What about the arm-flapping thing?

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Oh no! Not fairies!

I don't see what all the flap is about! After all, this is just one of the characteristics that gives us citizenship on Wrong Planet.

I still feel kinda bad about the poor fairies, though.

I flap. Unapologetically. Rather be a 'ret*d' than a bigot anyway.

I've done what I guess is called hand-flapping as long as I can remember.

I used to get laughed at in school for it and in adult life I managed to control it in public although sometimes people still notice it.

I always just thought it was kind of natural. It happens most when I get excited with a train of thought - my fingers will start flicking around, then the rest of the hands and before you know it my forearms are shaking around like crazy and on up to the shoulders when I really get going. My elbows do a kind of chicken-dance that I guess looks kinda funny. I pace incessantly and have worn pathways in carpet in any accomodation I've ever lived in and the hand-flapping goes along with the pacing.

NB I work in learning disability and have zero respect for and interest in anyone who uses the term 'ret*d', most especially on a forum that is supposed to be about diversity and overcoming prejudice. Unbelievable really but there you go, it takes all sorts...

theMascaraSnake: For reference, I don't call people 'ret*ds'. I use the term the way Sandra Radisch says, in a book, "There was a ward for us ret*ds on a floor by ourselves" and Elana Connor uses 'ret*d', it's taking it back from the people who call me that all the time, the same way many gay people have taken back 'queer'.

'ret*d' to me isn't a diagnosis, it's a rather disgusting set of assumptions about a lot of people (people with intellectual disabilities, autistic people, people with cerebral palsy, people with brain damage, and so forth), and as long as people are continuing to use that word and those assumptions on me, I'm going to continue throwing it back in their face whether or not it makes people who don't get called that all the time uncomfortable. And I'm in pretty good company when I use it that way, I know of many others who do the same. (Even heard of one person who used it that way, from the person who had originally called him that -- it left quite an impression, even years later, to be told "I'm glad I'm a ret*d and not someone like you.")

If you have zero respect for anyone who uses the word in any way, it's possible you have zero respect for some of the people you work for (or for who they might be in the future). If you only have zero respect for people who use it as a term of hate, I'm right there with you.

I never heard the term being used in a 'reclaimed' kind of way but I wasn't referring to your post as I noted the quote marks - it was yupa I think who brought the term into the thread in a way I didn't like, wasn't having a go at you.

I am very sensitive man so when people use bad words I throw a hissy fit that way they know to do it behind my back and I'm none the wiser which is what I like please just let me live in peace here in this fantastical world of mine.

Yupa did, however, give me an idea as to how we can cure Asperger's. Let's just get together and list all the AS symptoms that one or more of us don't have, and are extremely irritated by. Then we all agree that they're not symptoms of AS but symptoms of being 'ret*d', insisting that anyone can conquer them by exercising greater self-control. Eventually we will 'bigot' AS out of existence and go back to the good old days of just being weirdo's and 'ret*ds'...I can't wait...

Lets not stop there lets get rid of all nonconforming behavoirs so we are all the same



me too so you won't be alone

I strongly object to the word "ret*d" being thrown around like it's the worst thing that a person could be! There are plenty of things you could be that are much, much worse. Such as a jerk, a**hole or a friggin' handflapper!! ! Just kidding.
Seriously, I think that it tells something about our society to use ret*d people as our standard of what we loathe. The ret*d people that I know and have known are very sweet and deserving of much better than that. How would you like it if Asperger's became the next byword. "quit acting like a stupid Asperger's!" Somehow that just doesn't sound right.

I totally agree with you. That word really bothers me. I've also known people who are Mentally Challenged. Those people that I've known were some of the Coolest people that I've had the fortune to have known. They have their own unique way of looking at things. I believe that they are Angels who have been sent down from Heaven to teach the rest of us a lesson about Compassion. There are worse things to be than "ret*d" There are Jerks, Crooks, Assasians, and Abusive Parents and Partners, just to list a few. There's an even worse thing to be, than what those Special Angels are so meanly called on a regular basis. A Bully. I apologise for bringing up Violence, but I've just felt the need to speak my Mind.

Some of us may be using the word a bit flippantly, but I'm sure we're all in agreement with you there. It was just some friggin' (ex)hand-flapping Asperger's who got us on this tangent.

I don't flap, I do three quick claps when something excites me or makes me do a real belly laugh. If I'm on my own I do it but if I am about to do it in front of someone I can just do one and clasp my hands together tightly before the next two come.

No, no more than any other group of people is anyway. Saying that about a group of people (did you know it's often said about autistic people, too?) robs them of their humanity almost as much as the standard conception of uselessness does, and doesn't allow them to be human with good points and flaws like every other person on the planet. (This is why my tagline in another place is "Not a special angel, just your average imp," and the place itself was started by someone who goes by "Rettdevil" because she has Rett's syndrome and gets really sick of people talking about "Rett angels".) If you see someone as that kind of pure, I guarantee you're not seeing all of them.

I can't speak for CockneyRebel but in my experience ret*d people are very nice and quick to be friends, very accepting and sweet (although unconventional and sometimes innapropriate)!

There have been quite a few flapper threads I have come across here on WP and this one is among the best. I say that because despite the derision of being called a "ret*d", I find many folks expressing the deep down reasons WHY they flap, along with great descriptions of HOW thay flap. Flapping to me, was one of the most tell-tale outward manifastations of AS, and to gain a greater understanding through this thread has made my whole Wrong Planet adventure worthwhile. Thank you all.

Last edited by oatwillie on 18 Mar 2006, 9:42 am, edited 1 time in total.