Sensitive Topic What do you think about those who want to "cure" us?

[HisShadowX]

I was thinking about asking my psychologist about what affect MDMA would have on someone with Aspergers.

The street name of MDMA is known as Ecstasy. The drug is mainly known as a sex drug but it's purpose is it increases a persons social awareness and empathy.

So imagine someone with on the spectrum who has no empathy and little or no social awareness? I'd question whether or not it can help us connect

 

[wyverary]

I was thinking about asking my psychologist about what affect MDMA would have on someone with Aspergers.

The street name of MDMA is known as Ecstasy. The drug is mainly known as a sex drug but it's purpose is it increases a persons social awareness and empathy.

So imagine someone with on the spectrum who has no empathy and little or no social awareness? I'd question whether or not it can help us connect

I have done "Molly," a concentrated form of MDMA. I'd say it did indeed make me more "outgoing" and "affectionate," but that is definitely not the same as social, and CERTAINLY those "connections" aren't meaningful in the least. It felt pretty good and did make me feel more comfortable with larger groups of people...until the effects wore off, I crashed, and was left with a throbbing headache. It's a temporary effect that, when over, leaves you off worse than before. The only positive effect would be to temporarily make one more comfortable in crowds.

 

[AsheSkyler]

Heheh, and my initial resisting thought to taking ecstasy was "what if they think that's how I always feel about them and then I can never get rid of them when it wears off!?"

 

[Ylva]

I'm not saying "all NTs" here, because many are on our side and a vast majority don't care either way, but those that are pro cure do tend to be evil or insane.

As for autistics that are pro cure, they remind me of the brain-washed and broken people in Nineteen Eighty-Four by Orwell.

 

[metalminx24]

People fear things/people/situations they don't understand, and I guess that if you don't understand something it's more human nature to try to get that thing to adapt to you, rather than you adapting to it. That's not to say it's right but I think we're all guilty to some degree of wanting others to change to make our own lives easier/less stressful. But I suppose if things were equal, given that Aspies/NT's just have different wiring, if they're going to look for a cure for us we should look for a cure for them too!!

 

[NiceCupOfTea]

Autism isn't going to be cured, at least not within the lifespan of anyone currently living. It makes me laugh when people get all scared of losing their special Aspie status, as though it were actually a viable reality instead of theoretical hype.

Me, if reincarnation exists then I'd certainly want to be born without autism in my next life. I just have a feeling life would be a whole lot more fun and enjoyable without this socially crippling disorder. Just as life would be a whole lot more fun and enjoyable without Crohn's disease, which I also have. I literally couldn't care less about preserving autism, which is what this debate boils down to.

 

[Ylva]

It makes me laugh when people get all scared of losing their special Aspie status,

No one's scared for the "status", but as long as people keep thinking it's okay to pretend we don't have a right to exist, that attitude is going to be problematic for us.

 

[CaveDweller]

As for autistics that are pro cure, they remind me of the brain-washed and broken people in Nineteen Eighty-Four by Orwell.

I find this comment a bit harsh. I myself look at a lot of what passes for 'normal' behaviour and wouldn't want that mindset given the opportunity. It's almost as if some kind of mass mental illness is spreading throughout society and is manifesting itself in countless negative ways.

However I don't think you can judge people on the spectrum for wanting a less challenging way of existing. We all have different degrees of it in different ways and therefore different experiences with it. For some it may feel more unmanageable than for others making the difficulty just too much to bear.

We talk about neuro-diversity. Maybe first we need to accept diversity amongst the autistic community as well.

 

[Ylva]

However I don't think you can judge people on the spectrum for wanting a less challenging way of existing.

Oh, I want a less challenging existence, but I admit that what I want is for the harassment to stop, not for the neurological layout to go away.

People who spend their lives in wheelchairs after an accident stop worrying about wishing it weren't so within a year. Why do autistics spend their whole lives wishing they were in a way that they could please others? Did they really spend their entire childhoods in the brainwashing room? (Not room 101, but the one before.)

 

[clg114]

A cure for what? It is true that I have been diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, but that certainly does not mean that I am sick and need to be cured of anything. I am not broken or disabled in any way. I am more capable than "most people" that I have encountered, that is why they seek me out. If medical science were to develop a cure for Autism and offered it to me, I would not hesitate to decline.

So I think that those who would like to cure us need to think about curing that needs to be cured.

 

[clg114]

We're all indoctrinated in childhood, but some of us survive it. . School itself is a 12 year government training program which strips people of all individuality and turns them into uniformed thinking, obedient, compliant workers and consumers. A herd mentality within which everybody is the same and anybody different is viewed as defective and in need of correction. With most people this thinking and attitude sticks with them for life.

To bring it back round to the original question, I think those who want to "cure" us are those who are unable to see beyond this cemented thinking which views different as being broken and in need of fixing.

You got it right. Most human beings, like many other species on the planet, are social animals. This accounts for the herd mentality. The only real difference between humans and other social animals is human intelligence. One of the differences between NTs and Aspies is that Aspies see diversity as a good thing.

 

[CaveDweller]

Most human beings, like many other species on the planet, are social animals. This accounts for the herd mentality. .

I agree and the last post was me giving my honest opinion to the original question of what I think about ....

I dont want to stray too far into this area as I'm not sure it's appropriate for this forum.

 

[Ste11aeres]

You got it right. Most human beings, like many other species on the planet, are social animals. This accounts for the herd mentality. The only real difference between humans and other social animals is human intelligence. One of the differences between NTs and Aspies is that Aspies see diversity as a good thing.

I've known plenty of Aspies who didn't see diversity as a good thing, and plenty of NTs who do. I don't think that particular attitude is an AS vs NT thing.

 

[clg114]

I've known plenty of Aspies who didn't see diversity as a good thing, and plenty of NTs who do. I don't think that particular attitude is an AS vs NT thing.

I know that your probably right about that and you probably know more people than I do. It is just my point of view, which certainly does not make it right.

 

[gonz]

Why do autistics spend their whole lives wishing they were in a way that they could please others? Did they really spend their entire childhoods in the brainwashing room? (Not room 101, but the one before.)

This comparison of autistics who wish they weren't (of which I am one) to people who've been brainwashed or are, as you put it earlier, broken is offensive. Deeply so.

I'm not going to explain to you my reasons for wanting a cure (ignoring, for the moment, the unlikelihood of a cure surfacing in my lifetime). I don't think you'd understand them, I doubt you'd even be interested in understanding.

But, unless alienating people is your goal, you might consider finding a new way to word your opinions on this topic.

 

[AsheSkyler]

Oh, I want a less challenging existence, but I admit that what I want is for the harassment to stop, not for the neurological layout to go away.

People who spend their lives in wheelchairs after an accident stop worrying about wishing it weren't so within a year. Why do autistics spend their whole lives wishing they were in a way that they could please others? Did they really spend their entire childhoods in the brainwashing room? (Not room 101, but the one before.)

I gotta agree with the brainwashing thing, excluding the conformity issue or direct irritations like being able to hear those critter-chaser-offers. Not that I've explicitly known many people that are physically disabled or at least not in recent years, but they seem to get a lot of mercy and acceptance. When you're just socially awkward and a socially unacceptable freak of nature getting hit, punched, kicked, insulted, threatened, starved, and generally deprived of compassion and friendship it's not surprising some break and wish they were more socially acceptable just so the pain will stop. Pain and deprivation have been pretty commonplace in behaviour control whether as simple as teaching that it's not okay to steal or it's something stupid like war or brainwashing, and has been a pretty effective method of breaking people. Doesn't always make it right, but that's the way it is.

The actual physical issues of autism and it's comorbids I can deal with. They're annoying, sometimes painful, but I can manage them. I'd probably accept a cure or a partial cure to get rid of the worst of the SPD and I can't blame other people annoyed with the direct nuisances of whatever condition they get. The attacks from other people? Pisses me off. I'm not gonna take a cure if there was one just because some little over-controlling pansy got their panties in a bunch and can't stand that I'm not what they want me to be. That goes for both neurotypical and neurodiverse who panic over people being different. Granted, I was raised to be self-reliant and combative so I can weather through a lot of it, but it gets me down from time to time knowing I'm never going to find a friend that at some point won't wish me dead or want me out of their lives because I'm too much of a weirdo for them to tolerate. If I had a dollar for every death threat I've gotten...

 

[NiceCupOfTea]

People who spend their lives in wheelchairs after an accident stop worrying about wishing it weren't so within a year. Why do autistics spend their whole lives wishing they were in a way that they could please others? Did they really spend their entire childhoods in the brainwashing room? (Not room 101, but the one before.)

More likely, people adapt to being in a wheelchair after a year or so. That doesn't mean they like it, just that they've got used to it. In general it's easier to adapt if you know there is no chance of reverting to your former state, but it still takes a long time and most people have to go through a period of grief for their loss first of all to get to the other side.

I've never been in a wheelchair, but I did have a stoma - something else which takes most people about a year to get used to. Some people get the opportunity to reverse their stomas. A few turn it down, but the vast majority don't.

As for autism, not wanting to have that is about pleasing myself, not other people. I'm used to it, in the same way a long-term wheelchair user is used to using a wheelchair. But it hasn't brought me any advantages in life and precious little contentment. Not even other autistic people appreciate my different thinking, let alone most NTs. Okay, I gotta go - should really have left 20 minutes ago but whatever :-/

 

[Jacoby]

Well you can't "cure" us, maybe there will be better treatments in childhood and eventually prenatal screening but there is no curing us already here. I think the idea of prenatal screening for ASD to be unethical and immoral but it's probably inevitable.

 

[camerartus]

As a non-aspie, I think the "trying to cure" is a load of crap. Having aspergers is not inherently the same as having a deficit. It's not like schizophrenia, or brain damage, or being delusional. It's a different mind, but not alien, or a dangerous type, just different.

 

[wanderer03]

You know what, I don't seek a cure. I just want the same legal protections afforded people with physical handicaps.