On Youtube: Woman with Aspergers talks about Cho

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[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bccw0jVovKw[/youtube]

I was greatly impressed by what Alien8ted said, she expressed how I feel about the tragedy at VT and why it might have happened.

Ack, her constant crying really irritates me, no offence. I cannot watch it when someone is so emotionally demonstrative. I could never be on video while in that sort of a state. She seems to be using what happened as some sort of personal cathartic cleansing.

YEAH, what about ***MY*** autism? She hits frequencies that are PAINFUL to me! It takes her long enough to say that autistics might not be so bad, and then says a lot of that is due to her being budhist! She doesn't make AS, or the people that have it, look very good. I just hope she easily got VERY good grades at a good college, because she is setting things up for a big fall.

And she makes claims with no support. WHY is she making only $8/hour? HECK, she is a member of TWO protected classes, possibly three! And she has a MASTERS!! !! !! She is supposedly "One of the smartest persons on the planet"! And she is making $8/hour!?!?!? WHY?

She ALSO misuses pronouns, so her whole rant can be abused, etc... She says things she certainly doesn't want to. That also detracts from her entire rant.

Anyway, he put himself in a bad place, and was bad EARLY ON! I ADMIT that I couldn't have survived with the attitude, etc...., that I used to have. I ALSO ADMIT that I might not have ever changed. I was bullied. My senses are assaulted even TODAY, even by things like this video. Still, why would anyone go SO far, etc.... I pushed my talents in one area and in my special interest to the limit.

And, even though I am AUTOdidactic(I guess that makes sense for a guy with AUTism), I have always been considered the best. I may not be making nearly as much as I could if I wasn't autistic, but I am making a LOT more than $8/hour. I say that only to say that AS shouldn't be used so much as an excuse.

ADMITTEDLY, I am too nice with managing people. HECK, I interviewed a highly recommended person yesterday, and everyone thought he would PASS! He only got about 2.5% of the questions right! NOPE, I am NOT kidding. He seems to think he basically has the job.(Even though he wouldn't even ATTEMPT to answer 70% of the questions, and I told him that the real interviewer would be harder on him than I was.) I feel SO bad about flunking him with such a score, that I have only told 70% of the people, and want to talk with them before going further.

I have also been told I can't GIVE away gold.

Steve

Last edited by SteveK on 21 Apr 2007, 9:54 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I am very skeptic that Cho was autistic. An autistic would not PREMEDITATE a violent attack.

SteveK,

I make less than that. Of course it's probably more due to the lack of high-paying jobs and the crappy economy were I live than me having AS (hence the reason I'm back in school).

Oh, and her crying and over-dramatizing makes me cringe, too. And the fact she calls AS "the worse disease imaginable" makes me want to throttle her.

I'm not belittling her making so little, only that she claims it is SO tied to AS, etc... I give AS CREDIT for my being able to so easily make so much! Yeah, you and I agree in every respect you mentioned. Oh yeah, the US has declared war on me, and people like me, basically saying we don't exist! They are IMPORTING cheap labor because of that STUPID excuse. That has lowered quality, available work, and wages. LUCKILY, they are STILL higher than what I make, but they are less than HALF of what they were. That means I haven't even TRIED to get a raise in YEARS! BTW Don't believe the garbage about it being only IT. The first phase included EVEN secretaries and hotel workers! The second phase has ALREADY occured, and affects ******EVERYTHING*******! So it affects everyone in the entire US. Even hamburger flippers at mcdonalds and envelope stuffers.

Steve

So, everyone is different, even autistic people. You seem to be saying that what she says is not valid because she makes only $8 an hour. What does that have to do with the validity of what she says? I make $17.50 an hour--is what I say more valid than her because I make more? I'm sure you make more than both of us combined so, what, that makes what you say more valid and more representative of autistics or any other group?

And so what if she's a member of two or three protected classes? That just means it might be harder to fire her, not that people are going to pay her more money or hire her for higher-paying jobs. Her talents may lie in an area where it's hard to make as much money. You know yourself that there are fewer options for someone with autism--you almost have to be in something like computers or engineering to make good money if you're autistic, because an autistic person is almost sure not to be good at anything that makes big bucks but requires people skills, like being a sales rep or a high-up in management. (I'm not saying there aren't autistic people doing well in these areas--I'm just saying it's less likely for autistics than NT's with good social skills.)

So she used a word incorrectly--so what?

I understand that maybe she could have waited until she was less emotional to make her video, that excessive emotions might make NT's laugh and take her less seriously (or maybe not depending on the NT--many NT's do have compassion), and that strong emotions can make some autistic people uncomfortable.

But the salary thing really is upsetting to see on an Aspie board, where some people may have trouble even keeping jobs despite having high degrees. Please don't be swayed by conservative talk show hosts and politicians who think anyone can make the big bucks if they only try harder...I know you're conservative and that's fine but I didn't think you'd follow the party line on something like this!

I disagree about an autistic person, an Aspie, premeditating an attack. If a person was demented enough, they could simply obsess about the attack itself.

Due to the propinquity of the posts, I'll assume I have somewhat assuaged your concern about income. I'll leave it at that for now. And yeah, there is a huge group of jobs I would be bad at. I try to get on the periphery of them, and FAIL. If I succeeded, I could make a lot more. 8-(

Yeah, I AM in computers. When I was a kid, I aspired to go into electronic engineering. I guess I am lucky that I always wanted to work at my interest. FURTHER, when electronic prototyping became so much harder, and things changed a LOT, I switched to computers.

If you are talking, words mean a LOT! Some words, such as pronouns, affect EVERYTHING. One quote out of context, and her concerns about attacks against autistics become THREATS against NTs!

Again, sorry about the pay reference.

Steve

You know, she would actually have a point except for one thing: I've found that the people who play the sort of games she was talking about have severe problems of their own. Seriously, I'm very confident in this: a true NT is generally going to have a pretty gentle nature and won't particularly care to play those sort of games. As much as we aspies and auties may envy some of their advantages, those advantages convert into an ailment all their own if extended too far. Sometimes, a supposed NT is actually more of a sociopath than anything else. If we're going to focus on ways of preventing auties from becoming isolated to the point of making them a risk, we might as well put some focus on those who play a role in them being driven to this point. It takes one bully, whether the punches are verbal, nonverbal, or physical, to compromise the mental stability of several people, and the worst ones are those who have the easiest time of getting away with it.

Ooops, you must have been posting this at the same time I posted mine. Sorry about the politicial thing--I shouldn't have assumed just because you have conservative views that you would have the attitude I was mentioning--that was stereotyping on my part and very wrong and I apologize.

You're so right--there are so many people that are making crappy wages in this country, both AS and NT, despite working hard (some at more than one job) and having degrees.

Yes, we must have been posting at about the same time and I didn't see your previous post before posting. That's true about the pronouns--I've heard that some autistic people do have trouble with pronouns, is this true? She probably should've edited her video first--of course I don't know what kind of equipment she had. Or written down her thoughts first--she might have been nervous or something.

I can still understand her being emotional though--it's probably a very emotional topic to her and maybe it's hard to keep from crying. I doubt she cried to manipulate viewers--I think some Aspies cry as easily as some NT's or maybe even more so. Possibly crying easily is more frequent among Aspie women than Aspie men? I think she was sincere.

I did not realise it, but the video was an Empathy Test

I’m a big fan of Phillip K. Dick!

The Voight-Kampff Scale by the Pavlov Institute of Moscow, is a fictional Empathy test used by Blade Runner Rick Deckard (part psychometrician and part executioner) to detect an absence of empathy in Androids hiding in the general population. Once discovered, the Android is retired; a euphemism for execution.

Rick Deckard noted that, …’’she smiled innocuously- at variance with (the serious implication of) her words. … an android trait, possibly, he thought. No emotional awareness, no feeling-sense of the actual meaning of what she said. Only the hollow, formal, intellectual definitions of the separate terms.

Philip K. Dick, 1982: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, pp. 166-167

She may be in a situation where she has to deal with a lot of game-playing NT's with problems, and maybe has had a lot of them around her all her life (maybe her family was like that?) Maybe it's given her the impression all NT's are like that. I've certainly heard some Aspies talk about NT's as if all NT social life consisted of lying and playing games, when really, an NT who constantly plays those kind of games with others often will end up friendless themselves when everything comes back to them. But if a younger Aspie only has experience with those kind of NT's, how would they know that not all NT's are like that?

That is disturbing, but not that surprising if she is at a point now in her life where her Asperger's seems to be causing her the most problems. It's sad she feels that way, but it's her reality--it doesn't mean it's all Aspies' reality. (It's my reality too so I can totally identify. Not that it's the worst disease imaginable, but it does seem to cause me a lot of problems and not have any compensations like special talents or thinking skills that come directly from AS--maybe it's the same for her.)

But then it's probably not the best thing for NT's to hear someone say that, because it might reinforce misconceptions they already have about AS.....and then they will think that all Aspies feel the way she does.

Can anyone say "Borderline Personality Disorder?"

Geesh! I sure hope she doesn't get much airtime.