Conservative environment?

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Hey,

I was wondering if anyone other than me was raised as a conservative Christian, and if so do you get the feeling that being sheltered like that might make Asperger's worse? I kind of do, but I could also buy that it might be a reverse causation (conservative Christianity might be popular in my family because I know of at least two other Aspies, and they might like the structured rules that come with it. Also, we live in the South, which is definately a factor).

Really can't answer that question without engaging in stereotyping. And I've known enough conservative Christians to know better.

My parents were politically liberal and Episcopalian (the American version of The Church of England, or the Anglican church, founded by Henry VIII to circumvent Catholic divorce laws; not evangelical).

However, I was raised in a highly structured and traditionalist environment. It was almost militaristic. There were rules about every detail of day to day life, and "Because the Bible says so" was the answer to a lot of questions. I had to go to church every Sunday until I turned 18 and I was not permitted to openly question anything about Christianity or even learn about other religions. Criticizing or questioning parents was not allowed, including talking about things a parent had done that might be frowned upon. The reason for this was the commandment, "Honor thy mother and father." My parents were also very selective about what books, movies, and TV shows were OK to "be exposed to". So I have a feeling that it may have been similar to a conservative Christian environment. Maybe it even counts as one?

In the past, I blamed a lot of my AS traits on being raised in this environment. I was very culturally naive because I had been sheltered from popular culture and prohibited from interacting with adults outside the family unless it was in a structured setting like a class at school. It was easy for me to blame all my social awkwardness on this. But I don't think it actually caused my AS or literally made it worse. I think it just made it harder to compensate for it, or to make it less obvious, if that makes sense.

just wondering... were you diagnosed as a child, i.e.
did AS play an explicit part in this strict upbringing?

i am the opposite -
totally religion-free upbringing
(which i consider good)
total lack of strictness & structure in youth
(which i consider very bad in retrospect)

I had a New Age/existentialist sort of upbringing, that started out nominally Presbyterian and then went into an intellectual, artistic, non-churched mindset.

No, my family even my grandparents are surprisingly liberal. Not sure about their beliefs but I've always gotten the impression that my dad is Agnostic (Wouldn't have ever heard of the term though) and that my mother is either non denominational Christian or Deist.

I know that religion has always been an extremely small part of our lives, my mother's Bible for example has been gathering dust for years but that's pretty common in my experience. I think around here religious beliefs are much more of a personal thing.

I was raised Mormon/LDS and just left the church a few years ago. I'm 31.

Being a member, believing certain things, may not have made my AS symptoms worse, but it certainly made me feel like a failure, worthless, etc. I never could be the perfect Mormon Girl and beat myself up about it for years. The 2 best things I ever did for my self esteem was quitting mormonism and getting an AS diagnosis. Now I know why I'm different and that makes me feel a lot better about myself. I'm no longer trying to put my square peg self into a round hole.

I was diagnosed as a child, but not with AS because it wasn't being diagnosed back then. My AS traits were documented and presented to the psychiatrist, but I was given a diagnosis of ADD - Predominantly Inattentive Type. A lot of aspies my age were diagnosed with that because it was the closest thing to AS at the time. In the early 80s, an autism DX was reserved for children who were basically non-verbal and had a lot of classic autistic behaviors. My DX was switched to AS only last year.

I don't know if the diagnosis affected my upbringing, but I don't think it did. My parents were like that before I was diagnosed and my brother was brought up that way even though he wasn't diagnosed with anything. They were stricter with me in some ways, but I think that was because I was the oldest and a girl. They held the traditional belief that girls should be sheltered and protected more than boys.



Interesting. So you think it's best to bring children up in a structured, secular environment? Or just to avoid extremes?

Do you think there was any cause and effect relationship between the way your parents raised you and your diagnosis or the way you experience AS?

How were your parents politically liberal? It sounds like they are ultra-conservative.

Nope, diagnosed in college. I think my parents didn't want to admit anything was wrong, beyond general misbehavior. Also, the fact that my dad almost certainly had it probably made it less obvious.

Oh, and just comparing myself a bit more to EvilKimEvil, I'm still sort of a Christian, but it's my own version of Christianity (Paul is a heretic because I say he's a heretic, nothing he wrote counts, and creationism is an abomination against God ). I feel better about myself now that I'm more liberal, but that wasn't why I originally gave up hard-core Christianity (I was kind of tired of hearing how all my friends were going to hell, and I was going with them if I didn't try to force my belief system on them).

Hardcore Christianity is terrible for Aspies I think. I mean, if you really like it it'd be great, but if you're not it's really hurtful to hear your parents talk about how horrible of a son/daughter you are because you're so different, and they expect to pray over all your differences so that God can "heal" you.

I used to live in a Mennonite village (Mennonite - one of the Anabaptist churches) in Saskatchewan. I actually liked it save for some rules - and especially some rules now that I have lived in the big city for almost 20 years now. My parents are meandering but are quite evangelical. They go to Southern Baptist churches and the sort... I've feigned away from it.

I had a variety of viewpoints growing up. My interest was Dinosaurs from before Kindergarten to 5th grade. One of my Aunts was a Biology Prof. at DVC and she helped me understand the Theory of Evolution, Marine Biology and the Radical left stupidity (which she endorsed) Of SDS, Weather Underground et al. In the meantime I walked away from the Methodist Church at age 7 because they refused to answer questions that made them uncomfortable. I don't even remember the questions now, just that the smug ,strict bastards would not answer them. So at 7 I declared myself an atheist. From age 9 to about 11 I spent time at the Concord Naval Weapons Station, in the Gym I would watch and listen to the Marines doing Riot Training while I waited for Judo class to start. I also was allowed to hang out with my brothers and our friends at the Tug Boat office and dock area when they were not loading bombs on the AE Ships to be sent to Vietnam. My stepfather at the time was a violent drunk a**hole but we all liked the guys he worked with at the Tug Office. About 40% of them had tours in Vietnam mostly Brown water Navy trips on the Mekong River and tributaries. They were not self aggrandizing in any manner. They spoke in general terms of the hassles of keeping guns and Boat engines running properly, and very specifically about r&r and being stationed in the Phillipines. My older brother joined the Marines, I joined the USN and a step brother from another of my moms marriages went Army. Even though there seems to be a heavy Bias against the Military on Wrong Planet I have never regretted my decision to serve.

They voted Democratic and agreed with the Democratic party on most major political issues. They were ultra-conservative when it came to personal / family life, though.

Actually a lot of people in my extended family are like that: politically liberal to varying degrees yet very traditional / conservative when it comes to their own lives. I'm descended from the Puritans, and I think that culture has survived to some extent . . .

secular: that would be best - if you are secular
structured: YES, in retrospect
Or: i don't really understand the or in the question; so:

structured & secular TO avoid extremes??? no

i don't see religious-structured vs secular-liberal as
natural pairs - there is no true opposition in them
(sorry, got to rethink&rephrase that)

i simply do not see the need for religion in my philosophy;
although i have a theoretical interest in religion as a
psychological & social (and literary) phenomenon -
i simply don't do metaphysics myself -
and i have totally not been brought up religiously (nor anti-r)

whether my upbringing in that sense suited me, or i came to suit my upbringing, is ..., an interesting question actually (surprisingly - i found myself earnestly answering my own rhetorical question): it suited me
(which follows from the observation that i was very much neglected and left to my own devices - so i am largely the product of my own upbringing)

had i known i had AS at a decent age, no doubt assistance would have been sought; if so, & heard of executive dysfunction as an integral part of AS - i would not have come undone in every aspect of life

not knowing that i have AS-ed + way-too-free an upbringing
has combined in undisciplined self-wreckage around fifty -
yes, i could have done with just a little bit of attention & structure from ... someone - anyone would have done

i can take some pride in having lasted so long
but pride won't keep the fire burning

i asked the question as it seems structure is so important in auti & aspie life

Personally, I have nothing against the military. I have more of a problem with the president having absolute authority over it. I want to come up with some system where, in the event of catestrophic incompetence (ie Iraq) in the white house, some third-party group (possibly the UN or NATO) has the authority to give the army a direct order to stand down, arrest the president, and escort him to some internationally held territory for trial (assuming that, like Bush, his orders constituted war crimes). Of course, we'd also need to make sure the system prevented orders like "invade your own country" from being obeyed (not that the soldiers would likely obey them anyway), but still have it provide a check on US imperialism and Executive power. If that happened I can imagine alot of the anti-military sentiment would go away. Regardless, I disaprove of alot of things the US military is currently doing, I don't think it's the military's fault, though.

Just letting you know.



I'd actually disagree with this. I've heard that it's easier to leave religion that to come into it, so it might be best if children were raised with some kind of feel-good "God loves you" faith on a minor scale, and were allowed to choose for themselves without prejudice later on.