Help with son who won't engage

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I wish I could be as optimistic on you on this, but I can't. Due to the fact that I home school and do not do so for religious reasons, I look at a lot of public school curriculum to decide what to use as well as the state exams for multiple states so I can see what standards I need to meet for my child to be competitive. If you look at what is going on in the science and math-related fields you will see that communication skills have an increased emphasis in both the curriculum and in the final yer tests. Used to be that if you could work out the answers to highly technical questions (and show your work) that was more than sufficient. Now you have to be able to communicate how you did what you did and what your answer means into dumbed-down non-technical speak.

Right now, that is OK for us because it is something we need to work on, and we are not in public school. For kids who are, this means that the kids who communicate well with mediocre math/science skills/aptitude are getting a leg up on grades in subjects they would normally not do so well in. In contrast, kids who could whizz through maths and sciences and balance out their maybe not so great grades in the humanities are now being saddled with English class type requirements in their technical subjects and this is going to make their grades in those subject suffer.

If you combine this with what you posted about technical skills being taught universally, you can see where this goes. This makes it easier for employers to find "good enough" engineers/scientists etc. with good communication skills and they don't need to hire the better scientists with poor communication skills who are not a "good fit" for the organization. Yes, there will always be a need for the top flight guys and girls, but the demand will be lower, the jobs fewer than they are even now, and harder to get.

I have multiple family members in IT and I can tell you that the requirements for collaboration and communication are higher than they have been and are heading higher. The meetings and teamwork requirements are greater than they were even a decade ago. i do not see this abating and now that every little kid is being taught technical skills, this will make things worse.

Experience and training. I'm inspired by leaders who really seem to genuinely be about other people rather than themselves. I can recommend some books, one is called the heroes journey, i forget the author. It's abit lengthy but a few chapters give a good picture of what it's about. It discusses the role of the hero in story telling, but you can see how it relates to everyday life. So i try to be the 'hero' and focus on helping others first.

The Chimp Paradox is also an essential read and helps you understand the basics of how our minds work. The 7 Habits of Effective People is also a good read and Start With Why by Simon Sinek.

The success of social media is not a fluke. I've said it time and time again, we are social species, this very forum proves that. Anything that undermines social engagement is a disadvantage and anything that can improve it is not a waste of time.

Automation and robotics will ever decrease the professions to a point where there is nowhere left to 'hide'. Social expectations are increasing exponentially as the Experience Economy races towards overtaking consumerism.

fluffysaurus - the book is actually called The Hero With a Thousand Faces by Joseph Campbell. It discusses the theory of the journey of the archetypal hero found in world mythologies. It's abit 'involved' but I have found it one of the most inspiring reads of my life.

I am probably the parent that pays least attention to the social development of his children, yet my children are more social than most other autistic children out there. I am also the parent that let the children throw tantrums freely, yet my children are the happiest children around. This is even written into my children's IEPs, so there is solid proof of everything that I say. As one teacher puts it, my son smiles "from ear to ear."

On the other hands, all parents that try hard on making their children socialize, have nothing to show. What I've consistently seen is, those parents start to teach their children to socialize from age 2 or 3. By the time these children are in their 20s or 30s, those parents are still trying to make their children socialize.

In the Christmas break, my children hanged around with their cousins. My wife told me: "Look at how well Ivan is socializing with his younger cousins! You are right, these children really don't need any socialization training... they pick up socialization on their own!" I had to roll my eyes at my wife, to let her know that of course I was right.

Autistic children don't need social skill training, nor speech therapy. They are not sick. They are not defective. Autistic children are social, by nature, because they are humans. There is nothing to do in the direction of verbalization or socialization. You develop them properly, all the verbal and social skills will come, for free. You try to socialize them, and you end up harming their self-esteem and you end up ruining these children's lives. It's not even a case of "the cure being worse than the disease": there was no disease, to begin with.

Social media: all the parents that I've seen that are social media stars, have horribly underdeveloped children. You would think that these parents would do well because they know so much: they know which teachers are good and which teachers are bad, they know all the advocates and legal resources out there, they participate in all the local conferences on autism, they virtually know all the autistic families in town, they know all the available therapies out there, they know all about nutrition, supplements, prescription drugs, they know all the ABA providers, they know all the discounts and freebies for autistic children. They spend their life on social networks non-stop. You'd think their children must do well. Yeah right. It's all exactly the opposite: their children are among the most underdeveloped ones. How come? OK, it could be one unlucky case, you tell yourself. But once you see one family after another like that, then you start to get the causality of things. These parents are the cause of their children's underdevelopment.

Why is it that once people start to focus on "social" aspects, their autistic children's lives automatically get ruined?

Why is it that when parents don't pay attention at all to their children's social skill development, their children instead turn out much more social?

How was I able to let my children throw tantrums freely, yet my children are the happiest children around town?

How come other parents have to struggle, but our life is so easy nowadays, to the point that my neurotypical wife would tell people, that if she had to do it all over again, she would still choose to raise autistic children?

I don't suffer. I have a good and easy life. Those people that promote socializing autistic children, they don't have a good or easy life. Yet they are telling people what to do. I don't get it.

People, give me a success story and I'll believe you. To all of you: you don't want me to dig into your past postings and prove how you've complained how hard your life have been, how hard it has been to raise your children. All I see is people telling each other how hard their lives have been, how many tears they have shed, and then they turn around and tell people how to raise kids. Huh?

I've never shed a single teardrop about my children being autistic. I've had fun. Lots of fun.

So when people tell me that socializing autistic children is important, I say: yeah right. Look at your own children, look at mine. No, thanks. My children are so much happier and so much more social than yours.