Saga Norén, opinions for a school project please?

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Harmolina
Butterfly
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Joined: 13 Nov 2015
Age: 25
Posts: 11
Location: Sweden

07 Apr 2016, 12:16 pm

I'm doing a project on the subject of female aspies presented in the media, and of course I will bring up Saga Norén. I want to know what the rest of the aspie community think, here's what I've got. Please disagree if you like :)
1. She is an aspergirl in a famous tv-show who isn't just comic relief (*cough - Sheldon Cooper*). Yay!
2. She is though written with very sterotypically boyish aspie traits, which may make uninformed NTs assume that she what aspergirls are like. That could be an issue, since most aspergirls don't display these traits in the same way that boys do and could contribute to the lack of information for and about the quiet aspergirls in the shadows who don't think they have aspergers because what we see is based on research done on boys. This is my area of concern I would like to get some response to. What do you think?



Jozie
Blue Jay
Blue Jay

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Joined: 4 Nov 2015
Gender: Female
Posts: 98
Location: Australia

07 Apr 2016, 6:06 pm

I think you're absolutely right. The differences between male and female manifestations of autism are not yet widely understood and female representations tend to follow stereotypical male presentation. This is precisely why I denied having autism for 15 years after a psychologist suggested it to me. I though that since I don't lack empathy and am not interested in trains or computers then I don't have autism. The direction that you want to take with your project is the right way to help people understand the reality of autism for females. It takes time for awarenwss to catch up to research.
I think its also true though that any high functioning autistic in the media is somewhat unrepresentative. They seem to always be highly successful in their field and are not very adversely affected by their autism. I know there are many autistic people who are very successful but the media doesn't seem to acknowledge the high levels of unemployment and chronic depression experienced by many people.