Do most people even know what AS is?

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I find that the perception in the culture is that someone with autism has narrow talents, but lacks common sense. Remember in Rain Man that Raymond had exceptional math talents but didn't know how much a candy bar costs.

Rain Man was a person who was able to take care of his personal needs (toileting, dressing, etc.). He was able to keep his room clean. He was able to relate to people extremely superficially. He was stuck in a routine--but, within the routine, he was able function more or less "normally."

I believe he could have benefitted from therapy, and from living in the world.

He was "high functioning" for a person in need of institutionalization. As others said, I'm not sure if he's Level 2 or Level 3.

He was only institutionalized after he accidentally turned the hot water on too high in the tub when Charlie was bathing. He was an older teen by then. He was only institutionalized because his parents were worried that he might accidentally hurt Charlie. He had to be pretty high functioning to have been living at home that long during that time and to have been able to turn the handles on the tub while the baby was being bathed.

I think that a lot of his disfunction came from the effects of decades of institutionalization.

I have no doubt that you're right about this.

I have formed the opinion that in Britain the 'experts' have decided it's a condition restricted to childhood that magically disappears on the 18th birthday. If the visible behaviours can be quashed, then that's the problem solved. No, that's THEIR problem solved. I survive by constantly reminding myself the problem is in the inflexible thinking of the observers, stone NTs. I hope not all NTs have petrified thinking. I have yet to find out. How anyone appears does not hurt anyone else. It's not a temporary skin blemish. It's a way of life.

Many NT's are actually cool, in my experience.

It's pretty much the same way in the US. Autism is a child's affliction, from the standpoint of the general public.

Thanks kk. You give me courage to keep going. I hate the term NTs as we are all so individual anyway. It's good to feel I do finally belong somewhere, though. Rainman was definitely more about institutionalisation than autism, I agree.

Wasn't the movie about Charlie taking Raymond wherever because their dad left all the money to Raymond in his will to like stick it to Charlie? I mean I get the idea the dad was a jerk when it came to his kids. Maybe Raymond was better off where he was placed. I really do not think he could have gotten along without some sort of assisted living.

Sometimes so called self diagnosers with AS don't even know what it is. I didn't know what it was when I was first diagnosed. For a while I just thought AS was a set of behaviors and flaws and being a target for being discriminated and targeted and being rejected because that is what I had read about it online long before they had blogs so I could to what I was reading about it even though not all of it fit. So I had always worked on my behaviors to get better so I often question my symptoms since I keep hearing how exhausting it is to keep it up while it's been the opposite for me and how it's a lifetime condition and supposedly you never get better from practice. So confusing. Maybe I was just socially awkward and just had a bad personality and it got me diagnosed because of my anxiety and low self esteem and because of my incompetent school staff and other mean kids who were intolerant of differences and because I was trying to be "normal" to better myself so I could be "normal" and be liked and have friends. After all some people just need to have this condition to feel better about themselves and feel it's not their fault for their failures and how others treat them.

Yep, the dad certainly stuck it to Charlie. But Charlie seemed like sort of a arrogant ass; maybe he deserved it somewhat. But maybe his arrogance was caused by he missing his older brother.

The movie took place in 1988, so Raymond was institutionalized in the 1960s. It was thought that I should go to one of those places, too. Of course, Raymond would have done better in a group home. But Raymond seemed content at the institution where he was. It was much better than most of these sorts of places.

Obviously, he didn't grow because of the institutionalizations.

The institution in the movie was much better then most institutions which were hellholes of people bieng chained to the floor and sedated. Autistics were used as guinea pigs for experimental drugs. LSD was an "in" experimental drug for a time.

I'm sorry but I think this (SEE BELOW) is very judgemental on people who both have been diagnosed AS and also the self-identifiers. You are repeating things that get hashed out with lots of bad feeling here time and time again.

It's a hurtfully inflammatory assumption to say "After all some people just need to have this condition to feel better about themselves and feel it's not their fault for their failures and how others treat them."

This is exactly the kind of thing people on the spectrum, who come to WP FOR SUPPORT, do not need to hear from OTHER people on the spectrum.
My bolding in the post as follows:

You're missing the point -- even to say "some" people, what then follows is still an ugly assertion to make.

Because people come to this site to find answers. If they are not yet diagnosed, it hurts to arrive here and find that you're even talking about "some" people -- because it's very easy for someone who already feels vulnerable to think "she means me."

"SOME" is a cop-out and I think you know that.

Plus, I don't like your tone -- "Oh wait aspies are" etc.

You are being sarcastic -- yes I can tell SOME times. Or does that make me not autistic anymore?

You're being sarcastic and nasty. Don't think it escapes me that you're one of those. You're one of the people here who perenially question the diagnosis of others, and put people down in exactly the kind of comments you made above.

It's this kind of member that makes me find this NOT a good place to be.

League Girl, I WILL NOT be engaging with you further on this. I have probably about as low an opinion of you as you would seem to have about me. I've noticed your mode of thought and mindset about this kind of thing before and I'm not impressed.

You're one of the people I need to avoid on here because the BS you say angers and stresses me. Oh but THAT'S just an excuse too, right? But you don't care. You lack insight. You have no compassion. No understanding.

Greetings. Talking about the question in the title. So I asked my friends what they know what Aspergers Syndrome is and they said not really. But they knew that if someone has Aspergers, they aren't serial killers or murderers. Well, it's possible, but being diagnosed with AS doesn't mean murderer. One friend said they read the summary from wikipedia. My other friends didn't know anything.