Dear Aspie:WHY ARE ASPIES VULNERABLE TO BULLYING?

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jman wrote:

"What exactly is it that makes aspies vulnerable to bullying and other forms of victimization? Is it a certain facial expression, or tone of voice, or a certain gesture or what?"

Whoa. Good question there. Don't we all wish we'd known the answer to this one sooner...

Pundits in psychology, after earning their Masters of the Obvious, will tell you with a straight face and much gravity that aspies get picked on because they're ... different. Unfortunately, this brilliant assertion gets us no nearer to understanding the specific behavior that incites bullying and that's what's important if we want to change our behavior to alleviate the bullying.

Aspies put off classic submissive body language as a natural course of events. You asked about facial expressions, voice tones, and gestures: well, all of these play a role. Aspies make poor and infrequent eye contact. In the NT world, that means you are affraid to face someone. It means you can't hold your ground. Aspies, as they get comfortable, tend to curl up, slouch down, and cross their arms. In NT body language, these gestures signal withdrawl, fear, and defensiveness. An NT will sense--rightly or wrongly--that the aspie won't tangle with him.

And unfortunately, this is often true--an aspie won't fight. Why? Well, apart from the fact that many aspies lack the physical coordination and fighting skills of their peers, many aspies hold a gross misconception: they think human interaction is sane or logical. Aspies usually think that when a conflict presents itself, there has been a misunderstanding, and they can resolve the problem by sane discourse if they look hard enough. They get caught in a morass of indecision and end up taking a raft of cr*p from whoever happens to be confusing them with false, badgering statements. Here's an example, with the subtext of the statements in parentheses. See if it looks familiar:

BIG LUTHER-So I heard your were kissing my girlfriend. (I want to fight you because something inside tells me I need to)

ASPIE-No. I didn't even know you had a girlfriend. (No, I didn't)

BIG LUTHER-Well I heard you slobbered all over her, shrimpy. (I'm going to make you fight me to defend your honor)

ASPIE-I haven't kissed any girls at all. (You've clearly got the wrong guy pegged for the crime)

BIG LUTHER-(pushing Aspie) What if I say you did? (I just want to fight, moron! Forget about the girl!)

ASPIE-(crossing his arms) I still didn't kiss anybody. (I'm certain I didn't do anything wrong)

And on and on. Now of course Luther is going to see the aspie cross his arms and take it as a sign of withdrawing in the face of antagonism, and go after the aspie twice as hard, because he thinks he's got him beat. The thing to notice is that, if you read the subtexts in brackets, they don't match up. Luther is implying one thing with his words and body language. The aspie is deducing quite another message and responding to the wrong message. He won't fight, because he doesn't see that there's anything to fight about. It would be different if Big Luther just came out with the blunt truth:

BIG LUTHER-I want to fight you because my stepdad pushed me around this morning and I feel like taking it out on you.

ASPIE-Any way of avoiding this unfortunate incident?

BIG LUTHER-Nope.

ASPIE-(sigh, raising fists) Tally ho, then.

Aspies run afoul of authority and power by unknowingly projecting signs of aggressiveness and arrogance as well. It is the diametrically opposed problem. Since they don't know body language very (well if at all), they don't know when they are putting off signs of arrogance and aggressiveness such as staring at a bully (a challenge), standing apart from any group (setting oneself apart from herd), not making small talk with peers, putting hands on the hips (aggressive), sitting higher on the bleachers than the bully (attempting to dominate), or talking to girls the bully has earmarked as his own.

NTs have a natural hardwired system in their brains that prevents many of these faux pas in the presense of a supieror power. When an aspie unknowingly makes the wrong moves, he broadcasts an intention to challenge the Lion of the Woods. The result is merciless persecution.

You may now ask, "Why is it that the bullys need exercise these strange territorial behaviors in the first place? Why can't they control themselves?" The answer is that the bullies are rarely aware of the real reason they do many of these bullying behaviors. Their instincts, built into their genes, tell them they must dominate as many people as possible, control as many females as possible, control as much territory as possible, and destroy deviant members of the tribe such as aspies and homosexuals. Since they aren't very well aware of these subconscious urges, it's next to impossible to argue with them.

Can aspies avoid bullying? To some extent, if they learn the rules of NT body language. Aspies who speak body language can often avoid the two species of problems discussed above. But even these learned aspies won't avoid all the pitfalls, and the only solution is to consult a higher power, such as a teacher, and give him or her a rigorous explanation: "You cannot leave me with these bullies! They are programmed down to their DNA to misunderstand me and make my life hell!" A rigorous explanation obviates any line from the higher power like, "You need to learn to handle bullies on your own." This is ignorant nonsense. Aspies are fundamentally different people and must take special measures to ensure their lives are livable.


(If you would like to ask a question of "Dear Aspie..." about flirting, small talk, and other mysteries of non-verbal communication, simply PM your question to GroovyDruid. Due to the amount of PMs received, not all questions will be published, but they'll all be considered. Thanks for sharing!)

I heard sometimes schools use bullies, to try and get students who might be less compliant to comply. This could be a reason they target Aspies, since we're known not to mindlessly fallow authority.