Do you think Asperger's Syndrome is over diagnosed?

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I did not mean my post in the way it was received.

Half the people I've seen who attention-seek with it don't even know what the symptoms are.

I ask them about social problems, alot of them go "WHAT SOCIAL PROBLEMS? I HAVE ASPERGERS, NOT SUMTIN WEIRD!! !"

Keep in mind that they don't even go 'Oh, the social issues aren't even really a problem for me, just the sensory stuff.'

These people don't even know that social problems are one of the symptoms.

Hmm.

I'm kind of sensitive on the topic of 'losers', because basically... how do I describe it?

There's people who used to bully me because I was a 'loser' and 'stupid' and so forth. ('Stupid' not in the sense of lacking book smarts, but as in 'makes stupid decisions' or something.) They really were some of the worst of the bullies I ever met, because their methods were elaborate and psychological rather than straightforward violence. I once saw them convince another 'loser' (who, like me, mistakenly looked up to them and thought of them as friends) of some pretty elaborate stuff, more elaborate than you'd probably even imagine possible, they went to great lengths to do this to him (some of what they planned to do is even against international torture laws despite being a purely psychological tactic, that's what I'm talking about). They did something similar to me, only with different topics entirely. They saw 'losers' as almost objects, their playthings, toys, not people, and pleasantly gullible of course.

(And although they at times made me doubt my own sanity, I've been told by people who were there that my current assessment of the situation is accurate.)

Anyway, said people were very upset that I was diagnosed as autistic. Why? Because bullying or taking advantage of a disabled person is taboo, and they might realize they were doing something that most people (whether rightly or wrongly) consider lower than low.

So of course, they love to pull out the whole line about, "You're not autistic, you're just a loser." (And will even tell bald-faced lies to support that point.) When what they really mean is, "If we acknowledged you were autistic, we'd have to acknowledge what we did was wrong."

Which I think is wrongheaded thinking, because what they did was wrong to anyone, not necessarily any worse to do to an autistic person. But it's a very widespread phenomenon, not just among such obvious and accomplished bullies, to use words like "loser" to justify negative treatment of something. Such people tend to be resistant to someone "not just being a loser, but having a disability" (in their eyes), because (again in their eyes) what they treat someone like is okay if their target is a loser but not if they're disabled in some way.

So I worry when people say someone is "just a loser not an autistic person," because that is almost the perfect example of what bullies say. I don't think everyone who says it is a bully, but it's how bullies justify the dehumanization of their targets. (Not that they never justify it by autism either, but that's a whole different matter.) So it sort of reinforces that idea. And, as I said, I'm sensitive to that because of personal experiences where people have tried forcefully to project "loser" onto me so that they can harm me. And I think "loser" is one of the most common sort of social/nonmedical pejorative characterizations of autistic people.

Personally, I don't think one can reasonably claim it's over-diagnosed or over-self-diagnosed unless you've personally evaluated--and are qualified to evaluate--a representative and statistically significant sample of people who are diagnosed, professionally or otherwise. Otherwise, you're just making a whole lot of guesses and inferences based on your own ideas. Besides, it's not like there's any kind of universal standard for determining who is or is not autistic. I've had many therapists and psychiatrist who never mentioned the autism spectrum, one who diagnosed me, a few who've agreed with that diagnosis, and one psychiatrist who seemed skeptical. If you show one person, autistic or otherwise, to a group of psychs, I bet you'll get a lot of different conclusions.

I remember reading at one point a scholarly paper on how many "immature dudes from comedy movies" as you put it, might be autistic.

Then there's this article (Kids Called Nerds) which is interesting. They say nerd instead of loser, but it's often the same group of people who get called both.

A quote:

No.

I used to wish I had been diagnosed earlier in life but maybe I wouldn't have gained the same understanding of the syndrome nor got the insights I have now at a younger age, or at least, not so forcefully. My own late diagnosis has helped me a great deal in allowing myself to look at issues and feel able to deal with them. I might have ignored them at an earlier age.

Perhaps, but I think people are a bit over-zealous with self-diagnoses. I am neurotypical, but share many trait with AS people (I've scored "possible AS" on the Baron-Cohen test and even my psychologist said that I showed the traits), but I know I'm just an introverted, non-social person with intense, focused interests. It doesn't necessarily warrant a diagnosis, and a matter of fact I've noticed many self-diagnosed people who seem less AS than I am.