Stereotypes of Autism

[the_tortoise]

I found this interesting.

Stereotypes of autism

 

[WereBear]

In quite a few cases, media representations of talent and special abilities can be said to have contributed to a harmful divergence between the general image of autism and the clinical reality of the autistic condition.​

Oh, heck. YES. Show me something Hollywood got right... I can wait

 

[WereBear]

Another interesting element:

There is a fourth case history, on Hellmuth L., but this case is only there to demonstrate that brain damage may result in behavioural symptoms that overlap with those of autism, but in fact should be differentiated from the autism diagnosis.​

I have run across stuff like "autism is brain damage" from a LOT of online sources, some of them supposedly legitimate. But how does this explain our intelligence and proven abilities? Doesn't "damage" imply something not functioning?

 

[the_tortoise]

Another interesting element:

There is a fourth case history, on Hellmuth L., but this case is only there to demonstrate that brain damage may result in behavioural symptoms that overlap with those of autism, but in fact should be differentiated from the autism diagnosis.​

I have run across stuff like "autism is brain damage" from a LOT of online sources, some of them supposedly legitimate. But how does this explain our intelligence and proven abilities? Doesn't "damage" imply something not functioning?

There are a lot of different ways to have autism......that is the best I can sum up my own perspective on this.

To me "damage" implies that a force (e.g. disease, flying objects) was applied to something and changed it, usually in a negative way.

Maybe in some cases brain damage actually has caused someone to develop the symptoms of autism while in others there was never any damage at all and autism is just part of that person's normal self. (This doesn't mean I think that the latter is exactly the same as the former, nor does it mean I think autism is something bad.) Autism right now is just a collection of symptoms, so really anything at all that causes that collection of symptoms can be called autism (subject to whatever exclusion criteria they have in the DSM and ICD these days).

I don't think having areas where your brain doesn't function very well / things your brain doesn't do very well (or at all) for whatever reason means you don't have intelligence and abilities -- perhaps even really exceptional abilities and/or intelligence. It's not an either/or sort of situation. And it all gets complicated by subjectivity, by value judgements.....ideas about what levels of ability are good or desireable in whatever area(s), ideas about how valuable one type of ability is over another, ideas about being different.....

If we're talking about IQ scores and making comparisons to non-autistic people.....People with Asperger's, as a whole population, have higher average IQ scores than the general population as a whole but I suspect that is only because lack of intellectual disability is a requirement for diagnosis .... the higher average IQ may be nothing but an artefact of how people decided to carve up the ASD categories in the first place. And looking at autistic people as a group across the spectrum(s), plenty of ASDers have intellectual disability.

In quite a few cases, media representations of talent and special abilities can be said to have contributed to a harmful divergence between the general image of autism and the clinical reality of the autistic condition.​

Oh, heck. YES. Show me something Hollywood got right... I can wait

I think it is a little bit like how mainstream film and TV portray supposedly ordinary people in ways that the vast majority of ordinary people will never match (e.g. most characters are pretty well off in financial/material terms, and adhere to a very narrow range of physical appearance), just much more specific and extreme and on a deeper level of the person in the case of autistic characters. And it seems a lot like how they portray other minority groups.

I wouldn't say the portrayal of autistic characters is 100% wrong, myself -- just limited and flawed in some ways (albeit pretty far-reaching/serious ways). I've found things I related to in the films I've seen with autistic characters (Adam, Mozart and the Whale, and Mary and Max).

It's not possible to create an autistic charater that reflects every person with autism, so I suspect that for every autistic character that is ever made, there will be autistic people who see that character and think, "WTF, I'm nothing like that."

 

[WereBear]

And this... this really got me angry:

Sometimes this line of reasoning is taken one step further. In the extras on the DVD of Snow Cake, Sigourney Weaver talks about Linda's character, saying that she is ‘refreshingly frank’, ‘straightforward’, ‘upfront about her feelings about things’ and that she ‘doesn't waste time on social rubbish’. She hints at Linda's moral superiority, even if some would feel that these are behaviours that follow from the condition and that there may not be much of a choice in it. If people do not lie because they can not, they are not on a moral spectrum.​

Maybe it will turn out we have a low capacity for denial, but from what we have discussed here, we more logically choose to be of good character. The italicized part annoys me greatly.

Now we're not on the moral spectrum?!?!? What!?!?!?

 

[tducey]

I've gotten the whole because I'm good with memorization that I should always be good at it all the time. That I should remember #'s on a whim.

 

[Fridgemagnetman]

In quite a few cases, media representations of talent and special abilities can be said to have contributed to a harmful divergence between the general image of autism and the clinical reality of the autistic condition.​

Oh, heck. YES. Show me something Hollywood got right... I can wait

Way out west?

 

[the_tortoise]

And this... this really got me angry:

Sometimes this line of reasoning is taken one step further. In the extras on the DVD of Snow Cake, Sigourney Weaver talks about Linda's character, saying that she is ‘refreshingly frank’, ‘straightforward’, ‘upfront about her feelings about things’ and that she ‘doesn't waste time on social rubbish’. She hints at Linda's moral superiority, even if some would feel that these are behaviours that follow from the condition and that there may not be much of a choice in it. If people do not lie because they can not, they are not on a moral spectrum.​

Maybe it will turn out we have a low capacity for denial, but from what we have discussed here, we more logically choose to be of good character. The italicized part annoys me greatly.

Now we're not on the moral spectrum?!?!? What!?!?!?

That one bothered me, too. I don't think it's meant to say we aren't on a moral spectrum at all, I think it's meant to refer only to a moral spectrum for lying.

But just because a person can't lie doesn't mean they would lie if they could -- doesn't mean they have no moral beliefs / moral code about lying.

 

[the_tortoise]

Way out west?

I don't understand....

 

[Fridgemagnetman]

I don't understand....

Hollywood got right : Laurel and Hardy,way out west

 

[WereBear]

It's just the paper talks about autism stereotypes... and then commits one... by saying we are morally incompetent and have no control over it...

 

[the_tortoise]

It's just the paper talks about autism stereotypes... and then commits one... by saying we are morally incompetent and have no control over it...

I don't think that's at all what the author was saying.....not at all.

This is what I think the author was saying:

If a person is literally able to lie, then whether or not they choose to lie in any particular situation becomes a moral choice. Whether or not they lie depends on their moral views about lying.

If a person is literally unable to lie, it does not matter what their morality about lying is (they could think it is never justified or always justified or anywhere in between), they will not lie -- whether or not they lie is a matter of ability. It never becomes a moral choice, because it is not a choice at all.

Before honesty vs. deception can depend on morality, it depends on ability.

People mistakenly assume that autistics who literally cannot lie are choosing not to lie, they are completely missing the fact that the ability to lie is not there.....someone who literally cannot lie might or might not make the choice to be totally honest if they had the choice, but since they don't have the choice it's a theoretical issue; The fact that a person who is literally unable to lie never lies does not prove/demonstrate anything about their morals.

 

[WereBear]

Before honesty vs. deception can depend on morality, it depends on ability.

Ah, for me, it is a choice, and it wasn't clear to me that is what the author is saying. Because it was not clear that is what was going on with the character in the movie.

 

[the_tortoise]

Ah, for me, it is a choice, and it wasn't clear to me that is what the author is saying. Because it was not clear that is what was going on with the character in the movie.

I agree it is not clearly stated.

 

[the_tortoise]

I would have seen it the same way you did, @WereBear, or just been unable to make any sense of it at all, except that it reminded me of something....

People will say I am very non-judgemental or individuals will thank me for not judging them and I always feel sort of weird about it when these things happens -- particularly when someone thanks me for not judging them.

This is because almost every time I am thanked for not judging, I can't understand how or why I would judge the person who is thanking me -- I often can't even guess what possible judgement I could make.** As much as I am glad the person feels safe and knows I am not judging them, and as much as I know it maybe doesn't matter (doesn't change anything about the situation or how the person feels) what the reason for the lack of judgement is, I don't see how I deserve thanks......because I didn't do anything, I had no choice about being non-judgemental.

It seems like this sort of thing is what the author was talking about.....just using a different example.

I could be totally wrong, though.

And if the author literally meant that we can't be considered to have morality about lying or whatever else due to lacking an ability to do it, that would be extremely upsetting....even though lack of ability might make it impossible to judge someone's morality based on behaviors they have little/no choice about, that doesn't mean the person has no moral beliefs about those things.

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**This doesn't mean I have never judged anyone nor that I lack the capacity for it in every situation; There are situations in which I could judge someone or at least could see how they might be judged even if I am not making those judgements, myself. Also, I have been judgemental of others before and I very likely will be again at some point. (It's not something I'm proud of, and I try to avoid being judgy at those times when I am capable of it -- because I do have very strong beliefs about these things -- but I do not always succeed.)