this post was submitted on 22 Oct 2023
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the_dunk_tank

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It's the dunk tank.

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[–] [email protected] 36 points 1 year ago (2 children)

i mean yeah i generally view it as ND, in particular the use of pathological personality diagnoses by the carceral state to justify longer sentencing for minorities have me view it as politically aligned with other ND movements where diagnosis is used to revoke autonomy. it's better to focus on harm actually done rather than this moralizing belief in some inherent evilness in someone's soul or something. a lot of autistic liberation has an adverserial relationship with diagnosis in general, I would generally advise people to be skeptical of a diagnosis created on the assumption there exists such a thing as genetic basis for a born criminal. in particular the moralization of not having empathy fucks over a lot of autistic people and is a common complaint in autistic circles, that hyperempathetic autistics throw other autistics under the bus by presenting themselves as morally superior. not having the physiological empathy response does not inherently make you a murderer, it means it takes more effort to understand someone else on an intellectual level.

not that I would then argue you're ableist, because I think there is an issue where a lot of leftist spaces moralize disagreement and massively overescalate shit.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

True on several counts. I don't believe it's a genetic predisposition for evil, so much as an inability in many prosocial areas. But this does not automatically mean their behavior is criminal, it's often more low level emotional abuse of others - and there are many who grow into more prosocial behaviors.

At any rate, people with autism who do not have empathy have additional bio-psychologi al factors that may straight up be comorbid NPD - depending of course how much it "disorders" ones life (diagnoses are always contextual to ones environment and conditions). But there's also learned narcissistic tendencies as a maladaptive way of coping with extreme conditions.

Getting to the core point though, ND is only ever a problem if it manifests as harmful behavior. Someone with the prerequisite genetics of someone with Antisocial Personality Disorder (colloquially called psychopath or sociopath), is not guaranteed to be a murderer for instance, but if they grow up in extreme trauma or abuse it becomes a lot more likely. All that to say, these are neurodivergences and fine on their own - but narcissistic or psychotic behavior that hurts people is a problem.

It gets problematic if we overdiagnose and pathologize everyone as well as if we excuse harmful behavior because of someone's ND. So like you said, it goes back to taking more time to work with someone, but most of society isn't going to do that in these conditions, which will further alienate such individuals and increase the harmful behaviors.

Shits hard yo.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

i'm not sure we are actually agreeing here. yes, if someone is being abusive then addressing the abuse takes priority; the issue is the assumption that being diagnosed means one is an abuser, per se. and even in the case of low level abuse of others, that doesn't disqualify someone from being ND. lots of ND and mentally ill people do bad things, often as children, which then gets them diagnosed and subjected to the abuses of mental health institutions.

being ND isn't a label you only get if you're on good behavior, it's something you are, it is a relation to the norms enforced by a medicalized society. i am autistic not because i do nice things and deserve a pass on my stuttering and odd facial expressions and mannerisms, i am autistic because a nazi collaborator wanted a metric to decide which children should be kept alive and which ones should be euthanized. ND includes anyone whose brains are deemed aberrant. i am treated and accommodated (or not accommodated) a certain way, regardless of knowledge of any formal diagnosis, and so I'm autistic because of that rather than a diagnosis.

i really don't like the "people are being overdiagnosed to excuse shitty behavior" line for this reason. yes, people do look for excuses when they do bad things, but that does not mean people are lying about whatever ND identity.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago (1 children)

shut the fuck up and read theory

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago

I welcome theory recommendations on this subject.

After reading your post ten times over it’s hard to come to any understanding of it except “i view npd as ND because the state uses it to justify longer sentencing for minorities.” and “lack of empathy and lack of regard are the same or close enough”, both of which I see as pretty wrong.

The former point is weird and I don’t feel like digging into an understanding of the priors it’s coming from if there is some kind of underpinning you can just link to that’ll clear it up.

The latter really stands out because a child without empathy for ants might smash their nest or smash them, but when told that it’s wrong to hurt or kill the ants a child without regard will continue to do so. They’re not the same thing and autistic people without empathy aren’t acting without regard. Those are two very different kinds of thinking.