Good natured teasing?

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Sometimes I really can't figure out the difference between good natured teasing and downright offensive. I don't know. I might be thinking it's one when it's actually the other.

My dad has always loved teasing so, for an Aspie, I'm well-used to it and reasonably competent at distinguishing it from meanness. VMSnith'sm explanation is pretty good. Another way of distinguishing friendly teasing from non-friendly is that it is natural for you to strike back without meaning to hurt the other person, and also if it's so over-the-top that it can't be taken seriously. for example:

Girlfriend: (hands over a small paper box) This is for you to keep your brain in.
Boyfriend: Yeah, yours would go right through the pores in the paper. (both laugh)

or
(teenage girls)
Older sister: you terrify everyone.
Younger sister: Well, duh! Everyone says I'm your spitting image.

In both cases, they know each other well enough that they know perfectly well it's not seriously meant (for example, the couple in example 1 might both be intelligent, and the sisters might be attractive). It's a bit like a friendly contest to see who comes up with the best reply. It's a bit like playing chess - it's simulated combat, but you can play chess with a friend, even though you're trying to disembowel his king.

Incidentally, banter and teasing are often used to establish closeness - i.e. by doing banter you're implying that you know the person well enough to tease them and that it will go down well (doesn't always happen of course), and that it will not lead to something uncomfortable (again, NTs don't always get this right - a good example was a very much NT girl, hearing banter in which one guy was being teased with being told he probably slept with his own sister due to where he's from, and she added that her grandparents had committed incest, which silenced everyone. the point is that with the guy and his sister, nobody seriously thought they were committing incest and he knew it - whereas the girl was talking about something real). You don't have to get it right every time, just often enough.

I often can't tell the difference between the two.

There is a fine line between teasing that is an expression of friendship and teasing that is masked hostility. And in my case I have a tendency to take things literally and may find it difficult to be able to discern the difference.

The few friends that I have tease me nicely. They often jokes about how hyper I am, and they tell me that I look like I kid (I am 40, but people think I am 25). They also tell me that I seem to be sleepy from time to time.

I can usually recognize the difference, though I'm still not that great at taking criticism. Learning to share art online has helped me become a little less sensitive about everything, but I'm still quite susceptible to it. I also have difficulty judging how far I can go when giving critique or when joking with someone. I've offended people this way when my remarks were intended as a joke.

That said, playful banter CAN be done well. My (Aspie) friend and I used to joke about how, if anyone overheard our conversations in a different language, they'd think we hate each other.

There is a difference between what friends, real friends, will do just as friendly stuff, and what is decidedly hostile. A friend for instance might say after I just not only corrected him on what was the director in that movie but also the main actor, main actress and mentioned they then made 4 other pictures together and which ones, "So, who was the cinematographer rainman?" I would reply with something made up (because I never remember stuff like that) like "Greg Schutzer, definitely, definitely Greg Schutzer definitely" while rocking back and forth slightly and shaking my head, then breaking the act to laugh with them. In this context it's good-natured friendly ribbing, same way I might say "Oh you dirty dirty little slut, let me get a beer in you so I can have my wicked way with you" after he tells me about his sexcapades last weekend and he might reply "I'm just not that kind of girl, you better buy me dinner. Or get me a Bacardi breezer and I'm all yours." and then we laugh about that. The fact that we both play along with what's said and then laugh it off is what minimizes the insult, and we expect one another to do that as friends because a friend wouldn't really mean you were a slut. Not a real friend.

The point being, he has permission to tease me because of familiarity. Because if a stranger were to say "What's your problem you mental freak, shouldn't you be locked up somewhere?" to me he'd stick up for me or rather by me since I'd blow up over someone saying something like that and tear them a new one. Similarly if someone were to make an anti-gay slur against him I'd have no problem telling the person who said that about him to shove it up ... yeah I'm not gonna say here what I would say but it would be impolite. Also if someone made a rainman comment against me who wasn't one of my friends but some random stranger - that's not friendly ribbing. I'd take offense at that because it's not the kind of thing you say to people you don't know, because when you say that to someone you don't know it's implied that it's insulting because you have no history with that person to tell you or them it's not meant in a bad way.

But the point is, we would defend one another, so there's a certain amount of implied trust between us that any teasing we might do to one another is playful rather than malicious. If I ever thought I'd stepped a line (and a real friend would tell you if you just did) I'd apologize immediately, and it's expected that they'd do the same for me.

I never make fun of others, because I can't tell the difference between the two types of teasing. I will however make fun of myself on occasion and that can make people more comfortable.

Like all stereotypes have some degree of truth, all teasing has some degree of malicious intent – in my opinion.

I think you have to be pretty close to someone for it to be good-natured. I know that I get very irritated when people I barely know say things to me like, "Shhh! You're too loud!" because I don't talk. To me, that's the equivalent of saying to someone in a wheelchair, "Sit down! Take a load off!"

I've attempted good-natured teasing before, and it didn't turn out well, so I avoid it at all times.

My friends and I take part in that type of teasing, all the time. It's fun.