How is armchair diagnosing not against the rules?

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because it's not a diagnosis.

i know what you're referring to.

if people get triggered because the feedback they get goes against the suspicious they held, that's their own problem, and it's not something that the mods need to be bogged down with.

I wasn't talking about OPs in these circumstances, I'm talking about the answers people here give. I never said they're not trying hard enough, I'm not "triggered" or in wanting of a "safe space", if you've just come here to insult me then piss off - unless you actually want to add something instead of going off topic to have a dig at me.



They could misunderstand and be misled is my concern. People aren't making clear enough that they're speculating.

You want to limit what people can say so the comparison to SJW's is apt. I have come out against blanket statements with no evidence that historical figures and celebrities are autistic. I have never advocated banning those statements. I also asked what people should say in leiu of armchair diagnosing so I was referring to reply's to the OP's

You did say it is not virtually impossible to get an adult diagnosis while that is generally true it is not true for members in certain locations and financial situations. That is about self diagnosers not people replying to them. But the reply while triggered by your comments are not all about you. It has been common amoung opponents of self diagnosing to imply that the self diagnosers are not trying hard enough for a proffessional diagnosis or can get one if they really wanted. And it has been common for opponents to says self diagnosers have negative motivations.

People fortunate trying to ban ideas they do not like for the greater good, assuming negative motivations. There are commonalities with SJW's

If I am at fault it is probably for putting your remarks in quotes leading to the understandable belief that I am responding just to you. I do tend to reply at times to both spacifically to one person's remarks and the context of the general arguments made about that topic and have gotten in trouble for it before. How would be a better way to respind in that situation?

Last edited by ASPartOfMe on 02 Jan 2017, 9:31 am, edited 1 time in total.

Creating a new thread on self diagnosis and SJWs would be my suggestion instead of changing the topic of my one - just because you can vaguely relate it to one of my replies doesn't mean it's on topic. I don't want this thread getting derailed talking about a completely different thing that you just so happen want to talk about after seeing this thread.

Perhaps if there was easier access to assessment less people would be coming on here to express things, to be told possibly/probably you are autistic.
For some of us it's the only place we can go to get a focus on things.
I have had the A word bandied about on several occasions but never any hint of a referral. Last psych appointment I was given a printout to an autism charity but told professional support was very thin on the ground.
Was also told it's not something mainstream psych services deal with, even though quite a few on the spectrum have comorbid mental health issues.

I do wonder whether those born in the 80s, and after, realise how fortunate they are, re things having been picked up on , compared to those of us who were children and teenagers in the 60s and 70s.

Because you were unfortunate enough to be born in the wrong era, and therefore struggle to get a diagnosis,does that really mean you should be dismissed as less autistic than someone fortunate enough to be born later?

I'm talking about the replies, not the reasons the OP may be posting.

How would you suggest people should reply? Just saying "Go get an assessment" in a "Let them eat cake" manner would be quite brusque and dismissive.

To make it clear that it's their own speculation that their symptoms fit autism, to say it's a possibility rather than a probability, and to point out the only way to know is to see a doctor and give advice on how to go about that - that's all I can come up with at the moment.

I understand that you are concerned, but I think you can safely allay your fears as the speculation aspect is both inferred and implied; both parties are aware that this is an online information sharing situation and that it does not resemble a physical clinical environment.

Something like that is what is done most of time.

I tend to say if "you have many of the traits associated with autism" or if I do not think they presented a case that thay may be autistic usually this would be just describing social difficulties I would ask about sensory sensitivities or repetitive behavoirs or just link to a reputable of list of autistic traits. These people usually tend to worry that they wrote too long a post or they might not be aware of things like they lack of cognative autistic empathy or thier sensory sensitivities are not typical so I do not want to assume they are not autistic. I also tend sometimes ask if their traits are impairing their life.

My reply will vary based on the post. If they are a teenager I will suggest they get proffessionally diagnosed I will do the same if thier life seems to be impaired by thier traits.

Last edited by ASPartOfMe on 02 Jan 2017, 1:24 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I heard all of that in my own time and it all sounded adversarial rather than helpful.

I think it's reasonable to assume that people coming here asking for personal opinions of random internet users realize that this is not the same thing as getting officially diagnosed by a qualified professional. It's just a first step toward deciding whether seeking a professional diagnosis would be helpful to them.

While I don't believe "armchair diagnosing" should be against the rules, I agree that the community should be more careful when responding to such questions.

Fnord used to regularly post something like the following each time someone created an "Am I an Aspie?" thread:

When I posted for the first time here with: "Do I Have Asperger's, Or Simply Poor Social Skills?" back in December, 2012, windtreeman responded:

I personally found this type of advice much more useful that having the community respond, "yeah - you're probably autistic".

Isn't a possibility and a probability essentially the same thing.

Probably is very high level of possibility.

'Possibly' and 'probably' are both varying degrees of 'not definite'. It would be wrong for WP members to say 'you definitely have autism', but I don't see that actually happening.

Also, you have to keep the context of these questions in mind. These are people who have passed for 'normal' their entire lives. They most likely possess a reasonable level of common sense, and understand that official psychiatric diagnoses can't be handed out over the internet by random strangers.