Why do you accept the label?

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Am I an Aspie? (If so, I don’t remember ever regretting it, and I would rebel if anyone tried to pin the label upon me. ) If I am not an Aspie, what is the significance of the traits my family and I share with my autistic son? Is the same true of other family’s of autistics? Are such diagnoses really on the increase? Are many of us becoming more Aspie-like - less conforming? The psychiatric profession once tried to earn a living by psychoanalysing mothers of autistic children, trying to convince them they rejected their autistic children. Are psychologists now trying to earn a living by convincing children that their “differences” are a syndrome - an abnormality? Something to "be treated". I hope the story of my son and our experience with the psychoanalysis’s might be entertaining for everyone to read - and maybe stimulate some discussion of the questions I pose.

A Few Impertinent Questions about Autism, Freudianism and Materialism

http://30145.myauthorsite.com/

Hmm. Intelligent design.

There's a pattern here that doesn't imply intelligence at all. It's simply a matter of those best adapted to their environment being the most successful. It may look intelligent from the outside but it's not.

There are so many stars, but many varieties could never support life at all (although some of the earliest stars that were too short-lived to allow life to develop made life-supporting stars later possible). Some can. The sheer variety means that there's room for life somewhere - in many places - in the universe. However, it may be that Earth is the only planet with complex life forms - or it may be one of many. This isn't a sign of intelligent design, however, but a sign of chemistry in action. Chemicals interacting with each other to form amino acids to form DNA to form life in a chemical stew that is the ocean or atmosphere that can support such life, and dealing with the fact that the composition of these things can and will change over time, making a previously accommodating environment hostile to some life forms.

When life develops, which species are the most successful and most dominant is a matter of many factors which also includes random chance. Humanity is where we are because the Chixculub Impact removed an extremely successful category of animal life from the picture, giving mammals room to evolve to dominance. It is irrelevant whether intelligence was behind this or not simply because the difference is indistinguishable. Herbivores often become extremely dangerous in relation to predators because of the sheer pressure placed on them by evolution: A predator that "loses" misses a meal and can try again tomorrow. A prey animal that "loses" dies. This isn't intelligent design, though. It's simply process of elimination.

The history of life on Earth is a history of many species rising to dominance and then going extinct, for whatever reason, and other species taking their place. Often, the extinctions were caused by the newer species replacing the old. Over and over again, life fills the same niches with successful species, who eventually become unsuccessful and are replaced. It's like DNA is brute forcing things over and over again. Like trying to guess a password by changing one character with each attempt. Eventual success is possible, but only because all previous combinations failed, not because someone specifically chose the correct combination.

Humanity developed due to increasing brain complexity, and was able to adapt in ways other animals could not. Could develop strategies, use tools, etc. This has been a powerful adaptation and look where we are now? This again doesn't mean anyone was pushing us toward evolving these brains. It's how it worked out, how we survived best.

I don't think an intelligent designer is particularly logical. The whole universe works this way, by process of elimination. Successful things flourish, unsuccessful things do not (however you define success). Humans are on Earth because we didn't evolve somewhere else and because we evolved at all, not because we were placed here.

tl;dr: Evolution has no telos.

Yes, "differences" are abnormalities by the very definition of the word "abnormality." There's nothing wrong with the word. It just means that something is out of the ordinary. You can't deny that spectrumites are abnormal, and there's nothing wrong with being so.

AS and autism needs to be treated or else the kids cannot live a normal life. If you haven't noticed, there are alot of miserable people on wrongplanet that were never given the tools to succeed. This is what treatment is for. I have come across alot of very sad people here who never learned how to get along with the rest of the world.

People are under the misconception that treatment means that someone is going to try to "turn someone normal." This is not true. Treatment for ASDs are centered around learning social skills and learning flexible thinking. Both of these are essential life skills to everyone. Treatment does not mean taking away a kid's eccentricities or quirkiness.

I didn't know how to embrace my own quirkiness until I sought out treatment. My pre-treatment self felt very defective and I would often try to stifle my aspiness, but learning how to accept my own eccentricities is a huge aspect of treatment. I am by no means "normal," and nor do I want to be.

I would not dismiss the idea of autistic kids's mothers rejecting them. Maybe I'm just a little bit aspie, but I especially remember as a child feeling like my mother rejected me.

As for intelligent design, well the conventional explanation for life and especially human history makes no sense. They would have us believe that humans existed for tens or hundreds of thousands of years. Then all of a sudden coincidentally at the same time different civilizations around the world just sprung up. The idea that there are more ancient civilizations is ridiculed. I think there is some David Icke-type stuff in history that is true.

Because its the closest thing thats made sense up until now.

The characteristics described within the diagnosis, fit closely with my own experience.

Case in point: http://lifestyle.msn.com/your-life/fami ... 90&page=0/



I don't know what you mean by "conventional explanation." However, civilization was growing at a particular rate among humans as human social groups continued to increase in size until they built city states, nations, and then empires. I am not sure what you're referring to as "all of a sudden coincidentally at the same time different civilizations sprung up" as tribal cultures existed for tens of thousands of years before that. There are actually two separate theories here - one is gradual evolution of increasingly modern civilizations and a "great leap forward" that theoretically happened 50,000 years ago. Either could be true, a combination of both could be true. Anthropology and archeology do not provide a single solid answer here. However, the explanation for the "great leap forward" is not sudden coincidence, but a kind of social/economic/cultural evolution - like the bronze age, the iron age, the industrial revolution, the invention of the microchip, etc.

Oh, and I accept the label because it is part of who I am, and has contributed to shaping who I am for my entire life. I have nothing to be ashamed of.

Yes, I feel like I was rejected by my mum and I accept the label. However only my family and a couple of close friends know I'm a aspie

I accept the label because I accept what I am and what I am is an Aspergian.

Also, when I was first diagnosed and had how it works explained to me, it was a very welcome word because after years of wondering what my problem was I finally had an explanation (and the revelation that it's not a "problem", I'm just different).

I've always been a very rebellious and "against the grain" type of person, but this is one label I don't mind and don't associate any negative connotations with.

If I remember the biblical story of the tower of babel correctly enough, it reminds me of "civilization". I once read a book called Escape from Evil, and another website on this topic, and if understood that well enough, humans create glory or hero systems to transcend their own lives and deaths (oddly, I've been asked if I have a concept of my own death and life plan or trajectory. But it's not like I don't know what death is) which they have some level of awareness and fear of even outside the immediate threat of death. In a way, their culture or civilization is their God, which makes them more than what their own lives are or may feel like. So by identifying with their civilization's standards of being heroic; power, status etc, it then gives one a sense of "immortality" and grand importance. I think it was said that the primitives handled this problem in a better way, that so much of their lives was built around cosmic importance (I believe Becker called it an illusion).
It's more complicated then this and I'm not saying it all that well.
I don't know what I think about "civilization" and I thought about this topic quite a bit because it seems insane and it has taken all my energy to function in it.
I also have some disagreements with psych's/mental illness and CBT because it seems to me that being maladapted to a sick society, in the forms of depression, anxiety, etc., could get you a label of being mentally ill. So, instead of saying, hey, what's wrong with the environment to make me in pain, it's turned around and sometimes said, or the potential to be told, to change your thoughts to feel better. To me it is like your hand on a stove, you have pain to tell you to pull your arm away because something is wrong with the situation. The fault doesn't lay on your hands for melting on the stove. But in regards to anxiety and depression, mental stuff etc., on a societal level, the problem seems to be placed on the individual to change and adapt.
I am not anti-psychiatry, and I do bring this stuff up to my counselor all the time when he first started trying to tell me to change my thoughts without understanding what I was trying to say, and now he's open to it and admits psychiatry's past and current mistakes.

Why do you accept the label?

I always knew I was different but not why through out my childhood and early adulthood and the not knowing 'what was wrong with me' was tearing me up inside. Having a name for it helps me a great deal. That is why I accept the label.

I dont't understand the OP, to many confused questions and no paragraphs, please rephrase.

As for autistic spectrum stuff, I like the label and it gave me some relief. Not simply relief why I have social problems but someone explaining to me my particular different developmental differences and understandings I may have as they come up but sometimes I'm not even sure I understand the guy. It's been more stress relieving in this case.

I see the label as describing a pattern of behavior that happens to come closest to explaining why I do things the way I do (that, and ADHD).

Also, I have the freedom to call myself an aspie. If I wanna say I'm an aspie, I'll say, "I'm an aspie! HELL YEAH!".

Whoa, I think it's time for me to calm down a little. Sorry if I got too excited there.

I accept the label, because it explains my differences.

Thank you for the responses, everyone. Everyone is different, and differences should be celebrated, rather than deplored. I've always known that, but what I must remind myself is that psychotherapy is helpful for some people. Some people really appreciate such help.

A Few Impertinent Questions about Autism, Freudianism and Materialism

http://30145.myauthorsite.com/