Aspie philosophy

Post Reply New Topic

This involves a full reverse on what we're told. Empathy, as Simon Baron Cohen describes it; the idea that intuitively some people have the ability to recognize how a person is feeling and to console them. But that's only an ideal. Ever since I was a kid, I think what they define as "empathy" has offended me. The reflexiveness, the lack of any understanding on a cognitive level of what a person is going through but the well meaning smiley face on the front that's supposed to console them. We're programmed to do this to keep down our urges of killing and maiming each other. It's so robotic, in a way, and the irony smacks me every time. Because what I know about people and about suffering, I know because of a mix of intuition, intellect, and experience. Could it be that, since my intuition is crippled, I compensate by using these other elements? I don't know if it's the same for everyone. But what I think I know is that often times people have no clue how really to console a person. If you've never seen this in action, you yourself could be living proof; have you been asked "what's wrong?" or baby talked to, when absolutely nothing is wrong, because you have a naturally impassive expression? You've been treated with kid gloves for no reason except that person has percieved you as upset because the contours of your mouth don't match the model? Or maybe you are in the dumps, and the people around you perform their little consolation attempts - then once they realize they don't have an effect on you (or maybe they do, but those contours aren't budging), they happily trot off to talk to the person that's easy to talk to. Where's the intuition there?

There's an industry of soap operas and tabloids out there for these people to empathize at. It's reached critical mass; when there aren't enough living, breathing people around to empathize with, the pot starts boiling over! We're empathizing with symbols here. For a hobby. Like your housecat, the distant ancestor of a lion who would hunt an antelope, hunts a mouse, although you feed him kibble.

I don't want to maim or kill anyone, because I know how much it hurts to be maimed, and I recognize the finality of death. I don't like seeing people suffer - actually suffer - but most of the time, I don't care anything at all about the superfluous details of their lives, which is usually the cause of their faux-(I'm taking a big liberty here) suffering. So even if I can hold a conversation, and I can, I usually don't want to. But everyone does suffer, and when I see it it has an immediate effect on me, and I try to talk them through it.

Empathy to me seems shallow, robotic, and programmed; easily distracted, but enthusiastic when it finds an outlet that's easy to work with. It's a reflexive aversion to aggression, but once beyond that, kill everything! We're animals again. And once the war's over it clicks back into place, and we know again, war is hell. Maybe a cognitive understanding of empathy would make people easier to trust and predict. Maybe empathy doesn't exist.

I think most people have substituted drama for empathy. Perhaps without realizing it, what they're actually trying to do is make life interesting for them. I don't think people who read tabloids and watch soaps to replace something that's missing from their everyday life actually have an understanding of what anything is. So when they're taught from these things that they should go up to anybody and ask them if anything is wrong, and they don't get a response like, "aliens took my dog", "my father raped my sister", or something that's straight out of television, then they don't know what to do. True empathy takes a while to get used to - you have to recognize what the other person does/look like when they feel down and then offer your help, not force it upon or patronize them. I'm a lot better at this than I used to be, but it still takes work.
So don't despair; it's not that empathy doesn't exist, it's just that few people know how to correctly express it. But it sounds like you understand what it is, so at least it's not just me.

Oh, poor little Maldorory, I know just how you feel, now you tell me all about it, because that is what I am here for. Now, now, come on, let it all out. I can tell you need a friend right now. What you need is a big hug, now dont be shy, come on, come Malse, you will feel a lot better when you tell me everything, because I want to know what hurts my little Malse-palse.

From Futurarama, Bender meets Flexer, they smile, speak happy words, grow closer, hug, and both steal the other's wallet.

I have realised from my time on forums, especially spiritual forums, that even most NT's do this empathy because it is what everyone else does. It is the 'right thing to do', so they do it, in spite of the fact it is ridiculously shallow and meaningless. They do it because they have come to the assumption that everyone else responds well to such ultimately useless expressions as 'I am so sorry to hear that' and 'I will keep you in my thoughts' and 'Oh, I do hope things get better'. I find it pathetic, I have to say. And even more pathetic is that for a time, I did it too, but I am afraid that for the most part, it was more to push up my post count and to pass the time than out of any real empathy as I have no clue how anyone feels when someone dies as I have never felt any real grief when someone has died.

I prefer, if someone is having problems, to offer practical advice, not these token comfort words. Personally, hearing such comfort words only ever makes me feel awkward and annoyed anyway. I can guarantee that our ancestors didn't go around offering comforting words when the chips were down. I imagine they did something about it, or that life simply went on as you didn't have much choice then but to carry on and battle through. I find the set of social rules and expecteds that humans have created through the years...odd and unnecessary and ridiculous for the most part.

I find that the more of a "Feeler" they are, the more emotive they get. The really high end Feelers (those with high scores in this area) seem to create drama so they can "feel." When it reaches that point, it isn't about you anyway. It's about them. "I would want this if I were you." They are also mind blind in a sense because they can't understand someone who really does not appreciate that or understand it. That's why it is kind of amusing that they diagnose us and treat us as if we have the problem when it really goes both ways. I find very few mainstream people (as opposed to saying NTs) who can really empathize with me because the way my mind works is so far removed from theirs that they simply have no context left to understand it. So, it takes many examples with a great deal of detail before I find one that resonates with them. We have to find some kind of common ground in order for them to really understand. It's difficult and takes a great deal of work on both parts. Both parties get frustrated and exhausted. It's not impossible (except with high end feelers I've found), but it is extremely difficult. Maybe some day I'll figure out how to make a high end feeler understand that I really do want to be left alone. I still have work to do there in order to figure that out.


Empathy has become mixed up in all these empty social niceties that people habitually use. "How are you?" they ask, but really don't care. However, if you don't answer, they care about that and think it's rude. The fact of the matter is that it is rude to ask that when you really don't care. It would be better to just sit in silence and not indicate that you do care. But, that isn't the rule we are taught and they are just following the rules. We (Aspis and NT Thinkers) think it to death.


Here's the main difference I see. Mainstream people want other people's approval of their ideas and actions (usually unconciously). So, they will say things like, "He is hot, don't you think?" They want to know that someone agrees with them and the more someones that do the better. Being social really requires that need. If you care what others think and that they agree with you, you will be more disposed to following rules that are really made up and have no meaning outside of the fact that everyone agrees to follow them. This is what is meant by a social contract. It may have been an evolutionary trend where that brain was successful because as we became tribes, agricultural societies and industrial societies we had to do that to have a better chance at survival than the single predator.

The difference I see with most Aspies is that we don't have that natural predisposition to want to "fit in" or blindly follow the rules. It's just not there. We want to think everything to death. It's not enough for us to just blindly go along to blend in. That's why we stand out. (By the way, I know some NTs or mainstream people who do this as well, but they can blend in and understand if they want. The wiring isn't out to lunch like ours is, they conciously choose to do this.)


That is why you see such a weird dynamic in things like empathy where it has taken on almost a life of its own. It's become a self-replicating virus. It doesn't really bother me. I can see where it happened. I don't know that it will stay that way in a technological world. In fact, I don't believe that it will, but that's my opinion. Only time will expose what really happens.

That's really interesting, I'd never given it much thought before, but the number of times people have asked me if something's wrong or if I'm ok and I've wondered why they're asking is astounding..

The Meyers Briggs book would you tell you about this and give you the true tests. It's expensive. I've gone through the official Meyers Briggs test several times. I'm always the only INTJ in the room. It's a sad fact of my life that even my personality is bizarre. What are you going to do!

Anyway, the reason that Feelers are that way is because they feel things instead of thinking about them. That is how they process the world. You can be more or less of a feeler. If you have scores that are fairly equal between feeler and thinker, you do both and will when it suits you. Those are the balanced people and what you want to aim for. The extremes are high end Feelers and high end Thinkers. High end thinkers are like me. They see someone emoting and they kind of stare at them and think, "I wonder what would cause that reaction?" while the high end Feeler is feeling like you don't care how they feel. They are just opposite ways of taking in information and processing it.

If you read the whole thing, it demystifies behavior. It is really very good and the actual course, not the knock offs like the Kersey, would be of great benefit to Aspies because it would give you information about why people behave like they do. It explains all those times when we wonder, "Why are they doing that? What do they get out of it?" You start to see that really just is a different way of taking in information.

My philosophy is that we should each live our own lives, according to our own rules, and not worry what people think.

I think CockneyRebel needs a hug.

I'm practicing my feeler CockneyRebel! I need to practice my empathy!