BBC to air documentary on presenter Chris Packham's autism

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I wouldn't worry about it, Birdie. We all have our blind spots. I'm not entirely certain that Chris Packham understands quite how lucky he is. He obviously had a very supportive family, and has enjoyed a hugely successful career. It's a bit of black and white thinking.

I tried to take the good bits from his story. I related a lot.

I think there is a tradeoff where if you struggle a lot in life you tend to have more sympathy for other people, yet people who were more supported as children can be more successful but less empathetic.

I think there are lots of struggling people in Britain who will look at someone hugely successful like Packham and not understand what he's complaining about, because they have very severe issues of an entirely different kind, and not such successful lives.

I certainly don't feel any pressure to stand up and be counted. I have a family to take care of. Maybe in twenty years' time. I don't know what the future will bring.

I would love to be open about autism, particularly because I am very verbal, and I'm able to stand in front of an audience and present a topic. In that sense I relate a lot to Packham. I think I would be able to make sense of this to people. But I can't afford the cost to my life, certainly not now.

Don't worry about it, you are not responsible for absolutely everything.

Disclosing anything be it autism, cancer, or sexual identity etc is a personal choice. The decision to disclose one's autism is especially difficult because others reactions vary so greatly and our impairments in reading other people. The publicity about autism in recent years has been a double-edged sword, some are recognizing that autistics can be productive members of society while others are reacting by claiming it is vastly overdiagnosed or a vaccine caused epidemic.

I wish the BBC would make this program available for online viewing in America.

Thank you, underwater and AsPartOfMe, for understanding where I was coming from in that last post.

I'll give some background to the aftermath of the documentary.

Following the airing of it, the people who support fox hunting then announced/tweeted that they more or less don't have to take Chris' condemnation of bloodsports seriously anymore because it's just his autistic "rigid thinking"!

Some of us on Twitter were outraged at that and took up for Chris. I posted that this is what happens when someone comes out as autistic -- people seize upon it as an excuse to not take that person's perceptions or opinions seriously anymore.

I also made it clear I condemned that even while saying it's part of why some of us don't "come out."

Chris tweeted to someone could they send him the original letter from the hunting brigade. So he was on that thread.

Yesterday he tweeted thank you to everyone for supporting him, but he also linked to a longer thank you on his website -- and it was there that he said it was immoral for anyone to NOT be open about their autism.

And I got upset about that because there isn't a tweet long enough to explain that we are not all in a good position to do so.

Thanks you guys for being understanding about my rant!

And yes, it's black and white thinking on Chris' part but I forgive that because well, autism, lol. We have all done it.

But I just don't think he realizes some of us can't do what he has done. And that yes, it is a very personal decision.

I love the documentary and I think it's great for him but yes, I don't think he knows how the same admission would go down in another person's life.

At the same time, it's a vexing issue because. . . if we all did come out, en masse, and every one of us at the same time was facing reactions from out bosses, clients, work colleagues, family, friends etc. it would be such a critical mass that non acceptance of any of us would cause a storm.

I realize that the essence of what Chris says about disclosing is right, the theory is right, because it's only by regular people getting to find out that the guy or gal next door is autistic too that we can change people's stereotypes.

But one by one, each of us face a world of trouble in reality, in practice. The theory is great, the practice will cause some people to get fired (in a sneaky way,) get bullied, all kinds of fallout.

Chris' aftermath response -- which is a good one except for the bit about it being our duty to open up. . .is here:
http://www.chrispackham.co.uk/news/aspergers-and-me-thank-you

My friend who has teased me about my sensory issues did watch the documentary. He said it was good.

I met up with him today -- and for some reason unknown to me, he was making all these "jokes" that involved false premises and sarcasm. He's never done a lot of that before. Today he was doing it over and over.

The kind of jokes that fool a very literal person - I'm a very literal person; I take everything in earnest, it's one of my autism-associated traits I cannot subdue even at the age I am now. The kind of thing where I take what was said seriously and then the person goes "ONLY KIDDING, HAHAHAHAH!"

It was like he was actually doing it deliberately.

What. The. HELL???

You really sure that's a friend? What would it take for you to ditch him?

He's not a friend, he's a dick.

I know. . .I'm thinking that more and more. This is dickish behaviour.

What confuses me about him is that "the rest of him" -- like the rest of his behaviour, is, well I was going to use the word "decent" but that's going to sound really weird in the context of his teasing crap.

How can one person be decent some of the time and then a clowning-around dickhead at other times?

I don't know what to think about him anymore. I was really puzzled by today. I didn't know why he was suddenly doing this s**t -- especially AFTER seeing the asperger's documentary!

I mean, I've more or less GOT TO think, yeah, that's a complete dick. . .

He teases me about autism related traits. . .

.....so I ask him to watch an autism documentary. . . ..

....so that he might stop teasing me if he realizes and takes the documentary seriously. . . .

So he says he watched it, he said it was very good, he seems serious about that and he seems like he did take it seriously. . . .

. . . . and then he RAMPS UP the teasing ? ? ? ? ?

What about the rest of his behaviour is "decent", as you put it? Does he do you favours, help you out, listen?

The decent stuff is things like:

He's caring about animals in general; animals are a big deal to me so this is something we have in common and how our friendship started. He loves wildlife, he also takes in dumped kittens (people have even started leaving them at his house because of it) and he takes feral cats to his veterinarian and pays for them to get treatments and neutering from his own pocket; he feeds a small family of wild foxes who come to his house.

He was a carer for his mother before she died a year ago and took his responsibilities seriously; was a really good son to her, etc.

He doesn't like to hear about people or animals being treated with unkindness (I know! Ironic!)

He's very calm and doesn't get rattled by much of anything, tries to see both sides, etc. I get quite emotional about things both in good ways and bad ways, and I'm amazed at how nothing ever seem to bother him.

He's one of those people who would not be capable of violence or anger -- I've never seen him angry in six years I've known him.

I've known violent, angry, law breaking, vice-addled people and unfortunately even been in a relationship with one, so having a platonic friendship with someone who is none of those things was quite refreshing at first, just to hang out with someone who wasn't bad things and doesn't do bad things in life.

He's just a very calm, ordinary, balanced type of person. We can chat on the phone once in a while, and occasionally meet for a coffee, like today. We talk mostly animal stuff because that's our big shared thing we both care about the most.

I can't say he exactly helps me out in anything much, lol! There have been a couple of times I've called him while upset about something that happened, but he will talk for a while but he's not really a problem solver or someone who can do any favours as such. It's not all that deep of a friendship, but unfortunately he's the only nearest thing I have locally to a friend of any type.

But this teasing crap is really wearing on me.

I think he's a passive-aggressive piece of shite. He probably did this to his mom for years, and he's recreating that dynamic with you. I may be wrong, but I don't think I am.

A lot of times, I think people believe we don't understand that they're taking the piss, because we don't have visible reactions to it, and we often don't understand in real time. We're pretty good at conversational post-mortems, though.

It's worth either giving him a dose of his own medicine or ditching him, I think. If you had a small circle of friends where you live, would you be with this person?

Why was that other thread removed?

BirdInFlight, I interpeted Chris Packham's thanks post differently. I think the "voice, however small" he is referring to here is one of a public figure, rather than that of any individual autistic person. Therefore, I think this was a reference to his own decision and not necessarily meant to imply that all autistic people have a duty to publicly identify themselves. I think the "however small" might refer to various profiles of public figures, perhaps recognising that he isn't as big a household name as many others - or to other hypothetical public figures who have a wide audience to speak to who may not be that well known, but still have some reach through the media. That's how I read it, at least.

That's how I interpreted it as well, although I can see both sides of the argument.

I think ultimately it boils down to what he said in the programme, that society needs more understanding of autism and as someone who is 'high functioning' Chris Packham feels that he's in a position where he can help to make the general public a bit more aware of autism.

The problems such as not getting work from disclosing you are autistic is more down to the narrow-mindedness of the person you were doing work for - they were happy to give you work before they knew you had autism, but not after? That's because of pre-conceptions surrounding autism, and I think Chris Packham is trying to raise awareness so this kind of thing doesn't happen.
Granted he is in a much better position than most, and yes he is lucky, but what if he never got the big break into television? I bet he'd of struggled to find more normal work, and as we know from the programme he has suffered from depression due to his autism, and things could of been very different for him.

Autism, as we know, is a very complicated and varied subject, with individuals differing massively across the spectrum, so no two people will be alike.
I think what Chris Packham is doing is very positive for autism in general, but there is an awful long way to go before people understand it fully who don't have to live with autism, or someone with autism.

On a personal note I haven't been diagnosed yet (December is my assessment) but I have been convinced for 8+ months that I have Aspergers. I have personally been struggling with who to tell and how to tell them. I have wanted to tell my 'closest' friends for months but I just can't bring myself to do it because I just know someone will turn round and say 'you don't look or act autistic' despite not knowing the personal hell I've had to live through my whole life, which is now making sense thanks to my research into autism.

At one point I was going to prepare a post for Facebook for when (or if...) I get diagnosed - I put a lot of effort into what I was going to say but then one day I thought 'no' because I imagine a lot of people would kick up a stink with such things like 'you can't be autistic to have not been diagnosed earlier' and in such a scenario I can see myself getting upset and frustrated because I have been seriously depressed my whole life because of my inability to read and interact with people 'normally'.
Watching Aspergers and me made me feel a hell of a lot better that I have managed to learn how to cope with my failings as well as I have, and gives me hope that I can improve on them now I have a better idea of what I am lacking socially.

Hope that makes sense as it's a bit of a beast of text

I watched this with my mother when it was on the TV, and I found it really interesting and cool. I liked how he was talking about his autism and it drew similarities to mine, like with the anxiety and difficulty socializing with others, since I am in a position of that at the moment. I thought being different from everyone else is similar too, as I also feel that way, being different.....but I like it.

I was curious when I heard about this behavior therapy program, but I don't like it at all. Autism does make you feel different, but you cannot cure it, especially making others normal and I would not want it to change. It's happening overseas though, and where I live it is not allowed. I am happy with my autism as it is.....even if I had loads of negatives overtime...

It was really great to watch, I enjoyed it

Old thread, but I just discovered this documentary and thought it was just great and thought it was worth reposting.

I can identify with many of the experiences of the subject, Chris Packham. I entered college with a major of zoology. One of the things I also agree with is when he says that he feels normal when he's alone. I grew up in the 70s-80s and I also found punk rock as a saving grace like he did.

I've only just noticed this part of the conversation. To me Chris looks quite obviously uncomfortable, it's interesting to think that NTs don't even notice this. They don't notice it when I'm uncomfortable, it's either that or I'm just ignored.

I've felt my emotions and feelings have been almost completely invisible for most of my life. I can't believe that other people can't see it, including in Chris Packham, unless I'm jumping to conclusions here. I did study body language in my teens which made it 10x easier to recognise when people got uncomfortable, like the shoulders hunching and being less animated. Would NTs really not see that Chris was uncomfortable in that film?