Susan's Blog: Is Autism the New Gay?

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A RANT

I'll give Susan Senator this, she's certainly got a point about the gay thing. Consider -


A state of mind that affects one's whole life

Thought to be hard-wired into the brain rather than learned

No single obvious cause identified

Vilified by society

Source of heartache to relatives

Source of bewilderment and anger for others

Affecting more men than women

Significant presence amongst superstars of culture and invention


What I disagree with is a couple of infuriating assumptions. And having taken a moment to walk round the room fuming, I can come back to the keyboard.

Ms Senator seems to imply that there's too much autism around, too many people trying to leap on the bandwagon. (As if accidentally insulting your friends, endless sniggering behind your back, and getting laid once every four years was some kind of bandwagon). She seems to be worried that if autism becomes cool, there won't be enough compassion or resources for her own precious little kid.

Well, I kind of agree. There IS too much autism around, so here's my solution.

There's proper autism, like AS, HFA, LFA, etc.

Then there's the other autism, mainly suffered by indignant middle-class parents. It's a mixture of grief and rage. It adds to the already-considerable stress of being an autistic child. Please, please note that I don't mean to belittle people's suffering. My own mother's frustration is the worst memory of my life. But that grief is a stage to be passed through, not fuel for a doomed quest to "de-auticise".

The recent controversy over autism and its representatives in Canada is a much bigger example of the same thing. When this other autism is presented with such overbearing sanctimony, we should adopt a new term for it. In honour of that great comedian Chris Morris, I suggest Prestadidwick's Congena.

I'd not read anything by Ms Senator before. So I went to look at her webpage. And there's her book, with its nice wistful cover. Saying f*****g everything about Prestadidwick's Congena. A little boy, hunched up with his back to us, watching the sea. That is not autism. Autism would be the zen lapping of the waves. The book cover shows us not autism, but a parent's-eye view of it. A personal insult from God, conveyed via your disinterested child.

I'd like to suggest an intriguing possibility - as society's values changed in the twentieth century, homosexuality came out of the closet and autism went in. Homosexuality was legalised and taken off the psychiatrist's list of mental illnesses. It became an acceptable lifestyle - or at least, if you wouldn't accept it, you had to keep quiet about it. And a good job too. It's not just Quentin Crisp getting beaten up - what happened to Alan Turing was one of the worst disgraces in British history.

As society became gentler and more matriarchal, gays got a better deal. All kinds of people got a better deal. But not us. In the postmodern liberal world, communication is far more important than achievement. Interpersonal skills matter, technical skills don't. The autistic personality is the irritating grit in the eye of matriarchy. As any reader of WP can tell you, there is little about autism that women like. The kinder, more feminine society we've had since the sixties turns up its nose at the dull grey sweaty sock of a calculating engine that is the autistic mind. Geeks. Nerds. Ugh!

This is the terrible irony of society acquiring a more human face - what happens to the people who can't relate to humans?

So we got the first stirrings of Prestadidwick's Congena. I remember it back in the 70's, as a child. I was taken every other Saturday to an organisation known as the National Association for Gifted Children. There I met lots of kids, many of them classic Aspies. Asperger's notes were still gathering dust in Vienna at that time, but the symptoms were all there. I remember the parents as well; earnest, optimistic, dedicated - yet with the eyes of someone trying to keep the lid on a bubbling cauldron. The quiet sadness of it all.

And here we are now, in the twenty-first century, facing the so-called autism epidemic. I believe there's no such thing. There has, however, been a huge explosion of Prestadidwick's Congena. Congena sufferers have taken what was once just known as "bookishness" and relabeled it as a terrible affliction. They've also done the same thing with "boyishness", relabelling that as ADHD. Sorry, it's bollocks. These children are not afflicted, they are simply young people with traits that are currently unfashionable. They have to go through what Crisp and Turing did half a century ago.

So there's your parallel with homosexuality - gays were once the victims of certain fashionable prejudices. Nowadays it's the turn of the autistic.

And there's some delicious irony for Ms Senator to consider - yes, we're victims! Victims of liberals. Victims of you. You, whose articles aren't really about your son, or his autism, but about how you feel about it. You worry that too many autistic people will exhaust society's compassion. We don't need compassion because - as you rightly point out - there's not that much wrong with us.

I am being asked to bear a greater sorrow than I imagined possible, perhaps worse than the day I first learned of his diagnosis. I am to accept that this very narrow future, this nearly closed door, is the only remaining place for my firstborn son. - SUSAN SENATOR

<Dr House> "I'm afraid it's Prestadidwick's Congena. I'm sure of it." </Dr House>

In my experiences aspergers seems to be the "hip" disorder. In high school I had a few teachers that just loved me for having as. I think its weird but the school psychologists practically go down on you for having it. Stupid if you ask me.

Hmmm. If you're gay you can make yourself a ridiculously active social life based around it. If you have aspergers you... probably can't. The glamour quotient isn't quite as high.

With all his money, Keanu Reeves choses to ride exactly the same motorcycle as me, a 1972 Black Norton Commando Roadster Combat.
Do you think this could be an aspie trait?

http://www.absolutecelebrities.com/mugshot/keanu_reeves.html

http://rides.webshots.com/photo/1055511910041880440KAnGGx

I have to admit that I roll my eyes whenever I hear how "trendy" or better yet, how "overdiagnosed" AS is. I've been professionally diagnosed for a few years now, and when I tell people I've never received a reaction of "oh cool!" Mostly people either have no idea what I'm talking about or feel sorry for me. That's not indicative of something "trendy." As for overdiagnosis, how can anyone possibly know that? Have you met everyone diagnosed and made a personal determination as to whether the diagnosis was warranted or not? Geez, talk about practicing armchair social science. It's absurd, and illogical.

My GAWD! I ran to the window, threw it open, stuck out my head and yelled

I'm MAD AS HELL AND I AM NOT GOING TO TAKE IT ANY MORE!!

my goodness, what clarity of mind, what organization of thought, what vivid imagery!

( especially the grey sweat socks bit, that was spot on genius!)


thank you, Deep Blue Lake. I chalk me up as a fan of your writing!

Merle

I'm tired of hearing people talk about it being overdiagnosed. I agree, in some cases, it may not be right, but there are just too many diagnoses out there anymore to even care-at least for me. I mean, sheesh-how many of us have been misdiagnosed? How many have been flip flopped from diagnosis to diagnosis? What happens then-are we sucking up their resources just because somebody's opinion turned out to be crap? ...or is this a limited thing where we are only sucking up resources when it pertains to their family? They shouldn't be laying it on us, saying we are the ones sucking it up-if they know so much about it, teach the people who diagnose us rather than ranting in a blog.

It comes across to me more like, "my son is the only one that can have this because I said it's so... and now I'm going to belittle everyone I've ever heard of that might possibly have it, even though it is considered a spectrum. I know what it is like because I've met one person that I know of in my entire life who has it..."

...and the people complaining so much about these things are almost ALWAYS parents of the kids, or family members of the adults. It is always griping, always complaining. If it was so damn trendy and easy to get a diagnosis, why don't they just run out there and get one too to add more drama to their stories? If it was so trendy, why do we get beat up and made fun of all of the time? I've never had someone watch me rocking back and forth say to me "man, I wish I could be cool like that..." instead I get the opposite reaction. Are there really that many people who demand to have something that people attach such a negative stigma to? Are there really that many that are able to force the diagnosis-I mean, come on. Most people cringe when I say "autism" in any context. If it was true that it was a trend, I imagine they would be lining up at the therapist's doors instead. They all want to say it is a trend, but nobody wants to actually have it... so where is the logic behind that one?

My favorite is when they write a story to "speak out" for their child... that's just gagging right there. I'm sorry they are so prideful, I'm sorry they feel like they need so much sympathy, but it does absolutely nothing for their child, and it doesn't teach anyone what it is actually like. All it does is increase the stigma, or increases the amount of people who look at me like my dog died when they find out. It's pathetic.

Everytime I hear about AS being over used or common misdiagnosed tool, it makes me cringe because it makes me wonder what do I have then. Am I just someone who is crazy or someone who is an as*hole because I have the symptoms. It's rediculious I have to have a label just so people can understand me. Either I have it or I'm an as*hole.

Hey you, hush now. I like Keanu.




Definately. I saw him on The Colbert Repore and he was extremely awkward verbally. As Ticker noted about the split-personality of actors' real-life and professional virtual-life (systems mimicking) many public people are functional socially (extremely public situations - the whole world watching you) but seem to be rather slow (bimbo-dumb even) on a physical level which can't possibly be explained away as "shyness" or social phobia. Sociophobes simply don't choose lifestyles or professions where they risk becoming famous. Also remember this is a spectrum of symptomology ranging from mild tendencies of functioning-style to full-blown incapacitation.





FOUR YEARS??? You goddamn lucky SOB.

And don't forget the chronic users of internet pornography. We subsidize virtually every IT datacenter on Planet Earth.

HOW do you figure? The use of trunk lines is at risk(due to overuse), and a LOT of bandwidth used, spam, etc.... And MOST datacenters aren't set up to, and most don't make money from, porno.

I think that Juliette Lewis might have AS but am not totally sure. I have also wondered about Shirley Manson from Garbage.

Ouch, 2ukenkerl, your lack of humor symptoms are showing.


Just incase you need specific explanation outline of the humor logic:

1) Geeks and nerds: use computers
2) Geeks and nerds: awkward with female people
3) Geeks and nerds: use convenient access to computers to provide proxy for female people

Why do you wonder if they think they might have AS?

This is what made me think that Lewis has AS.

HOLLYWOOD -- She's only 27, but Juliette Lewis is already on the comeback trail.
Lewis began acting when she was 12, started an affair with Brad Pitt at 16, received an Oscar nomination for Cape Fear at 18 and was a major Hollywood player by 21.

Then came her escalating dependency on drugs, her very public breakup with Pitt and bouts of depression.

In 1996, Lewis crashed.

She barely made it through the filming of The Evening Star before rushing to a Scientology drug rehab clinic in Florida.

"I had lost my pride and my drive. Acting had been my whole life and I didn't even want to do that any more," recalls Lewis, who says she started using marijuana as a teenager "to sedate some of my creative energy.

"I was always a hyper person and I was often overcome with self-loathing. It's a dangerous combination."

She does not blame her downward spiral on her breakup with Pitt, but acknowledges it added to it.

"We split just before Legends of the Fall and Interview With the Vampire came out.

I couldn't go anywhere without seeing him on a billboard or magazine cover.

"It was like a haunting that left me very sad and very reclusive."

Lewis insists the drugs, self-loathing, confidence crisis and heartbreak are all in her past.

"I'm really contented as a person. I'm in a very positive place. It's when you're negative that you're going to have hardships."

Like so many fallen angels, Lewis learned that Hollywood is quick to forgive.

Just months after leaving the Florida drug treatment centre, Lewis was cast in Garry Marshall's The Other Sister.

In quick succession she starred in The Fourth Floor, My Louisiana Sky, Room to Rent and The Way of the Gun, which opens Friday.

In The Way of the Gun, Lewis plays a surrogate mother in her final weeks of pregnancy who is kidnapped by two thugs (Ryan Phillippe and Benicio Del Toro).

The film was written and directed by Christopher McQuarrie, who received an Oscar for his screenplay for The Usual Suspects.

McQuarrie says he didn't need to audition Lewis. He wrote the role with her in mind.

"Juliette is the best actress her age working in Hollywood today. Even if you don't like what she does with a particular character, you have to be struck by her fearless honesty."

Lewis says she used her younger sister Brandy as her adviser for her character in The Way of the Gun.

"My sister has two children and one was a caesarean birth. She explained how I should feel being that pregnant and why. It was invaluable advice."

Lewis is grateful for her sister's advice on a second count.

It was Brandy who introduced Juliette to professional skateboarder turned actor Steve Berra.

Berra played Cheech Marin's son on Nash Bridges and has a recurring role on Felicity.

"Brandy introduced us about three years ago. Steve and I were just friends initially."

Lewis used one of her days off while shooting The Way of the Gun to marry Berra.

Neither Lewis' mother, graphic designer Glenis Batley, nor her father, actor Geoffrey Lewis, was present.

"There were only six guests. We wanted a very intimate, quiet wedding."

Lewis' parents divorced when she was just two years old.

"They were never a couple to me, but they were both excellent, supportive parents."

Her father was a staple of Clint Eastwood's westerns and played his sidekick in Every Which Way But Loose.

"I visited my dad on those Clint Eastwood movies. I developed a huge crush on Clint and on acting. I always had a vibrant imagination and when dad saw I was interested in acting, he set up a meeting for me with someone at his agency."

Her first role was in a TV movie called Homefires.

"I played the homely, introverted daughter. It typecast me for a very long time. I kept getting all these loser characters, wacked-out girls and waifs.

"Because of the characters I played, people assumed I was a drug addict before I actually was.

"This whole image thing in Hollywood is destructive.

"It's hard for people who aren't in the industry to understand what it's all about. They feed off the scandals and sensationalism. They'd much rather hear me talk about my drug problems than about the experiences I had working with Martin Scorsese (Cape Fear) and Oliver Stone (Natural Born Killers)."

Lewis has signed to star in Bruce MacDonald's next film, Claire's Hat.

"He's the director of Hard Core Logo, one of my favourite films. This is going to be the hardest thing I've ever done because I have to play a Quebecois woman.

"I have to master the accent and the attitude, but I'm determined to do it for Bruce because he is such an amazing man."

If you don't think Lewis does, than what woman seems like a better candidate ?

I think the real problem here is that we're confusing quirky and nerdy personalities with REAL true autistic symptoms.

And I got news for ya folks...not everyone who has AS or any other form of autism is intelligent. I'm living proof. In fact I was failing math and science in middle school to the point of nearly flunking.

I have a hard time believing celebrities like Keanu Reeves or George Lucas have AS. It's not enough to be geeky. I look things like stimming, obession with patterns, poor eye contact, resistance to touch, awkward walking/coordination...that kind of thing.

Now with geek culture pretty much consuming the entire Western World it's no wonder people think autism is being over diagnosed in this country.