *all* children act up at times, and all you need do to make a horror video is a bit of selective editing.  
Alison

Oh, I'm sorry, Greenlion!  I thought you were just giving us your personal feelings.  I had no idea they were the Truth. :roll:
Oh, well all us silly Aspies can stop attacking you now for sounding like a belligerent uneducated boorish troll!
Alison

"Should" is a very loaded word. People should not tell other people how they should be.

Well said, as was the other stuff you said that I've deleted from the quote, because the sensory sensitivity issue was the one I was wanting to address. As well as it simply being the way I percieve the world (loved the fingertip example), my sensitivities have advantages. Some quick examples would be if someone dropped a sewing needle on the carpet, I'd be most likely to see the light reflecting off of it and be the first to find it. Or, at work, when I'm in the back of the store sweeping, I can hear someone come in, even if they were very queit and go greet them. Or, I can hear changes in the sounds the fridges or computers make and know that something isn't working properly. I'll admit that it IS annoying to have extreme anxiety, sometimes to the point of meltdown, because of certain sounds, but I think it'd be more accurate to say I'd like to find a way of coping with that. I would not want my perceptions altered.

Some philosophy education should make it clear that "truth" may or may not actually exist. But, that's pointless to the discussion at hand.

Am I the only one confused by this? Couldn't you come into contact with "the truth" by all of those things you mention discarding? I don't see how your response follows from what was said.

It shocks and angers me that people are so concerned with "curing" people like me, instead of promoting understanding, acceptance, tolerance, and being able to co-exist. It frightens me that people are frightened by diversity simply because someone acts and thinks in a way they don't understand. Many people act and think in ways that I don't understand, but I try to open a dialogue with them so we can at least try to see where each other is coming from (even if we don't ever end up aggreeing). I never think there is something wrong with them for their thoughts, opinions, and behaviours (although that might be from society convincing me at a very young age that there isn't anything wrong with the people that confuse me, but there is something wrong with me).

As for expressing not expressing compassion for those mothers (why no fathers?) until challenged to do so, I didn't really read much of the original thread you refer to, and I did, in this thread, express compassion for at least my own parents. Not because I was challenged, but because I was reading this conversation and not that one. However, you neglected to acknowledge my earlier posts...

To bring up an issue from the first few pages, you kept denying the comparison to racism (and did you deny a comparison to homosexuality? I can't remember.), but you've never explained why such comparisons are simply false. When other people brought them into discussions, you kept saying something like you've already addressed that issue, but you didn't actually explain how it was irrelevant (unless you did, and I miss it. In which case, I apologize).

Actually, if problems occurring during meiosis is the reason for the increased risk of Down's Syndromw with increased age of the eggs, then couldn't it be a risk factor for autism? Probably not if autism is like eye colour, but...anyway, just thinking out loud.

It's actually pretty hard not to personalize it coming from our perspective that autism is not a disease.

A= I am autistic and it is a part of who I am
B= Autism is a burden on society

A+B= I am a burden on society

I wanted to reply to the example of the autistic in church stomping his feet and such. I think it was an adult not a child, but egardless WatsonSword said it much better than I would've. My response was going to be "well, maybe his parents shouldn't force him to go to church."

---I apologize for my multiple posts and bringing up older stuff from the discussion. I was away for a week or so, and replied as I caught up.

Vespers: I don't know why I said it was pointless. I think I felt insecure about speaking up.

violet_yoshi: I'm sorry to hear about your experiences. I could be out of place here, but I think M actually meant that there must be something wrong with the therapy and/or therapist, not that there is something wrong with the child.