Aspies and "Typical"

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I was raised to believe that all groups of people suck. There can be good individuals within those groups, but the groups themselves are never good, and people in groups are even worse; groups always bring out the worst in people anyways.

Stereotypes define what the "typical" person in any given group is considered to be, right? They can be negative, neutral, or positive (although of course the, um, stereotype of a stereotype is negative) but they supposedly describe what is "typical" of a group.

So if the people I like are pretty much never going to be typical of any group whatsoever anyways (besides maybe weirdos, or aspies.. but even then.. not so much typical.. anybody I like would be massively offended by being referred to as typical.) then how does it matter, at all, what the typical person of any group may be?
This opens another question in my mind. Might it be that the offensiveness of stereotypes is less in the stereotypes themselves, and more in the offensiveness of being considered typical?

(I know there are some people who believe that sweeping generalities and stereotypes are true of all people in a group, but I find those people fairly rare and truly disturbing and infuriating. Unless it's a group classed by the criteria you're making a statement about, like saying that all people with blue eyes have blue eyes, but even then, some might be wearing colored contacts. It's just completely and utterly senseless to think that a huge group of people can be utterly identical.. Even in Brave New World it didn't happen that way. Maybe almost, but that's fiction anyways.)

Given that aspies as a group can be loosely defined as being the opposite of typical, how can stereotypes really mean anything at all?

I think the only thing you can look at group stereotypes for is shorthand in communication, ie. not having to chase people away with a litany and life history of a person to preface whatever point your getting at. As far as intragroup identifiers though, people just seem to migrate to whoever seems to either fit their natural emotive motif or alternately whoever has something they want - like power for instance.

That said though I wouldn't give aspies the sort of epic status you've denoted, I've met more than enough who were banal if not moreso than most. I've known plenty of NT's who are quite refreshing to be around as compared to a great many if not most aspies. Yes, we have a set of specific sorts of neurological strengths and difficulties, that brings about some amount of common experience, but I've said it before and I'll say it again - so do diabetics and in much the same ways. We go through a bit more social head-twisting than a diabetic might perhaps, we likely need to talk to each other a bit more for support based on trying to help each other make the most of our wiring, but I think the thing that really holds us out as special is that, while there are a great many health conditions out there in existence, the autistic spectrum is one of those oddities where your sense of the normality of non-normality (everyone having something) can be rather significantly truncated - or at least early on in life. That gives us the extra-added sense of being super-different or somehow that much farther over and above other people with other conditions. Don't get me wrong, I'm not reading you the riot act at all , just noting that there are many groups out there who surpass up by leaps and bounds (maybe not the diabetics but, enough). That I think our realities in terms of self-given group identity and psychology schematic of the world around us are more based on misinterpretations and what we can't see rather than what we supposedly can see that other people can't.

I didn't really thinking I was giving "epic status".. actually almost maybe the opposite. It's just that it can't mean anything at all to me what a typical person of a group is like, because I don't like people who are typical. I don't so much mean being open to all people and stuff as I mean not being open to people who are very much part of a group.
I guess I was also kinda questioning why aspies do tend to get a bit prejudiced and stereotypical. Is it an attempt to fit in? A belief in somebody else's judgment, with the knowledge that they're just not good at figuring out people to begin with?

Hmm.. I think I'm still not making sense.

And of course as an adult you have come to realize that is not strictly true, right?

Groups that I can think of that have no inherit corruption include soup kitchens for homeless people, such as run by the salvation army, the united way. Both are quite large, and although they have religious aspects, as a third party outsider I never noticed them pushing even that.

Others... I worked for the Canadian diabetes association. The Red Cross as well seems to have escaped corruption. Farmers market associations tend to be free of graft as well. I currently work for a downtown association, and it would be remarkable that they could have their fingers in something dirty as well.

I did security at a 'night in from the cold' for street people in the basement of a local church. The church was founded and is run by a former street person. Though we had a meal that night, there was absolutely no religious observation preceding it.

Aside from this site I don't know any other Aspies. I didn't realize I might be one until I started reading comments on this site. There are quite a few people here who qualify as overbearing and opinionated. (There is a good chance I am one of them.) But the things discussed here are interesting. I don't find that in many other places.

Is it good that a meal at a church had no religious observation? I could see how perhaps it wouldn't be good if it were mandated that everyone in attendance had to pray, but I don't see how the simple presence of prayer before a meal would have been (appropriately) seen as offensive. Yes, I know some would complain that it was offensive, but by doing that, they would be showing their own bigotry in pushing their lack of religious beliefs on the people they claimed were pushing their religious beliefs by prayer.

That aside, there may be some groups not inherently corrupt, but that still doesn't mean that I'm going to get along with every single member of those groups anyway.


Which is also where the phrase "the exception that proves the rule" comes from.

There's also a bit of a difference, however, between judging someone based on a group they were born into and a group they chose.

Somebody said something in another thread about being just as foreign to people just down the street as to people on the other side of the world. (Or something to that effect)
That's what I meant, I think. When you're foreign to your own culture, what exactly does any cultural standard mean? It could have to do with clothing, but most places with different clothing customs don't impose them on visitors or do so only marginally. (Some middle-eastern countries are more obsessive about clothing standards, but seriously, if I wanted to go to the middle east, I'd be totally covered anyways. I'm very pale. If I weren't covered, the entire surface of my skin would be one big blister. That's kinda the extreme, anyways, though.)
Most aspies aren't exactly fashionable.. There are some exceptions, and many, especially females, attempt to conform somewhat to clothing norms.
Standards of behavior.. of ways of speech.. when we manage it in our own cultures, it's still usually more like trying to fit into a foreign culture anyway.

My apologies. I meant to suggest that they had no price associated with participation or agenda to push. I am not personally offended by prayer and I dont see why anyone would be. It was a night to provide those with need with shelter and food. Nothing asked in return.



Agreed.



Nods. I often feel as if I am in a culture of one. Even other aspies and autists are a separate group. Of course, I do feel closer to them than more typical people.



Right. I take a conscious effort to dress as nicely as I can. But it is not instinctual as it is with some people, seemingly. On the other hand, grooming isnt such an issue.

Except for those groups that are DNA-based (like race, gender or neurology) I think groups are fluid and people can move in and out of groups. So stereotypes can sometimes sort of fit but not for long and not about many people in the group because the groups themselves are extremely fluid. The most fluid type of group there is and the most dangerous is also the one that anyone can join but I bet Aspies never do: the mob. A mob is different from a crowd. A crowd is just a whole lot of people together. A mob is a whole lot of people together on a singular mission and the mob does things which no individual in the group would do, which makes it exceptionally dangerous. I've been caught up in a mob a few times and it is both exhilerating and terrifying. Mobs can tear people to pieces literally and they can stand against tanks.

When you say you were raised to think that all groups of people suck but that individuals within those groups can be good but that the group itself is bad, I'm wondering if this was a reference to mobs (which can be comprised of anybody, they just need a group mission) or of more stable groups such as religious, political or geographical groups. A mob can kill. A mob can tear down the Berlin Wall. A mob can stand against tanks or lynch somebody. Mobs are their own social organism that does things no individual in the group could or would do.

Of course maybe you aren't talking about mobs at all. If not, never mind.

That phrase is generally not understood correctly. It means an exception -tests- the rule. If the rule has an exception, then it is false. This is logic 101. The way you disprove the assertion "for all x Predicate(x)" is to produce a particular x, say z such that Predicate(z) is false. All it takes is one counterexample to invalidate a general law or rule.

ruveyn