anneurysm wrote:
I am a public speaker who conducts sessions on ASD issues, and I would like to start by saying that I am a very inclusive person. About a year ago, I will admit that I had a narrowly defined definition of who should speak out within the ASD community. I initially thought that people only wanted to hear success stories and how one has overcome things, and only include people who can interact with the public well. I now realize that people with less-than-perfect social skills should speak out about their current experiences (preferably in settings where their differences will be 100% tolerated, such as autistic-run organizations) without the pressures to prove anything or to do small talk afterwards.
Anyway, my current dilemma is not about excluding people who have communication difficulties, but more to do with protecting the image of people on the spectrum. The scenario is this: because I am a well-known public speaker, I bump into many people on the spectrum who aspire to do this too. However, I have recently met two people who may be a little unsuitable for this job, but I would like to ask the members of the forum whether they agree with me, since I am only one person with one opinion.
Here are the two people I am currently torn about.
#2 - Have never met him but know a lot about him through a friend on the spectrum. This friend told me that he is immature, a slacker, and his special interest is weed. I also smoke occasionally, but I am *very* discreet about it and I am not obsessed with it. I take a look at his facebook and that is also the impression I got from him Almost all his comments are about weed, drugs, drinking and antisocial behaviour and there is lots of profanity. He called someone an as*hole, told someone to f--- off, said that a friend 'likes penis up his a--' and wrote 'suck my d--k you f-----g f----t' on justin bieber's page. He even got a pot leaf tattoo and is telling everyone about it. So, he sends me an email asking about how he could become a public speaker as he has aspergers (confirmed by my friend) and apparently got 98% on a project about it. I have not responded back for obvious reasons.
I don't like rejecting anyone, and I am not going to tell them they are unsuitable, but perhaps they should work on these things. Either way, I am paranoid about how autistics are portrayed and I do not want these guys to embarrass themselves.
What does everyone think? How do I deal with people like these? Any input is appreciated.
Hey its #2, Dr. Evils deadly assassin.
Seriously I do want to help people with autism and other disabiltys.
I'd even like to take a person out too mabey a bar or a smoke shop in TO if there of age and try to have a good time with persons with disabiltys or mabey even go paintballing with them or if they don't like that I'll try to have fun with them in any way possible. We only live once lets make the best out of it.
I am starting to make postive changes in my life by being nice to others in real life but if I don't like somthing about someone I can be a complete ass to them. For example there is this girl who I go to this program and she likes me but I don't becuase she is very annoying and likes things that piss me off such as Justin Beiber I really hope she dosent start to dislike the music she likes just so she can get me to like her becuase I would feel totally creeped out I dont know if she has AS or not becuase with females its hard to tell unlike with males but I would try to be more of a better person to her when I go to my program for learning.
Also I look forword to meeting you in person and we can talk if this is really what I want to do.
08 Sep 2011, 10:48 pm
I also encourage you to stay on this forum...you could learn a lot from the people here.
