Controversy Swirling Over My Head

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I know more than a few of you have voiced outrage about my posting style here on WrongPlanet.net. My sense of humor is a little caustic sometimes; I like absurdity, irony, and satire. Anyway, many of you dislike precisely what I like and rather have a "safe haven" for Asperger's syndrome group support (the implication being that my posting style is disrupting this feeling of safety). I have admitted sometimes I like to stir up a little controversy and enjoy speaking against the consensus even if I don't truly believe what I am saying (playing devil's advocate or using Socratic irony). I intensely dislike "staleness" in opinion.

I am not here for group support in the highly sentimental way. Building people's self-esteem is not really a goal of mine; but I'm not trying to knock people down, either. I'm not here so that people can say, "Those NTs are evil! They beat me up and stole my lunch money again today! Woe is me!" and then respond, "There, there, it's okay. Those NTs are bad people, but we know how you feel! " I'm not traumatized if someone disagrees with what I say, and I didn't really expect such negativity over my sharp (as in it cuts through conventionally accepted beliefs like a hot knife through butter) humor.

When people react so strongly and so negatively to some of my posts, I wonder whether I really even have the same condition as them. I begin to review the symptoms of AS in my mind and recall that, yes, I do fit many of these symptoms despite the differences with other members.

For those of you who have forgotten, I will review how the symptoms of Asperger's affect me—why I am here:

• Social deficit
  
  • Trouble making friends
  • Miss or misunderstand nonverbal communication
  • Flat affect (little facial expression and flat tone of voice)
  • Awkward body language (as in I rarely use body language to communicate but some people read meaning into the positions my body happens to be in)
  • Tendency to one-sided conversation
  • Overly formal and pedantic language
  • Obliviousness to how people are truly reacting to me
• Stereotyped and restricted patterns of interest
  
  • Asperger's syndrome and the autistic spectrum
  • Abnormal psychology and psychiatry
  • Personality and social psychology
  • Linguistics (phonetics, phonology, dialectology, etc.)
  • The French language
  • Moral, social, and political philosophy
  • Politics
  • Geography (mainly maps and flags, really)
  • History (particularly ancient and medieval European history)
• Hyper- and hyposensitivities
  
  • Acute hearing despite sometimes hearing things garbled
  • Have great difficulty falling asleep if temperature is outside a small comfort range
  • Poor sense of smell (as a child I had a snorting tic; well, I guess it would have been considered a tic)
  • Does not notice small cuts immediately (as in I might have to see the blood to know I have a cut)
  • Feels the blood not circulate well through my limbs thus requiring me to shift positions in bed a lot to keep good blood circulation
  • Needs darkness, silence, and right climate to fall asleep comfortably
  • Does not always see/notice things that should be obvious despite having corrected vision

Does this mean you're going to stop trolling?

I don't know how not to troll. Saying provocative things sometimes is part of who I am. My words are naturally colored by my personality.

I've learned to resist, why can't you?

On a site full of Aspies, why do you think you were singaled out as being infalmmatory? Listing off symptoms a good portion of us deal with does nothing. It might if you were not surrounded by people who can work around this stuff.

And don't even THINK about saying "it's harder for me than you" after this post you put a little while back:

Granted, that was about phobias, but using your own logic and principles (i.e. if you can get over something, we can) than if we can get over something, you can.

I do disagree with the fact than anyone can overcome anything, personally; however, you have not presented yourself, in both apparent coherence and ability to overcome as cited above, as someone who is totally incapable of not trolling.

I'm not saying you need to be a social genius, or even "fit in." But THINK before you post something: What percentage of people here is this likely to piss off? If it's higher than 50%, you're probably trolling. Use that left brain and do the stats, based on past experience and previous reactions to similar posts, as well as criticism recieved for types of posts you have made.

I find phobias an embarrassing weakness, something one should work to purge. I do not have the same opinion of trolling; I actually enjoy it.


I think about it and think about how interesting and funny that post I'm about to make sounds. It's hard to judge my new posts based on previous ones because I read a comment as slightly provocative but not enough to piss anyone off. I tend to categorize the ideas expressed more as funny than inflammatory. When I'm about to type something that I realize would probably be genuinely upsetting, I do censure myself. My mind also, essentially, expresses itself by finding the ill logic in group conventions. Aside from my provocative posts and more stuffy posts about abstract concepts, I have very little to express.

Honestly, I don't find your posts to be so bad at all, and I think they're usually at least somewhat interesting to me. Yes, you can be a little cynical sometimes, but generally you seem to be sensible. There are certain members here that I think are overly rude and condescending, but you are not one of them.



As some of you may have noticed, I thought the same thing when I first joined this board (which wasn't that long ago, so I still might be a "n00b" in some people's eyes) and saw your posts (as well as some other people's), but eventually I realized that in spite of your different interests and outlook on life, you do have a lot in common with me after all. Now, there are a few members here that I still find hard to believe are Aspies (and some of them are undiagnosed, furthering my doubts), but that's another matter.

And I find it ridiculous that people are calling you a troll. Trust me, I've seen trolls, I've even been one myself (not here though ). I know what a troll is.

Earlier in this very thread you said you ENJOY stirring up controversy for its own sake, even if that means telling flat-out lies. Now you're saying you can't recognize the difference?

In light of some recent threads, I'll be issuing a friendly notice here that the mods will be watching this thread closely and that everyone here in this thread is to keep their tempers muted and pointer fingers holstered.

Thanks

Obviously you dont know what a troll is because by NeantHumain's own defenition a troll and has admitted he enjoys trolling. Someone who posts regularly to get an annoyed/upset reaction is a troll. Not that i am saying we should do anything about it or that it is such a terrible thing. He without sin should cast the first stone and all that.

NeantHumain has made interesting posts with good points of debate and has helped me me come to see weaknesses in my character and WPs as a group and i thank him for it. I will however be sceptical of the validity of anything he posts here without evidence to back it up.

Sorry, nothing I've seen NeantHumain post strikes me as a troll post. He may have admitted to trolling, but I think he was only admitting to the definition of trolling that a lot of people seem to have on here, which is not one that I'd agree with. IMHO, posting something that's brutally honest or that's bound to spark controversy doesn't constitute trolling if there's also some substance to it, which (IMHO) is the case with NeantHumain's posts. Also, at least Neant balances these types of posts with ones that couldn't be classified as troll posts by any standards. The people I think of as trolls are those with the sole purpose on a community is to post blantantly outrageous and/or offensive messages with no substance. Or, if they do post non-trollish material, they do it under a separate alias.

Of course, there's no universal definition of a troll, and everyone's entitled to their own opinion. But I view quite a few other message boards, and I can say that at least two-thirds of the active posters on those boards would be considered trolls by some of the people here.

Fair enough. Everyone is entitled to their opinion.

*does a Mr. Bean and, amidst much trembling, slowly removes her index finger and thumb from inside her jacket and lays them on the floor...*

I've never found you offensive personally Neant, your posts have been thought provoking to me. I don't know if youve heard of the comedian Chris Morris who did the "Brass Eye" tv show, but I always thought your posts were the WP equivalent of that show,ie offensive parody to make a point.

chris morris is a genius.

however, look at all the furore when people "didn't get" his programme on paedophilia. it's a fine line to tread, especially with people who can take things literally, not recognise irony or sarcasm, etc. i often don't realise when people are joking, and that's why i use those ghastly bloody emoticons, so that others can be sure when i'm joking (i am The Queen of Irony in real life)...

I like emoticons now !