Is Aspergers Syndrome more disabling than Down Syndrome?

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1. ofcource not. Apergers does not impead mental ability and in a modernized and technologized its much easier to cover for a social deficit.
2. If I had a choice I would choose to be born with Aspergers and I hope I get to have the next time I'm reincarnated.
3. What is the point of this question? It seems like your tying to stir up things

I don't think one is better or worse than the other, they're just different.

I do kind of wish that autism were more physically obvious, so people could immediately see that I have it, and maybe have a little more patience with me, and understand that talking is difficult.

well, people with Down Syndrome get a bit more support than someone with aspergers.

if i have trouble with something in school they just say "well emily, you were born with this disability so you have to deal with it" but if someone with down syndrome has an issue in school, they say "give them a break! its not they're fault they have downs syndrome!"

once i got into a fight with another kid with aspergers and they said "emily, its not his fault he said that to you, he has aspergers" but they didnt take a moment to think that it wasn't my fault i hit him because i have aspergers.

I would reply, "No; but I don't think they ought to envy me, either. And we have a lot in common."

I have many of the same everyday issues that people with Down syndrome have--I need to manage my apartment and take care of my cats and pay my bills and remember my medication and somehow make it to appointments, and keep myself clean and fed and sleep enough... and that's difficult. I keep that up pretty precariously. Someone with DS, with a mild intellectual disability, living on their own with a little help, is pretty much in the same situation as me, and faces many of the same problems. Finding a job we can do is difficult. We have problems accessing education. We have problems maintaining our right to make our own decisions.

On the other hand, there are some things that are very different. Someone with DS has a visible disability, so people have all these preconceived ideas about what that person can do and what they're like. They have to deal with stereotypes practically automatically, every time they interact with someone. People expect them to be disabled, so they don't get mad at them for supposed moral failings when they mess up; but on the other hand, they don't expect them to be competent individuals, either. Aspies have the opposite problem: With an invisible disability, no one really knows that we're autistic right away, so we escape the stereotyping, but people don't give us the benefit of the doubt either. We're called rude, lazy, nerdy, thoughtless, cold losers. And while people don't start out with the idea that we're basically incompetent, they also take a while to realize that our challenges are real.

Our strengths are often different. Down syndrome causes physical problems, which can make people with DS physically less robust than people with autism and more likely to experience major medical problems earlier in life. Autistic people often have normal or higher ability in academics and learning in general, which offers some opportunities for employment and many interesting pastimes, but the subset of autistics who also have dyspraxia will tend to have problems with physical tasks. DS affects social skills only because it affects every other aspect of cognition, so that people with DS can be socially talented; autism affects social skills in an extreme way, so that social skills are usually a weakness.

Both groups have developmental disabilities, so I do think we can learn from each other. But let's not limit it to Down syndrome. Just like Rett syndrome is only one possible cause of autism, Down syndrome is only one possible cause of intellectual disability. People with ID from other causes share many experiences with both autistics and those with DS.

Should developmental disabilities groups include autistics who study mathematics for fun? Do they have enough meaningful things in common with those who can't yet count money? I would argue: Yes. We categorize people by "intelligence" much more than we should, and that leads us to ignore the similarities.

That's a very good answer. It's well thought out and it speaks the truth.

This thread makes me feel very sad yet I don't know why.

Did anybody see this article? It's been on the CNN front page for a few days.
It's a mother writing about her young daughter with Down's Syndrome.

I think we are actually living in amazing times. It's just this very moment that society is beginning to open their eyes and look at disabled and "different" people as members of society for the first time. Ten years ago a story like this would have been unheard of. Myself, I'm still finding out from here and real life about all the misconceptions I had (and some I still have) about Autism, Down's Syndrome, Sociopaths, Schizophrenia and much more. I think it's absolutely amazing that this is going on and that people would have been stuck in an institution before, now may have options and careers. I really hope for all the younger kids and adults, that this trend grows and expands and they benefit from it! Well us older ones too!

http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/14/health/bo ... pt=hp_bn13

As someone who went to special schools for the developmentally disabled, including
kids with Down Syndrome - absolutely not in my opinion. Not even close really.

In my case as a moderate functioning mostly nonverbal autistic, most people who don't know better assume
that i am mentally ret*d. And they dont have all that much patience with me, and often treat me like i was a two year old.

Sorry, that was not the intention.

I am just wondering whether I under-estimate how disabled I am from AS.

I find it funny, how people in an Asperger forum blame around about NTs being so full of prejudices toward autism, but on the other side many having the same prejudcies against other mental disabilities.

Its not possible to say if people affected by Trisonometry are more or less disabled by that, then people with Autism, because just like Autism, Trisonometry can show many effects from "totally disabled and needing assistance all day" until "being able to live on their own, do a normal job" and so on.

So the answer you want depends on the individiums that you compare, and how much they are disabled. Your questions is just like "Who do you think is more diabled. People with feet problems or people with eye problems?" If someone misses two legs, then he will be much more disabled then someone needing glasses with 2 dioptries. And someone getting a bit of feet ache after 2 hours of walking will be less disabled, then someone being blind.

There is no "the individum having trisonometry" just as there is no "the individium having autism", so you cant do any comparisons who is more affected.

From a general medical oppinion, I do prefer autism, because sadly, trisonometry is by statistic causing you to die sooner, due to physical reasons.

I was trying to write what Schneekugel wrote, but she put it better than I was managing. That is, that impairment can vary widely within each population.

Parents should be free to screen for whatever they want. I don't think its fair for the child to have parents who would rather not have had them as a kid. I don't think it's fair for the child either to expect society to look after them if their parents don't want them, when society is ill-equipped to have them as a member.
Who are we NOT to use our judgment about whose life is worth living, given that we cannot provide support every human life that exists now?
I am personally terrified of having a kid with some sort of serious disability. I have a hard enough time looking after myself! Of course, some would say I shouldn't have kids then, and that would probably be my preference, except my husband really, really, really wants to be a dad.

I don't think its so much that such children expect society to look after them, its more a case of children and babies are ill equipped to take care of themselves and it would be frowned upon to just leave them to their own devices. Though it is best for people to be responsible about having kids there are still going to be some that are born to unfit parents who can't take care of them.

It's not just frowned upon, it's a crime.

We have Hitler to thank for the mess that humanity has gotten itself into. If Hitler was never in power, many more people would respect all human life and not just the lives of "perfect babies".

If the question is "which is more debilitating?" then the answer is that even the most severe aspie has it much easier than the highest functioning DS.
If your aspergers were bad enough to handicap you to the level of a DS person then you wouldnt be classified with aspergers, but with low functioning autism (which is different, but overall very comparable to DS as a disablity, generally speaking).


But if the question is "which is more emotionally stressful to the person with the disablility?" then its hard to say.

DS even have an imediately recognizable odd physical look. And thier handicaps are also obvious from the first seconds you encounter the person. So society make allowences for them.

In contrast aspies look normal (dont have any equivalent distinctive physical look), and our disablities are subtle( you have to work alongside us for months to realize what oddballs we are). And because we are higher functioning society (and we ourselves) expect more of us than society expects of DS people (and they expect of themselves). But though invisible our handicaps are real so the gap between expectation and reality is usually greater for us than that for DS'ers. So it could well be that aspies may have more emotional stress from thier disablility than do DSers generally speaking.