The 'Asperger industry', and political correctness

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I just get the impression that it is someone who is genuinely trying something out , and wants to tell others about it because he really believes it could help.
I have the same thought when I refer to my own experiments with gluten exclusion and my theories about its role in aggravating ASD symptoms, extrapolated from widely available studies in and books about the connection between food-intolerances and mental health/disorders. There's no malice, just a desire to offer help. Seeing as the chances of my writing a book about it , despite, or because of the 15 years spent thinking about it , seem miniscule or non-existent what's the harm in making my idea freely available on the net!!

Someone might be helped by it!!Maybe JCJC thinks the same.
Where does the bullying come into it? I don't understand why he's seen as some sort of threat !?

Persistence, perseveration, nothing to lose recklessness. Along with the well known aspie tendency to put feet in , repeat, elaborate, etc etc!!

To me his " problem" as you call it looks like aspergers; repeat, persist, obsess, repeat, etc !!Doesn't everybody on here do that a bit? I def do, esp about things I believe in, especially as threads disappear so fast into back pages .

He has an idea he believes in, like I do in mine about gluten. You probably repeat yourself from time to time when it's something you believe in??!


But it's true that if I hadn't just literally last night worked out that personality is a word for something unreal then I too might be getting upset at somebody who is suggesting that a massive base of my personality could be removed just like that ! !

I suppose that might be right. Though in that case he's hardly "cured" himself And at any rate I think it's dangerous and kind of mean.

Or maybe not, but I just get very suspicious about this...

Maybe I'm just being naive!! Has been known!!

But I think JCJC is putting his finger on a sensitive issue which is that it often looks as if aspies want to have their cake AND eat it; both be helped and supported etc with a special status as Disabled with all the benefits that will increasingly bring , AT THE SAME time as insisting that they are very happy and fulfilled and content as Aspergers , according to many anyway.
I too experience this two-way thing; am I to be pitied or envied?
I think that it is a serious problem in the presentation of ASD to the world.

While it is still not clear whether people with ASDs feel disabled or not , I think any "industry" of research, treatment and aid for people with ASD is also bound to suffer from these ambiguities; is it there to understand and explain ASD to the world so that their difference can be taken into consideration and even celebrated, or is it there to reduce or eliminate a disabling painful condition as far as possible ?

If Aspergers is a desirable condition, of special and valuable skills then It doesn't seem right to give it (Aspergers) disability protection. It would be more appropriate to just treat the co-morbities and related issues under "labels" already available. And forget about "curing/healing/preventing" anymore cases of Aspergers .People would simply be on a spectrum of humanity but SUFFERING from depression, anxiety, OCDs etc. (Just like predominantly white people have more of some health problems , and mainly black people more of others,etc) Which I think would be more useful .
And also avoid the phenomenon of people basing their sense of self on a disability status!!

So long as people with ASD say they do not want to be cured can you blame others for thinking that after all we are just "lazy, selfish, inconsiderate" ( as my mother used to say) people thinking too highly of themselves to bother with anyone else!! Or at least be quite reasonably confused about what we do want ! !

I think it's very useful and a good thing that autism has been seen to be just one end of a spectrum stretching out over a significant minority of humans , but that the term aspergers unfortunately just sets up yet ANOTHER dividing line , another sub-group. A club, an ID !

Last edited by ouinon on 26 Oct 2007, 1:59 pm, edited 2 times in total.

Agreed.

Now as for the Asperger's Industry theory, maybe. I'd prefer to think that psychology recognizes areas that need attention based on incidence of a particular issue. Everyone knows what codependency is now, and it's easier for people to identify an unhealthy relationship, for example. Do things get too hyped up? Sure. Thing is, I think we need that as a counterbalance to ignorance.

In pain? Who's in pain? I ain't in pain mate. Being me rules.

Was just thinking to myself, the future looks bright and the world's full of pretty girls that just love society's outlaws. off to a rough biker's pub now where I fit right in... oh the pain, the pain of existence! Let u know later if I pull. Oh the pain! No More! Now where's the rizla; one for the road. Oh the pain!

it could be an obsession or interest, but why would he just flat out not respond once he gets people debating it most of the time if that was the case? It's almost like he's saying "quit getting frustrated with the people who tell you to do things differently... do it my way instead!" His whole site to me seems like a sales pitch, and thus seems rather illogical unless he is just wanting us to go there and be guinea pigs or anything. He uses broad generalizations in explaining it, applies nothing to himself really, and expects us to buy it... I'm not so sure I do. He's also been known to say that he doesn't even know whether or not he's an Aspie... often in argument, lol. Granted, that could be the case, but he also does NOTHING besides advertise this unlearning Asperger's site. I've never seen him talk about anything at all without referring to it. He rarely even says "yeah, I do (or did) that too)", I don't think I've seen it at least.

I hate sounding so critical, but I've also talked with him and told him where my skepticism comes from-he talks about it until I explain that, and how he hasn't talked about anything related to what it was/is like for him (I have tried asking nicely many times during discussion before finally just feeling like a guinea pig), and he instantly stops responding. Maybe he is just confused, maybe he's unsure... but regardless, to come on here and every time announce that everyone here is miserable while not bothering to listen (that is his pattern), doesn't seem to be the best method to use to get through to anyone, and he never does say how it actually changed anything, he just lists things for us to do and vague statements about any changes or difficulties.

Just my opinion, no offense intended, and he already knows I think this stuff, lol, as I've told him before and discussed it with him.

I am sure he has no malice intended, but as someone on the spectrum, some of us like to see something we can relate to before we can actually take the "solution" into consideration. I have not been offered any assurance that he's ever gone through anything that we talk about, or anything I've asked about-he avoids that like the plague.

I also want to clear up, that I have no anger towards JC as a person. It is the method of going about it that I more or less criticize, and that I cannot really decide upon his intentions as all, as he rarely responds. It is merely the approach that concerns me, not him as a person, if that makes sense. It's PURELY situational frustration.

It may be my general ease of confusedness, but I thought I was pretty happy. I'm an Aspie married to an Aspie and working in the evil old behavioral health field. I have 4 clients. One nonverbal, two semi-verbal, and one Aspie. I help the first three express their wants, needs, and feelings, and I help young miss Aspie to have fewer meltdowns at school and work out in words what she knows for her tests. (She has mild apraxia issues.) I absolutely never work to change someone's personality, simply to help them engage their world with less frustration. I had no one but my family to help me do this, and I'll admit, childhood was rough sometimes. And lonely.
But as an adult, I have friends, a husband, a rewarding career, and my own room filled with sensory toys, stimmy fun, and an iPod that need never turn off. I understand and can explain myself when I have a bad day. I can choose to tell my co-workers my status, or not. On the main, it's not a secret at my office, clients' homes, or schools, and most families find it an immense relief to have a TSS who "gets it." My brother and all the cousins on my father's side are Aspies. To us, it's not a disability. It's a skill-set. Now, the Sensory Processing Disorder that came with it, that causes all manner of havoc some days and makes me do things like spin, bang my head, pull my hair, and tic patterns on my fingers. THAT's a nuisance, and a little off-putting to my friends. But the ASD, that's more a puzzle or non-issue to them, and yes, most of my friends are NT's. Perhaps you're feeling some heightened anxiety response out of proportion to reality. I can get that way when friends do not immediately answer phones or show up at precisely on time. Then the panic rises and I say things about "no friends, no friends, never coming, I will be alone, day is ruined, etc" but I catch myself and talk back down.


Gilly


"Living in a glass house, having fun. Lying in a glass house, watching the sun."

Hastening science leads to disaster. History has proven this.

I think it's healthy for Aspergians to pick up a more positive self-concept.

What? Caution and tolerance? Not rushing to implement some "cure" that may or may not destroy our lives? Trying to build in ourselves a sense of pride in who we are?

Meaningful scientific advancement is a slow process. Rushing it leads to quackery and multiple forms of stupidity.

[quote="githionel"]My brother and all the cousins on my father's side are Aspies. To us, it's not a disability. It's a skill-set. Now, the Sensory Processing Disorder that came with it, that causes all manner of havoc some days and makes me do things like spin, bang my head, pull my hair, and tic patterns on my fingers. THAT's a nuisance, and a little off-putting to my friends. [quote]


REPLY Hello, Githoniel ! Welcome to WP , and thanks for post because it really fits with something I'm trying to work out ( on my thread about "Continuum Concept and Swaddling".)about how sensory deprivation in babyhood, all those hours spent by many babies in virtual isolation and immobile environments etc from birth to 6 months , might explain some of the sensory disorder aspects of AS.

I am puzzled that you separate them up,( into Aspergers and a Sensory Processing Disorder) , BECAUSE so many posts on here seem to use evidence of sensory processing difficulties, meltdowns, stimming, etc etc, as PROOF of being Aspergers!

If they are separate how can one be proof of the other ? And why are sensory disorder symptoms used as diagnostic symptoms on tests for Aspergers?

BIG QUESTION!! Anyone ?
I am VERY puzzled!! And would love it if someone could explain this aspect of the aspergers industry to me!! Diagnosis for one syndrome ( aspergers) made on whether experience symptoms from another disorder ( Sensory Processing D )?! !

Last edited by ouinon on 28 Oct 2007, 2:16 am, edited 1 time in total.

Dude, most of the annoyance is carried over from other conflicts over various issues.

All you said was that 1) science isn't moving fast enough, voicing the suspicion that the academics were intentionally slowing it down, and that 2) Aspies shouldn't encourage this by taking a "not bad, just different" attitude toward their problems. My main objections are 1) I know from personal experience that rushed science produces nothing but poison, and 2) it doesn't do us any good to feel worse than we already do about our problems.

I'm personally feeling a bit stupid for having got all excited about people here apparently not wanting to eradicate Sensory Processing Disorders despite their obviously not being useful or fun!!, because I was under the impression they were part of Aspergers , seeing how often they're used to prove ASD in tests ! !

Last edited by ouinon on 28 Oct 2007, 2:30 am, edited 2 times in total.

I am puzzled that you separate them up,( into Aspergers and a Sensory Processing Disorder) , BECAUSE so many posts on here seem to use evidence of sensory processing difficulties, meltdowns, stimming, etc etc, as PROOF of being Aspergers!

If they are separate how can one be proof of the other ? And why are sensory disorder symptoms used as diagnostic symptoms on tests for Aspergers?


[/quote]

Well, here's where my professional background plays a huge, helpful role for me. Picture a Venn diagram. One circle is Aspergers, another is SPD. You can, logically, have SPD but none of the social/behavioral setbacks, thinking patterns, and OCD tendencies of Asperger's. You can also be a person who has Asperger's, but never really feels the need to stim, has reasonably good body awareness, and reasonably good visual-spatial skills. It's just that ASD and SPD are comorbid something like upwards of 75% of the time from the ASD end. So, if they're looking for the often diffuse and subjective early symptoms in say, a kindergarten child who can't tell you she thinks differently, you look for those tell-tale markers because they're often so obvious and visible.
It helps to consider Asperger's as a cluster of things. "Behavioral disorders" are often more varied to diagnosticians than something easy like strep throat, and may, in hindsight, comprise several disorders or syndromes working in concert. In my family, it seems to have a particularly strong genetic background, as 5/6 children born between my father and his brothers are Aspies. We were not neglected or unloved. My older half-sister and younger sister are both NTs, my brother and I Aspies. I have rather marked SPD, my brother's is more mild. Yet his overall stereotypical Aspie-ness of behavior is greater than mine. (He programs video games and struggles with writing, while I speak 8 languages and majored in writing for children.) SPD is a small but hard to ignore part of life for most of us, but not all.

Gilly

Thank you very much.
The thing that now interests me is WHY they are co-morbid to that extent. What is it that predisposes person to one so heavily if have the other? You said from the ASD end , that means that if have AS will prob have SPD? Not that if have SPD will likely have AS ? Or ? Not quite sure which way round you meant that. Would like to know more about this!
Thank you very much for your original post too. I had been confounding the two terribly!