Autistic Culture?

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I think there is an Autistic Culture, just like any other ethnicity. Personally, I find 'our way' perfectly natural since we're logic based, not emotive/social based. Do others here find the same? For ex: There is a deaf culture, wtih their own rules and ways. All cultures have rules, but ours do not seem arbitrary since their based upon the natural order of logic. I guess the 'real world' is hard sometimes since others have mysterious social rules which can be arbitrary and even harshly judgmental. I like Wrong Planet since we're basically free from these conventions.

Just this week I've been slammed, hard, by an outside source that simply doesn't use, understand, or recognize logic. With logic there is a pattern and sequence, like a rythym. Do others here find this true? Is this why it's often hard for Auties/Aspies to fit into cultural normalities? Is our way too different? I am struggling right now and feel hurt. In the 'real world' I do see gross injustice, where innocents are hurt and discriminated against - unacceptable! But apparently I am alone in this amongst many (not all) neurotypicals.

Sometimes neurotypicals (I do not use this word with any value-judgment, just neutral term to designate 'that who is not autistic') are so emotive and are confined by their own arbitrary unstated rules, which defy logic. I am hurt. I hate seeing others hurt by so-called 'important people,' whom I do not necessarily recognize as important. I base whom I respect on their merit, not another's perceived status.

But, do you think what I've described (Autistic Culture) is too isolating for us? I am really struggling hard with this. I cannot pretend to be not autistic and I never will. Mostly I do fine, but then I feel like I'm slamming into that impervious impenetrable wall. Ouch!

Actually, I've found most things to be logical if looked at the right way. Sometimes it's stupid, but most things do make sense. Tell me what's illogical, and I bet you a cookie I'll be able to figure it out.

Moving on to your question, IMO there isn't an innate autie or aspie culture. There isn't an innate deaf one either.

Cultures are not something that just are, they're stuff people make up as they go along. The aspie culture is what is being created right now, with this post, and all the other posts in this forum. As we interact, experiment, play, we are creating our own society, our own common understanding. So of course there is an aspie culture; you're looking at it.

My logical nature is a huge part of my social problems. I'm an impulsive correcter of bad reasoning, with good intentions of course but it always leads to people getting offended for reasons I can't understand.

BTW, is that your lab, LabPet?

Yes, one from the University, but no my usual (it's a mess in this photo, btw - not my fault )

I completely understand about that invariable misinterpretation - I often am so hurt, left having to explain to another why. And I can't. It's as if I speak a different language. They have their arbitrary mysterious social rules and I operate by Occam's Razor.

At least here, WP, there are like-minded. That's not to so all other outsiders are unkind - they're not. Some are mean, yes, some just don't understand, and some don't care. Or combination of. Scary.

Cultures are molded by the inhabitants and we are a culture. In fact, if you Google 'Autistic Culture' there are multiple hits. Interesting, from an anthropologist's viewpoint. Apparently the Internet has accelerated what is identified as autistic culture since this is a good medium for our communication style.

I've seen some pretty damn emotional people with Asperger's (autism too, tantrums due to being unable to be understood comes to mind).

You'll find that people with ASDs tend to be severe in certain aspects, and minute in others; high intelligence in one area, average to poor in another.

You'll see people with ASDs exhibit all of the usual emotions, some may be more pronounced, others diminished; the same with the cognitive ability.

There may be a total lack of a certain emotion, just like speech, but like those who're nonverbal, a total lack of emotions is rarer than not.

I wouldn't be too willing to subscribe to an "autie"/"aspie" logical and moral standing compared to "NTs" who have a different one; one "aspie" compared to another is just as different as one "autie" to an "NT".

Culture comes to be when people are outcasted.

At first they try to not be outcasted. Then when kicked repeatedly they decide, fine...I'll just go find others who won't.

I get emotional at times. Then there are times when all emotions seem to shut off.

Yes, we are a culture, but like the Hydra, many heads.

I see groups within, centered on something. Science the common language for some, and other views for others.

We are not like the deaf, till they come up with ten types of being deaf.

We are not like the disabled in wheelchairs, normal except in body.

We are not one with the mentally ill. Autism is not Psychiatric.

we are not defective and ret*d. It is not a Developmental Disability, we do develop normally.

To us, language works, but hearers do not.

So we turn to Science, Art, Music, Math, where some can hear us.

We have many cultures.

We who survived a world without the new and ill defined words now used.

We who just found we were not the only one.

I have some traits more than others, or at least expressed.

With no knowledge of what, I survived a hostile world, filled with toxic people.

I made my own space in a world I now call NT.

It is a culture, of one.

The Lab Pet is younger, smarter, cuter, and sees the same world I do. A culture of two.

Autism is simple.

Five blind men describe an elephant,

One touches the tusk, and says it is like a rock,

One the trunk, and says, it is like a snake,

One the side, and say it is like a wall,

One the leg, and says it is like a tree,

One the tail, and says, it is like a rope.

Autism is simple,

It should be stopped through abortion,

they should be locked away where real people do not have to see them,

they should be changed with electroshock everytime they act autistic,

they should be put on drugs, for better zombie than auti,

it is their fault for not trying to fit in,

they exist to make NT's feel superior to something.

We seem to have no communication problem with each other, and some common traits that never made the DSM.

Sub species seems to be a better description. Marked variation to the species, common factors that identify.

We have great problems interacting with the general world, and it is basically their fault.

We come here for rest and suport, and it is nothing like out there. Here we are just real people.

We all have problems with the world, and suffer, yet there are millions of us in the US.

I went and looked at Autistic Anthropology. Some good leads. Different communication style, in person, interesting results when we meet. A commonality in work methods, hard to get started, then hard to stop. Non system organization.

A key point. We are one, the rest of the world is a pecking order. My coping method is I am a pecker.

I attack to start with, hence peck and establish order, then they can deal with me. If I do not, and they do expect it, they often go into a pecking frenzy. That seems to be the reason we get attacked, bullied, a lack of role playing in the dominance order disrupts the NT brain. They do not deal with equals.

Here, across age, gender, we are all equal, a bunch of ones.

As all forms of organization are based on the human pecking order, that does not work for us, nor can we understand it.

Mutual support works for us, we will all join in helping a one, for we identify, then we go our seperate ways.

When I take responsability for another, I find it easy to stay focused on that. It often benefits me, but I would work less, just for me, but put drive behind helping another. I do not feel that motivation towards the world, just one other.

It is in my business. I print for others, and in the world, such people are customers. They expect less than perfect. I treat each customer as the only one, and I work for them. I am not just selling a product, I am supporting them at a personal level. I get good feedback.

Our method of dealing with the world works, I am rated higher than the NT version of the same.

So we do have a distinct culture.

Being so rare and spread out we never meet, the Internet being our world, where we can. It is also my path of business. We latched on to Science, Music, as a means of communicating when our words did not, but here our words work. We are all ones, but do have a common culture, which is strange for a people who never met. We are the diffused tribe.

Next step is I am enjoying working with some ones from here. It is treating your neighbor like yourself, which is all we can do anyhow. It works if your neighbor is also a one.

I have plans for enlarging my business, and for bringing in other ones. I can see that traditional methods and goals will not work. So I am working on how we work together, how we could live as a community, and develop an economy.

We are a culture, we need a tribal village and economic base. What we need most is to learn from one another. We do not have to be in the same place, or doing the same things, we just need a center of focus.

I think we do have great economic and educational potential.

I have heard of people making good money in the real world selling things for use in Sims. That is something of my model, a physical place, real machines, real people, and a virtual web network that is an extended version.

As an example I print fine art, and I can turn an email attachment into a highest quality print, paper or canvas, and have it out the door by Priority mail in a day. I can print one, or five or ten copies of a book, which might take a few days, and am working on plastic parts that would take months, which is fast in that industry.

Some of the businesses I deal with I know everyone from the web. I know their age, education, history, family members, children, pets, and they are very real to me, but we have never met.

I think this type of a Semi Sim World might work for us. My publishing located on a farm would have business, employment, education, and space to go off and be alone when you want to. I have never had much use for clocks. Getting to work on time wastes my potential for work.

I sleep till I wake up, mope around and drink coffee, but when I get too it, I can turn out some work. I only want to give my best stroke. I also live 27 hour days, so I am not in sync with much.

We need a place where our physical culture can self define. We need a Haven that grants Sancuary.

Living in an Autistic world is something I look forward to.

LabPet,
does culture mean the same thing as community?

Communities can have cultures, and be part of cultures.

I wasn't aware that there could be such a thing as 'Autistic Culture.' I know a few ASpies in real life and I don't get along with them. They have the same problem with social interaction that I do, thus 'doubling' the same sort of problem I have with neurotypicals. In order to build a culture, people have to communicate (in whatever special way they do) and I just don't see anything along those lines with anyone I know in real life who may or may not have some form of ASD. Maybe it could be a form of 'hermit' culture, if there is such a thing. Otherwise culture, as I understand it, really doesn't apply in this case.