Why do NTs turn nasty ...

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Haha i am indeed cynical, it is nice to have someone recognising my point of veiw as well though. I actually think you express your opinions better than me though, because you come across as being laid-back.


And someone expresses what i was trying to say with so much more elegance, why doesn't this suprise me?

Either way, this is a support forum and i can assure people on here that sometimes the aspie is just plain wrong. Telling everyone they are in the right and part of a privilaged divine group that can do no wrong is NOT support. It's setting them up to fail spectacualrly because the offending behaviours they have are not going to be dulled, they will become exaggerated.

I've been carried through life by a sucession of NT's, but i've also been bullied by NT's as well. NT's are neither good or bad, they are a group of people. You can change the responses you get from them by changing your behaviour and in the process you don't have to be any less autistic.

well, it would be easier to deal with NTs if there weren't just so many of them! And they are everywhere, too! If I met maybe one, or two a day, perhaps, but everyday perhaps 99.9% of people I meet are either NT or pretending to be. . .

it's exhausting!

and yes, when I am pretending to be NT I turn nasty too. So sue me.

Last edited by sinsboldly on 22 Jul 2009, 8:12 am, edited 1 time in total.

.....pretending to be

How true it is..

sad, but true

oops! I sincerly hope that no one is impacted negatively when I pretend to be NT just to make life go easier. . . except me, of course. Is life supposed to use up every smidgen of effort and energy I have? really?

oh, well. . .

OK

Great to hear the more mature survivors.In my experience eccentricity was more accepted in the past we all nts and autistics share the human experience but with the advent of marketing pomoting its simplistic idea of happiness it is what you have and how you look not who you are.With the current epedemics of depression substance abuse vilence obesity prison populations anarexia an objective observer would conclude sothing is up.If when someone asked how are you they really wanted an answer maybe things would improve.

An irritant more than anything else, I usually find the more brighter race to be more compatible.
Where's the match? I want to light this fuel drenched idiot.

Yeah, I just read through some of these posts, and I see both sides. Like, this is a support forum, and many Aspies, including myself, go through these anti NT moments because of something that happened off the computer (or a series of unfortunate events with NTs). I used to refer to it as society all together, but NTs work too. It's not that they really hate NTs as much as they just hate the world, so just be happy that they made the conscious decision to hate everyone but the people on here for purposes of here (to include you)...lol. Anyway, I also believe that mentality is more destructive than constructive. There are ways to turn destructive moments into constructive ones, but that's not always the case. Anyway, I don't see anything wrong with people going on about how AS is better than NT as a way to vent their frustrations, but I don't see anything wrong with someone saying, this AS vs NT mentality is not cool. I guess what I'm saying is that I understand why people will have that mentality, and in some cases, it is justified for that reason (not all cases though), but it still isn't a good thing.

So in other words... all you people are right

First, the disclaimer: I may be NT. I dont really know. I know my son is AS, I know my husband is probably AS, I think my dad was most likely AS, and I have a lot of AS traits but not all the seemingly crucial ones. On here, I assume I'm NT and that my participation is driven by trying to be a better parent to my AS son.

So. I "get" the need to vent about NT's and the world in general. I do like what the poster above suggested, that the wording maybe should be against "society" instead of NT's, because NT's is a group of individuals; society as a term includes pressures that affect those individuals.

But no group, and that includes NT's, can be accurately attacked as sharing all traits. NT's are a spectrum like AS are, and are plagued by their own life difficulties that affect how they deal with the world. To say "all NT's are mean" is just as prejudiced - and inaccurate - as saying "all AS are arrogant."

What I've noticed with my son is that he is, unfortunately, unaware of how he can reap what he sows. While many members of society are driven by self-interest and don't care how they get to the goal, most are trying to play by the rules. And those rules say to place nice. Except that we'll all understand if you don't feel able to play nice when someone isn't playing nice with you. So my son using his AS bluntness might verbally express a truth that has just come into his head, like "because you are fat ..." Well. Society considers that a mean thing to say, truthful or not. He's just given people a license to be nasty back, and he has no idea he just did that. We constantly break down interactions at home to figure out what happened that he isn't seeing. He's getting a lot better at it, about being able to look backwards and see, but he still isn't able to apply a filter to his mouth and actions; he really doesn't WANT to, and that is his choice, but then he can't complain about the fall out or accurately blame it on the other people.

When he was younger, virtually 100% of the time we could break it all down together and find where HE was mean first. In middle school, it's closer to 2/3's - kids at this age ARE mean without provocation.

I personally think it would be a lot more productive to try to figure out your own role in a negative situation than to rail first thing against the NT's. But I can also understand choosing not to do that; its stressful, it shouldn't be necessary, it may not even be possible, and so on. But I think its important to ACCEPT that you may have unknowingly done something to contribute to the situation, instead of concluding all NT's are mean. Why? Because living in a world full of people who you believe DESIRE to be nice is much more pleasant than living in a world full of people you believe are mean to the core. It affects everything you do, and the change in perspective makes it more likely that you WILL be treated with kindness.

I've been teased, left on the margins, embarassed, and more. But I still believe that most people are decent. That third grader struggling to find her place in the heirarchy, who is mean even to her friends, actually does grow up into an adult who knows better, most of the time, at least. You have to trust that.

Ah, but there is a problem. Trust. I see it on the parenting board all the time. Kids who have had to battle a world so confusing that they no longer are capable of trust. I often find myself telling parents that they will have to rebuild trust with their own kids. The whole thing about precise language digs deep when it comes to trust; the AS who conclude the whole world is full of lies and, so, the charge to be truthful is a hypocracy. I don't know what to say about that; either you are willing to trust, or not. I can't change your experiences to date.

I wish I could change the life experiences you all have faced so that you no longer see the world as such a horrible place. I can't. No one can. But I can tell you that my son isn't growing up with the same negative experiences I know most of you faced. He's happy. He has a really positive outlook on life. Yes, he is confused and frustrated by certain things, but at least people around him are listening and taking his perspective seriously. The NT's in his life are willing to learn, willing to meet him the middle or more. They aren't all mean.

So those are some of my thoughts. I don't know how you'll take them. And I hope I haven't misspoken or expressed myself less than precisely; I have a problem with that stuff here.

The way reading this makes me feel is something like how any caring person, NT or aspie, might feel watching this:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XSuhlww_8-0&feature=related[/youtube]

Aspiewordsmith, as someone who has obviously been hurt by hatred, knowing how devastating it is, why do you yourself employ it?

Honestly, I can't believe the mods allow this sort of open discrimination of NTs. If an NT came to WP and said these things about those with AS, I'm sure they'd be stopped.

At first, I thought that WP was a cool place. But everywhere I turn, on so many of the threads, there's just all kinds of out-of-control discrimination and ugly stereotyping of NTs. Because of the prevalance of hatred for NTs here, I'm not sure it's the right place for me... I know some of you think that's absolutely the correct conclusion and that I should just leave and never come back. To those who do: You deserve every moment of loneliness you have created for yourself.

Thank you for sharing this. It is actually a current topic of discussion between members and moderators, and among the moderators, as to what extent such discussion should be allowed, and what extent it is in violation of the more generally worded terms of service. I think those that want to be able to vent at will need to understand that it DOES upset other AS members and make this a less comfortable place to be for many members that this place is meant to serve.

Its understood among the moderators that this is a touchy subject. Many members have had horrible experiences. But when does venting about those experiences cross the line? When are the feelings developed missplaced? It's worthy of discussion here and, I believe, part of the evolution of learning and understanding where one fits in the world.

I hope that, difficult as it is, you will contribute to the discussion and help members of differring viewpoints find some perspective.

(I can't watch the video because I don't have sound on this computer so I can't comment on if its appropriate)

You're partly correct but there's something I don't quite understand. I don't see how you can claim there's a level playing field - that aspies "discriminating" (venting) against NT's on this site causes just as much hurt as the bullying/discrimination that goes the other way. I mean, NT's are a HUGE group.

Then there's also the misconception that all the problems aspies encounter in life stem from their own behavior and misunderstandings due to problems with social skills. The fact of the matter is aspies are more often targets of bullies and other nasty people - not because they've offended anyone, no - merely because they appear different. This is an issue that isn't adequately acknowledged by professionals regarding autism. Instead all the focus is on how we are the problem that needs to be fixed. Can you see how this creates resentment?

I think a lot of NT's come on here with an honest desire to help, so I understand how reading an angry post lashing out against NT's feels like a slap in the face.

I guess I don't know exactly what I'm trying to argue other than the fact that I see both sides and the issue isn't as simple as one group discriminating against another.

Very valid, Feyhera. From my perspective, complaints and ranting about situations or the actions of individuals (or even specific groups) are entirely appropriate... it is when it moves from the action to the person, from self-expression to vehement attack, or from the individual to all people of a certain type, that the line is crossed on appropriate behavior. There are -people- in my life who have treated me poorly; that does not correlate that all people are cruel. I hope you don't leave, as I've found your contributions most enlightening and honest. Sometimes when you've been hit so many times, it is hard to remember or recognize whether it is a helping hand or an approaching fist.


M.

Try not to take the anti-NT vent threads personally. They are objectively and logically full of untruths (obviously nothing applies to all of any group) but in the final analysis it's just a vent. And cooler heads always prevail somehwere in these threads anyway. There is a lot for us NTs to learn here from people with Been There Done That experience about the AS people we love but often don't understand. And I think the open dialogue threads build bridges and outnumber the vent threads. The handful of NTs here are like the handful of white people who joined in the original civil rights protests of the late 50's and early 60's. They probably wound up listening to a lot of untrue vents like "white people all want us to go back to being slaves" and things like that. But ultinately bridges were built and it was a good thing.

Kind of sounds like you are talking about my post a few up on here

OK. This is the deal, from an NT perspective. There is nothing you can do about people who choose to be mean. Yes, there are plenty of them, but it is not a majority in this world, just a very painfully destructive small group. The only thing to be done about them is to keep out of the path and give them freedom to self-destruct. So the focus turns to those who would be nice but misread your intentions because you don't know the social rules. THOSE interactions can be worked on and improved.

My son knows who I think he should just stay clear of, or take any issues with straight to the principals office. We can't solve their issues; they can't solve his; the common ground for getting along is pretty non-existent. So you press the ignore button, or go through offical channels when they insist on pressing through the ignore button. We identify those kids and people, and develop tactics for staying clear. I have to do that, too, as an NT; everyone does.

They are much more than just a "small group" and it's not easy to understand it unless you experience it yourself. If it were a "small group" there wouldn't be special schools for children with disabilities, they would all be main streamed. Part of the reason they aren't is because they would be psychologically traumatized by the absolute sadistic nastiness from the students attending regular education. When they are in schools for regular kids, as a group, they are seperated from the regular students during recess because of this main reason: bullying and sadistic behaviour on the part of regular kids. It is not an illusion or a delusion. It is not paranoia. It's not due to bad social skills. Regular kids target kids who are different. The proof is in what I just listed.

Have to disagree, Ana... All people can be cruel; that doesn't mean they are. During adolescence, the changes in the body affect even the most temperate of souls. To project that all other people are sadists is unfair and inaccurate. And from what I have observed here and on other AS sites, the role of bully is not the sole domain of the 'sadistic NTs'.

BTW: What you related was anecdotal and subjective observation, not proof.


M.