I finally really get why NTs might not like us
02 Feb 2014, 8:53 pm
I think of it in terms of ego and expectation. While myself and a few other people I've met with AS are not without these characteristics, they certainly have a tenancy to manifest in a different way.
The first is expectation. If someone holds a door open for me - they expect me to walk through it. If I use another door, I have broken their expectation. It matters not whether I was avoiding them, didn't notice them, or just happened to like another door better - all they will see is an expectation that has not been met.
The next component is ego. By breaking that expectation, you have the potential to do several things. You have denied them a "feel good" moment by robbing their opportunity to do a good deed. You may have established a precedent that you are "too good" to walk through their door, and created a false sense of superiority. You may have even forced them to evaluate their own conception of conventionally accepted social norms (this is evidenced by the "why don't men hold doors open anymore?" gripe).
Notice how in each of these cases, your reason why isn't even mentioned - because it doesn't matter. What matters is how YOU impacted THEM. The emotional response of an affront to one's ego is diverse in both form and intensity. In turn, this effects your expectations - perhaps you expected to just walk through a door. The quiet murmuring of "***hole" behind you breaks your expectation, and in turn are left confused because you don't know why you're suddenly an ***hole. Rinse and repeat ad nauseum.
The system that we as people have created depends on the subtle recognition and validation of these expectations in order to satisfy the emotional ego. We have the unique ability to effortlessly degrade, disrupt, and redefine this system while being completely oblivious to it. This quality is one of the most terrifying things to the "right" planet, because it forces them to re-evaluate the very structure of their social architecture. Instead of finding a place for this rogue quality, it is much easier to exclude it, discard it, and try to forget about it.
Remove the ego and the expectation, and all you have is someone holding a door, and someone walking through a door.
03 Feb 2014, 7:17 am
And sometimes people do both at the same time. Judge me and dismiss me while deciding I am missing some part of the social hierarchy and this justifies squashing me because (at least I think) they really feel it has to be done, I can't be allowed to continue to exist and feel any dignity or of any value. For whatever little (to me, not small to them) thing I have missed.
Remove the ego and the expectation, and all you have is someone holding a door, and someone walking through a door.
That's fascinating, the idea hat it terrifies people to be confronted with someone who is even a little bit disruptive to their social architecture.
People get angry with me when I don't hold contradictory facts in my head and instead question things that the social hierarchy says aren't debatable. The most classic being I am genuinely surprised when a boss does not understand, or ignores, but I assume does not understand, the rules and announces we are all to do something that is against rules, policies, or even illegal.
I don't even know that it's my questioning the facts that causes problems, it's any subtle failure to recognize and acknowledge a social hierarchy that really matters that seems to be considered hateful.
And maybe that explains why people describe me as kind, nice, sweet, but ultimately, they generally do not want to be around me too much.
03 Feb 2014, 8:25 am
In addition to what others have said, I've noticed something else. Many people in the past have accused me of lying, making things up or trying to hide something. I recently came across a list of body language and behaviours that are (allegedly) displayed by people when lying, and was pretty shocked to realize that much of it fits my typical social (mis)behavior to a T.
Liars either avoid eye contact or overdo it. Liars get hung up on unimportant details and talk about them way too much, which is supposedly a sign that they're making things up as they go along. I do this when telling the god honest truth because my mind tends to wander and I might feel particularly enthusiastic about certain details. The list goes on. Fidgeting, nose touching etc., I do all of that. Scratching my nose and adjusting my glasses are my most common stims. I cough nervously to force myself to exhale when I realize I'm hyperventilating. I shift my weight from one foot on the other because I have a hard time keeping my balance. I forget to blink, then notice that my eyes are burning and start to blink excessively. My voice wavers, changes volume and becomes more high-pitched when I'm particularly nervous.
In other words, everything about me screams "pathological, yet extremely untalented liar". And when I don't talk to people and simply stand next to them at a bus stop or in an elevator, my behavior says "watch out, there is something shifty about this guy. He's probably up to no good". This is especially unfortunate when you're a rather tall and bulky male person with an unintentionally angry default expression and a thousand yard stare, which probably intimidates people even without my hunched posture and my nervous ticks.
Being mistaken for a liar is particularly frustrating when you visit a physician and try to convince them that you're in severe pain. I don't know about other people here, but I for one usually don't scream or distort my face when I'm in pain. It has to get pretty bad for me to outwardly show my pain, and even then I don't scream or whimper. I usually just panic, hyperventilate, and feel a strong need to move around. On several occasions in the past, I've been sent home by a physician who clearly thought that I was faking or exaggerating, and it later turned out to be something severe and urgent (appendicitis, pleurosis etc.) I think a major portion of the medical community is appallingly unprepared to deal with autistic people and other special needs individuals, but that's a different topic.
03 Feb 2014, 12:47 pm
Such an interesting topic.
I've begun to suspect I was AS and the only way I could to think to describe my issues before I suspected Aspergers to people was the uncanny valley syndrome. I haven't seen anyone else describe it like that and two people on here came up with this.
I have ADHD and dyspraxia.
If I am an Aspie, then I will be a mild one. A lot of my socialisation is acting so I don't have trouble with others. My family has moved around a lot and I was born in another country and I attended an international school before university. (IB represent!) I speak 3 languages and my dad used to be a university lecturer in the sciences.
I've always been interested in humans and could read the latest stuff due to my dad.
So a few observations:
1.humans only became humans in the past 100,000 years or so. Before that, aeons and aeons of non verbal communication. So as much as we are verbal, that's just a thin layer on the aeons of lizard brain. Sometimes I think we rely too much on the verbal (humans in general) and believe it should solve everything. It actually slows everything down. I don't believe people on the spectrum don't have access to the non verbal layers but rather it's the disconnect between the frontal cortexes and everything else. If it's smooth then we are NT, if not it's manifested in all the different neurological wiring. Apart from personality of course. It could be genetics, it could be environment or both. As my dad says, intelligence is 100% nature and 100% nurture.
In my case, my mother fell seriously ill when she was about 6 months pregnant with me. She had to take a medication that has since being banned. My extended family show signs of ADHD, and different things. They are generally quite mild, except me.
2. People have different personalities, some of my best friends are accepting and tolerant NTs. I like them much better than some Aspie people I've met. Some people are just unpleasant whether Aspie or NT.
3. Cultural issues. Some cultures are more pathological than others. I currently see that Western culture in the early 21st century is being run by psychopaths. This will make the entirety of culture pathological. You have to move closer to the sociopaths to survive.
I've always been odd as a child. It was accepted in my family and in my community. That was just how I was end of discussion. It was amusing if I tripped over my feet but no big deal. When my parent's friends came over with the kids, they would tell them I was very shy and to go play with me. The kids did not think anything of it and accepted it. I played with them in that moment, they weren't abusive. When they went, I was just as happy to go back to my own things.
I don't remember being bullied and didn't really see it happening that much among the kids.
I did not get abused till I moved to Europe, specifically the UK. I hadn't developed the tough skin that many people have to get. And I'm quite concerned if we had stayed, I would have been dead. It's not the kids bullying, it's adults bullying others at work. It's the Daily Mail bullying others by their newspapers. People bullying others in magazines. It goes back to those in charge. I've always wondered why the hell society was so awful. If you accept that it's because people who have no empathy are in charge, it all makes sense.
Sociopaths have always been around, but different cultures value different things, and if you value things sociopaths are good at, well what happens is what we see.
4. Language.
Non verbal communication is a language. Some people are better at languages than others. I just viewed it as in English you say yes, in Spanish you say si, in French oui, etc. I think if you've learnt languages it might be slightly easier to pick up on it. I can read Japanese kanji but all the characters, argh. It's a different style of thinking. I learnt a little Japanese ages ago. And counting according to the type of object was just a totally different thing to do. I read a blog by a person with dyspraxia who was studying sign language and said it helped him be more aware of subtleties which is quite intriguing and I intend to learn to see if it changes anything. Anyone know sign language in here?
I know people who speak a West African language from when I was a little (my parents moved there). There's no word for orange, they find it difficult to see orange as separate from red. For them it's the same colour. In the same language, there's no separate pronoun for male and female. Women traditionallly have more power and I wonder if a little bit of it could stem from not always instantly knowing what sex someone is.
With my languages, I have to change my ways of thinking to speak one language. So I can see in a way, how it could be to think differently.
Also I'm aware that what people think of being true and set in stone is only cultural. Like eating dogs.
03 Feb 2014, 5:04 pm
The first is expectation. If someone holds a door open for me - they expect me to walk through it. If I use another door, I have broken their expectation. It matters not whether I was avoiding them, didn't notice them, or just happened to like another door better - all they will see is an expectation that has not been met.
The next component is ego. By breaking that expectation, you have the potential to do several things. You have denied them a "feel good" moment by robbing their opportunity to do a good deed. You may have established a precedent that you are "too good" to walk through their door, and created a false sense of superiority. You may have even forced them to evaluate their own conception of conventionally accepted social norms (this is evidenced by the "why don't men hold doors open anymore?" gripe).
Notice how in each of these cases, your reason why isn't even mentioned - because it doesn't matter. What matters is how YOU impacted THEM. The emotional response of an affront to one's ego is diverse in both form and intensity. In turn, this effects your expectations - perhaps you expected to just walk through a door. The quiet murmuring of "***hole" behind you breaks your expectation, and in turn are left confused because you don't know why you're suddenly an ***hole. Rinse and repeat ad nauseum.
The system that we as people have created depends on the subtle recognition and validation of these expectations in order to satisfy the emotional ego. We have the unique ability to effortlessly degrade, disrupt, and redefine this system while being completely oblivious to it. This quality is one of the most terrifying things to the "right" planet, because it forces them to re-evaluate the very structure of their social architecture. Instead of finding a place for this rogue quality, it is much easier to exclude it, discard it, and try to forget about it.
Remove the ego and the expectation, and all you have is someone holding a door, and someone walking through a door.
Excellent, well written post loudzoo. I agree with all this. You put into words so clearly what I wanted to say myself. There can be so much going on under the surface of things in a simple action like just holding a door open.
Having doors held open for me has always been sort of a pet peeve of mine. I am in and out of doors a lot in my job and it becomes really tedious. People hold doors open at times when it doesn't make sense to, like when I am still 20 feet away from the door. What if I suddenly remember something I left in my car and have to go back for it? Am I supposed to explain?
Another one is, if I have my hands full and I plan to lean on the door with the whole weight of my body to open it...then someone else, seeing what I am doing and trying to be helpful, suddenly yanks it open at the last second so I lose my balance. Plus, here's the kicker: they interpret my loss of balance as a sign that I need help, rather than seeing it as the result of their own interference. How about ASKING me first if I want the door held open?
So yes I notice I have a lot of expectations of my own about what I prefer people to do, what I find polite or not, etc. but my expectations are quite different from the ones most other people have. Our signals get crossed up because my way of doing things is so different.
I understand the frustration people have when expectations aren't met. What dumbfounds me though, and sometimes scares me, is the amount of ego people have invested in getting their expectations met, the way people can act like they have been personally insulted by a small thing like not greeting them, or not walking through the door they held open.
In my company we had a training seminar some time ago about cultural diversity and understanding differences. They pointed out how some of the things people think of as common courtesy in the US are not universal to other cultures. One thing they mentioned specifically, which I thought was really cool, is that not everyone will respond to a greeting...and, that having a co-worker ignore your greeting is not grounds for finding fault with them.
03 Feb 2014, 5:05 pm
EXACTLY
03 Feb 2014, 10:33 pm
totally agree that cultural differences affect us. Introversion (and to some extent, mild Aspie-like behaviour) is more accepted in the East. The elder generation sometimes thought I was a polite, intelligent and modest person, though my own generation thinks I'm a weirdo and a frightful bore. In the West I am not only socially inept, but insular, unfriendly and a thorough bore.
04 Feb 2014, 12:23 am
You need to keep in mind two very important things.
First, some people may deliberately snub someone that they feel is beneath them, meaning the inflated ego of the person walking through the door is consciously telling them not to acknowledge the person holding it for them. While this may not be true in your case, the person holding the door isn't a mind reader. So, depending on the situation, the ego in question can belong to either party, not simply the door holder.
Second, if you're consciously aware that you're not responding politely to kind gestures, then you need to exam your own ego. It's almost like you're saying, "I don't see any need to thank these people, therefore it's silly, and they are the ones in the wrong. It simply doesn't make sense to ME." See, this can also be an issue of ego, but not for the door holder. Your expectations are not being met, as you feel you don't have thank someone for being polite, therefore it's silly to you, therefore you think the people getting offended are in the wrong.
And yes, if someone holds a door for you and you need to run back to your car, simply say, "Thanks, but I forgot something," and turn around and go to your car. Is that really an elaborate explanation?
04 Feb 2014, 12:36 am
1) The first is expectation. If someone holds a door open for me - they expect me to walk through it. If I use another door, I have broken their expectation. It matters not whether I was avoiding them, didn't notice them, or just happened to like another door better - all they will see is an expectation that has not been met....
2) The next component is ego. By breaking that expectation, you have the potential to do several things. You have denied them a "feel good" moment by robbing their opportunity to do a good deed. You may have established a precedent that you are "too good" to walk through their door, and created a false sense of superiority. You may have even forced them to evaluate their own conception of conventionally accepted social norms...
3) Notice how in each of these cases, your reason why isn't even mentioned - because it doesn't matter. What matters is how YOU impacted THEM. The emotional response of an affront to one's ego is diverse in both form and intensity. In turn, this effects your expectations - perhaps you expected to just walk through a door. The quiet murmuring of "***hole" behind you breaks your expectation, and in turn are left confused because you don't know why you're suddenly an ***hole.
4) Rinse and repeat ad nauseum.
I'd like to respond to these points. While there's some truth in what you're saying, I feel you're analysis is too one-sided:
1) I don't believe it's simply a matter of not meeting their expectations, but rather deliberately not acknowledging their gesture.
2) I don't believe it's robbing them of a feel good moment, or forcing them to question social norms, but rather making them question why someone would chose to avoid them on purpose. Even if you preferred the other door and had nothing against them, you could at least acknowledge what they'd done. "Appreciate it, but this door's quicker."
3) In any of these cases, you didn't even give the door holder a reason why, but you chose to not acknowledge the act. Then, you're critical of them for being angry, but notice how in these cases, you deliberately chose to not even acknowledge what they were trying to do for you. Even if it wasn't convenient for you to go through that particular door, the person holding it would have no idea WHY you've chosen not to acknowledge them.
4) "Rinse and repeat ad nauseum." If this is happening on a regular basis, then clearly you must be aware that they are doing something they perceive as being kind toward you, even if it's not to your benefit. Don't try to tell me you're unaware. And if you can't even acknowledge the gesture, then it may be a question of your own ego not being met, as you see such acknowledgement as unnecessary and therefore can't be bothered.
04 Feb 2014, 1:48 am
I have thought along these lines why NTs don't seem to understand our own attempts to communicate with them simply because for NTs we are seen as "loners'' and other labels that I think are rather unfair.
For one thing, because of the usual communication difficulties that comes along with autism, it seems that NTs will either see that as unwillingness to communicate, a failure to communicate, or not willing to communicate when in actual fact we are just trying to communicate much like NTs but because NT communication consists of both verbal and non verbal aspects, which varies a lot and sometimes seems to blend together and for most of us having to deal with the usual sensory issues and when that happens, it can be so easy to be overwhelmed.
I have even noticed that in NTs, that when they engage in conversation , not only can they engage in verbal communication non stop but sometimes when you are a part in the conversation group, as I have myself experienced, it is very hard to say the things you want, whether it is a subject, as discussed by neurotypicals, that either as an aspie you are interested in or not.
There were times though when I was fortunate enough to be with my peers of the usual NTs when I do get a chance to verbally interact though that they apparently do not sense my autism which on occasions I normally keep quite about it and I do what I can to "go with the flow". In fact they don't even suspect on the surface in regards to my Aspergers
In regards to conversation, I get the feeling that somehow what I say doesn't even matter to them or else the NTs would have cared about what I would say if I engaged in their level.
In addition, NTs have an awareness of what is happening right now but since because of my interests, which necessarily is not that of many NTs, I do have a hard time of being in the moment, whereas NTs seem to be fully aware, especially with other NTs, and when that happens as much as I have to fight it, or rather if I'm around NTs, that awareness that NTs call empathy, it seems that my interaction with them fails in that regards. I don't know whether that is my autism kicking in or if my moods get in the way.
If NTs had a greater appreciation of neurodiversity, especially the fact that instead of their usual perspective on autism, which can get tiresome to hear, they can appreciate the full variation in the human aspects and by human, I mean our interests, desires, our own unique perspectives on the world can NTs finally sympathesize with
our plight.
04 Feb 2014, 1:10 pm
Yes, at 20 feet away in a loud environment, this might be more than I can manage.
Your posts in this thread come across like you are trying to teach the rest of us here the proper way to behave, and I think you could do to examine your own ego rather than telling the rest of us to examine ours.
04 Feb 2014, 2:11 pm
They dont like people who may come off as odd or different they want everyone to conform and be the same if you are not one of them or are different they will gang up on you, attack you, troll you, bully you, and also not let you join their parties.
_________________
Your Aspie score is 193 of 200
Your neurotypical score is 40 of 200
You are very likely an aspie
No matter where I go I will always be a Gaijin even at home. Like Anime? https://kissanime.to/AnimeList
04 Feb 2014, 7:13 pm
Agree and disagree.
Yes, I'm sure I have an ego. I think we all do.
I guess what bothered me about this sub-topic regarding common courtesy is the great lengths some people have gone to justify their rude behavior. They make it all about the (presumably) NT holding the door without examining themselves.
All of your posts come across like, "I'm totally innocent. Yes, I recognized they were trying to do something kind for me, but they shouldn't expect me to acknowledge it cuz I said so!"
Are you at least be willing to examine yourself a little bit or are you just looking for people to agree with you? And it's okay to criticize me and my behavior if you want, but you never really addressed anything I've said.
As far as the 20 feet away thing, if you can pick-up on the fact that someone's holding a door for you, just put your finger up and point back at the parking lot. Then turn around and go back to the car.
04 Feb 2014, 7:20 pm
You already stated earlier in the thread that you don't believe these issues have anything to do with brain wiring, and I addressed that. Are you willing to consider the possibility that other people on this forum may not always be able to do the things you are suggesting? I haven't seen any signs of that in your replies. You just keep giving suggestions of what you think other people should be able to do, and should do.
04 Feb 2014, 8:11 pm
1) I don't believe it's simply a matter of not meeting their expectations, but rather deliberately not acknowledging their gesture.
2) I don't believe it's robbing them of a feel good moment, or forcing them to question social norms, but rather making them question why someone would chose to avoid them on purpose. Even if you preferred the other door and had nothing against them, you could at least acknowledge what they'd done. "Appreciate it, but this door's quicker."
3) In any of these cases, you didn't even give the door holder a reason why, but you chose to not acknowledge the act. Then, you're critical of them for being angry, but notice how in these cases, you deliberately chose to not even acknowledge what they were trying to do for you. Even if it wasn't convenient for you to go through that particular door, the person holding it would have no idea WHY you've chosen not to acknowledge them.
4) "Rinse and repeat ad nauseum." If this is happening on a regular basis, then clearly you must be aware that they are doing something they perceive as being kind toward you, even if it's not to your benefit. Don't try to tell me you're unaware. And if you can't even acknowledge the gesture, then it may be a question of your own ego not being met, as you see such acknowledgement as unnecessary and therefore can't be bothered.
Allow me to clarify.
The intent had no bias towards NT or AS. In addition, it was purposefully intended to be one sided. The intentions of the person walking through the door are irrelevant to the context of the situation, as they cannot be understood by the holder unless said intentions are conveyed (whether verbally or non-verbally). My position assumes that no action is taken on behalf of the former party, and that no intentions were conveyed, other than the former party simply did not walk through a particular door. In fact, I tried to exclude the former party from my position as much as possible to avoid contextual confusion.
Furthermore, my example is not a product of direct personal experience, but rather an extrapolation of other observed tenancies in human behavior. If I stressed out about holding doors as much as your rhetoric seeks to convey, I'd have no time for the good stuff in life, like photoshopping cat pictures to send to my Aunt May.
In the future, please refrain from making outward personal assumptions when discussing abstract theory of thought analysis. It is both unneeded and detrimental to your credibility. I am not the only one here who has felt a predatory vibe in your posts, regardless of what your intent may be. I would advise you to be conscientious of your writing tone if you wish to be included in this discussion going forward.
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