Autism in France: Psychoanalysis, Packing, Other Travesties

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My time spent in France was the most wonderful time of my life. The culture there is a lot more tolerant to Aspies and just about every other type of N.A. out there... it's hard to explain but French people don't have this type of greedy/utilitarian attitude that is so common in America... it's a real joy to live there as an aspie. I've heard of the disturbing charges and accusations, but those mean nothing to me considering what my experience was like and what the culture is like there in general.

I'm sure none of you want to think about this... but it seems that that the US is possibly the worst place on earth to live for an aspie. It is impersonal, the low-skillset jobs available to aspies here are plain depressing... most of us will end up with either a tiny reduced-income apartment or group living, and multiple part-time jobs that treat workers like we're disposable trash. No Holidays, no sick days, no breaks, no respect... just a lot of slaving away until you have a breakdown and no longer can.

That pretty much describes my life.

Even though the general attitude towards aspies here in Canada is somewhat better, as far as I can tell, I can still relate to the experience of slaving away at a crap job just to get by, with low-end living arrangements. I'm currently working part-time as a grocery cashier, and I'm renting a room in a friend's family's basement.

My friend and his family all know I'm an aspie, and so do my managers at work, though I'm not really treated much differently than I would be if I were an NT in the same situation. I get along well with my friend's family though, and I work hard to ensure that I stay on my managers' "good side", so the attitude my "superiors" have towards me is generally positive.

All that being said though, I still hate being a cashier, mainly because the customers I work with drive me up the f*****g wall, there's often a lot of noise and confusion, and I often have to deal with things that set off my germaphobe tendencies, like leakage from packages of raw meat, saliva on the bills people hand me, and other things like that.

When I get home from work, I'm too tired and lazy to do anything productive, so I just watch TV, surf the web, post on here, and eat copious amounts of junk food. Not surprisingly, right now my bedroom is a complete mess, and my friend's mother has been nagging me to clean it. I can't blame her though, it is really that bad.

I can't handle cash register at all. I have had many jobs where they tried to push me into doing cashier work. In addition to me being slow an incompetent at it, it caused me to have panic attacks so bad that I thought I was having a heart attack. Several times I had to walk away from customers in the middle of an order, punched out, and drove myself to the emergency room. Needless to say, the jobs didn't last.

I clicked on the link and, among other things, I see this:

But what are the violent comments they are referring to? and what is "the 3rd plan etc"?

Carlotti was criticized by some "professionals" for promoting only "methods that work" (yes, that's exactly why they criticized her !). The third autism plan is the current effort to help autists in France ; it's still insufficient, but it's a good step in the right direction.

Anyway, the situation seems to be calmed down a bit now.

In the second world war, germany tried to eradicate other races and create their arian race, the perfect human. Blond hair, blue eyes and possible big tits too if it would fit them Well. Lebensborn project disgusts me

Here we stand now, 70 years later. We watch society go all nazi on us. f**k you, france!

As a culture, the French are much more tolerant and accepting of differences in sexuality, gender, and cognition (though, not always so if you speak with a bad accent ). The systems in place seem much more humanizing than in the States, and technical schools are much more respected than in the States (I've noticed an odd stigma about it in certain demographics here in the States). HOWEVER, their education system absolutely sucks if you do not fit the learning style it was designed for. Multiple choice is a joke, and spelling mistakes count against you in a math test, which usually require answers in the forms of sentences, as they are very fond of word problems, usually with a twist. You are not taught how to write an essay; you are expected to absorb the necessary skills to succeed, though success is defined very differently than here in the States. Everything is graded out of 20, and it is possible to achieve a negative score. The educational philosophy is that a 20/20 means you are perfect, and perfection does not exist. Thus, 1-5 percent of students will achieve a grade of 16 to 18 on any single test (which is considered exceptional), most will hover between 9 and 12, with 10 considered as passing. Starting in 6th grade, kids who do not fit the learning style will start redoing grades, with up to 50% of the graduating high school class having redone a whole grade because they may have gotten a 9 overall in a single class (dropping out is not uncommon either). When I attended the French system (from the start of school until 9th grade), learning disabilities were interpreted as a sign of laziness (I'm quoting a 6th grade teacher here). With enough hard work, of course anything is possible. There were no resources or ways of doing school that respected multiple intelligences: case in point, I was starting to discover calculus in the 4th grade while I was also struggling to survive in history class (so much useless rote memorization and regurgitation!). The teachers focused on my shortcomings and never recognized my, at the time, superior math abilities. In fact, the system is set up to allow your worst grade to define you. I guess this is motivating for some people.
There is also very little redemptive route in academics in the French system. They are a bit essentialist in that aspect. However, if you suck at school, you are not dehumanized, and there are other routes for leading a successful life. If you suck at school, it just means you suck at school, end of story. But if you wanted to pursue only one subject matter, or you only have the cognitive strengths to pursue a limited set of fields, you're at a huge disadvantage since generalized intelligence is a prerequisite for success there.

It's very possible that things have changed dramatically since I was in the French system, though I doubt it would have changed completely.

NO WAY! (Sorry I love emoticons).

Hard subject, because I live and grew up in France, and the way I was treated by the system and by psychoanalysts, I consider abuse, child abuse, especially in the 90's. Luckly for the USA I was first diagnose there, and then diagnose a 2nd time in France in the mid 2000's. But just thinking how badly I was treated during the 90's, just thinking about it makes me want to cry I was never packed, but it's all the rest, I was always seen has the "crazy one". And even today, some shrinks say It's a choice, other say it's my mom's fault, and others say I made the choice of being autistic at birth. France can be in advance on a lots of thing, but on others this country is 100 years backwards.

Last edited by SpirosD on 27 Sep 2014, 10:44 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Bonjour, actually the French school system hasn't changed, even today. And all you have written previously is true, sadly... In my case after graduating high school I was force to do my higher studies in America (I studied films and arts) because here the system is very elitist, lots of nepotism and to enter film school here (FEMIS) you need 2 or 3 years of university and then need to pass the testes, and when they ask who is a director you like and you say for example Spielberg, you fail, but if you answer a pretentious intellectual director like Godard then maybe they will let you pass. So screw that I went to America for my higher education.

Wow. I'm only just learning about this now. Its really weird. It just does not seem like the kind of thing that would happen in France. They have possibly the best health care system in the world and are generaly a tolerant and enlightened people. Its flabergasting that this goes on there . I'm truly shocked.

I was actually surprised when I first heard about this.

Best enjoyed with a Gauloise hanging loosely from a corner of your mouth:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGeQXdh43eE

Edit: Except SpirosD of course. He is a hero for his statement about Godard.

Ah ah, brilliant song... Sadly I would agree with this song, and I'm half from this smelly cheese eating country.
EDIT : About Godard, the man is not even French, he's Swiss living in his tax heaven country using French public money to make his intellectual boring films.

If you ever seek refuge, I hereby invite you for Dutch cheese and Belgian beer in my "narco-État". (That is what Chirac called The Netherlands once, I believe.) And we even have a few film festivals to boot.