Do you think we should be allowed to mate?

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When I said "this thread is ridiculous" I meant the OP probably should have thought some more about posting this before doing it. Of course the answer is going to be yes from everyone but the few who are really sad or on the side that ASD needs to be cured. I'm on the side that strife and war will always exist and trying to perfect human society is an utter waste and wrong. Personal freedom is more important, good or bad, otherwise we might as well all be ants who never really lived. I'm not here to argue about what the 1960's CIA did and didn't do.

I agree in principle that there are some scenarios that warrant intervention...
But do you trust the people in charge when there is so much evidence that they are, by and large, untrustworthy?
Would you put your life/lifestyle in the hands of neurotypical power mongers?

"Power corrupts...
Absolute power tends to corrupt absolutely..."
Moreso when involving the neurotypical mindset with it's inordinate need-for/emphasis-on social status and mating rights...

Yes, yes...
I know...
Not all...
Not most neurotypicals are that way...
But the ones that are, are...
Can't argue with that though some may try...

Those who have a power lust are often/usually the ones who are motivated into gaining it...

"But you must remember, my fellow-citizens, that eternal vigilance by the people is the price of liberty, and that you must pay the price if you wish to secure the blessing. It behooves you, therefore, to be watchful in your States as well as in the Federal Government." -- Andrew Jackson, Farewell Address, March 4, 1837

“There is no safety for honest men except by believing all possible evil of evil men.” -- Edmund Burke

"If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary." -- James Madison, Federalist no. 51.

"Liberty cannot be preserved without a general knowledge among the people." -- John Adams

"Tolerating imperfections is the price of freedom." -- Dr. Thomas Sowell

http://freedomkeys.com/vigil.htm

History repeats itself, particularly if ignorance is allowed to proliferate...

But then, why should I care?
I have abdicated from humanity...
And joined the Martian Confederacy...

You should care because we are all in this world together. Withdrawing from the world is no solution.

Personally I think it's a pretty good idea for an Aspie to selectively withdraw from the parts of the world that are hideously incompatible with their autism. Total withdrawal from the whole world is impossible, especially these days, and it's unnecessary because some people are OK about ASD. In my case there are huge swathes of the human species that I avoid and have little or no sense of identity with. Frankly I care little about them. Whether or not I should care about them is a moot point. I don't think it's possible to truly care about anybody or anything purely out of a sense of moral duty, because caring is a feeling that you either have or you don't have. There is no should be, there is only what is.

It is the only rational thing to do from where I sit...

I broadly agree...
This life system has been put in my "too hard basket"...

Q: Why did the man bash his head against the brick wall?
A: Because it felt so good when he stopped...<boom> <tish>

The absence of pain by comparison feels bloody damned good to me...

Which posts or fragments of them were so disruptive?

All I can say is, go ahead and try to stop me...

I would start any such list with the OP... Every time I see this thread I find it hard to believe it exists.

IMO, it is to the credit of this website that this thread hasn't been locked...

Everyone is entitled to their own view and beliefs, they only become a problem when they are foisted onto others who do not share the same beliefs. The choice of whether or not procreate is down to the individual and is not a decision that should be made by another person based only on their own personal preferences or prejudices. I don't drink coffee, I don't smoke, I don't watch sport on TV and I don't personally wish to have any offspring but I don't seek to prevent anyone else from doing those things.

I agree. More specifically, it's a credit to the mods who have to make such judgments and to the general direction Alex said.

That said, I am disappointed that this thread was created. In my view, such a pitiful emotional outburst belongs in the Haven, not General Autism Discussion. But on the whole the answers are good and it's interesting to see even the less thoughtful posts.

Still, every time I see this thread at the top of the list, I think "That thing again? Why does that even exist?" And I feel disappointment that conditions are so bad and some people are hurting so much that they would thoughtlessly spew out an idea like this.

Where is my grammar brain this morning?
That should end: "...the general direction Alex gave."

Well, Keep in mind It may be very possible to raise an autistic kid in such a way that no disabilities occur. I even think there are many autistic people out there who are not diagnosed or don't know it because they have none of the disabilities that autism can induce if the brain's developmental process gets derailed. Either way, we need a certain amount of those autistic genes and traits to make us what we are. And come to think of it, should we really be calling the "phasing out" of something that we don't even know about? It's also immoral anyway, people should have the right to reasonably reproduce, autistic or not. you may want to rephrase your 'question'. Just a suggestion there.

All that aside, I'm exactly in the same boat as you, I never thought autism was so bad until you graduate high-school. "Living a life a introversion", welcome to our world! It's going to be interesting to see what the future has in store for us. I would tell you that there is a very good chance of things improving.

For my mentality having an autistic child (even with LFA) might be funny and not something sad, but my will do not want suffering and problems to my child and other people (and LFA is highly problematic condition...). NTs are like "space aliens" for my mentality and my autistic mentality could not want to have non-autistic "space aliens" as spouses or offspring. For my mentality it is better to suffer in celibacy to death than have a wife who is not an Aspijka.

Loaded topic and hearkens back to the old movement(s) to sterilize "mentally ret*d" individuals (and various other groups).

I have had the awful thought once or twice that had I realized earlier that I was on the spectrum, I might not have had children. I love my children to the very ends of the earth and feel it would have been a very sad and lonely existence without them, but between my borderline-ASD husband (he never admitted it to himself either) and myself, we sometimes half-jokingly call ourselves "the perfect autistic storm" and our youngest son is struggling in school with "autistic-like tendencies" (his on-paper assessment by every psych and other assessor he's ever had) and with desperately wanting friends but being unable to make them, and our middle son is classic/Kanner autistic with intellectual delay and will never live independently. I can tell you that the horrific thought of what might happen to my sweet, open but behind-the-eight-ball son in the hands of strangers helping him once my husband and I are dead keeps me up at night.

There ARE times I feel my husband and I doomed our children.

BUT...does that mean no autistic person should have children? I don't believe so, because:

1. Obviously, controlling reproduction in specific populations is a very, very, very, very, very bad idea, for a number of reasons I won't re-hash here; you all already know them.
2. Who knows whether an autistic person will have an autistic child? Maybe not.
3. Who knows whether a neurotypical person will have an autistic child? Maybe so.
4. It is a spectrum, as we all know. At what point is someone "so severely affected" that his/her quality of life is, per any person's outside opinion, "worth" living? Indeed, I know of plenty of examples of the opposite - neurotypical people who, for whatever reason or cluster of reasons, DOESN'T think his/her life is worth living.
5. I have heard the theory that autism is a genetic mutation/deviation (those seem like disparaging descriptions to me but I can't remember the actual word used) that is going to randomly present in the population one way or another, so simply not "allowing" autistic individuals to reproduce won't stop more autistic people from being born.

Just my thoughts.