Bullying less severe for aspies in other nations?

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Canada is the same as the US, except we have free health care.

Ireland's pretty bad for bullying, personally I don't get bullied because my schitzoid tendencies keep me pretty safe, people just think of me as "unknowable", and "weird", but no-one can say anything bad about me. Some NT's even recognise that I'm depressed, and offer the hand of friendship but I can't return the favour

There's one severely Autistic guy in our school that gets badly bullied. To be completely honest, before I knew about Autism I assumed he was a "ret*d"; a word with little meaning apart from forming a "us" and "them" mentality, but I'd never thought about its meaning before. I never bullied him myself, but I found his verbal stimming ("baffage", whatever that is ) a bit funny. But, through a weird twist of faith, I realised one of my best friends has Asperger's (Although I noticed he has symptoms of Schizophrenia too, but then again schizophrenia and asd's have a bit of an overlap), and then I realised I had it myself. Funny eh?

longest offside ever...

In a similarly weird twist, my friends mom has alogia, and has a weirdly flat effect, which leads me to believe she is schizophrenic (she also has a "crazy person" demeanour, if you get me), which might explain why I can understand and empathise with her daughter (she is NT but a little quirky and emotional, like me....five years ago), and why I can understand what my friend is thinking (I think he is a latent schizophrenic, for some weird reason he seems a lot like I was a few years ago.

He tries too hard to fit in, he's in "guy love" with a "cool" NT, because he thinks he's the path to happiness, and women, and of course he has this crazy-useful "stream of consciousness thing going on where he blurts out what he's thinking. For example, he thinks that I'm "manly", and I'd be cool if I got a decent haircut (homoerotic stuff, I know, but what can you do The bad haircut's intentional anyway, I don't want to stand out)

Anyway,

Ireland's bad for bullying...

I also live in Australia, and I struggle to believe that the social structures portrayed in American movies aren't massively exaggerated, here there tend to be groups of friends with similar interest, but we are not at all 'bound' by it, most of us have friends outside our particular friend circles. Also, regarding the AS bullying (im not sure if it is also like this in America), if people could tell that you are different because of a mental condition (mental retardation, visible autism), it would generally be considered very low to pick on you, and bullying wouldn't occur much, that doesn't mean anyone will actually want to be friends with you, just that you won't be bullied much. Alas, my autism is mild enough that people think I am simply weird, most do not even believe I have AS when i tell them, and did (not so much any more) get bullied for it.

Just a little curious now, are American kids really low enough to bully a kid who obviously has a mental condition, or does the bullying only occur as in my case?

For our foreign friends, let me explain two of America's worst problems: sexual repression and narcissism.

Sexual repression: Sex is dirty, but we do it anyway. Don't ever talk about it, etc., etc. In high school, one effect is the formation of cliques. Cliques contain both boys and girls and are often centered around a particular activity. Instead of dating one-on-one, we have group dates as a way to avoid sex. The exceptions to sex avoidance cliques are the orgiastic cliques, which often overlap with the druggie cliques. Somehow sex happens in the other cliques, but romance doesn't. It's not unusual for a 30 year old American to have had sex but no love affair. Another effect in high school is that cliques monopolize activities. For example, my high school had a dance clique. So, all of the fun dances were only attended by them. (I don't include the ritual dances like homecoming and proms in this.) When Americans grow up, they retain the cliquishness. For example, when I first bought a house, the first block party was dominated by a clique. Anyone different is excluded. When my wife and I went to our first Lamaze class reunion, we were wondering what we were doing there. Between my AS and my wife's foreigness, we were different and not to be socialized with. Recently, I went back to work from an outing with 3 20-something women. One of them was flipping through the radio to find a song so they could share the experience of singing. They laughed when they hit the Spanish station. (Different language, music, and low-status people.) I was offended and told them what kind of music it was. Afterwards, one of them stopped speaking to me: I was just too different, even though she herself is an immigrant. At least, I don't have to see her anymore after her job change.

The sexual repression has also led to the rise of the "hookup" culture. "Hooking up" is originally an electrical term coming from connected hooked wires to terminals. Now, it means anything from a date to living together. The most common meaning is casual sex. It has a bizarre etiquette. The Sexual Revolution swept away all of the rules, so kids created new ones that are even less sensible.

Narcissism is like fat: necessary for life but harmful in excess. Too little narcissism and you neglect yourself and die. Too much and you could be President. OK, that's a bit of an exaggeration. American child rearing after WWII became obsessed with self-esteem: making children feel good about themselves. The thing that the psychologists missed is that self-esteem is a result variable arising from self-confidence and accomplishment. Neglecting its basis leads to excess narcissism. This narcissism is characterized by the beliefs that whatever you do is good and that your children are extensions of yourself and, therefore, are perfect. Going on a television show to subject yourself to ridicule is perfectly acceptable, as you can do wrong, so you don't perceive the ridicule. This narcissism can have some very insidious effects. Parents don't actively raise their children, because the parents can do no wrong. In one case, I convinced a (foreign) friend that her child was mentally ill. (This was by no means fun. I was upset by this discovery.) Her husband refuses to accept this, because his child has to be perfect, even if she is miserable, does abnormal things and hates everyone besides him.

Combine sexual repression with narcissism and you get "Girls Gone Wild" and the like. If I were a woman, I would require far more payment than a cheap piece of clothing to make me take my top off. But, then, I don't think that everything I do is by definition good and my sexuality is healthy.

Did I mention that I've never had an American girlfriend?

Okay so I was at first looking up on google on if autism and other mental conditions were less in europe and bam, this thread showed up. I felt like replying so I joined.

Hey, I'm a 17 year old from Phoenix, Arizona, U.S., and I'm sort of an odd case in a way whe it comes to what I am. I was not born with any mental condition such as autism. Somtme in the time before memory, I went deaf during the important time to learn how to speak because of something in my ear that grew larger, so later on when it got treated I had severe speech troubles for years (my speech therapy ended at 7th grade) . During the speech-therapy years, I was often diagnosed with various problems which were then proven false; ADHD, Aspergers, slight case of autism, etc, when in fact my issues came from my atypical childhood. Now, I'm normal except for a lisp I don't give a s**t about, my nervousness when I meet someone new, and me feeling a bit awkward socially in groups larger then 3-4.

When it comes to cliques in America, it varies from school to school. My elementary school (, which I went from K-7) was a small private school, where I don't recalled ever being picked on or there being any cliques; then again, the Upper Division (7th and 8th grade) was ~20 people total, it was very united together, and it was untraditional. 8th grade I went to a free public charter school (my year there was the first year of the school; it now goes up to 12th grade), where there were cliques.

Now my high school's a bit of a mixed bag. Yes, there are various groups which are centered around whatever; the uptight "I'm going to <insert ivy league school> off a rhodes scholar!" kids generally hung with themselves, and generally the pretty girls hang out with the pretty girls, and generally the jocks love cocks; I mean, generally the jocks hang out with their jock buddies. However, it's only generally, since all people usually like to be around people who are like them . It's not uncommon for a person to fall under multiple categories (Orc-Dork/Football Player, Stoner/Anime-Nerd, Goth/Intelligentsia, etc. The groups that existed I don't recall being organized into large units; basically, 1 lunch table could fit 6 comfortably, 10 when you wanna pack it. Furthermore, bullying I don't see or notice a lot; yeah, people will say stuff to your face and behind your back ("ew, that kid's ugly. Stupid bastard"), but that's about it.

Then again, I'm a gay teen in a largely homophobic partt of phoenix, so I never tied myself to anyone really. I always floated about here and there, never treally befriending anyone because of their homophobia, except for a few people who are now my friends or semi-friends (go GLBTS Youth!). I might have never noticed bullying because people usually think I'm a stoner when I'm actually a very intelligent guy that isn't uptight. ( my best friend originally befriended me since he was hoping I'd be good for smoking with. I don't do drugs; I prefer alchohol). Furthermore, this could be due to how my school's surrounded by suburbia, allowing there to be less economical differrences, and also could be because of how my highschool's relatively new (10 years old), alllowing the chance for the school to not form a typical hierarchy. It seems like the older high schools have the clique problem more, possibly because freshmen learner the "order of things" by their older peers, then the freshmen become older and pass the order of things to their newer peers.

Even though I defended my American school, I hope that after my secondary education in the U.S., I can move to someplace away from the Americas. I'm thinking the UK or Australia due to those being dominately english-speaking, but I have plenty of time before thinking of where to go after I get some degrees here in the U.S.

-P.S.- Sorry for the long post.

I like this thread very much, about the cultural differences in bullying. It's fascinaing and I believe that America has one of the worst bully-cultures. Anti-bullying classes are being offered now by school admins in a lot of the school districts even!

I was bullied in Jr High and High School very much. It seems that is the way American kids tend to communicate--the NT culture is to tease each other because they're all so insecure. Teasing borders on bullying, esp. when we are dealing with the victims--often AS kids who don't understand jokes and teasing. There are extreme cliques in the US. The TV does not exaggerate this. It's all about money, looks, status and other very shallow things.

Interesting topic. I actually recently read a book about nerdhood (nerddom?) in America. The theory put forth in this book was that American anti-"nerd" sentiments goes back to the turn of the century, when white factory and other "grunt" physical laborers were losing their jobs and status in the workforce to more intellectually-based workers, who were generally Jews and Asians - therefore, it started off as both a class and a race issue, with gender stereotyping coming in soon afterward to combine with the racism.

On the other side of things, the push towards idealizing athletes and valuing the physical over the intellectual was largely due to both America and Britain's being colonizing military powers. The introduction of physical education into school curriculum, according to this author, was because both countries wanted to be bringing up the next generation of men to be soldiers who would go out and spread political and religious influence to "uncivilized" parts of the world by physically overwhelming the enemy.

This is more of a "nerd vs. jock" rather than "AS vs. NT" thing, but I thought it was relevant to the question nonetheless.

EDIT upon reading an earlier post (about Japan and bullying): Yes, the Japanese are much less friendly to nerds/otaku and other outsiders than American anime culture would lead one to believe. From what I understand, it's seen as the responsibility of the person who is standing out to fit in more rather than that of the person who is doing the bullying to be more tolerant.

That being said, however, I have to wonder if the fact that Japanese manners and social behavior is more codified (mostly, or so far as I know, into language), that can be explained in a more logical and tangible way, makes it easier for Aspies to pick up them than on American ones. In America, there's not all that many OBVIOUS manners that have to be taught. The English language is all but devoid of formalities and honorifics by comparison to some, and only a few universal rules about body language. Most people here assume that others will pick up on very subtle hints, often based only in body language, and act accordingly. Would a more obvious system of social behavior, be it through language or otherwise, make it easier for Aspies to interact with NTs?

This is very intersting, I've often wondered about this question. I haven't traveled very much, but when I went to Ireland I thought the people there were SO much nicer than they are here in the U.S. I've often fantasized about moving there, I think I'd fit in SO much better. And from the other posts on here, I guess I'm right in believing that it's tougher here in America for aspies. I don't mean to hate on my own country, but so many people here are mean, selfish arrogant, and simply people I don't care to know anyway. And sadly these cliques are everywhere, I think there IS a caste system.

For the non-Americans here, I would like to say yes, American school is very much like our media portrays it. There are rigid cliques. Your sex, race and nationality, family wealth, religion, interests, mental and physical capabilities, and sexuality determine where you are in the pecking order. Female is below male, everything is below white, class breaks you up accordingly, Christians are best, intellectuals are worst, jocks are best, and being non-straight will get you anywhere from harassed to murdered.

Mind you, this isn't universally true. This sort of thing is most prevalent in the middle of the country, and most especially in rural areas. The US is a large country, it's not uniform. But in most schools, anything that makes you less normal puts you further down the ranks. Something like Asperger's is socially lethal. Mental and physical torment is the norm.

This is how it was for me, and many, many others. My mother, a Jamaican, thinks that American schools are totally insane, and I agree with her. I don't pretend to speak for the whole country, but a good deal of it is this way, with varying degrees of severity.

I heard instances of people who have asperger syndrome bullied in Canada, UK, and Australia so I think that instances of school bullying of aspies is just as severe as in America.