Easy targets to make fun of?

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Why are people on the spectrum such easy targets to make fun of in social situations (especially amongst young people)?

Perhaps it's because we tend to be a bit impressionable, naive, gullible. (take your pick)

It doesn't stop either Jamesy people are well over famiar with me in a condescending way. I've baulked against it in the past but there's really no point, the situation goes from friendly condescension to hostility. I go along with it these days.

I always find myself in a protective role with people on the spectrum when it comes to this.

Same thing here. I went to school with a very kind but naive girl who is absolutely autistic (though she's never told me this). She was incapable of telling when she was being patronized, and that was incredibly frequently. People loved to put her in situations where she thought she was finally being included or praised when it was all mocking.

I definitely told people to back off a few times despite not being an assertive person. It broke my heart because these same people who mocked her for her differences were always virtue signaling by being friendly to the higher support needs autistics and down syndrome people in the special needs program.

Not autistic enough to be pitied, too autistic to be accepted. I hope she's being treated better these days.

That sounds like me and a lot of us on this site.

I fall under the category of "not autistic enough to be pitied; too autistic to be accepted."

If you're on the spectrum, being NT-passing probably comes with more pros than cons. One con, however, is the phenomenon you described (how we're not quite autistic enough to be pitied). I am NT-passing. Most of the population probably thinks I'm NT but strange.

I have some school stories similar to the classmate you mentioned. There were instances where I would think I was being accepted, yet looking back, I realize I was getting mocked.

Then on a related note, there were cases where I would think I was part of the group (in social settings), yet "the group" ended up showing clues that they viewed me as someone who just so happened to be there.

As for the OP's question, I think the outside world can tell there's something off about us (even if they don't officially know what). That's why we're seen as easy targets.

I was watching a documentary about autistic people and they had a young autistic man doing a voice over for something. I watched the way he walked and it was quite jerky and robotic. I wonder if it's that which makes us stand out. I've sometimes been told I walk strangely but the people couldn't point out what was wrong about it.

Being truthful but naive about sex was the starting point of the 'bullying related trauma' that I've never fully,or semi fully, recovered from.
Then like ravenous dogs feasting on the flesh of a newly dead corpse they latched on to my odd gait, poor coordination, and social awkwardness.

As for walking, there's a coworker of mine I'm pretty sure is on the spectrum. In the hallway, I've noticed he gives a super-wide berth. After observing him, I realized that's how I walk too. Sometimes, seeing someone else do the same thing as you is what it takes to make you realize "I do the same thing."

Perhaps a wide berth could be what they're talking about? Maybe a wide berth is something people on the spectrum do?

What do you mean by wide berth

A "berth" can mean a space between adjacent piers into which you park sea going ships.

So the expression "giving a wide berth" means "creating space". Usually you hear the expression when person A doesnt like person B and tells you that "I give person B a wiiiide berth!" to avoid dealing with them.

With the post above I guess it just means you walk in a way that you create phycical distance between you other folks in the hallway.

Last edited by naturalplastic on 22 Jul 2023, 3:14 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Because folks make fun of ineptitude, and social situations are what autistics are most inept at. Rather simple.

Oh I used to know someone who did this. It was as if he would rather walk into traffic in order to avoid getting too close to people. He also was so shy that he never spoke. I liked him.

He...might have been on the autism spectrum. Or maybe not.

Yeah I don't like to assume

My neighbour once said that she could tell my daughter was my daughter by the way we walk. It freaked me out a) to think a neighbour watches us and knows how we walk when we aren't even together - enough to know we were related, and b) that our walk is different enough to stand out. I know I'm stiff and wooden so I guess that means my daughter is too but I don't see it in her. Someone once told me I move like I didn't take the clothes hanger out of my shirt.