"Normal" people are stupid...

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I have feigned interest down to a fine art........after 36 years, I can maintain it for a short while.

While my friend is banging on about her babies teething problems or some issue that does not merit much attention, you nod and say "ahah" and "hhhmmm" and "I see" and "wow, that must be hard" and so on. It is not that I don't care as such, it is just mind- numbingly boring. Oh and maintain some kind of eye contact if you can.......and while you do all this think of something cool. I think of black holes, or building a machine based on the principles of photosynthesis to convert CO2 to O.......or some other thing.

I have only been busted a few times......but trying to maintain that level of focus for the sake of social etiquette can be really draining especially when tired.

Take care and make sure you have contact with at least one person a week who stimulates you if you can.

Mics

I'd like to chime in if I may.

Cactus man, I have AS, but I think I am on the "cusp" of what you would call an NT. I only have a mild touch of AS, and I have learned a lot about the way the NT brain works, and I do pretty well in society (although I don't always act like an NT I will admit).

The problem ISN'T that NT's are stupid. But rather, activities that require learning or concentration, like school or work, are often mentally draining to an NT, even if those same activities give you enjoyment and stimulation. After a long hard day of work or school, NT's plain and simply don't want to learn or concentrate anymore! That's why they engage in "Small talk". Small talk is like a kind of relaxing drug for NT's, allowing them to still connect and communicate with people, but in a way that requires little mental effort. I have AS, and I am still able to engage in small talk. Small Talk is not a bad thing, and people with AS need to quit believing it is.

Another reason for "small talk", is the possibility of a funny or interesting story being shared (like your friend being pulled over, that's interesting). Pushing the conversation into political matters and a bunch of legal mumbo jumbo..... most NT's WON'T find that interesting.

Hope this helps explain it a little.

There is no mild Asperger's. There are just people with Asperger's with very high IQs (130+) and people without as well as people with Asperger's with lots of life experience and people with Asperger's with little life experience. IQ and life experience determine how strong your symptoms are.



While small talk may not be as pointless as it seems at first sight, it's just completely boring to me. Real conversations are much more interesting and I find most NTs (especially women) quite shallow in general.



Still, this can also lead to funny annecdones.

To answer the OP - in some ways, NT's are more communicationally challenged than we are. At least we know we have problems and try to work around them. Most NT's I know think the way they communicate is the way everyone else ought to do it. never mind that some people need to communicate a little differently. It amazes me the number of people who don't make any effort to talk to me when I am nice to them. OK, I can be a little off-putting and I am not the most interesting person alive but I have always believed that if someone is noce to you, you should be nice to them. As much as I lack empathy (which is totally), I remain at a loss to understand how supposedly neurologically normal people have little or no patience with those that are a little different from them.

Don't get me started on that topic again. I agree that as shallow as NT's are, NT women are in a whole new catogory of shallow all by themselves. Whilst I can form passable acquaintenceships with men, I can never get this far with women. I attribute this to NT women being too shallow consider that a man with a handicap is still a person.

... which makes them ignorant and arrogant.



NT people feel uncomfortable with people they don't understand and can't relate to. It's creepy to them.



I disagree with your conclusion. IMO NT women are much harder to relate to and become friends with as an Aspie man because :
- women are more empathic/emotional (thus also less logical) than men and therefore more likely to feel uncomfortable with people who are "different"
- women are more shallow and therefore less likely to be interested in Aspie interests
- there usually is at least some sexual tension between heterosexual males and heterosexual females

That's pretty much what I said. In particular, your first two points expand on what I was getting at. I have to question how "empathic" women are if they are unable to handle people who are "different". Surely part of the definition of empathy is being able to see things from the other person's perspective. In this case, trying to understand how things are for an Aspie male. I think a better word to use would be "ignorant".

From a neurological point of view, empathy is nothing but the sub-conscious processing of non-verbal cues and the subsequent generation of matching emotions. This works fine for NT people, but with people who are mentally deviant people these sub-conscious processes simply fail and emotions generated are not in synch with the other person's emotions. Because most NT people are not aware of this, they tend to draw the wrong conclusions.



Ignorance is definitely relevant, but not just for women. This doesn't explain the difference between the sexes.

I don't think of myself (or other Aspies) as "mentally deviant" To me, the word deviant implies "bad" (for example, sexual deviant). I am not bad for being an Aspie. I am merely different. I tend to think of myself as "perceptually altered". To me, this has no connotations to it either way. I aapreciate this may come across as waxing semantics but I do believe in the power of subconcious expression.

You raise a valid point - if NT's do not know about AS, they will tend to - quite innocently, I believe - draw the wrong conclusions. Therefore, there is some onus on ourselves to educate those we are going to want to talk with on a regular basis. I ave never actually been able to this from a combination of not knowing how to do it and fear of rejection.


I have always found it easier to communicate with NT men than NT women. I think this has to do with the superficial nature most most NT women have that only some NT men have. I think this is reflected in the general nature of sexual relationships experienced by handicapped people at large. Handicapped women don't seem to have much trouble finding "normal" men who accept them as they are. I believe this is because men deep down value others for who they are. This being the case, when meeting a women with a handicap, the normal man will not automatically reject her as unworthy. He may reject her because he does not like her personality or whatever but that is a different matter. Certainly, I have seen lots and lots of obviously handicapped women with men who - again obviously - love them deeply. With handicapped men, the picture is less rosey. Women's general superficiality tends to lead them to reject handicapped men on sight as being unworthy. I am not sure if a man being handicapped - in the female mind - translates to being less masculine but it is the same result. I have always noted that NT women are put off by my general appearance at first sight. It would not occur to an NT woman to think, "Why is he like that? Perhaps I should ask and learn more about him". I have noted that most other handicapped men I see in public and have known as friends always seem to be alone. There is the odd handicapped guy who hits it lucky - and good for them - but by and large, the depth of character needed to look beyond a handicap is just way beyond most females. I recall reading a study somewhere on the sexuality of handicapped men and the general conclusion was that sexuality and handicapped men are often mutually exclusive.

The ultimate hypocracy is that women will deny this if asked.

Whether you use "deviant", "different" or "altered" is indeed just a matter of semantics. I personally use the term "deviant" because however you look at it Asperger's Syndrome remains a form of "abnormality". I consider e.g. homosexuals, blind people or highly gifted people as "deviant" as well for the same reason.



The problem is that you can't just tell everyone you have Asperger's. Many people will think less of you because of it either because they see you as handicapped or because they believe you're just using Asperger's as an excuse not to work any more on yourself than you already are doing. This is why I would never mention it to a colleague or just random aquaintances but only to friends and people who have Asperger's themselves.

Stilll, you can explain to people that you are different from other people in the way you think and behave and if they are openminded enough that should be all they need to know besides a few social scripts on how to deal with those differences.



On one hand you say you don't consider yourself deviant, yet on the other hand you call yourself handicapped all the time. Hmmmm......



I'm not sure about this analysis. I would say lack of self-confidence and miscommunication are far greater issues than us being considered handicapped. In fact, my Asperger's isn't very obvious to most people who don't see me every day yet I still find it extremely hard to seduce women who haven't already fallen in love with me from online conversations...

People do tend to fear what what they don't understand - this certainly hold true for psychological conditions. Just look at the discrimination the menatally ill face on a daily basis. NOTE: I am not implying that Austism is a mental illness - I am using mental illness as an exmaple to illustrate a point. I don't think there would be too many people whom I meet who would not realise I am significantly impaired. Having said that, I think most people I meet would acknowledge that I make a huge effort to be as communicative and socially acceptable as possible. I can't judge this but I think most people in my limited "social" sphere respect me for this.. Whilst I have never quite been able to raise the issue of my AS with others, I think would be able to explain to anothers about AS if they asked.


I have though about this idea for a long time but the fear of possible rejection remains the limiting factor.


Again, semantics. I prefer not to use the word "deviant" due to the negative associations it has. I feel words like "handicapped" and "different" are more socially neutral. I am certainly significantly different from normal people as a function of being handicapped.



If your AS is not very obvious to most people who meet you then you must function quite well. I do not. My limitations are pretty obvious to anyone I meet. I can tell this from the strange looks I get from people. People always seem wary of me, like they can't figure me out. I am used to this to the point of being over it but it illustrates the point. Whilst I agree that self-confidence is important in life in general, I would be willing to bet that most significantly handicapped individuals (men and women) would be less self-confident than their "normal" counterparts. Discrimination and rejection tend to kill one's self confidence after a while. Keep in mind you have some success with women to use to keep your confidence up - sort of like, "If I have done it before, I can do it again". Lots of handicapped men do not have this. Achieving something for the first time is always the hardest - getting women included.

As far as confidence goes as for attracting women, I still don't see the importance. I still maintain that confidence is not a reasonable indicator of a man's (or woman's) character. As I have said in other threads, the majority of confident people I have ever met have been smart as me at best and complete idiots at worst. When I evaluate someone for the first time, I am really not swayed by how confident they are - after all this is just a measure of how wonderful they think they are. I tend to form my own judgements on how wonderful (or not) I think they are. I must be doing something right with this because most of the people I have nothing to do with are described by others as fools whilst most of the people I have anything to do with are quite well though of by others. Sadly, my method of evaluating others requires a depth of character most women just don't have. Bad luck for them. Good thing about not having any empathy is that when others get hurt by their own poor decisions, I don't care.

For this reason, I am happier with my earlier decision to accept being single. Why should I spend my whole life trying to prove to some superficial chick that I am as good as a normal man? I know I am as good, I just a bit different (OK - I am a LOT different but that is baside the point). I think your earlier idea on another thread about targeting non-mainstream women might have merit. When I think back over my life, the women I have gotten along with the best tended to fall into this category. Nothing ever developed with any of these women but at least I was able to maintain friendships of a sort.

I think pursuing NT women is a waste of time because NT women are a waste of time.

It's not so much that mentally ill people are discriminated. People just don't know how to deal with them and have problems trusting someone they don't understand.



Bad example. Asperger's Syndrome means that you just have a different wiring of certain parts of the brain and the only reason it limits us it because we're expected to behave like Neurotypical people and we can't. Under conditions more suitable for Aspies, we'd probably be more succesful than them.



Give it some time. The more intelligent you are and the more experience in life you have, they less people will notice that you have a condition of any kind. They may still think you're a bit weird but eventually more and more people will think you're weird in a positive way rather than a negative way. In fact, I've even learnt to bend some of my Aspie traits from annoying to funny at occasions.



Just try to be confident, try to learn the necessary verbal cues and try to adjust your behavior to your environment. They better you get at those, the more easily you'll blend in and the less impaired you'll feel when interacting with others. Eventually, you can decide when to behave more like "yourself" (thus allow your Aspie traits to come up more openly) and when to play a role (e.g. at your work) and adjust your behavior accordingly.

It does take many years of practice to get there, though.



People not willing to accept your personality with both its positive and its negative sides are not the ones you want as a friend or a girlfriend. Of course you don't have to go all Aspie on them the first time you meet them, but in time people should learn to cope with your annoying aspects. Otherwise, they're not real friends.



I'm not handicapped. I have learned to overcome many of my limitations as an Aspie by rational means. While I'm still somewhat socially impaired and while I still have issues getting everything organised, I don't think my situation is really desperate. In fact, I recently gained most selfconfidence than I ever had and I feel I'm ready to finally meet women anywhere besides online.



Everyone thinks I'm somewhat of a weirdo, but an increasing number of people thinks I'm weird in a funny or other pleasant way. That doesn't make it easier to find a suitable partner, but it definitely makes it easier to increase my social network.



So what if everyone thinks you're a weirdo? Be funny. Be flamboyant. Be spontaneous. Be happy. If people sense a lot of positive vibes from you, they'll be less bothered that you're a weirdo then when they sense mostly negative vibes. In fact, they may actually start to like you in spite of your weirdness.



Gorgeous people are probably most confident than butt-ugly people, geniuses are probably more confident than ret*ds, rich people are probably more confident than poor people, etc. The easier your life is, the easier it is to feel confident about yourself. That's plain common sense.

Yet, having a lot of s**t happen in your life is no excuse for not at least trying to appear selfconfidence. If you aren't selfconfident, then fake it. If you can't genuinely think positive at least try to appear optimistic and strong. It's definitely better for your social status.



Considering my exes were either mentally unstable, desperate or not very serious at all, I can't say I know what reciprocated love really is and I sometimes feel just as desperate. Considering I've never had anyone fall in love with me who I hadn't been speaking with online for several hours a day, I still find it hard to believe that any woman can actually fall in love with me after just meeting me in person and having a casual conversation. However, I am willing to put it to a test and do anything I can to increase my chances of succes in that area.

Whenever you're stuck in life, it's not a matter of holding on and doing whatever you've beeing doing unsuccesfully while complaining things never work out. Whenever you're stuck in life, it's time to figure out why your old methods have been unsuccesful and use the results of your analysis to try something totally new. It's the only way to advance in life.



While men tend to be most attracted to a woman's spheric shapes, her long hair, her penetrating eyes or her mysterious personality, women tend to be most attracted to men who are physically taller than them, more selfconfident than them and more dominant than them. Insecure and submissive little men are a great turn-off to most women, which is the very reason teenage girls almost always end up with the greatest @$$holes of high school while the nice guys are totally ignored.

Selfconfidence is obviously not indicative of a man's character, but it is indicative of a woman's degree of attraction to him.



Unless you're not interested in neurotypical women, you should try to adjust their perception of you based on their superficial subconscious methods of evaluating others that than based on how you evaluate others.



I think pursuing NT women is a great way to train your dating and flirting skills. This will make you well-prepared and more confident for the moment you eventually meet that non-mainstream woman who'll become your wife

This forum is probably the only place on earth where my messages aren't 10x longer than everyone else's. I love it

Socially, a lot's happened for me recently. Basically, I've just stopped caring about people who don't want to talk about anything remotely interesting, and I must say I'm satisfied with the results. I've found it surprisingly easy to just ignore most people. Quality over quantity is my new policy.

But then there are still some loose ends I haven't quite figured out how to tie off- people I've known for years who are somewhere between superficial and real, and who have very mixed feelings about my "antics." For instance, one of the problems was that one of my friends would insult me over Facebook, but sarcastically, and I couldn't tell that it was sarcastic (you can't read emotions in type, after all). So, after some confusion as to why my friend was suddenly pissed at me, I'd insult him back and assume that the friendship must be over. This happened twice, and after the second time (in which I got pretty serious and personal) he gave me the cold shoulder for some time. We talked about it in person at a party (I had to start the conversation, after some drinking) and things are better, but not "better." Apparently I freaked him out a bit and he thinks I need help...

So, to continue on the subject of "You can't just tell people you've got Asperger's," what now? If I say anything about it at all, I want to wait until I can get an official diagnosis so I don't sound like an idiot, but I don't know if that would be a good idea or not. To complicate matters, two other mutual friends had to look after a young kid with AS for several days, and apparently he irked the hell out of them by bragging about knowing Japanese and basically just being an egotistical little nightmare. I'm concerned that, if they were to find out about me having it or whatever, they might associate me with this kid they had to look after, and as a result see me very differently (and negatively).

But now I'm kind of veering. My options are A) Tell him I have it, if it turns out I have it, or B) Let him think I'm normal, but slightly crazy. I don't very much like either one.

Couldn't agree more. If you listen to most NT's talk, they just spend most of their time opening their mouths and espousing complete and utter s**t. I have always had the concept that if one doesn't have anything worth saying, then one should simply shut the Hell up. I certainly practice this. As a result of NT's tendancy to talk crap, I find myself spending an inordinate amount of time working out who is and who isn't worth talking to. Not that I am very vocal anyway - I tend to only talk when I need to.

My posts are still longer on average than the average post



I've been doing this for years. The only problem is that some people require a fair amount of smalltalk before they get to the interesting conversations. Especially women tend to be very superficial at first but can eventually turn a bit more deep once you know them.



Stick these friends as long as you can and re-evaluate these relationships when you have at least a friend or 2-3 who accept you as you as. The more I develop my social skills, the more picky I become regarding who I consider my friends.



Just tell them your brains are wired a bit differently than other people but don't mention "Asperger's" or "autism". Most people find it easier to deal with people they consider just quirky than with people they consider autistic. That's why I speak only to my best friends about Asperger's and to anyone else I just say I have some "excentricitic" behavior.

On the other hand, if you DO tell your friends, it may change their perception of AS altogether. You've obviously had some hard times with them, but you clearly haven't "irked the hell out of them". In the end, it's up to you as you can judge the situation best, but figured I'd offer my 2 cents.

In all fairness and for the record, I do like to occasionally just say pointless things. Sometimes my friends and I will even have entire conversations consisting of non sequiturs in which neither of us know what the hell is going on, just for the sake of filling an awkward silence. My objection is to those who become genuinely upset when I attempt to say anything thoughtful.

I'm pretty sure they already get that my brain is wired differently
I'll need a better excuse than that if I am to get them to understand...

Actually, I think I've most definitely irked the hell out of them. When it comes to those two mutual friends in particular, they threw a party, and I wasn't sure if I had been invited or not. (Facebook invite problems.) After a very awkward and long message asking one of them if I'd been invited and imploring him to be honest if I hadn't, he basically told me to chill out that confirmed that it was okay for me to attend. Halfway into the party, I'd consumed some alcohol, and I'm beginning to recognize the fact that alcohol makes me act like JJ from Skins when he takes the pills. (It's a British show; I know some people on these forums are aware of what I'm referring to because I saw a previous post about it.) Basically, I just say things without thinking. (At least people finally get what they want: a me who doesn't "over-analyze" ) Anyway, both friends are in the next room, and for some reason I tell the people I'm talking to how I'd been confused about the invite situation, and how I couldn't help feeling like I might be an unwelcome intruder- I think it was in response to them asking why I looked uncomfortable, or something. One of the friends comes out and a girl seated at the table with me is like, "Did you invite ___?" and I just put my face in my hands like "What the hell, I'm so screwed now," and he just playfully comes up behind me and rubs my hair (also like JJ... weird) and says how he loves me, and of course he invited me, and etc.

You'd think I'd just shut the hell up, but later on into the evening we're talking (me and a different group of people who don't know each other) about how we know the two friends hosting the party, and I give this long, complicated, confusing spiel about how I hope I'm their friend, but am not entirely sure because I keep saying and doing stupid things (oh, the irony), and I have the strongest feeling that one of these people (a certain girl in particular, but not the same one as before) must have told them what I said. It's just an extremely uncomfortable situation.

Oh yes, and I got into a heated argument with somebody who was friends with the two hosts, and this may have been the reason this guy left the party when he did (immediately after the argument).

Damn... looking back on that one night by itself, I'm thinking maybe telling them that I have AS is the only way I can possibly preserve this friendship- even if it turns out I don't have it!