Meeting social expectations versus social skills.

Post Reply New Topic

Real simple I'm sick of all this NT crap about developing social skills.


So much of it is mimmicking nt's to the point that we don't appear different.

Making eye contact, isn't a social skill, it's a social expectation.


Being socially considerate is a social skill, like being able to predict what makes others happy.

There's such different things.

Theres a faint line drawn for NT expectation to AS ppl.

If a guy is in a wheelchair, you make exceptions to his inability to play football. Because AS is in your head, ppl expect you to "grin and bear it" alot when situations arise.

Why the hell should WE immitate THEIR behvaiour to fit in because it makes them uncomfortable?

Developing social skills is useful for NT and ASD people. We live in a society. As such, there will always be certain expectations or else society would breakdown, no?

There are certain things that do not come naturally to me that I do anyway because it is expected and makes life easier for me. I imagine this is true for strictly NT people as well.

Are you saying that aspies and auties should not be expected to comply with any social rules, expectations, or conventions? I have a hard time envisioning how life would work if that was true. The "rules" provide general parameters for everyone. Granted, some of the rules may be too complex to be readily learned by people on the spectrum, but I don't think recognizing that means that people on the spectrum should just summarily dispense with trying to meet any social expectations. Is that what you are suggesting? Are you saying learning social skills is useful, but simply adhering to social expectations is not? Or are you just frustrated?

Why should I comply with social rules?

Unfortunately there's a big problem with not adhering to social expectations. I agree that in theory, we shouldn't be expected to behave in certain ways to make others feel comfortable if that's not what feels natural to us, and I think most NTs would agree that they wouldn't like having to do that either. However, we live in a society where in order to keep a job, maintain peaceful relationships with other people, and generally manage the necessary interactions of life, we have to do it anyway. There is simply no way around it. I suppose you could choose to live as a hermit in a cave somewhere and completely ignore social rules there, but if we are to be part of human society then the options are to learn and adhere to at least some of its rules, or be treated as an outcast or an invalid and be unable to function independently.

It would be nice if there was an alternative, like being able to move to an Aspie-land where these expectations didn't exist, but sadly that's not the case. The best any of us can do is try to carve out an existence which fits our unique needs as best we can, such as finding careers with minimal interaction with people who don't "get it".

^^^

So true. It would be great if the world was ideal for each individual, but it's not, and that's the unfortunate truth.

I think even in Aspie-land some kind of social conventions and rules would have to exist. Otherwise no one would ever know what to expect from any social interaction, and to me that sounds like the biggest Hell imaginable. To not be able to predict what would happen. To have no guidance regarding what is expected of me. How would one function?

As I said one clearly should be considerate of other people, and develop ways to communicate, and to get along.

MY problem is that were expected to do things that do not fall under these categories.

Alot of it comes down to I speak this way, you should too or go back to where you came from.

There are so many things that nt's expect and do, that we shouldn't have to bare with. Rhetorical questions, body movements, etc etc. There not social skills there expectations.

Just as speaking english isn't a social skill but a cultural ability, so are many many other concepts, that nt's take for granted.

I think by given in, and adapting to things that are totally unantural were selling ourselves short.

Were essentially vulcans after all, would should be able to find our own ways of being.

Obviously communication skills and the ability to be considerate are hugely important however, it's counter productive to develop mimicry skills.

Tyranny by majority. Look, unless you want to make your own AS communities, isolated from NTs (and can do it economically), you're going to have to grin and bear it. The end.

We shouldn't. Doing anything for no other reason than that is is "expected" by others, is a terrible reason for doing it.

I do it though, because it makes my own life better. I'm able to get things done because I get help from others doing it. With NO social skills, that's practically impossible. Unless you count the kind of "help" that you never asked for, that is intrusive and highly annoying. The fact that learning social skills happens to please others is just a side effect.

And it's really not that bad of a side effect.

It adds up to a philosophy I learned to adopt a long time ago, that has helped me out a great deal in life:

"I'm going to do what I need to do, even if it's what you want me to do and pleases you."

The difference between nts complying with conventions and autistics doing the same is that it is easier and naturaler for nts to comply. I don't buy that nts are like this too nts have trouble with this too nonsense. The trouble is not on the same level.

True dat! ^^ (I like that word "naturaler" too by the way. )

It's the naturalest way to mean more natural, yep yep yep.

It is muchly more better it is!

NTs don't meet all social expectations either.
And in some cases it would be immoral to meet a social expectation, such as it was a social expectation for the Nazi soldiers to take the Jews to the camps and load them into gas chambers.

I agree society needs expectations to function, but I think far too often people translate that as "Any expectations" and think in terms that anything that is an expectation will help society hold together and do well. That's just not the case. Some things are very positive, some things are neutral, and some things are negative, and some things are mixed. Although in the end nothing is truly "neutral", because making something a social expectation necessarily entails that people will be judged on it in some way and this is a cost to everyone since if it's about something that doesn't really matter someone who could've otherwise contributed a great deal to society could be prevented from making it up the ladder to the point of being able to do that.

Society doesn't need expectations to function, it needs the RIGHT expectations. Social anomie(normlessness) would be preferable to a society that has all the wrong expectations in that at least then a society with the right ones could potentially emerge (social anomie is unstable and doesn't last).

I think there is a world of difference between social expectations and social skills and NTs should be more precise about it instead of characterizing everything as "social skills". It isn't a failure of social skills if you know something will come off as rude and then say it. In fact your social skills are being used with precision if it's directed at a person you desire to be offended, and sometimes NTs do that. If they are allowed to do it, so should we.

It's only a failure of social skills when say you are rude and it didn't occur to you, or you didn't understand the joke. If you know all the social information but defy social convention that's not a matter of social skills at all, that's how you are using them.

I fully agree. Social SKILLS should be a separate category from conformity to social expectations.

Another person in this thread wrote:


At least SOME social expectations are necessary. However:

In the long run it should be possible for the autistic community to raise public awareness about specific social expectations that tend to be especially difficult for many autistic and autistic-like people, such as eye contact rhythms.

Social conventions regarding eye contact differ radically from one culture to another. Even within the modern West, the importance of eye contact varies somewhat by locale. (According to my boyfriend who has lived in different parts of the USA, eye contact is much more important in California than in NYC.)

On such culture-dependent matters, social change ***IS*** possible if enough of us work on it together long enough.

When I say that social change is possible, I speak from experience. I've been intermittently involved in the LGBT rights movement (I'm bisexual) since the late 1970's (when it was known as just the gay rights movement). That movement has succeeded beyond my wildest dreams. I always expected SOME progress, or I wouldn't have bothered, but, back in the 1970's and 1980's, I never dared to imagine that gay marriage would one day be legal within my life time.

This year my main "special interest" has been studying the autism community. I notice that the autistic rights movement HAS succeeded in persuading at least some parts of the psych and educational establishments that it's NOT a good idea to try to totally stop autistic kids from stimming.

On the other hand, as far as I can tell, teaching eye contact is still a top priority for ABA therapists, and no one in the autism research establishment seems to be even remotely considering the idea that teaching modern Western eye contact rhythms might conceivably have any bad side effects whatsoever on at least some autistic kids, such as diminished capacity to concentrate on the content of a conversation.

Social conventions regarding eye contact are an issue of great importance to me personally. Whether or not I am officially diagnosed as "autistic," I certainly do have the autistic-like trait of having extreme difficulty with eye contact. In my case, I can make brief eye contact at the beginning of a conversation, but, once I get into the conversation, my mind almost completely disengages from any and all visual stimuli, so I have no idea what my eyes may or may not be looking at. Any attempt to regulate what my eyes are looking at makes it extremely difficult to focus on the content of the conversation itself.