Why are some thing acceptable and others not

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Is it supposed to be hard for some one with AS to learn to show emotions and read them. I have a very hard time expressing my emotions. Sometimes I don't know why I feel some way and can't describe how I am felling. Usually when I have an extreme emotion I flap my hands and tense my arm muscles. Why is this? I do it without thinking and wish that I don't. I hate being different and having people judge me. Whenever I flap my hands in school I have teachers ask me if I am alright. Then the entire class has to look at me and then laugh. Why is flapping not exceptionable but cursing is. Kids curse to show frustration and that is (though wrong) accepted. But simply rapidly moving your hands isn't. Why is rocking not acceptable but shouting is. There are involuntary things that I do that even my family can't accept but then those things are.

I used to flap my hands, although now it's turned into rapid foot/finger/leg tapping. I'm inevitably going to do it, and I found myself not minding what people thought after a while. The only option other than accepting others are going to have disrespectful opinions of quirks like that is to stop doing them, and that wasn't an option I felt like taking. All of this came with age though; I was subconscious about it when I was going through that early, awkward teenage stage.

you could talk about this with the staff at school, laughing at someone with a disability just is not right.

The first advice I will give you is "Don't ask why." Instead, ask "When are some things acceptable" or "What is happening (or not happening) to cause me to feel extreme emotion?" When we ask why, this is too vague. To arrive at an answer to a problem, ask "What, Where, When and sometimes How" questions. "How did I get to this place where I feel so emotional?" Pay attention to what is happening around you. Is the room noisy? Is someone in particular doing something that you find upsetting? Is someone misunderstanding something you've said or done and reacting in a way that causes you to feel uncomfortable emotions? Emotions that are hard for us are triggered by something. They do not appear by magic. Use your ability to recognize patterns within yourself and the patterns of behavior around you. You can match patterns to emotions this way.

Arrive at an understanding of what is happening, when it is happening. Write it down: what happened and the way you felt about it.
Or, if you prefer, draw a picture of what is happening and how you feel. Ask someone you are comfortable with and trust if they will help you understand the times when you feel these extreme emotions and what you can do to feel more at ease within the situation, or with the person or people. Accept yourself!.

UnseenSkye provides some good advice here with regard to the first half of your post.

The second part is a bit more tricky. Why is, for example, rocking not accepted behaviour, while cursing (though frowned upon) is? Part of the answer is that rocking and hand-flapping are uncommon ways to vent an intense emotion (such as intense anger, intense anxiety you describe). Not many people do it. only a small percentage. So, a lot of people aren't confronted with rocking and hand-flapping, and since they're unfamiliar with it, it appears strange to them and therefore 'unacceptable'. People in general don't deal well with behaviour that's strange to them, even if it doesn't harm them in any way.

In your place, I would inform at least the teachers that you stim (rock, hand-flap, etc.) in this way to let out those extreme emotions. They should be understanding of it. Then, you could also inform any of your classmates (or at east the ones you'd expect to understand). There will always be people who'll remain ignorant, but you can enlighten some of them.

EDIT: I've found myself in similar situations.

Non-Autistic social standards deem it inappropriate that you partake in certain behavior. The many different behaviors that the Autist engage in, is judged as being disruptive and maladaptive by typical standards of development. In a majority Autist environment, where such behaviors are common, they would not be considered social unacceptable especially IF said behaviors were known to serve key functions.

TheSunAlsoRises

Last edited by TheSunAlsoRises on 15 Aug 2012, 8:04 am, edited 2 times in total.

Because the world is stupid!! !

People keep saying that. I'd like to see it demonstrated in real life.
In my own perception, when I go to my monthly autistics meet-up, although autistic behaviours are certainly met with both understanding and acceptance (as would be expected), I also find that the more eccentric and -let's say- unusual behaviours are still looked upon by some as being particularly strange. If I can generalise, I observe that those Aspies who can pass as 'normal' the best, will find some autistic behaviours annoying even, and discuss among each other that at least they know how to 'tone it down' a little for the outside world.
This is not overt, the atmosphere at the meet-ups is such that autistic behaviour (for example, preference to be silent, certain stims, certain quirks, mannerisms in verbal and non-verbal communication) is welcomed and understood. But there is still an ever so slight undertone of 'the closer you are to "neurotypical", the better you are' vibe.

That's why my own hypothesis is that, if all non-autistics were to be transported off the face of the planet, leaving only autistics to run society, it would be ruled by those autistic who are the 'least autistic', the mildest.

You can see a similar trend here on WP. The discussions are dominated by Aspergers and HFAs. I sometimes see posts come by that say as much as 'I prefer not to be associated with more severely autistic people'. Not quite THAT strongly, but it's the jist I get from most of the 'it's not a disorder, just a difference' posts.

IMO the reason that people on the spectrum who act closer to an NT model seem to have it better is precisely because the world is NT dominated. Being able to "pass" or "fit in" better gives some people a feeling of confidence and acceptance that others likely don't feel. Many of us are probably holding ourselves, consciously or not, to "normal" standards because that's what's seen as creating happiness and success in the society we live in. If NT's were taken out of the equation (not saying I'm advocating this or anything,) there could easily be a different model of normalcy or superiority that would favor people with other abilities.

What confuses me is, what emotions I am supposed to show in public. Apparently (I've been told her several times) that people give me funny looks because I'm not showing any emotion and they are afraid of blank-looking people, but when I DO show emotion I still get attention drawn to me. Like if the bus is full and I have to stand and I glared at everyone before I got off, I get people gawping at me from the bus after I get off or even laughing, as though I was not meant to show how annoyed I felt about standing up on a whole 40-minute bus journey. Anyone would be angry about that, but apparently we're not meant to show any emotion about it, just get on and look neutral. But then when I DO just look neutral, people expect me to give them a facial expression or something.

WTF??????????????????????????????????????????????????

Generally, THIS.

I'm too emotional, I'm not emotional enough, I have no sense of humor, I don't take anything seriously... What the hell do people want?

Let's do this, since we are talking about an Autistic environment.

It would be a stratification based on a number of factors IF an Autistic environment leaned far more toward intellectual pursuits rather than socialization skills. I believe since those with HFA and Aspergers are more aware of differences (impairments) in socialization, behavior, and communication in Autism; a greater acceptance of the Autist would occur.

In other words, IF i came in humming a tune and flapping my hands(for a job interview) an Autist is more than likely to open up an Autistic's portfolio then a Non-Autist.

In addition, people with HFA and Aspergers might have a higher probability of having children on the other end of the spectrum which would further make them aware of the socialization, communication, and behaviors of the Autist.

TheSunAlsoRises

Sun, I see you emphasise the word 'if', of which I'm glad, since it's highly speculative to claim an autistic society would be geared toward intellectual pursuits more than the society we have now. One would lead to think so, I agree, if we go by the poster body of wrongplanet.net, or by the average visitor of an autistics meet-up.
However, almost everyone who visits the forum has, by definition, an interest in autism, as well as an interest in participating in internet forum discussions- just as an autistics meet-up will attract a certain crowd. Visitors of neither platform are necessarily representative of ALL autistics.
As of late, I have been working with co-workers who each have their own disorders. Among them, I suspect there to be autistics (I have not verified; I'm simply guessing, based on how common spectrum disorders are). None among the crowd are intellectually inclined. If the majority of autistics in the world turns out to be uninterested in building a society that values intellectual pursuits, we'll still be left with the plagues we experience now; greed, hierarchy, strife.

Secondly, a society that is more oriented on intellectual pursuits, is a society still. And a society runs on social interactions. Here on the forum, we are quick to identify non-autistic or 'neurotypical' social mores as 'different' from our autistic ways, as two alternative mindsets with their own respective preferred social code. But I disagree with that philosophy. I perceive non-autistic social code as the universal norm- not all that different from the social code that exists in the behaviour of other social animals; dogs, wolves, horses, game birds. Certain universal behaviour patterns can be identified, next to the ones that are unique to each species. That which, here on WP is popularly referred to as 'neurotypical behaviour', is, in my opinion, simply the universal human social code that spans all cultures. It is not maintained as the diametric opposite of autistic behaviour, since most people who are more or less familiar with autism, will view autistic behaviour as one of many types 'deviant' from the norm, as surely as borderline is one, bipolar disorder is one, narcissism is one, obsessive compulsiveness is one.

What I suspect is that what we call 'neurotypical' conduct, is the underlying universal social code within ALL people, engrained in our nature. If our speculative society has an autistic majority, or even if it's autistic as a whole, then there would be no question of accepting autistic behaviours, stims, and quirks, since those stims and quirks would be UNIVERSAL. No one would bat an eyelash for hand-flapping, lack of eye contact, speech quirks, rocking, stale body language and the like, because they would be ever-present.
However, given that our society must still function, as a society primarily through its social interactions, those behaviours that, in our current NT-dominated world, are an actual hindrance to communication -to relaying the message from sender to receiver- will still be a hindrance in our autistic world. The more severe expressions of social 'impairment' will still be identified as actually being social impairments. As surely as red will still be red and blue will still be blue. This is something that can be quantified.