Aspergers is very diverse

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I don't think people who are classified as should be treated as one collective group because they are more diverse than it is made out to be. In pop culture, Aspies are often portrayed as brilliant and but socially reclusive to be technology savvy but dysfunctional in meat space.

But in reality, people who are labeled with aspergers have a diverse array of abilities and needs as well as interests and desires. Some are socially aware but reclusive. Others desire constant socialization but are unsure how to engage people. Some have serious problems with executive function and organization, others are neat freaks. Some are academic over achievers, others have serious learning disabilities. Some are socially clueless others are brilliant at manipulating people. Some have outstanding verbal skills, others have trouble with articulation. Some have a good understanding of pop culture, others are pop culture illiterate. It is generally perceived that aspies are un athletic or at least dislike group sports but this is not always the case. Aspies have diverse interests and desires.

Do you feel that a general criteria undermines the diverse needs and abilities on the Spectrum. Does it do us a disservice to lump us all together?

What Aspie stereotypes fit you and what misperceptions do you feel people have about Aspergers.

I wouldn't say that I'm Pop Culture illiterate, but I'm not all that much into things that are current, such as today's street fashions, American Idol and Top 40. I like the 60s, though I don't come close to being a hippie and I like groups such as The Kinks and The Beatles, in that order.

Most people ASD or NT don't like the current pop culture. But what's great about this era is that the advent and improvement of the internet exposes us to pop culture from different eras.

I've had a lot of fun discovering eras of Pop Culture from before the 60s. I even listen to music from the 1910s and the 1920s, sometimes. YouTube has been my gateway to the world.

I'm in the category of people you wouldn't suspect have AS. Brilliant, reclusive and into technology (though more hardware related than software) but I suprise people in the fact that I can be social, I can party and what not.

I desire socialization but my view of humanity (it's a bad joke) prevents me from it...not that I'm seriously complaining I'm sure it would lead to disappointment as it has in the past. I am a neat freak to a degree, in some places I just give up and say "I don't give a s**t" like for instance my pants. I am NOT buying 20 different pairs of pants just so I can wear clean pants for the first 2 hours of each day, instead I have maybe 3 pairs which I will wear for over a week each since they get dirty (think motor oil and sliding around on dirt) daily anyways. I was an academic overachiever until Middle School, at which point I quit giving a s**t about my grades and only did schoolwork to keep myself busy during class, never studied, and in 9th grade I wouldn't even touch my mathbook at home. I still got a 3.3+ GPA every semester, peaking at a 3.7 something in 12th grade if that's any indication of what I'm capable of. My dad is a manipulator, I myself have it in me though I more often than not don't take advantage of that talent. I am up on all that is hip, though I can't stand any of it. I love sports, mostly football, weightlifting, running, biking, inline skating, baseball and kickball. Basically anything that lets me push myself to my limits, nothing requiring any major coordination.

I honestly can't stand many people on this site and can only relate to a handful. Two of which hardly even post unless I link them to a thread. I therefore do not consider myself to be associated with the rest.

I think too many people are buying into this crap that people with aspergers are far smarter than them on average, I may be but it doesn't seem like the majority are, I've had arguments on here as stupid as what the definition of PUBLIC is.

I've discovered pop culture from different countries from different countries and different eras as well childhood favorites.

I've also recently discovered the Pop Culture of the 1980s.

I've discovered 1920's swing, Lithuanian folk music, and watched episodes from old school Nickelodeon from the nineties and of course Once Ujpon a Potty.

I totally agree with you Ariela. Saying all Aspies are the same because they have some AS traits, would be the same as saying all NTs are the same because they have NT traits. We are all unique.

I meet the diagnostic criteria, as well as the descriptions found in Hans Asperger's own writings, with the exception of I don't think I had an unusual gait...though I was/am not the most coordinated person in the world.

I also seem to be the epitome of the learning pattern found to be present among many with AS in various studies. I have a high verbal IQ and good matrix reasoning abilities, and slow processing speed.

I had severe hypersensitivity issues as a child, the most of which I thankfully grew out of, and I do have my interests, which I can become quite obsessive about.

So I don't really deviate from any written description of those with AS.

However I do tend to deviate from the image many form in their mind, based on their interpretation of the descriptions of AS.

I find that many people expect everyone with AS, at all points in their life, to appear overtly socially awkward, never make eye contact (the diagnostic criteria actually says trouble making or MAINTAINING eye contact), and though it's not part of the diagnostic criteria, and is actually quite contrary to what one should expect of AS based on various studies, people seem to be under the impression that someone with AS would have fluency of speech difficulties beyond that which would be envoked by social anxiety or situations in which a person is bogged down by processing issues.

In other words, people seem to generally expect that someone with AS would not be verbally articulate, when hyperlexia is far more common.

People also seems to assume that people with AS are automatically naive, emotionally immature, or need looking after. I find this particularly insulting.

In addition, many seem to find it a difficult concept to grasp that a person with AS can be quite self aware, and make efforts to improve themselves.

But in the end, we really must be forgiving of individuals with such misconceptions. Most people can only garner a superficial understanding of these things, and it's unfortunate but true that even some doctors who have treated patients with OCD only understand OCD in terms of counting and washing, and have no concept of the underlying workings of the disorder.

Much the same can be said for anything.

I'm definitely more social than many Aspies, somewhat athletic, definite sensory issues (picky as all get out), but I have that one "common" hangup: Eye contact. You want me to look someone in the eye? Why? That's creepy! Well, unless I know you, and even then, it can be uncomfortable.

I think this whole thing comes from a lack of education about what AS and ASD really are. My daughter is ASD (not an Aspie, but I wish, 'cuz it'd be better for her), and people STILL tell me she'll grow out of it, she'll "get better," or that she doesn't "look" autistic. What the hell does that even mean? This isn't Down's Syndrome, where there's a distinctive visual difference.

So yeah, people lump all of us together. I guess it's a good thing that I like to talk. I've (nicely) educated many people, with less than five minute of conversation, that this is not as simple as living in someone's own little world.

Okay. Ending here before I ramble on!

I'm autistic without specifically being AS. There seem to be plenty of stereotypes I meet whereas others I don't meet. Some of them I've even met sometimes but not others. And sometimes I've even seemed to others to meet them without actually meeting them.

So let's see.

I'm not a visual thinker. Vision is my most scrambled sense along with hearing (although some people can be both visual thinkers and have scrambled vision that doesn't apply to me). My best senses are smell and kinesthetic. So that's one stereotype I don't meet whatsoever.

I'm not an idea thinker. I think best with no ideas. Including no symbols not even visual ones like Temple Grandin and lots of others have. My thinking such as it is, functions best as basically sensory sensations, especially one's based around my movement or the movement of others, and the patterns that these movements form. Another stereotype down as many autistic people seem to delight in ideas and intellect above all else.

I'm usually neither of the two most stereotypical autistic social patterns. What Lorna Wing describes as aloof (avoiding and ignoring social approaches) and active-but-odd (approaching others in highly eccentric or "inappropriate" ways). Not even "formal/stilted", a third stereotype she named. Despite the fact her four social categories have been contested, I do fit rather well into one of them the vast majority of the time. She calls it "passive". It doesn't mean the same as normal passivity. It means I can't generally approach people but I generally interact when approached. It's considered the rarest of her categories which may be why it's the only one that hasn't become a stereotype. It's also the most heavily linked to my movement disorder, and may be an early sign of it.

However, my inability to approach people has often gotten me stereotyped as aloof, especially when sensory or movement issues have made me unable to respond. People would tell me I had no interest in others socially. When I sometimes desperately wanted to socialize. Thing is, most people considered to want to socialize but not know how, at least know how to approach people. But many of us who want it but cant do it, actually can't initiate or show interest any other way. So we get inaccurately stereotyped as aloof and seen as having no desire to socialize. (And yes that means many people seen as unaware of the existence of others are actually extremely aware but can't show it.)

At the moment though I voluntarily spend most of my time alone, which makes me largely fit the stereotype of the loner. I do have friends but only because they do a lot of the initiating. Otherwise I can lose track even of my closest friends. At group activities (through developmental disability agencies) I don't generally directly interact with anybody. So these days I mostly fit the loner stereotype but in the past I didn't at all except WAY in the past.

I have great difficulty comprehending my surroundings as anything different than a swirl of sensation. This does make me fit some stereotypes.

I don't live inside my mind. I live inside sensation. This makes me not fit certain stereotypes.

I am usually the opposite of the stereotypical aspie thing of understanding someone's words (give or take auditory processing issues) but not their tone or movements. I get most information from tone and movement and struggle to understand words (meaning even the idea that words have meaning, then struggling to hold onto meaning -- different from auditory issues). But when I am understanding words I fit the stereotype a little because I lose everything else including tone and movement. Except that understanding words (auditory, written, or signed) takes a serious toll that it doesn't take on most people who fit the stereotype.

I do have the stereotypical information-based special interests sometimes. But all of the time I have that other stereotype -- entirely sensory-based special interests.

I used to fit the stereotype of rocking flapping flicking etc all the time. But due to my movement disorder I do it less now.

I can't use speech for communication which fits a stereotype. I used to be able to both speak more, and have some meaning to it sometimes, and usually pass as having meaning even though it usually didn't. Which makes my loss of it at that particular late age nonstereotypical. (I had also lost it at an early stereotypical age but regained it.)

I used to, instead of the more stereotypical rigid resistance to change, ride out my sensory reactions to change like a funhouse or something. People don't realize some autistic people can do that. But now I have trouble with it because I can get motion sickness now from those sensory responses.

As an adult I don't have the stereotypical "aspie" very high IQ. (Hyperlexia gave me one as a kid but failing to develop much further in certain areas combined with losses in others quickly changed that.) My current one is somewhat low.

I am not endlessly miserable about my limitations despite having what many people would consider far more of them than the usual idea of autistic people who can use words, and despite a nasty past. I'm actually quite happy and well-adjusted.

I don't consider social problems to be anything close to my most major issue from being autistic.

I don't fit the expected (at my best) communication level for someone with my type and degree of autism-related issues, and I don't fit the expected type and degree of autism-related issues for someone with my (at my best) communication level.

My abilities are not fixed. The stereotypical autistic person's abilities are more or less constant. Mine are constantly shifting. Next to a constant-ability person, my abilities may go far higher and far lower than theirs.

My life and existence completely blow apart the idea that functioning levels even make sense.

I had a severe receptive language delay and problems with expressive language but receptive was far worse especially with superficially good expression based on patterns instead of meaning. Most stereotypes of autistic people are the opposite.

I can read body language perfectly in people with my kind of autism. Which is supposedly impossible because supposedly our problems there are universal and caused by a complete inability to put ourselves in others shoes.

I can often "resonate" with people and objects and experience a deep connection to them. Autistic people supposedly live in a world barren of any sense of life even in human beings. In my case I live in a world where everything has life including objects and this means human beings simply aren't put ahead of other forms of company.

There's a stereotype about autistic people being hyper-rational and hyper-intellectual with little feeling (or strong feelings but only simple one's without nuance). I am highly intuitive and sensory, not very much standard ideas of rational or intellectual, and have extremely rich and nuanced feelings.

People often stereotype me as verbal because of my writing but actually I cone at words from a sensory and pattern based direction and have great trouble sustaining verbal comprehension, often more so than the people who stereotype me that way.

There's probably more but my brain has run out.