My best friends perception of AS, which bothered me

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Yesterday I was having lunch with a good friend of mine, and he and his girlfriend were talking about Albert Einstein. my friend asked me if I knew that Einstein had AS (my friend does not know that I have AS), and then proceeded to make a little joke about the pronunciation of the name Asperger's. I asked my friend why he thought Einstein had AS, and he said that Einstein was genius but a complete as*hole to his wife, and then said that there is where the trade off with AS is; you can be a genius or feel love for other people but you can't have both. This kinda bothered me, because even if it is true about Einstein that he didn't love his wife, that isn't me.

hes totally ignorant. no more no less

i kind of agree with him. a lot of people with asperger´s come off as as*holes quite often. And some just are as*holes to begin with.

Do we really think Einstein had Asperger's? I've read a couple of biographies about him, and he seemed like a fairly social animal. Maybe it was just easier to BE social back when Einstein lived -- I don't know. He definitely was awful to his first wife. I think that he had a bit of celebrity status, and therefore got away with misbehaving. If he did have Asperger's (which he may have) then he was more social than most.

As to your original post, yes, your friend was somewhat indelicate about Asperger's. I've been in this situation. My book review group was reading "the curious incident of the dog in the night-time" [in honor of the fact that I have a son with asperger's] and there was this lady that was new to the group, and didn't know me, and obviously didn't know anything about asperger's. She began to talk about how unappealing the main character was, etc., blah, blah, blah. There I sat, uncomfortably knowing that when she finally realized that I had a son with asperger's, she would feel horrible about what she was saying. Eventually I waited for an opportunity to naturally bring up the fact that I had a son on the spectrum, just so that she wouldn't continue on with her negative responses to the book and embarrass herself even more. Poor woman -- I think she was horrified -- and the next day she called and apologized profusely. I was impressed that she called.

These attitudes do definitely get under your skin, but unfortunately, we just need to tell ourselves that these people don't really know much about the issue.

I don't subscribe to the "trade off," supposition.

Being an Aspie does not automatically come with greater cognitive capacity. Having greater cognitive capacity does not automatically mean a lack of social coping skills. Having a lack of social coping skills is not the same thing as being an as*hole.

Einstein might well have been an Aspie, but we are in no position to do more than speculate. Far more important, to my mind, to see the scope of the spectrum in the real world, and the regular people going about their lives who are doing it within the context of their AS.

I run into this with my son and my husband from time to time. Some people with AS have a very direct way of communicating. Sometimes my husband seems like emotionally he doesn't care, when in fact he doesn't really see the gravity of the situation, and can come across as indifferent or uncaring when in fact he cares very deeply once he understands. My son orders me around sometimes, but it's not really him ordering, it's just him asking me for something without the expected social graces. Sometimes he has them, sometimes he doesn't. It doesn't mean he's a spoiled brat. Some NT"s differ in that opinion, but screw them I know better.

When an NT is looking at someone with AS, they are looking and interpreting behaviors/thoughts/words through NT eyes. What you call direct and honest, they call rude and insensitive, when in fact it's just a different way of communicating. It's like when someone is being accused of not listening, when in fact it's not that, it's the processing that is not happening and maybe the lack of ability to ask the right questions to understand. I constantly have to check myself and consciously think...is he not listening? or does he not understand? and then go from there. I often catch myself just assuming that there is no listening there, because with NT's that's usually the case. If you are not used to doing this, you fall under the NT way of interpreting what you are experiencing just by habit.

Take it from an NT...AS is hard to understand when you are NT and it took me a long time and a lot of reading to understand as much as I do now. I would imagine it's just as hard for those with AS to see NT's through NT eyes, as it is for NT's to see those with AS through AS eyes. Not to say there aren't AH's out there, there are. Too many of them IMO, however unfortunate as it is it sounds to me like your friend has been informed about AS by someone who doesn't have a clue. That is why real awareness is so important. This is a perfect opportunity to set your friend straight.

Yeah it is ridiculous. Most aspies are not geniuses.

At least he didn't call us, "ret*ds".

And remember, even being educated can give people skewed views of what Asperger's is. An guy I used to know was telling me about his brother, who has AS, and was sort of implying how hopeless he is... I usually don't tell people about my AS, but I told him right then and there. Shut him up well enough.

I don't think Einstein treating his wife poorly had anything to do with his possible Asperger's. It doesn't sound like anything an Aspie would do.

I hope we can get the word out that Aspies aren't any more messed up than the rest of humanity.