A Natural Law that I discovered...

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Since my ASD diagnosis in 2001 while in my 20s, I've noticed that every time I had to deal with a bully since (workplace, room-mate, whatever), the common denominator was that they never heard of Aspergers every time I told them of it. Even when I ran into some old bullies pre-diagnosis, and told them about it, they had no clue what it was. One even lied in a sarcastic way saying "Oh, really??! That doesn't sound like you at all!!"

But anyways, the point is that not knowing about Aspergers definitely produces some sort of hate-on for Aspies, and the other characteristic I've noticed of these bullies is that they tend to be the exact opposite of Aspergers: very extroverted, manipulative, smooth, street-smart, pompous, etc. They tend to be in positions like sales, finance, or management (the last one I've had my share of). And why should they have heard of Aspergers, seeing as they would never associate with an Aspie during their years: when it comes to clubs and dinner parties and such, they hang around similar smug and arrogant types.

The response from these menaces, when I told them of ASD, was quite surly: "Well you just have to try harder", "Well, you're just different, you just have to deal with that and don't go looking for someone to fix it for you", and even "That's YOUR problem, not mine."

By contrast, every time I told someone about Aspergers who knew about it, the response was mostly favourable, at worst neutral - I never got any foul treatment or judgemental comments from them. Work-wise, these were people who tended to be in science, health, IT, humanitarian or teaching positions, etc.

Conjecture: psychopaths and Aspies are natural enemies.

Arrogant jerks are arrogant jerks. What more is there to say?

Speaking from personal experience that would make things worse.
The bullies I know would have no sympathy after that. They would bully me far worse.
The reason people are bullied is because they can sense weakness. They see AS as a weakness.
They bully people who are different. It would be pointless to tell them that I am different.
It is an invitation to bulling.

Last edited by artrat on 06 Dec 2011, 10:17 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Or, there are bullies who when they learn about Asperger's, incorporate that into their repertoire.

See: Something Awful forum.

You shouldn't expect any bully to be nice, about anything. They're insecure and selfish.

I've found that even if they had known about Asperger's those people are just the same.

OK, guys, I gotta say this.

The most persistent bully in my workplace is an Aspie. The other bully (and he's mild compared to the aspie) is a hyper obsessive compulsive guy. Neither of them are bosses, just co-workers who like to threaten other co-workers. I assume they're fragile personalities and usually just let it slide; as do the rest of our workers (Aspie & NT alike).

Guess what, no one particularly likes either of the bullies. Sometimes I wonder what these two make of their friendless status at work; they seem so clueless about the impact of their behavior on how they're perceived by the rest of us.

I'm confused. Do you really expect people who know nothing about Asperger's to suddenly be all helpful and supportive when you tell them you have it? I don't get it. Why would they? They don't know anything about it, and a brief explanation never cuts it.

If you told them you had Superficial Extrapolitus, would you expect them to act any differently toward you? Yeah, that's made up, but that's the point. Telling them you have something they know nothing about is about the same as telling them you have something that doesn't exist. In their minds, it doesn't because there's nothing there under "Asperger's." It's an empty file. What are they supposed to do with it?

"Yeah, so you have Gobbledegook. So what? What am I supposed to do?" Sure, you could try to explain it to them, but how much time to they really have? Enough to learn as much information as it takes to understand it? I highly doubt it.

Of course you are getting better responses from people who've already taken the time to understand what it is. They know. They other guys don't.

I don't see that as a "hate-bully" thing at all. It's just ignorance.

Yeah it would be a reversal in character for bullies to show sympathy for your problems.

I agree. But also, Aspergers is not particularly easy to identify; it's a subtle thing; even to those of us familiar with it. If I encountered MR Xxx out somewhere playing music; would I suspect he's aspie? Not likely.

I worked at my current employment for six months before I started to identify three of my 150 co-workers as on the spectrum. They are very different. One is Miss Unpleasant Bully, another is a pleasant capable porter who probably has a low IQ and another is an outdoor laborer who is frankly a brilliant man. I wasn't trying to exercise aspie radar; I simply eventually noticed; but when high functioning; it's a subtle thing to the onlooker.

Man, when I clicked on this thread, I was kind of hoping you'd just learned about gravity...the hard way. :p

But yeah, I agree with ArtRat. Bullies aren't going to let you off the hook because you told them your weakness. If you try to play sympathy with them, you are just telling them exactly where to hit you where it hurts.

I feel like most bullies are like microcosmic bigots: anyone that isn't just like them is wrong, or lazy, or evil. I have a room mate who slips into bullying whenever someone expresses their limits, boundaries or other hang ups. She told me once "You could find a job no problem if you didn't choose to have so many hang-ups." As if I choose to have hangups, as if anyone would choose to have a massive, debilitating shutdown at the worst possible time. It's like saying "You could eat dairy if you didn't choose to be lactose intolerant."

A corollary to this topic is that those who know the least about Aspergers are the ones most likely to argue with you on matters relating to it.

It must go hand-in-hand with their arrogant know-it-all image.

Sometimes I just want to say "You do realize you're giving me advice on a condition (you admitted) that you know nothing about." But they'd probably just angrily reply "I don't need to know, because...."

That's basically it....

well, not all bullies are psychopaths, but all psychopaths are bullies.

I wouldn't say that's conjecture. I'd say it's a corollary. At least, in my experience, that's been true. Although I will say that I've heard plenty of cases where NTs were bullied by a psychopath, heck, years ago I commiserated with a few of them on a common enemy who I'd describe as a psychopath.