Asperger and Autism are not gifts

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Just to add, it'll depend in part on where you live, different countries and cultures have different approaches to things. I have no idea how Romania sees things but for example the uk is significantly further ahead in the approach to disabilities than a variety of African countries. There was a programme on the bbc recently and I can't remember which country it was but some disabled children were being drugged and left in a stream to die or be claimed by some god or devil or spirit or something, so they very clearly value disabled people significantly less in parts of Africa. Whereas the uk if that happened there would be massive outrage.

Also it doesn't really help that the world is geared up for the perfect nt. Most value good jobs, big houses, fancy cars, the wife and 2.5 children sort of thing. I personally have no desire for any of that, I want a nice wee house in a nice place with some animals and enough money to live off relatively comfortably.

We aspies get batted around our whole lives, jumping from job the job, being bullied by the bosses and coworkers, having meltdowns, having nobody to help us, eventually arriving at an old age of loneliness and illness(physical and mental), being kept around in hospitals and asylums, where we get abused by staff and other patients. When we die, nobody will come to our funerals or remember us. Quite frankly, the only thing I'm looking forward to is my own death, and I'm only 19. I'm glad we only live a few decades. At my age I should be going out with friends and partying, but instead I do nothing all day and look forward to my own death.

Do you still think there's anything good about being an aspie?

Your scenario is not true for most Aspies.

I agree with this.

When I see people calling autism a gift, I feel it is a response to extreme negativity about autism. People look at the bright side and the positives in reaction to an awful lot of self-esteem killers (from the general public) regarding autism. Hopefully at some point in the future there will be a meet-in-the-middle between the two extremes of "autism is a gift" and "autism is a curse." IMO it's a way of being.

Me personally I'm pretty damn content.

Ive realised that parties and similar are not the place for me and I've accepted that and moved on. I don't have actual friends, which 99% of the time I don't care. The other 1% I wallow in self pity for a few hours then realise if I did have friends I'd have no idea what to do with them anyway.

Though obviously others are different. Though what you're saying if definitely not true for most autistics. And often it tends to be those who don't accept it fully that feel like this.

Not all HFA people experience all of these things. Not even all LFA people experience all of these things. I can tell you with certainty that my intellectually delayed autistic son will have people at his funeral. He has many many people who adore him.

And certainly not all autistic people require "hospitals or asylums" (are there asylums any more)? My son will always need supports, and may wind up in a "house" with other autistic people but be holding down a part-time job per his capabilities, for example. As for me (HFA), I have never been admitted into a mental hospital and don't plan to do so. I have worked all my life and am going to keep on working as long as I'm able to draw breath. Yes, I need to make "self-accommodations" but I've found a way.

We are NOT all the same and even the lowest "functioning" person, whether physically, emotionally or intellectually (meaning not just autism but other ways of being), might have people around who love him/her, and help. Other people, even NTs, might have nobody around...everyone is different.

Check out this thread:
viewtopic.php?t=285335
The OP of that thread said that NTs subconsciously detect aspies, bully and reject them because that is the way nature works. They don't know why they are doing it, it's very natural. I agree. Aspies have the mark of Cain, so to speak.
And some people still think autism is a gift!

Cockroach, what may help, is to really think what is it, that ultimately is driving those people who push you down.

A person who for example breaks car windows in the night time, breaks into someone's computer or shouts mean things to strangers, doesn't really gain anything material of doing so. Thus such acts may seem completely erratic and unfathomable. But there is a gain for the perpetrator: a feeling of power. S/He is trying to gain what s/he is lacking. The perpetrator is transfering the innate feeling of helplessness into others. We all are lost and helpless in life in many ways, but some try to shun that by projecting it into others. They put or like to keep others in helpless situations to cope with their own.

This need for power is illustrated well in the example I read some time ago - according to that many people would rather be living as a rich or famous man in the 1700 century than as an ordinary person in the present time. So for many the position in the hierarchy is a lot more important than the absolute amount of materials and possibilities.

Understanding that some people feel this way, helps at least me to understand their rat race run to the "top". I feel that it ultimately is just waste of time and I wouldn't suggest wasting time in trying to reach and run after exterior "power". When you just stop and find it within, you become more independent of both material goods and "imagined" positions. I think it is more enjoyable to be free to enjoy life and interactions without the need to constantly play an unending game against everyone else. When you focus on the game all the time, you become blind to alot. You never might even get to really know you. Plus why to invest so much in a game we all are bound to lose?

Better to light a candle than curse the darkness.

Can you explain the metaphor?

<<if you're lucky to have a candle and something to light it at hand, that is?

Here is a famous Mulla Nasreddin story: The lost key

A man is walking home late one night when he sees an anxious Mulla Nasreddin down on all fours, crawling on his hands and knees on the road, searching frantically under a streetlight for something on the ground.
“Mulla, what have you lost?” the passer-by asks.
“I am searching for my key,” Nasreddin says worriedly.
“I’ll help you look,” the man says and joins Mulla Nasreddin in the search. Soon both men are down on their knees under the streetlight, looking for the lost key. After some time, the man asks Nasreddin, “Tell me Mulla, do you remember where exactly did you drop the key?”

Nasreddin waves his arm back toward the darkness and says, “Over there, in my house. I lost the key inside my house…” Shocked and exasperated, the passer-by jumps up and shouts at Mulla Nasreddin, “Then why are you searching for the key out here in the street?”

“Because there is more light here than inside my house,” Mulla Nasreddin answers nonchalantly.

It is what it is, to say it is a gift is pretty silly by any measure considering all that I go thru and struggle with every day. Some of us were born into better situations than others, some have overcome their issues, some haven't. The whole savant stereotype needs to go, I don't have any special skill or useful applicable interest. Like I get what they're trying do by boasting dubious ex-post facto diagnoses of great world leaders and inventors but I've always hated it because I'm not and have always known I could never be Einstein. Asperger's Syndrome from the start is an ugly condition as it was framed thru(correct me if I am wrong)the lens of a Nazi scientist trying to justify our existence in the face of eugenics so there was always this implication to me that our entire purpose is I guess to be "little professors" who can be trained in our craft to be considered worthy of being alive. I think it is pretty clear that most people are a lot more sympathetic to eugenic ideas that they would admit so instead of killing and sterilizing us they'll just leave us rot to our own device and ostracize us from everything. Intelligence is what you make of it, how well you are able to discuss politics or religion or whatever doesn't mean squat if you're not a functioning person. What use is that "intelligence"? I can't help myself, I can't do things alone, ultimately that is where I fear I will end up. It is most definitely a disability and should be treated as such, look at the 80% unemployment figure and that's just the beginning of some depressing statistics about us. We need a lot more help that much is clear and I don't see much forthcoming, maybe at least it will be better for kids that come after. Probably too late to turn things around now for me.

I find it difficult to understand how an autistic can somehow 'control' their autism. I know that I certainly cannot.

At first, I hated the fact I was autistic and tried to fight it and 'fit in with society'...but that was like trying to hide an elephant in a box of cocoa pops by painting its toenails brown.

So, I tried to 'accept it as a gift'...problem being, that I was the only accepting one.

So, I went back to hating my autism again...just wanting to be 'normal like everyone else' (even knowing they are far from it)...so I could be one of those 'blind sheep' and go about living my life totally oblivious and in blissful ignorance.

Neurotypicals just have a whole different set of problems that I would gladly trade mine for.

Also, any savants I display are usually met with 'meh'.

Hence why, I have come to regard my autism as a curse rather than a gift, because it seems that nobody out there understands me (hence my user-name) and they don't even make any attempt to try.