Do any of you obsess over politics or economics?

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(I've posted this same message on a few other aspergers forums. I'm hoping for a better response.)

anyone out there obsess about political philosophy and think it is caused by aspergers?

and political philosophy is a really ambiguous way of putting it.. I am almost less interested in learning about it now than I am attempting to apply it in my life.. and because I have came to the personal conclusions that ideology can only produce obedience. my autonomy and freedom can't be determined or achevied through any objectivist, subjectivist, materialist or idealist interpretations of history and reality.. intellectualism is the inactivity by which the diversion has even taken shape.

ver years I have developed a way of thinking about the world in which all reality is a diversion maintained by hierarchy. For those reading, I don't mean that this isn't real, what I mean is that the means of our survival and existential security has been hijacked by the religious persuit of a fascist lifestyle. this has led me to re-examine many intellectualized abstractions and live in such a way as to not consider the concrete representations.. money, the state, all of written history, the sciences which have been defined through man made laws and context but are treated and often subtle implicated as being merely an extention of nature and an evolution of society. though there is nothing organic or natural about them, other than their extension as a applied tool created by humanity. all these seemingly natural sciences which are adhered to globally, the monetarian economy, or sociology, or psychology, or the law... our creations are both of nature and of hierarchy I don't debate this, what I do debate is the false polarization and activity created in a man made monopoly over the metaphysical and abstract forces in reality, to which we attribute this reality, be it the state or money and all of history.

I have got so involved in the examination of reality and the persuit of my life without the state, and without money, and without all the intellectual bondage, I have choosen poverty and at times homelessness rather than conceide my freedom. and obvious criticism can be made of everything I have said about, and I am not above that criticism. My persuit of existential freedom has equip me with and opportunity not that available to any of my peers.. because I am a high school drop out and because I have absolutely no friends or social obligations, because I have got by for years on working as little as I can and using money as little as I can. even to the point where I trade clothes, and ask local restaurants for the things they throw away and often just dived.

I tried to squat last fall, and without proper preparation soon crashed on my cousins couch instead of freeze to death. I'm setting out this may to hopefully never come back. I have spent my days aquiring the skills I had but didn't apply the last time. I invented a coat made from plastic garbage bags and newspaper that warmer and drier than any coat I have ever had. the plan is to set up as many squats with alternative energies from disgarded construction materials and heating devices. electric heaters which I have constructed in my garage with very little welding skills.

I want to have enough squats so that if I get busted I'm not just out in the cold like last year.. so that even if I am kicked out of this one I can still move to that one. last year, I brought my labtop with me and stole signals off of open networks, using just a wireless card and a few chapters of a book. I want to do the same thing this time and document all the buildings I do and all the adventures I have and everywhere I sleep.. because all my life, since I was very young I have kept my mind focused on one goal... to live without money. over time it just exploded. and through many many ideologies and philosophies and sciences. this is where I end up.

I've went out before, hitched hiked the country barely saying 4 words to strangers... but back then, it was an experiment to see if I could do it, I still had all my id and a little bit of money. this time I won't have any of that and this time I don't want to come back.

Though I have many many interests and persuits in my daily life.. like living transciently and playing social games and art. I have always had an interest to meet someone who thought similar and had for years.. for years I searched for them in the "anarchists" or "radicals" who line the falsely polarized political frindges. and, though I have found many similar opinions and many similar thinking people, it has always been romance for most of them... they have degrees and occupations and families. they are so far assimilated into the things they claim to hate, their hatred is nothing more than the apathetic whining that has made my generation famous.. thriving on the neo-suppressive moral devices. the church is failing in the first world for one reason, there is a more unified and less dogmatic religious persuit. and though the many personalities I have come across and met have thought the same things I have, they haven't made the preparations to actualize anything.

I was reading about aspergers recently because I thought it cleared up the misdiagnosis that riddled my childhood, though if I do have it I don't have much desire to defeat this disorder... I fit the symptoms so perfectly it actually humbled me. All my life I have been misdiagnosed, hyperactive, bi-polar, ocd, anti-social, paranoid.. I've been on two psyche wards in my life, forcefully, and left both times against doctors order without medication. I knew the diagnosis didn't stick. if I do have aspergers, for all the social separation and confusion, for constantly underachieving, for the obsessions, if anything all this has done has brought me believe so strongly in disorder, losing control, and regaining the natural freedom of the roaming tribe in a modern context. It has given me independence. If I do have it, even through all the dysfunction and hardships I feel like I have came out with my youth and an opportunity at this freedom.

Over the years I have freed myself of social struggle and revolution, these ideas themselves are so controlled by negating and destructive histories that they can do nothing but distract us from the source of "political freedom" the autonomy of uncivilized man. their insistence upon the progression and strength of society, often captured by the nation state, often captured by the national economy.. only surges towards the destruction of the planet. warfare has been the greatest economic developer the industry has ever know, though intellectual property and the realization and application of money as a medium has enabled the diversion. if the conditions can be manipulated to increase the life expectancy through sterility in life.. though many many drugs and addictions are provided to get past survival sickness.

I am only checking these boards in hopes that perhaps I can credit this to aspergers and meet someone similar. my real obsession has been less with politics or economics over the entire coarse and more about the hierarchial infrastructure and application of money, even to the point of finding noticable incongruencies and learning everything I could about fundemental analysis and technical analysis of the business and the stock markets.

I appologize for not being entirely clear, I would love to e-mail people the things I have written, the charts I have made, and even my experiances and where I think I'll go from here.. though I would never think too far into the future it would only make me believe I could predict it... or that, historical existence had autonomy in anything other than abstraction..

if you are interested in having a conversation, leave me a message, xdebordisdead is my AIM screen name.. I'm not looking for the self-defense of everyone who reads this and feels the need to affirm themselves by debating me. Anyone who is looking for that should ask themselves what is driving that.

To anyone looking to help me get over something you see as merely symptomatic.. please just befriend me before you attempt to confront me. Please don't be my psychiatrist, I left them behind for a reason.

What I would really like, is to hear from other people, even if contrary in belief or conclusions or methods, other people who have been obsessed with politics and economics since childhood or adolescence and believe it can be attributed to aspergers. Is it common?

sorry for the spelling errors and grammar errors and any points where it lacks total coherence.

So you're a situationist? Hmm-I used to be-but these days I'm more of a social ecologist a la
Murrry Bookchin.

I agree that there are a lot of ditractions out there that are created in order to either sell us things or keep us prioccupied politically with small changes and side issues.

However, I also see alot of issues that have a real impact on people's lives, especailly at the local leval.

Good luck on the road, it's gonna be cold for a couple more months.

Oops! I lost track of your original question hmmmm the book "American Normal" suggests
Jefferson had Aspergers, and I can see how either Libertarian or Anarchist politics would apeal
to Aspies.Plus ideology is a left brain function, and involves structure building, so yes , I suspect you're on to something.

hahah, no I'm not a situationist, I don't really see the situationists as being something ideological to which someone could say "I'm a situationist..." we don't have to get into it, but I would consider that what debord called the "pro-situs"... sadly most of the situationists are dead now and I think if nothing else they have effected the coarse of history in every sphere while being absolutely forgotten by it.. but they predicted that would happen in 57 when it all began.

I have somewhat came to accept the reality that "the spectacle" (if you prefer that word) has no concrete antangonist. that the spectacle has assimilated so cleanly into life, especially in the western world, that any argument or action against it will 9 times out of 10 just reinforce it. Culture jamming, unitary urbanism, freeganism, etc, have all embodied the situationist criticism and perspective while only reaching coherence in consumer culture.

but it is funny that the first person to respond would even know about the situationists cause they have helped me over some huge intellectual hurdles.

And I'm not heading out until may.. so hopefully it will be warm by then. thank you for responding.

I'm glad to see such a quick response on such a frindge subject... I have never been that fond of murray bookchin.. in part, I think his reductionist opinions and polemics argument between (what's he call it) philosophic anarchism and lifestyle anarchism has absolutely no merit. I just find him to socially obligate a persons mind more than his views free it. though, I sapose, that is my perspective of most collectivists or socially generated general struggle... and it is bias even if it my poings can be objectively argued.

Thank you so much for responding.

I was obsessessed with philosophy in general as I thought that it must contain some answers to life's great questions. I don't know that it does, I found Nietszche the most enlightening because he's not ponderous or wordy.

I guess I agree with his notions that everything (all ideology) is a necessary horizon, a type of agreed illusion. I think that to step outside of those agreed illusions is to experience madness, to see the horror, so probably the best one can do is to know that there is no escape from ideology (apart from insanity) and the best thing to do with it is to recognise it for what it is. I mean most people are oblivious to the way ideology structures and controls their lives, so to recognise it is to 'void' it's influence in one's life.

I think that people who study philosophy either become christians or they don't. This is the main choice that will present itself to 'seekers'. I became one.

I think your life sounds an interesting one. It reminds me of the saints who reject all worldy/material things. I don't have the guts to do that, I like my stable and comfortable home.

I do have an obsession with politics, but only since fairly recently. Having said that, I have always been philosophical since childhood, albeit in "my own way".

I agree with some of your views. I am a socialist, which means I too hate money and capitalism. Perhaps I hate the way it is distributed rather than money itself. If it was distributed fairly, I would not have an issue with it. I am not a libertarian though - although I believe in social freedom, I think the only way to achieve a fair economic system is through a centralised control (like taxation) to ensure everyone has enough to live off.

I went through an obbession with politics from age 15 to 19.

I take an interest in politics, I suppose - but it's not an obsession. I would characterise my political beliefs as being free-market liberal (libertarian).

Even as a libertarian, I really can't see anarchism working out. Though many societal norms are constructed purely by the human mind, no amount of revolutions is going to stop humans from organizing themselves. Any tearing down of an established institution should be done keeping in mind that a new one will form in its absence. Power vaccums often lead to even greater tyranny than a central authority. For example, areas of the DR Congo where the governmnet has no power are effectively ruled by warlords and militias that engage in rape, genocide and general intimidation of rival populations. The same applies to southern Afghanistan. The problem is not central authority, but merely the scope of central authority that leads to tyranny. States should be formed such that they are constrained to protection of its citizens' persons, property and rights (from Locke) and little else.

Actually, Anarchism as that term has usually been used on the left isn't about abolishing social structure or preventing people from organizing themselves, but about substituting non-hierarchichal social structures (co-operatives, worker's collectives, communes) for state structures.

Argueably anarchists have only come close twice-once in Spain in the thirties-behind the
lines on the "republican" side of the Spanish cival war-and in France in 1968.Both times they/we
(I'm more of a Green now) were double -crossed by leftist allies.

Probably the most difficult argument against "social" anarchism is the Marxist one that anarchism lacks an end game-a strtegeyfor abolishing the state.The traditional stratgey was
the general strike-which didn't work well in either case.

If I understand what "Debordisdead" is up to, its about person integrety,person rebellion, and living as far outside the system as possible.Not appt to change the world,but a gutsy personal experiment.

sounds like a bunch of B/S to justify being a mooch on society,if you where really true to your belief of not wanting anything to do with the system, you would go live way back deep in the woods but you know that would take lots of hard work to keep yourself alive.

The native americans lived pretty much a commie lifestlye, but everyone had to pull their weight or they would be banished from the tribe

I too have an obession with political and social philosophy, but not in a manner in which I try to come with theories that strictly criticize or find contradictions in society, for that is much, much to easy. Rather, I try to think of ways that will help people realize the absurdities of a capalist system, without offending them, for if you even start to hint that people are 'dumb' or 'ignorant', they will immediately block out anything you are trying to say.

Also, I do find it hypocritical that one would live on the 'fringes' of society, and call themselves 'removed' from society, as Johnnie stated above. As you are still using the computer, which in my opinion, empitomizes the current capitilist system as much as anything else out there, you are very much contributing and participating to the system you claim you are removed from and despise so passionately. It is like the person who quits his basketball team, yet obsesses with criticizing and pointing out their mistakes, when if you truly cared less about them, not a single thought would pass through you mind about them, nor would you go to any of their games, or read their scores in the paper. All of which you seem to do.

I also find buddhist monks hyprocritical in the same manner, as their salvation depends on others suffering, for if everyone lived like a monk, who would support the monks? Monks depend on people living what they call a so called 'painful' life in order for themselves to seek salvation. I have a hard time seeing the virtue in that.

I also do not think that a movement toward a lifestyle free of institutions is possible in this world, as someone stated above. Not everyone is meant for such living, nor are some people even meant for such thinking. Such a world relies on an individual ideal, which not everyone will agree with, because everyone is different, one cannot force other people to embrace their personal ideals.

I also have had an obsession with politics dating from my teenage years. I would identify myself as somewhat neo-conservative (I am not libertarian). I have come to the conclusion that democracy and free-market economics are the worst political and economic systems around, except for all the others. I just do not see socialism working--either in its democratic or totalitarian Marxist-Leninist form. In the cultural sphere, I have come to the conclusion that traditional values keep a society together--without them, society disintegrates.

I obsess over politics and economics. In this world, those two viewpoints are intertwined.

Good idea, you might be onto something. Except many neurotypical people obsess over political philosopy...

I am more of a Political Scientist (I am only in 1'st year though). I like to use statistics and math to back up my claims and make research papers.
Political philosophy has intrigued me: Liberal, libertarian or Socialist.
Those ideas seem to "soft."
I prefer the cut-throat side of politics, extremely animated debates.

I stand in the center. I think government is important but so is the fair market.

I think that the best thing for all cultures is balance and tolerence.
I am also a major environmental fan.

I used to think up things and think over things relating to economics, politics, and philosophy, but i stopped because I was basically retracing the steps of every philosopher, but I had never read any of their s**t so people kept on saying to me, "So you're an existentialist, or a socialist, or whatever", and i had no f*****g idea what they were talking about. I was also slightly offended because they would label me a something. Just because I ponder over some idea means I am no longer a person, i'm an it of that belief?

Now i just dont discuss politics and economics and philosophy with people. I just read about it. And think.

It is not offense to call someone by a philosophical belief, it is usually a compliment
(unless they call you a nihilist). It means that you are well read in that topic.

Wow DebordIsDead, you have some serious willpower to live the lifestyle you are, for the reasons you are.

As far as AS causes an obsession with politics or economics, surely it depends if these are among your special interests. I myself have no clue about economics and especially politics, as a case in point I have no clue where to start in any political argument, indeed not that I have any opinion in the first place. For years I thought that was because I was basically stupid, naive or both. Not so, I realise it's just that my brain is completely fact-oriented and completely oriented towards concrete perception. My brain is totally useless at making sense of anything abstract, anything controversial, anything where there's a difference of opinion.

Another point about AS and politics. I saw in the DSM-IV diagnostic criteria that an item has been added as a criterion for diagnosing AS. It must have been a very, very recent addition. It says something like:

"Tendency to see everything in black and white, especially with respect to e.g. politics and morality."

Or something like that.