Most people on this forum don't have Asperger's Syndrome

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I am diagnosed with Asperger's, but it didn't happen until I was in my forties. I kind of laugh when I hear "social awkwardness." It's not so much awkwardness, when it comes to me. I usually jump right in, and monologue over everyone else, and then reap the consequences later. At which point, I retire to lick my wounds, and then later, I try it again! So the awkwardness doesn't so much arise at the prospect of socializing, as it does at the certainty that I am going to screw up. I've gotten better with age, though. Or maybe it's just that I don't care as much as I used to.

Words like empathy have such an elastic meaning. In most senses I don't think I lack it, just weaker in certain areas that are considered normal for an adult. See, to Autistics most other people are kind of alien to them, so they can't completely identify with them enough to have a normal level of empathy. Sometimes even when they do, they lack the social intuition to know how to exeute an appropriate response, thus appearing unempathetic if they withdraw from any attempts. Also, Autistic people often show a higher level of empathy for animals for some reason, probably because an animals feelings are much easier to logically break down and understand. For me to experience empathy on a purely emotional level, I have to really be able to identify with the person/character and the situation they are in, and when it does affect me it's so unexpected I don't always know how to react. I almost always have a stiff reaction to most things regardless to what I'm thinking or feeling, and I rarely have an emotional reaction even if I feel defensive of someone. Kind of like looking at an abusive relationship. I can feel intense anger at an abuser, but can't always relate to the victim since I know I would never stay in that kind of relationship. I can feel protective of them, but it's not always easy to empathize with them even if I know the psychology behind their behavior. On a message board, it's easy to make the assumption that people have a normal level of empathy. But it's far more complicated than that, it's different for everyone and I really don't think anyone with Asperger's lacks it completely.

Maybe, but throw in obsessive tendencies, extreme sound sensitivities, absentmindedness, extreme touch sensitivities, selective muteness, difficulty figuring out what was going on around me as a child, meltdowns, lack of eye contact, repetitive behaviours and rituals, lack of visualisation skills, audio processing disorder, flat voice, real hatred of telephones, etc etc etc... a diagnosis on the autism spectrum doesn't seem like a far reach for me!

I also wonder how much of this "empathy" can truly be called that.

I think most of the times people on this forum who have or suspect to have Asperger's "empathize" with others, we're not really doing that. We're most likely identifying ourselves with the situations of others, because those are situations we've gone through ourselves. That doesn't really require a theory of mind. Real empathy consists of being able to put ourselves in another person's shoes: that is, where I can imagine what the other person may be going through (whether it's good, bad, or none of the above) without having gone through that myself. Or at least, that's how I understand it.

And the reason here there is more than 1 woman for every 4 men, is that 1) autism in women tends to be underdiagnosed, so more women who have AS or suspect to have AS come to this forum, and 2) because the majority of parents, relatives and teachers who come here are women.

You don't need AS to join WP. My friend joined, and he's NT.

Well, ya gotta give Mw99 credit for knowing how to make a thread real long, real fast. As of this post, I don't think it's even 12 hours old.

I didn't actually watch it, I was just making a general comment about how aspies on TV might act.

they're simply intellectuals with poor social skills who don't find any common ground with all those average Joes surrounding them

and we call this asperger's syndrome.

Okay... Does it really matter if someone has AS or not? I have it, and was officially diagnosed by my psychiatrist. A lot of members here do have it, but can't get diagnosed because they either don't want to, or their parents won't allow it.


Listen to me acting all knowitall...