Show threadDziadekMar 7

@Dianora @JamesWNeal @pathfinder @actuallyautistic It will be very difficult for advertising to work on us #autistics because its roots are in Freudian theory and the subconscious. And it’s always “clever” with puns and trendy cultural references. None of this works on the logical level, giving one a reason to buy.

I get affected by advertising that’s witty and entertaining but it does no more than make me like the company. Don’t think it affects my buying.

Show threadOwl EyesMar 4

@minego that's funny and all, but I assure you #autistics tend to have their "weirdness budgets" all spent down to next to nothing.

@autistics

The Dead And The DecayingMar 4

There’s a lot I don’t like about Uta Frith, but too much of the #Autistic Community unintentionally makes excuses for Medical Misogyny by clinging to the “Girls Mask” ideology, instead of acknowledging the fact that Women and Girls can most definitely have #ASD manifest pretty severely WITHOUT Diagnosis, and similar dynamics are a thing for women with #ADD #ADHD.

#Neurodiversity #Autism #Autistics

Show threadDouglas Edwards Mar 3

@KatyElphinstone If I may sum up:

(1) Neurotypicals are the ones who are rigid, not #autistics! They have a hardwired set of assumptions and mental reflexes that facilitate efficient interaction with common environments (especially social environments) but can fail very badly outside their native domain. What I call the #EnvironmentalYoke.

(2) Autistics appear to pay a heavy price for our disconnect from the hardwired social interactions at which neurotypicals are so facile, but it is a FIXED price, paid up front. In return we get a potentially unlimited income stream of principled insights into how the world — the WHOLE world, not just the socially relevant part — REALLY works.

(3) Given (1) and (2), no wonder evolution keeps inflicting our kind on a bewildered neurotypical social world that sees nothing in us but weirdness and inefficiency.

(4) Your references appear to be a gold mine of resources for giving detail and concreteness to the very general concept of an #EnvironmentalYoke.

@autistics

cdayzeeMar 1
It’s ironic that after a lifetime of masking so hard when you’re hurting so deep inside, it’s still not seen & even in your despair of not wanting to continue, you’re still misunderstood. I guarantee that even if I left a note detailing all the things that were weighing so heavily on me, compounded by many years, that would also be misinterpreted, the pure truth lost. And a false narrative would prevail. So that in & of itself makes it futile.
In all the talk & crying out, I won’t become among the statistics like my ancestors, kin & so many others. Some of us will continue to trudge through as always, feeling weak even in this. I can’t be alone but it’s not widely talked about that I’ve seen. It’s always under the guise of poor mental health. We are medicated, chastised, institutionalized, patted on the head as if we are simpletons.
Where are my late-realized #autistics ? Another shot in the dark.
Show threadDouglas Edwards Feb 14

@KatyElphinstone The whole "lack of #empathy" idea builds on the #TheoryOfMind idea, which is rotten to the core. The basic paper applying it to #autistics (Baron-Cohen, Leslie, and Frith 1985) got the idea from an irredeemably flawed paper that had applied it to CHIMPANZEES[!] (Premack and Woodruff 1978). Both papers are hopelessly confused about what it even MEANS to say that a person — or an animal — has, or does not have, a "theory of mind". Both of these groups of researchers should have gotten clear on their concepts BEFORE conducting any experiments — and since they didn’t, both papers should have been refused publication.

@autistics

For Pete's Sake  Feb 11

So started watching #Patience on Channel 4. An #autistic archivist helping out the Yorkshire police with her memory and attention to detail.

To be honest I went in with low expectations as #autistics don't tend to get good portrayal on TV and Movies. However, I was pleasantly surprised so far.

There's a good scene in an adult autistic support group. And the actress playing the autistic archivist is #ActuallyAutistic herself in real life.

I recognise a lot of myself in the autistic characters portrayal and some of the interactions, especially the negative ones, from her neurotypical colleagues and superiors are spot on.

So far so good.

Douglas Edwards Feb 1

UGH. Just when I thought it couldn't get any worse. After my self-diagnosis at age 67 in late 2024, I thought I'd taken the measure of the depth of prejudice against #autistics when I learned that #filicide was an issue in my new-found community. But just now I learned, from a "Because you read" list in the #Wikipedia app, that some potential #AutismMoms aren't even willing to risk the possibility of one of us being born — or to wait for it to happen. Apparently "Prenatal screening for autism" is a thing. I haven't yet read this article; I just now discovered that it existed. But skimming the first paragraphs, it appears that the concept is too much even for Simon #BaronCohen; he has apparently denounced the practice as a form of #eugenics:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prenatal_screening_for_autism

@autistics

Prenatal screening for autism - Wikipedia

Douglas Edwards Jan 29

I've been reading more #Wikipedia articles on #autism-related topics. I'm currently in the middle of the article on "Theory of mind". I've criticized the "theory of mind deficit" theory before, as both misleading and demeaning. But I was still unprepared for one revelation from the Wiki: the "theory of mind deficit" theory wasn't even developed as a way of understanding #autistics. It was introduced by Premack and Woodruff as a way of understanding CHIMPANZEES, and adapted by Baron-Cohen, Leslie, and Frith to apply to us! Apparently it didn't occur to them that it might be problematic to use the term "theory" so broadly as to refer to any mental structure used to comprehend other minds — however lacking it might be in the explicitness and logical structure implied by that term. Or that it might be MORE problematic to do so in reference to autistics than in reference to chimpanzees. Thus it was that the science of autism lent credibility to a confusion between our comparative lack of INTUITIVE understanding of other minds, and our supposed inability even to understand the CONCEPT of other minds.

Premack D, Woodruff G (December 1978). "Does the chimpanzee have a theory of mind?". Behavioral and Brain Sciences. 1 (4): 515–526. doi:10.1017/S0140525X00076512.

Baron-Cohen S, Leslie AM, Frith U (October 1985). "Does the autistic child have a "theory of mind"?" (PDF). Cognition. 21 (1): 37–46. doi:10.1016/0010-0277(85)90022-8. PMID 2934210. S2CID 14955234. Archived from the original (PDF) on 28 September 2017.

@autistics

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_mind

Theory of mind - Wikipedia

Show threadDouglas Edwards Jan 23
@autistics @adelinej It's the work week so I can't write too much, but — something just occurred to me: if neurotypicals rely on the automatic mechanisms of their #EnvironmentalYoke (and not on any actual THEORY of mind) for understanding of other minds, that could help explain why they react so negatively to #autistics. Because that #EnvironmentalYoke doesn't work on us, or not nearly as well as they think it should. They misread us, or can't get a read on us at all. They compare us to robots or chimpanzees because that’s how they experience us! But the relevant limitation is in THEM, not us.