this post was submitted on 23 Feb 2024
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Autism
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I have to go back and read your description of how we come across again, but I'm going to comment on the advice a bit:
I think if I said exactly that -- "I'm not judging you, even if it looks that way" -- and it was interpreted as genuine, that message given verbatim is friendly. But I don't predict it would be interpreted as genuine.
What's a good way to phrase this so a person knows I'm not being snarky?
They don't believe me. It goes like this:
"I have autism"
"Oh, well I had no idea!"
"I know, but I'm not so good with understanding people. What you're seeing here is scripts I've practiced to get through the world"
"You seem perfectly fine to me"
"I know, I've practiced the scripts a lot. But I can't practice for all possible scenarios like I practice for the commonly-used scripts."
"Well you're handling this conversation pretty good"
"That's because I've had it hundreds of times"
But isn't someone informing them also how people learn? I know that pain can be necessary to knock a person into a new paradigm, but just getting basic info seems like it could be as painless as "actually magnesium won't constipate you. That's wrong. It'll give you the runs"
I do understand that something like "If you keep drinking and being late for work, you'll regret it" doesn't really come across to somebody and they probably need to feel the pain of those choices to learn new choices.
On the other hand, human knowledge is far deeper and wider than any human can absorb. It's worth making a study of. So many people have been through so many things and written about it.
Sure, makes sense
That's a good point. If you think about it, an average autistic encounters the autistic-neurotypical interface far more often than an average neurotypical does.
For a neurotypical, they might have 1 out of 10 interactions in their day being with autistic people, and other nine being with other neurotypicals.
For an autistic, the ratio could be reversed. 9 out of 10 interactions or relationships they have is with a neurotypical.
That difference, if not recognized by us, could lead us to over-estimate your awareness of how to successfully navigate this.
So yes, I'll make more of an effort to educate, and try to keep in mind the other person does this far less often than I do. I guess I have been unconsciously assuming they had the same expertise as me (and getting offended when they didn't enact that expertise to accommodate me, as I enact it to accommodate them). Thank you.
uh..don't open with this..
-The perception of autism has been ruined by being popular. Since very few of the nonphysical autism symptoms are unique to autism, you can maybe try showing the bits that are normal first and explain at some point when they notice differences? I myself did not know there were physical symptoms until I read the Wikipedia entry.
-A large portion of comedy is just timing. As such inappropriate timing will bomb really hard. It's also quite common for a person's personality to not match their physical appearance or language use. If you mention things early and often, and not after issues arise, it should be okay. Also, mention if you have trouble with tones and inflections. (This made me think of the Johnny Carson tomahawk bit, where he kept his mouth shut for a solid half minute before saying his line)
-There are multiple ways to learn, and that's actually one of the less common ones, especially if it's just a flat "don't" without an actual answer. The most common method being things exploding in your face.
-It's rather easy to learn from prior knowledge, but all of human knowledge had to be discovered at some point, which means somebody had to fuck it up repeatedly to get there, because they sure as hell didn't get perfect completion on the first try.