Have you been shut out of group work (at seminars etc.)?

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I heard a lot of gossip in some of my workplaces. Some of it was pretty malicious stuff and it was hard to see how their victims could have deserved it. Sad to say, the worst offenders with slandering the innocent were white and homogenous. When I started working in a mixed-race environment the chat was a lot less malicious and racism had also died a death, I guess because there wasn't a majority of any one race.

There was also quite a bit about what jerks the management were, but that was usually deserved, though there were a few stretchers and pointless whinges about practically nothing. The sad thing was that it hardly ever ended up in them taking a complaint to the management. I suggested they did that once and one or two of them looked scared and said "oh well, we'd best not upset them." There wasn't much open solidarity, but there was a fair bit of whatever you call that thing where you obey the commands too literally knowing full well that it's not what the management wants at all. But most of it was just a game of "ain't it awful" (an Eric Berne thing).

There were a lot of other disfunctional games going on, and office politics too, especially in the all-white groups. I suppose I stayed out of most of it or just didn't know what it was, but I sometimes joined in as a kind of fitting-in thing, if I felt there was some truth in what they were saying, and it might explain why I wasn't shut out more often. I can well imagine a more ethical Aspie not knowing about it and not wanting to know about it, and getting shunned for their trouble. The mixed-race groups made some effort to discourage turning individuals into laughing stocks when it did happen.

So I think one reason Aspies might get shut out is that they're more interested in keeping things honest and above-board, and in that sense they're too good for this world.

Hope I haven't strayed too far off topic with that long-ish rant.

@Jayo
Maestro Jayo

Nice topic, I seem to be drawn to and commenting on a lot of your posts. nice

And yes, social exclusion happens to us all and us ND's especially.
The occurrence is, I'd even go as far as to say: of course, much higher when looking at interactions between our group and Neurotypical peers.
In social- and or group-thinking any decent from the average is treated with varying forms of dismay, distain, ostracization, ... And this is so for us ASD peers and well as NT peers, we're all guilty of this in varying degrees.

My personal approach to dealing with this:
- if it is a group I do not really want or need to be a part of: I truly do not care. all my life I've been a hermit and had to make it on my own, ... I prefer it that way.
- if it is a group I really want or need to be a part of: I try and make myself useful to their group goals. My experience is that once a group finds you useful, they'll accept you plenty, of course while still mocking your differences internally, but they'll defend you against non-group members for instance.

Kind regards,
Kada

I'm always interested in workplace gossip. In fact I enjoy gossiping. But I'm not a stereotypical "overly honest" Aspie who's not to be trusted. I know what to keep to myself, as I have the social capabilities for it (although I'm an Aspie I'm socially intelligent). The only thing I'm not so good at is emotional regulation - so if I'm a victim of bullying or sense that people don't like me I can get really anxious and upset.
But when people tell me stuff about others, I don't go off and repeat it to the wrong people. I don't snitch on people either. I hate snitches. We have a few snitches at work but I'm not one of them.