[ SECRET POST #2640 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #2640 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 031 secrets from Secret Submission Post #377.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[diet_poison]

idk about Sherlock, but I think irl there's a difference between complete lack of a conscience v. having trouble feeling empathy. Someone with Asperger's isn't going to be 100% down with killing people, for example.

[diet_poison]

No, I don't think they have, but I assumed it was just because they don't know what "sociopath" means. It doesn't necessarily indicate that they have Asperger's, it just indicates special snowflake syndrome, with the sad side-effect of watering down a very, very important and very, very extreme concept.

...I guess I'm confused by what you mean by "not much difference" because there is a ton of difference. Unless you mean there's not a lot of difference in the whole self-diagnosis phenomenon in which case yeah, I see what you're saying.

[diet_poison]

I see what you're saying, yeah, and ia. I misunderstood your earlier comment.

[(Anonymous)]

Incidentally, I vaguely remember reading some research (okay, some abstracts, the journals were behind paywall) to the effect that people with ASPD and people with ASD both have abnormal gray matter to white matter ratios, but in the opposite directions. So on the one hand you have a population which is good at reading people and sending the right signals in social interaction but lacks cognitive empathy, and on the other hand you have a population with poor affective empathy and who struggle to read others' emotions but are capable of feeling very strongly for them when they can tell what's going on.

[(Anonymous)]

Wow, that's some interesting research.

Do you have any links?

[(Anonymous)]

No, hence the 'vaguely remember'. I'm sorry I can't offer more than that, it was a while ago and I didn't bother bookmarking anything because it didn't offer free access.

[diet_poison]

huh, that's actually quite interesting. It's too bad you don't have the links.

[elialshadowpine]

Just adding to this, I don't have the links either, but I remember reading about this too. It is also in line with my own experiences being on the autism spectrum. I have a great deal of empathy. I just don't always know the correct way to show it, and it is something I sometimes have to think about. (I have sorta in my head a "rulebook" of sorts for social interactions, that I add to over time, in my head, so I'm a lot better at it than I used to be, but when I was younger.. yeah it was a definite issue.)

[(Anonymous)]

DA

Someone with ASD is also not capable, AFAIK, of executing complicated ponzi schemes (for example), nor would they be inclined to. (I...don't think...?) From what I've seen, people with autism or ASD are incapable of communicating/making a connection with people at all, so they don't see themselves or others in ANY relation. Whereas a sociopath/psychopath is able to communicate and form connections with others quite readily...and they use this to their advantage, due to a lack of empathy.

[diet_poison]

From what I've seen, people with autism or ASD are incapable of communicating/making a connection with people at all, so they don't see themselves or others in ANY relation.

Isn't...that a bit extreme? Not ever capable, at all?

[(Anonymous)]

No. People with autism/ASD can very often communicate, they just do it in very idiosyncratic ways. You need to learn to read them, just as they need to learn to read NTs (neurotypical people).

/proud mum of ASD adult

[(Anonymous)]

No, people on the spectrum can definitely communicate and make connections (although really severely autistic people may not be able to), they just do it in atypical ways that might not make sense to others.

[(Anonymous)]

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa

1) Plenty of us on the autism spectrum head canon Sherlock Holmes as autistic. (I, personally, do not think of the BBC's Sherlock as autistic - partially because I don't see enough evidence and partially because Benedict Cumberbatch at one point likened autistics to Frankenstein's monsters and infantilized autistics.)

2) The lack of empathy in autism spectrum disorders is debated. There's the theory that we feel too much. A lot of us have said that we know people are upset or have an idea how that person feels, but we DO NOT KNOW WHAT TO DO. (Which ties into the social issues)

3) Please never, ever, ever imply that sociopath/psychopath = autistic or is similar, even if you just mean that "loose, ridiculous definition" people have. We are not sociopaths/psychopaths. We already have this stigma to fight, it does not need to be perpetuated.

[(Anonymous)]

I really don't think that Sherlock is on the spectrum. He's way too good at reading social clues.

[(Anonymous)]

Me neither, but do not say it too loud or a thousand self-diagnosed "auties" and "aspies" will descend on you screaming obscenities and telling you that you are oppressing them and HDU speak for them, DIAF, they are the only ones who could ever tell if a fictional character is on the spectrum.

People like to diagnose Sherlock as ASD because he is cool, sexy and clever - just how they would like to be.

As for canon Holmes: please. Read the fucking stories without your goggles on.

[(Anonymous)]

I understand.

I have a hard time reading people, but I change as much as I can to accommodate other's needs. To an extreme. I froze when one of my friends was really low on insulin (she's diabetic) and I was really grateful that someone else ran to get juice, because I just thought, "What if I bring something she hates?" Of course, there's also supposed gender issues (particularly in the way female autistics are socialized to be more accommodating and all.)

I'm sorry if I came across harshly, it's been a weird day. Thanks for taking the time to reply!

[elialshadowpine]

I am diagnosed ASD and I personally have quite a lot of empathy -- too much, sometimes. I just don't always know what to DO. I sometimes get it right... and sometimes very much NOT right. It isn't difficult for me to read people, to tell what they're feeling, or to emphasize (and sometimes the emphasizing can actually make responding difficult) at all... it's just that it's like in my head I have a rulebook for how to respond to situations, and, well, that rulebook isn't right for every person. Does that make some sense?

I have known a LOT of autistics who are the same as myself... but that being said, almost all the ones I know are women, and they HAVE found that autism (like ADD/ADHD) presents differently in women. So, I don't know if that is a factor in differing experiences. That said, I'd still be very hesitant to apply that across the board to all autistics, regardless of gender.

[elialshadowpine]

Yeah, my sister (who is also autistic) is that way. She really can't pick up on when people are not interested in whatever subject it is that she's chattering about. And I can see her doing what you describe -- but I don't think it's a lack of empathy so much as it is a difficulty expressing it in a way that other people understand.

I have ADD as well so I tend to think... really, really fast. Which is helpful in ways with social stuff because it means I can think of and dismiss ideas until I come up with something that I think will work. It also depends on the person too. Because I have difficulty with social cues, I pay a lot of attention to individual people (probably more than people realize, considering my memory and cognitive issues) and I try to... hm, if this makes sense, custom-tailor my reaction to them? Sometimes I can get this flat-wrong, and fuck up.

Something I see some other folks with ASD do is apply the same reaction to everyone, and that doesn't work. I have learned to be hyperaware, in a way, of details about people. This is going to be a weird analogy but like Spreadsheet!Anon but in my head (except not creepy). It kinda goes with the rulebook metaphor. So even if it doesn't come to me naturally, I can put the things that I know about the individual together with the reactions that I have "listed" so to speak and figure out which is best likely to work. It just happens at sorta hyperspeed.

It's not been easy, it's not come naturally, and I didn't really even know about ASD until the last five years or so and I didn't even think it applied to me until the last couple, so it's just been something I have had to muddle my way through. It seems to work! But it's very logical, in a way, how I figure out how to react to things properly.

And aw, thank you so much. I don't comment all that frequently, and because of my chronic night-owlism, I'm usually posting long after everyone else has wandered off, so I don't expect most people to see my comments (particularly if I respond to an anon). I really appreciate what you said very much; I really have mostly been winging this and hoping I'm doing okay so it made me smile to hear you say that. :)

[(Anonymous)]

Hey, I do this exact same thing! I have my little mental book where I mark down people's reactions to things so I can try to respond appropriately in the future. (I also default to apologizing constantly just in case lol.) I described it to a friend as living in a country where you don't speak the language, and there's a lot of regional dialect differences, so you mark down the linguistic differences in your basic language handbook and try to roll with it.