Aspies For Freedom

My reply to faaas on page one

I've been a longtime contributor to Uncyclopedia, and I don't find the article offensive at all. It's mildy amusing, but kind of subpar compared to the funniest stuff on that site. And even if I did, I don't think that would merit censorship or pulling the article in any way. Keep in mind the site has other, intentionally offensive articles such as Cancer Porn, Niggers, Holocaust, I could go on and on.



Also, one person who has taken serious offense to the article has been vandalizing the entire wiki, and demanding that the page be removed. Although many aspies such as myself and nonaspies have explained the situation and debated against him ad nauseum, this person refuses to stop. Perhaps a few fellow aspies here might be willing to fan the flamewar a bit? The full discussion on this article is here:

http://uncyclopedia.org/wiki/Forum:Asper...ing_matter

Completely disagree, Andra. They are not on our side at all. Satire is supposed to be intelligent - and this isn't even close. And it's hardly funny. Not only that, when anyone tries to fix it up, they revert it and ban the person responsible. They're a clique and are Aspie intolerant. I have no doubt about that.

Not a good idea at all. That will only make the situation even worse. If an Aspie is raging in there - you'd better stop and let him or her have the last word and ignore them completely. Aspies can't stand not having the last word when they're in that sort of mood.

I had a look at that link, and frankly it looks more like a political bunfight than a debate about Aspergers in a lot of places. Rage aside, the person brought up a number of good points. Also, it would appear he or she wants the article rewritten and not deleted - and I tend to agree.

But - and I think this should be thrown open to the group - Aspies don't take mockery very well as a general rule. There are exceptions of course as there is to every so called rule - but doesn't mockery equal criticism? And isn't criticism an issue for Aspies (in varying degrees of course)? At a guess that would be why this person (and maybe Lili Marlene) have an issue with it. It's a concern for me now that I think of it.

And I also went back through this list, and I can't believe no one has picked up the worst of the lot - Encyclopedia Dramatica! The person on Uncyclopedia mentioned it and I took a look! Holy crap!! If you think you've been offended by the other sites in this thread, you ain't seen nothing until you see that one!  :shock:

Erm, I am an aspie and I'm a longtime contributor to the site. They mock everyone and everything, and simply see no reason to make Asperger's an exception. If we did that, we'd have to take down so many of our other intentionally offensive articles. And they don't revert efforts to fix it up, in fact many users are agreeing that the article isn't exactly comedic gold and should be rewritten. What was reverted was the constant page blanking. I have yet to see anyone make an effort to fix up the page, but I would be more than happy to see someone take a crack at rewriting the page. Namely because it'd shut the bastard up.



And the reason it devolved into a political bunfight was because the guy somehow tried to compare us Uncyclopedia contributors to: Islamic terrorists, Bush's foreign policy, he made claims that he could sue as the law of his country would apply and not the laws of the country in which Wikia's servers reside (look up the word 'jurisdiction' in a dictionary), etc. I'm gonna go try and remind people what this topic is truly about.

No, don't. The way that forum is going, the Aspie will turn it against you. That's what raging Aspies do unfortunately. They firmly believe in what they are saying and if anyone contradicts them (whether the contradiction is right or wrong) the rage will turn on them. It's gotten way out of hand and it should be locked.

Talking of locked, the article is locked from editing (the raging Aspie noted that) which is preventing anyone from having a shot at it. Of course if the raging Aspie was vandalising it then OK, lock it. Maybe you should have a shot at rewriting it. As it doesn't offend you, I assume humour is a special interest of yours. If there's anything that overcomes the normal (hehe what is normal?) Aspie concerns with things like this it would be that.

What is the history of objections to other supposedly intentionally offensive articles on Uncyclopedia? A lack of humour is something that a lot of different people and cultures suffer from for various reasons - and the reactions are sometimes quite horrific. I noted that this was a key argument of the raging Aspie except that he localised it to Aspergers (which was pretty alarmist albeit not 100 percent false to be honest - he did bring up Martin Bryant which is a controversial point as he hasn't been formally diagnosed with AS - only suspected if that).

Oh - on the lawsuit issue. Be very careful. I know the case the raging Aspie was referring to. A mining magnate and devout Jew Joseph Gutnik was defamed in a book published in Israel. He bought the book in Melbourne and viewed it there. If you look up his name here;
http://www.austlii.edu.au
And look for court decisions, and you'll see that Gutnik had the case heard under Australian law. It does also apply to the Internet and I can back that up personally as I was stalked on the Net by someone from the state of South Australia. Now Internet stalking is legal in South Australia, but not in Victoria (where I reside) where it is noted in the criminal code. I had it heard in a local court in Victoria and I got the order. Now I disagree that the raging Aspie has a case (not knowing what country he lives in doesn't help but his knowledge of the Gutnik case seems to indicate he may be Australian as well) but if he did, it would be under local law. So be careful.

Well, that would be due to an individual being defamed/stalked. This is merely satire about a condition, not one person. And parody is protected free speech. Remember the Mohammed cartoons? The lawsuit was thrown out under Danish law.



And the article isn't locked, it's semiprotected. New users and anons can't edit it. (Not sure what constitutes new, I think three days...)

I did see that lawsuit mentioned in the forum. I haven't looked at the link yet though and that will be of interest.

At a guess, it's possible that the raging Aspie is also claiming defamation (which would fall flat on it's face because that can only work if it's personal and this is not). But no matter whether it's defamation or stalking, the precedent that was set was where the offence took place. There the raging Aspie is right. If they saw it on the Internet, the offence took place where he or she saw it. Therefore, local law would apply. I'll try and get a link for you while I'm online.

Good move with the forum. I'll be interested to see what the raging Aspie does next. They won't let it go - not if what I saw yesterday is anything to go by.

Oh - just on that issue of what could happen if an Aspie was offended by it, I'd be looking at the stabbing at McDonalds thread. I'm not trying to back the raging Aspie up (what did you lot call them again?) but it does make for some interesting discussion.

Should actually add this blog to this thread - this guy's a complete idiot. A bully and a tyrant.

http:// hatingautism. blogspot. com (link broken)

I'm trying everything possible to get this waste of webspace deleted.

Exactly, Brave - which is why just now I fired off an email to his local town office and it's welfare officer. He's downright dangerous and needs to be pulled into line PDQ.

[url]http://www.parentingaspergers.com/[url]

Looks like doom mongering sensationalism to me. No wonder my Mother thinks there's something wrong with me if this is the type of thing she looks at.

PM me with the details, Lucie, and I'll see what I can do for you.

"... it is important to note that borrelia is not the only infection that autistic children have.  Many children also have Mycoplasma, Herpes, Chlamydia, Babesia, Bartonella and many more."

If their kids have all of those infections as well as an ASD, I wouldn't go within a handshake's distance.

The issues that are addressed on the emergence site do have some validity. For example:
"You'll find that all symptoms reveal, not the source of illness, but rather the onset of illness; not the "cause" of illness, but rather the literal life stage on which a particular symptom, or cluster of symptoms, was once a normal, natural, healthy response to the person's life events."

Almost all of ASD typical behaviours are normal to a certain degree, frequency and intensity at the relevant stage of development. Most people move on whereas some of ours 'stick'. Identifying those allows to work forward and rather than focus on extinguishing behaviour that is no longer functional, we can add consciously add behaviours that are adaptive to our current circumstances.