Aspie Pride?

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What is with all the autie/aspie pride? Although, It's great that people have pride in themselves, there's a point where it goes from pride to narcissism. I've seen literally hundreds of posts claiming that people with AS are of some superior race. Have i been missing something? Aspergers has been nothing but a struggle.

Even on the bottom of all the webpages on this website, it has the footer 'Asperger's is not a disease'.

I confess I don't understand all the aspie/autie pride stuff myself but if people wish to have pride in themselves I say let them have it. It beats the alternative of them being depressed or angry about it. By the way, I agree that aspergers is a disease.

I think that most of those who claim autistic superiority believe that the way that NTs think and behave is simply idiotic. A lot of our so-called "problems" only exist because of the illogical and primitive systems which NTs use to run things.

If we did not have to tackle their nonsense on a daily basis, many of us would not be having anywhere near as much difficulty as we do, so you can't really blame everything on our disorder, or "difference" as some prefer to call it.

I dunno, maybe it is to balance out the other extreme of "you are a horrifically defective subhuman and should have been aborted" message.

I agree that Autism and Asperger's are not a disease the way measles ore chicken pox are. A more accurate term is disorder, as this describes a condition where something doesn't work the way it is supposed to. A serious enough disorder can be a disability, as well. The amount of disability varies with the amount of and form the disorder takes. So, I have a disorder that is somewhat disabling.

There is no question in my mind that it is a disorder, as there are aspects of my condition that make it clear that I don't function the way I would if I were NT. The amount and forms of my disfunction made it hard to get and keep jobs. It also has made it impossible to have in person friendships, and left me preferring the life of a hermit. I am not good in social situations, and hate physical contact, have trouble with eye contact (it feels too confrontational), and I hate social gatherings. There are also the more physical aspects of the disorder. I don't like loud noises, and can hear the high pitched electrical noise made by TVs, monitors, radios, and some other appliances. I also have some skin sensitivity issues. I can't stand to wear make up, and will wear comfortable clothes no matter what "fashion" demands. There are other issues, but there is enough here to show that my Asperger's is a disorder, and somewhat disabling to me.

I don't think the anxiety and depression that are common to people on the spectrum are another symptom of the disorder, rather they are a reaction to dealing with the problems caused by our disorder in getting along in the NT world. If we got along better in the NT world we wouldn't be having so much anxiety and depression.

It is quite apparent that we are not "superior" to NTs. We are a variant to the norm based on a disorder. Trying to make out we are superior, because of trouble in dealing with NTs is silly. NTs are not superior to us, either. They are just people who fall within the normal parameter, but like us, they come in good, bad, and in between behavior types.

If you want to go around chanting Autism/Asperger's pride, go ahead, but I don't see that as helping our cause. It will only serve to separate us from NTs even more. The world doesn't owe us a pedestal, just a chance at getting along better in the NT world.

Perfect, Questor, I agree 100% and couldn't say it better if I tried.

Disability pride is not limited to autism. Plenty of people agree with the idea that a disability can be part of one's identity, can be a neutral or positive part of one's life.

Disability pride is unrelated to narcissism and a superiority complex, which are often just reactions to prejudice. I say this because the thing you are taught when you're exposed to prejudice is someone has to be on top. If you believe autistics are superior, then it's obvious you still buy into that someone-has-to-be-on-top idea, and that's not the point of disability pride at all.

It's more like being proud of your identity as a citizen of your country or a part of your family or a part of your culture. You don't--and shouldn't--consider yourself superior. You simply consider being part of that group a part of who you are, something that you see as a fundamental part of your life, and something that you are not ashamed to identify yourself with. That's disability pride. It's got nothing to do with thinking you're superior. Think of "gay pride", for example; do those people think themselves superior to straight people? For the most part, no; and they shouldn't--the point of it isn't that they're superior, but that they're equals, and that who they are is not something they are ashamed of. Disability pride is quite similar.

The problem with the word pride is that there are multiple definitions that people tend to think of
1. A feeling of accomplishment and satisfaction due to what you have achieved.
2. Having a high opinion of oneself, sometimes leading to feelings of superiority.
3. Explicitly not feeling shame for things people treat as shameful in you. (This is a much newer definition.)
4. A group of lions.

People who discuss autistic pride, tend to mean definition 3, as Callista was discussing.

The problem is that sometimes, because of having enough bad experiences with other people (which are likely not autistic, with only about 1% of the population being autistic), that they think that they're better than the people who are hurting them. This tends to be a defensive mechanism that can cause a lot more problems that people often realize; people saying "If you're hurting me and trying to say you're better than me, then I'm better than you because I'm not doing that".

While the latter of those situations is far less often, its also far more memorable, so people who are applying the third definition, start being interrupted as using the second.


And just because while writing up the different definitions I thought of it, I have a feeling that from now on every time people talk about 'autistic pride' the idea that will come to mind is a group of autistic lions, and trying to figure out how the social dynamics of that would work.

I'm certainly not one of the aspie/autie pride people; I don't even tell people about my diagnosis. Only a handful of people know. I try not to talk about it much with those people, as well.

For me, being proud of being autistic would be like being proud of being white or male or tall. I didn't do anything to be that way, so I don't take pride in it. I tend to take pride in things I have earned.