"Aspies lack empathy" - says who?

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I find that a common accusation of people with Asperger syndrome is that they lack empathy. Out of my experience, I'd like to think that I'm a pretty empathetic person, that is, if I'm getting the definition of empathy right. In fact, because I feel emotions so strongly (a non-typical trait for aspies), I relate to people more. I've said before that I think that relating to someone is one of the most basic and universal human desires, and there are many instances in which I could relate to my fellow man's (or woman's) feelings.

And I'm not saying that this accusation is complete B.S. for all aspies. I'm sure there are plenty of people with Asperger syndrome out there that have trouble with empathy. I'm just saying that in my case it's the opposite.

Which begs the question - can anyone relate?

Aspies...don't...lack...empathy!

There might occur a "disorder" when it comes to empathy.

But a complete lack---absurd!

Yeah...cockroaches are pretty asocial creatures LOL

If you say you've got the social skills of an ant, then you're self-aggrandizing!

Says NT 'professionals' who mistook cognitive empathy for affectual empathy.

Says NTs who are culturally dependent on social cues, and aspie's lack of social cues and 'natural' conformity being mistaken as insensibility. (Just because someone's laughing, doesn't mean that someone is having a funny thought...) Expression is always not equal to emotion.

Sure, some aspies are confused or not knowing what they feel, but at least it's there. True some aspies can't take or get other's point of view, because either they never felt it/never happened or occurred yet.


Just because someone didn't cry at someone's funeral does that mean he or she don't feel what other feels about loss?
How about being a foreigner who congratulates someone's passing instead? Would that make him insensitive if the others prefer that they would rather mourn than celebrate death in a non-menacing, respectful way? Oh that's right, that foreigner can't do that 'there', he's not in his 'world'.

Social cues are just superficial to me. Granted, most NTs kept assuming what I feel and gets it wrong.

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It is a confusion, a logical fallacy arising from an NT bias. Because we tend to show empathy in ways that are different from NT ways, they make the false assumption that we don't feel empathy. The people who say things like that about everyone on the spectrum assume that it is perfectly ok to judge others as "defective in NT-ness" and it is a very ignorant attitude arising from normocentric domination.

Logical fallacies:

All ravens are black
All ravens can fly
Therefore all black things can fly

Empathy is an attribute NTs possess
ASD people are not NTs
Therefore ASD people have no empathy

Both conclusions are manifestly ludicrous...
I hope people actively challenge writers and bloggers who spread this smear and demand more balance.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/liane-kup ... 81691.html

Good article. I especially agree with the remarks this mother makes about the dehumanizing aspects of this myth. The no empathy stereotype is not only stigmatising and dehumanising, it is so pervasive the I wonder how many people who sought professional diagnosis were misdiagnosed with something else or had a missed diagnosis of Aspergers et al, simply because they showed a capacity for some empathy. I suspect that it would be a considerable number. Baron-Cohen has done an enormous amount of damage, and his later attempts to tone some of his preposterous statements down were too late - the horse of misinformation had already bolted and the mass media loved it. (Look at these freaks! No capacity for empathy! Expert says so! So it must be true!) It also played right into the hands of manipulative organisations like Autism Speaks.

I hope more parents speak out like the writer of the article I have posted this link to.

Have one very stressful situation, where you (the Aspie) are supposed to act in a expected certain way.

Add one Aspie who is so overwhelmed he goes into shut down mode.

Yeah..it looks like he doesn't give a s**t from the outside.

My husband has stood with a complete blank face when a crisis arose. It looks like he flat out didn't want to help and cared not one hoot about the issue.

He misses social cures, and frankly doesn't get why thing are important to people.
Is that a lack of empathy? I don't know. He behaved so badly at the last funeral we went to, people have asked me not to bring him to the subsequent ones.

I don't believe my husband has no empathy at all, but in certain situations it is missing.

Aspies have a non-typical way of displaying empathy; if you dont respond as expected, you are instantly assumed to have no (functional) empathy at all. Typical NT shortcut thinking

If anything, I think Aspies are more genuinely empathetic than neurotypicals, to the extent where they are sometimes overwhelmed by these feelings. Expressing one's emotions outwardly and in a way that is 'normal' to the majority isn't necessarily a sign of true empathy, it's simply a hollow social convention.

Yeah i agree that at times it can seem like we don't give a damn but it isn't true. I wish people realised that :-/

hopefully this is not too offensive, maybe kind of funny, if aspies get humor that is;

I don't believe that autistic people lack empathy, but just going by my experiences here not many express it very openly. You really can't tell if a person has empathy or not if they never say anything empathetic. So I can definitely understand how people might perceive it as a "lack."