I hate how we are potrayed on TV

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I hate it how kids how kids with aspergers are represented on TV that were all good at math and are homeschooled and have excellent services and their parents are rich. Well thats not the case services cost 800-to more than 1000 dollars and you cant get any if your not rich. That and rhode island has not curriculum for home schooling why dont they document our suffering instead of making us looking like a bunch super smart kids with social problems with loaded parents thats not often the case. Its either that or were made out to be murderous psychopaths that play lots of videogames. But there's one problem video games dont cause violent behavior and if it does for some of these psycho well their out of touch with reality.

i know what you mean it sucks.

the typical example is rain man

a more recent one would be the new e4 series called the big bang theory. The charachter with aspergus is made out to look like a freak. we discussed it in my media class and my fellow students took the opinion that all aspergus were geeks and fun to laugh at. that was when i told them i had aspergus and what it is actually like to have it and not the way that the tv shows are showing it.

shows like this are not helping the way society should treat people wid aspergus

Exactly thats what am talking about and by the why nice avatar.

thanx
i like urs too

Damn straight. And both your avvies rule.

Sociopathy has been pretty well dropped as a valid diagnosis; but it describes me generally, and I do play a lot of videogames [I'm too lazy to kill real people, after all].

To a degree, the portrayal could be a matter of jealousy. I've had people tell me--apparently sincerely--that they wish they could remember numbers and dates and basic math the way I can. I've also had people mention various attributes, and denigrate the whole with 'Yeah; but you're a freak'. It seems to be human nature to encounter any anomaly, better or worse, and try to rationalise it into a disability, symptom, or illness.

Or--and probably more likely--the average idiot has no idea what autism is and doesn't particularly want to find out; so it's become a simple, digestible plotdevice keeping people watching the flashing colours between adverts. Remind me: is it still cynicism if it's probably true?

Curiously, the one chance I've seen for a television show to get it right was abandoned: an episode of HouseMD had an autistic kid with parasites, and the implication that House himself might have Asperger; in the end, Cuddy denied that he qualified, though I keep having people suspect that House is based on me, out in the world. So I'm really not sure why autists are necessarily morons, villains, or both on television; I can only assume that the demographic don't want to think that we could be clever, invisible, and potentially able to take over the world as some new order of intelligence, like robots and computers used to be.

I have noticed that the best portrayals of autistic/aspie characters on TV are the ones who aren't diagnosed officially as part of their story line. Monk is a good example, he is so like me! I am also fed up that all the documentaries focus on autistic savants. Oh how great it would be if we were all like that!

I am average and I hate getting that rubbed in my face...

_________________
I have HFA, ADHD, OCD & Tourette syndrome. I love animals, especially my bunnies and hamster. I skate in a roller derby team (but I'll try not to bite )

I totally agree. My teenage son gets very upset at it, but I tell him to just show by his example that such portrayals aren't accurate. He's been in the same school district in OH from the beginning, so most of the kids already know him well, many have known him since kindergarten. They're very used to his "unique" way of thinking and doing things, and many of them even like it. They enjoy the way his mind thinks and discussing things with him. The kids in his band and music classes especially enjoy his incredible musical talent; he really does have perfect pitch and they like to play a note without him looking and then having him tell them what it is. He also knows the key of a song just by listening to a few bars of it.

He would have a terrible time in another school district in another area, though, since they wouldn't be used to him and transitions and changes are so difficult for him anyway. That's why he's with my mom in OH and I'm in SD. It breaks my heart, but it's really what's best for him as much as we miss each other, since we're pretty close.

But yeah, I also get tired of the inaccurate, often even hostile, media portrayals. I was watching Law and Order on TNT the other day, and they had a terrible example of it. It was so bad that I just couldn't believe it. Then again, you have to realize that AS is only now really starting to really get public awareness, and I think media portrayals of "new" conditions tend to follow a certain pattern. Remember how inaccurate AIDS portrayals were in the beginning? And portrayals of Alzheimer's and other dementia are not much better right now, either. My stepdad is in a nursing home now with what we thought at first was Alzheimer's, but we now know it's Lewy Body Disease, a combination of dementia and Parkinson's-like physical symptoms. And now my stepmom, irony of ironies, is in the early stages of Alzheimer's only in her mid-sixties; my stepdad was only in his fifties when he began showing symptoms. It's beyond difficult for me, since these people have been in my life for well over thirty years. So whenever I see a media portrayal of that, I often note just how inaccurate many aspects of the portrayal really are.

I, for one, wouldn't change anything about my husband. I consider him to be one of the most interesting, fascinating men I've ever known, along with my son. I love the way his mind works intellectually, his unique perspectives on things, his intellectual originality and creativity, etc. But you don't often see that kind of portrayal too often.

At least rain man had a good actor playing him so it wasn't corny.It was stereoyped alot, but i suppose it would be hard to get something accurate unless there was an out-of-the-closet aspie or auttie on the production team.

Autistic disorder seems to be portrayed well enough in fiction; Rain Man, Simon [in Mercury Rising], Roland in [X-Files], hell, I even think there was an episode of "Ghost Whisperer" that has people with autism in it, and it appeared accurate enough (I think--my mother called me when it was on, and I didn't watch much of it).

"Unlikely Travellers", a documentary has an individual with Asperger's in it, it's a good portrayal ('cause he has it).

exactly I hate that the only show savants or kids that have it pretty good servives. Why they actually talk about rhode island families that dont have a lot of money like less than $50,000 a year because services cost 800 to over 1000 with no coverage and trying to get help for school is a costant battle its really bad over here we are already in a recession and its degrading really fast and our school system is the worst. Most schools have high drop out rates and the new curriculum and ridiculous graduation requirements dont help much.So live in rhode island,not being wealthy and having 3 kids on autism specturm of which I am one of those kids is far from easy and can make your life miserable. Why dont they show the struggles and all the undesriable stuff or the average aspie instead of the shining examples or the ones who got it good. Rhode island is hell on earth if you have aspergers so if you have a choice dont live here its that bad.

I am also sick of the stereotypes. I wish for once they make a video on a bunch of aspies whom are different from each other and not all of them are good with math or are into science and the other stereotype crap I hear.

It's common for individuals with autistic disorder to have "special skills". Simon's parents weren't wealthy, not to mention they kinda got killed by a government "cleaner" due to Simon using his "special skill". He didn't exactly have an easy time....

I liked the movie, it even had a nice line by one of the computer guys, '...autism isn't synonymous with mental retardation.' In a way, that line was ahead of its time.

I don't like the way autistics are portrayed in the media. Rain Man was supposed to be a high-functioning autistic, but instead he was a one-dimensional ret*d. In comparison, both Albert Einstein and Temple Grandin was/is HFA.