How To Prove Yourself Superior
Be the ‘quit’ in equity.
What we need is a “Resign for Diversity” campaign…
Any academic from an overrepresented group who advocates more “diversity” is directly contributing to the lack of “diversity” by remaining in his position. Assuming the number of jobs is relatively fixed, such an individual is effectively saying, “I want the percentage of academics who have the same demographic characteristics as me to go down, but I am not willing to give up my job in order to achieve that goal. Rather, I want other academics with those demographic characteristics to give up their jobs, or to lose job opportunities.” Needless to say, this is not a principled stance…
If you can’t explain why you haven’t resigned, then don’t expect others to partake in this foolish “diversity” charade.
The goal wouldn’t be to encourage mass resignations; since most people look out for themselves, we shouldn’t expect many to actually resign. Rather, it would be to “get the incentives right” – to internalise the externality of advocating “diversity.” At the moment, white academics who have jobs can go along happily, waxing lyrical about “diversity,” while white academics who don’t have jobs bear the consequences. If those incumbents were pressured to resign, they might start to rethink their ideology.
A longer, more detailed airing of the idea, with much to chew on, can be read here.
Also, open thread.
No! No! I got mine. Take Him!
They think that they are so special, that “They” would never target him. That is what the Brown Shirts and the Bolsheviks thought until there was the sound of boots on the stairs.
In the comments:
“[T]he modern liberal has no conception of honour or shame. Nothing will change; liberals are experts at lying to themselves about almost everything”
That.
two recent studies found that male academics prefer to hire female
candidates, and white academics prefer to hire non-white candidates
I wonder if these choices are made for altruistic reasons or if the academics feel less threatened by their hiring choices.
Assuming the number of jobs is relatively fixed…
A fundamentally flawed assumption as can be seen from the creation of more and more Angry and Useless Studies departments, as well as the exponential growth of DIE positions both in those departments and in the central politburo of every school.
If those incumbents were pressured to resign, they might start to rethink their ideology.
Never happen, per above the goal is “diversity” through proliferation, not attrition of the unfavored caste.
You’ll be happy to know the kitchen is now open for your high-dining needs.
Please form an orderly line. No pushing at the back.
Please form an orderly line.
It would be OK if was mustard, but no civilized person puts ketchup* and mayo on a hot dog.
*(the sole exception to this rule is when adding the onions in red sauce from a snouts and krauts cart)
but no civilized person puts ketchup* and mayo on a hot dog.
The residue of latex will presumably add a certain something.
The residue of latex will presumably add a certain something.
I believe that is overcome by the flavored lube.
Are you autistic, Take your AQ test now!
Are you a racist? Of course you are, unless you are insufferably Woke™, according to this test.
Take your AQ test now!
24/50. “Few or no autistic traits.”
Are you a racist?
The devisers of the thing don’t seem to like mild or measured responses. The test – or rather, an unblemished score – seems to demand emphatic indignation on pretty much everything. There’s little scope for subtlety, or proportion, or for acknowledging reality and how people tend to behave. It seems to me you’d have to be an unrelenting busybody – and somewhat neurotic – to have any hope of escaping the label dirty racist. Apparently, I am “10.9% more prone to racism than the average person overall.” I suppose my being rumbled was only a matter of time.
I don’t need to take that test to find out I’m racist, I’m white.
but no civilized person puts ketchup* and mayo on a hot dog.
Heh. Define ‘civilized’. Like the people up there in America’s Pussyhat on horseback stomping on indigenous people in wheelchairs? I’ll be putting ketchup on hotdogs at least until my wife stops putting it on scrambled eggs. And even after.
Also, that video might be interesting in reverse. Just a thought.
If anyone’s getting aroused by that GIF, I’m raising the price of the drinks.
If anyone’s getting aroused by that GIF, I’m raising the price of the drinks.
For those having the opposite reaction, here is a palate cleanser.
28/50 so slightly autistic (26-30 is “slightly”). Though in my defense I was trying to complete the last 10 questions while my wife was calling me for breakfast. When I got there she pointed out to me that today is 2-22-22. To which I replied that it was also Tuesday. What?
Can’t wait to see how racist I am.
but no civilized person puts ketchup* and mayo on a hot dog.
Onions and mustard hereabouts.
I’ll be putting ketchup on hotdogs at least until my wife stops putting it on scrambled eggs.
[ Look of wide-eyed horror. ]
Is it too late to remarry?
On second thought…two questions in…never mind.
Is too late to remarry?
It is a somewhat common thing over here but mostly among men. Maybe a southern thing as well. Not that my wife is much of a southerner. First noticed it in Boy Scouts and then, to my horror, my father picked up the habit on a Boy Scout camping trip. Yet I say this as a child who was totally confused by the people who were totally confused by my innocent childhood request for ketchup to out on my school lunch macaroni and cheese. I don’t do the latter anymore but in my defense the school lunch mac-n-cheese would at have been much more edible with it.
Onions and mustard hereabouts.
Very proper and civilized.
…but in my defense the school lunch mac-n-cheese would at have been much more edible with it.
Indeed, which is why civilized people such as you wife who are forced to eat Satan’s Sphincter Sprouts put ketchup or HP on the things.
Meanwhile, I horribly failed the BLM test, as I also did the feminist test.
Of course this is probably due to the fact I was above average on the psychopath and toxic masculinity tests.
I had a friend who we think may be messed up in the head because he was traumatized as a child by seeing a clown fall to his death at a circus. I think Muldoon’s mom may have dropped an egg while cooking breakfast.
Take your AQ test now!
34/50 – “significant Autistic traits (Autism)”. Not surprised. Only reason I scored as low as I did, I think, is because age has taught me something about human interactions, and I’ve learned from previous social blunders, some of which I had no clue I was making at the time. So I answered some of the social interaction questions probably more in the normal range.
Not going to bother with the racism or BLM test – I already know the answer. I’m white, therefore I am racist, end of story. I just received a list of mandatory trainings I have been enrolled in by HR and the university DIE czars, but I am putting them off to the last minute. It used to be just the Sexual Harassment training (they finally added Prevention to the title /snerk) but now DIE and Unconcious Bias and MicroAgressions have been added.
Maybe a southern thing as well. Not that my wife is much of a southerner.
Pass her the keyboard. She needs to explain herself.
Laurence Auster’s unprincipled exception – a great insight with a terrible name. It sounds like a moral condemnation of hypocrisy, but what he was getting at was not only that liberals make circumstantial exceptions to avoid living their principles fully, but that mainstream conservatives don’t even state any conservative principles at all, instead they pile up circumstantial exceptions to hold back the full application of liberal principles for a few more years.
Ok, if Noah Carl’s plan works, Professor Goodwhite, knowing that Carl’s article has given Assistant Professors Snitty and Touchy rhetorical tools for knocking down his unprincipled exceptions to resignation, might be more careful about what glorious principles he commits himself to.
I worry about these sorts of complicated exercises in heightening the contradictions when the opposite principle can’t safely be argued, and people aren’t allowed to separate themselves from the consequences of whatever half-baked gesture Professor Goodwhite comes up with. You’re taking away the safety catch of the professor’s gun which might make him more careful (good) or might cause him to shoot himself (justice), but you’re not allowing other people to put up their own bulletproof wall between themselves and the professor’s moral idiocy, so innocent people can still be hurt.
When only one side can state its moral principles, when the moral pressure is one way only, and when the circumstantial exceptions are blown away by countervailing circumstances, then even powerful people can make destructive moral gestures, like Merkel’s 2015 concession to the principle that a German leader enforcing a German border is a Nazi.
I horribly failed the BLM test, as I also did the feminist test.
We’ll be at this all day.
Ok, if Noah Carl’s plan works…
It won’t, as it appears to the DIE hucksters, the only solution is more cowbell.
Gosh, that racism test is designed even more badly than I thought it would be. What if the non-white person I’m complementing on her English language skills is some Senegalese lady on holiday? What if the Chinese-looking guy actually is a dead ringer for Jackie Chan? And that’s what’s so ironic – someone who mixes with people from all sorts of backgrounds is likely to come out of such a test with a worse racism score than someone for whom non-white people are by default strangers about whom nothing is known.
My agreement with Black Lives Matter is, it says here, “very low.”
Take your AQ test now!
8/50 … what can I say? I’m a girl. 😉
[ Puts decorative coaster under Darleen’s drink. ]
“‘Honk honk’ is an acronym for ‘heil Hitler'”
https://twitter.com/sandyleevincent/status/1496096997857800196
Gosh, that racism test is designed even more badly than I thought it would be.
I got about 4 questions in and realized it was based on the fetishization of “minorities” and any normal relationships with “minority” individuals, or viewing/treating such people as individuals, was forbidden.
Well, he did admit it’s a charade.
“‘Honk honk’ is an acronym for ‘heil Hitler'”
We shall honk to the end, we shall honk in Ottawa, we shall honk on the seas and oceans, we shall honk with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our home and native land, whatever the cost may be, we shall honk on the beaches, we shall honk on the landing grounds, we shall honk in the fields and in the streets, we shall honk in the hills; we shall never surrender.
“‘Honk honk’ is an acronym for ‘heil Hitler'”
Funny how it’s always the left who are familiar with these little codes and dog whistles.
If you can hear the dog whistle, it means you’re the dog.
As if we cannot get enough of the old girl:
https://www.spiked-online.com/2022/02/20/the-revenge-of-the-posh/
As if we cannot get enough of the old girl:
That was already discussed in the previous thread.
Would Laurie qualify as a “posh bint”? I seem to recall seeing that epithet thrown at someone once before.
“‘Honk honk’ is an acronym for ‘heil Hitler'”
It gets better, for those who think it is an innocuous joke.
She knows this because “A very powerful ANTIFA woman who is followed by Barack Obama on Twitter” said so.
Honk.
They are not that self-aware.
Talking to minorities: one of my hobbies is accents. I find it is a great ice breaker. Many foreign people are pleased that I could guess. I did have one young Korean get his hackles up but then I pointed out that I have friends in Seoul (where he was from) and he smiled. Taxi drivers from Africa are thrilled that I am interested in where they are from.
AQ–this is really term inflation. What is being tested is Asberger syndrome, not autism. The true autistic are usually pretty non-functional in the real world. They can’t drive, can’t hold a job, may even be unable to speak. They may even bang their head on the wall. It is like calling the truckers in Canada a “violent” illegal protest, whereas Antifa is mostly peaceful–terms are stretched and compressed to reflect values not reality.
Talking to minorities: one of my hobbies is accents.
A good ear for such nuances is a wonderful thing.
ccscientist: “AQ–this is really term inflation. What is being tested is Asberger [sic] syndrome, not autism.”
There is an old joke that used to do the rounds amongst clinicians who worked with and assessed autistic people 20+ years ago*:
Q. “What’s the difference between Autism and Asperger’s Syndrome? A: The spelling.
Under the previous criteria [DSM-IV] the primary criterion for a diagnosis of Autism as distinct from AS was a significant speech/communication impairment/delay. Those people diagnosed with AS do not present with communication delay. In fact some AS children speak from early childhood as though they have swallowed a dictionary. Lastly people with AS [under DSM-IV] could be very bright or severely intellectually impaired and some people diagnosed as Autistic had superior Full Scale IQs. Nowadays, under DSM-V, there is only Autism. This confusion led to diagnosis ‘snobbery’ based on failure to have understood the diagnostic criteria in DSM-IV, e.g. ‘My son is AS; they’re the smart ones.’
The AQ test has been around for 20+ years and is a screening test. It cannot stand alone as ‘proof’ of Autism. There are many such screening tests, e.g. Gilberg, Ehlers and Wing produced one that I have used: https://www.bing.com/search?q=Gilberg%2C+Ehlers+and+Wing&aqs=edge..69i57&FORM=ANCMS9&PC=U531
Such screening tests must lead to a full panel assessment, especially in children: paediatrician, speech pathologist, occupational therapist, psychologist and educators.
For the record my AQ score in 1999 was 43. My brother, also autistic – think computer nerd extraordinaire – scored 37.
Jim
* I worked professionally with autistic people for over 40 years.
Math assignment, “Is our children learning?”
NTSOC: no disrespect, but I think merging it all into autistic is not helpful. The dividing line between asberger’s and “male” is not so sharp. Interested in things and numbers? Of course I am, I’m a guy. I have lots of male friends who are engineers, computer science, etc. and they are not so sharp socially. To call them autistic is not useful–they don’t need intensive intervention.
What is being tested is Asperger syndrome, not autism
I think what is truly being tested is lack of empathy and social skills. I have observed that many of the behaviours ascribed to Asperger’s Syndrome are also present in children from broken or abusive homes: lacking a sense of emotional or physical security means the developing brain is constantly in a mild excited, fight-or-flight mode and never has the chance to learn nuance, reciprocity, reflection and all the other skills that make up the ability to be social with other humans.
The data on this are interesting: you just don’t see Asperger’s Syndrome in children growing up in intact, biological families. I’ll admit some of this is that in Canada, at least, it’s basically impossible to get state welfare for mild learning disabilities and so doctors will often enter a diagnosis of “autism spectrum disorder” for single mothers who don’t have the resources to teach their child themselves. The formal diagnosis unlocks the state funding.
For those having the opposite reaction, here is a palate cleanser.
You are a kind and decent person.
Honk honk’ is an acronym for ‘heil Hitler.
I knew those ducks at the park were up to no good. Also, can a duck goose-step?
If you’re going to San Francisco
Be sure to wear some flowers in your hair
If you’re going to San Francisco
You’re gonna meet some gentle people there.
G’day ccscientist,
I have a nephew who is an engineer and also autistic. We can trace autism/autistic features down the paternal male line of our family: grandfather was a surveyor, my father an exceptional mathematician. Some family members presented a high number of autistic traits, but were/are not autistic. Clearly being an engineer or a mathematician does not make a person autistic. Frankly everyone alive presents with some autistic traits, though only a tiny percentage of people actually meet the formal criteria. Since production of films such as Rainman and Mercury Rising [Bruce Willis] popular misconceptions have led to all sorts of folks making romanticised statements about autism – without ever asking people who are really autistic.
I don’t understand this: “The dividing line between asberger’s and “male” is not so sharp.”
More males are diagnosed autistic than females, though there is concern amongst clinicians that there are likely more females who are autistic than has been recorded if only because female children are socially conditioned to fit in better.
I agree: “I have lots of male friends who are engineers, computer science, etc. and they are not so sharp socially. To call them autistic is not useful–they don’t need intensive intervention.” Correct because they’re functional in society – and they may not be autistic, so no one should be labelling them as such as to do so is to trivialise an important diagnostic category – see below.
Daniel Ream: Children presenting with attachment disorder can and do present as though autistic and general management of both groups may be somewhat similar. The prime difference is that an autistic such as I has no natural capacity for empathisng [verb], i.e. processing the spontaneous emotional-based communication of the majority. A child from an abusive family who develops an attachment disorder has the natural capacity to empathise, i.e. function effectively and relate to others in the emotional world of people, but due to abuse the capacity to relate in a positive personal, emotional manner with others is stunted, even repressed. Many autistics, having been taught the rules of social interaction, can ‘act’ in an empathetic manner following the social ‘script’ [manners] they were taught from infancy, but successful interaction is only possible if there are clear, consistent rules that govern every possible social situation. Autistics function in the world of sentimental people on the basis of learned rules. One nine-year old client of mine [average IQ] said the following to his mother: “I love you Mummy, but I don’t know what love feels like”. He’d been taught to make an affectionate statement to his mother as a necessary social rule. When I was studying in the USA in my late 20s and wrote letters home to my parents I agonised over signing of my letters with “Love Jim” as I knew I did not feel “love” what ever that is. Being autistic [though I did not know it at that time] I did not like lying and to write “Love Jim’ was to lie. I, as an autistic, do not attach emotionally to other people. My cousin, twelve years older, remembered me as a very young child and said I was always a ‘cold’ little boy. I don’t ‘attach’ because I can’t.
DR “you just don’t see Asperger’s Syndrome in children growing up in intact, biological families.”
Yes you do. Consider Temple Grandin and her wonderful family who taught her ‘manners’ as did my strict parents. A supportive, natural family with effective, consistent structure makes it easier for autistics to function, but doesn’t change the fundamental neurologic and developmental differences autistics present. Life is much harder for autistics growing up in dysfunctional families as there are few, if any, consistent rules in such families. The prognosis for an autistic child growing in a dysfunctional family is generally poor and has little to do with family wealth and social class. During the last 15 years before I retired I did many consultations at schools and presented many lectures on being autistic and behaviour management. A number of staff [male and female] from schools approached me privately after hearing me speak to tell me I was, effectively, describing them in my lectures. A dozen or so were later formally diagnosed as autistic – which was a great relief to them. One was a male, family man, age 35, Full Scale IQ 138 who was an excellent teacher and special school principal. Another was a woman teacher being treated [medicated] for a notional psychiatric disorder, but she was not mentally ill, but developmentally different. Once the true diagnosis was confirmed her acute anxiety was abated, medication ceased, as she finally knew who and what she was.
Autism isn’t a trivial issue and the label should not be tossed around casually. For me and every autistic person I know the confirmation of the diagnosis has been a wonderful relief.
Jim
“you just don’t see Asperger’s Syndrome in children growing up in intact, biological families.”
NTSOG is being far too kind in her reply. Your statement is utterly wrong.
I’ve taught a significant number of autistic students over the years, and their families were often exceptionally nice. Many of the children had siblings who were perfectly normal. (Our school is often picked by their parents, because we are quite old-fashioned, which suits their love of predictability, and reduces the bullying.)
We’ve known for a long time that autism has a genetic component.
To deny that is to make parents of autistic children feel like they are responsible.
innocent childhood request for ketchup to out on my school lunch macaroni and cheese
A good quality hot sauce is what goes on Mac n cheese.
Chester Draws: “To deny that is to make parents of autistic children feel like they are responsible.”
In fact it’s not all that long ago [1970s] that parents of autistic children were described as ‘refrigerator parents’ by Bruno Bettelheim, especially the mothers who were blamed for their supposed lack of personal attachment and emotional affection for their children, thus causing them to ‘become’ autistic.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Refrigerator_mother_theory
CD: “(Our school is often picked by their parents, because we are quite old-fashioned, which suits their love of predictability, and reduces the bullying.)”
Absolutely correct. I attended an exclusive and old-fashioned private school in which the structure and rules were explicitly defined and supported by staff – it was almost military in style. That made it easy for my to function in formal settings. In the unstructured schoolyard though I was bullied without mercy, even strangled unconscious once. [When one doesn’t have the innate capacity empathise and thus read and respond to spoken and unspoken (emotion-based) communication, then one stands out as ‘different’ and being different marks one as an easy target.] One of the psychologists who assessed me years ago asked what would have happened had I been born 20 years later [around 1970] to ‘flower-child parents’ and later attended modern, trendy ‘laissez faire’ state primary and high schools. My response was that I would probably have ended up in a mental institution as, until the early 1980s, an alternative diagnosis for very smart, but strange, young autistics was Childhood Schizophrenia. The professor agreed.
Jim
Although Asperger’s is an “autism spectrum disorder”, it presents very differently than what is typically described as “autism”.
I stand by what I said. All the data sets I’ve seen – keeping in mind that’s limited to Canadian data and with the proviso that Asperger’s is being intentionally misdiagnosed – shows a huge correlation between divorce and Asperger’s diagnoses. The younger the child at the time of the divorce, the higher the likelihood. Asperger’s diagnoses in stable, two-parent biological families, by contrast, trend with the more severe forms of autism and are rare.
We’ve known for a long time that autism has a genetic component.
We used to think that about BPD, too. And it does, after a fashion, just not directly; it is largely environmental.
My wife puts ketchup on her grilled cheese sangwiches.
That mother of hers…..
My wife puts ketchup on her grilled cheese sangwiches.
You say that like it’s a bad thing.
DR: “The younger the child at the time of the divorce, the higher the likelihood. Asperger’s diagnoses.”
If you were to meet me you would not know I’m severely autistic because I was taught and learned how to pass through society without causing disruption and drawing attention top myself in formally structured, known settings, e.g. an office setting or school. However if I was required to enter a social setting such as a bar or tavern or attend some other social event I would be terrified and stand as close to exit as I could for a quick escape before I had a severe anxiety attack.
Children, born autistic but not diagnosed [including both high and low IQ], can ‘appear’ to be totally functional/normal in a safe, known and structured social setting in which the rules are explicit and predictable, e.g. a normal middle class family. However add the disruption of a divorce with an added layer of acrimony between the parents, then all the rules of that family break down. Hence a previously undiagnosed, but now dysfunctional and highly anxious undiagnosed autistic child will suddenly be noticed. Divorce/family breakdown doesn’t cause autism, but the environmental changes as family structure breaks down exacerbates the presentation of autistics.
DR: “it is largely environmental.”
Perhaps you missed my reference to refrigerator parents [Bettelheim] before you posted? Your comment is actually parent-blaming.
I have heard of unscrupulous people who have sought a [mis]diagnosis of autism, usually so as to obtain government funding/services that is dedicated specifically to the autistic population.* I have also encountered parents who sought a diagnosis of autism for their spoiled brats: by mislabeling a badly behaved child [brat] as being autistic – autistic children are well know for their temper-tantrums and meltdowns – some parent avoid their responsibility to be effective parents and train their otherwise normal children to behave correctly. They hide their lazy parenting behind the autism diagnosis.
Jim
* Governments around the world provide funding/services to support people who are disabled or developmentally different. Each disability group is usually assigned funding. To gain access to such funding means that a person has to have a formal assessment according to the formal diagnostic criteria for the funded group, whether it be cerebral palsy, visual impairment, autism and so on. In Australia suffering a brain injury during the developmental period up to 18 years means a person will be funded on the basis of having an intellectual impairment and possibly a form of cerebral palsy. After age 18 years such an injured and incapacitated person will be considered to present with an Acquired Brain Injury [ABI] and funded from a different ‘bucket’ of money. People do ‘doctor shop’ for certain diagnoses that might offer better funding/support. I have been required in the distant past to deny services to certain families wanting services for a family member because the affected person did not meet formal clinical criteria set my the government department in which I worked.
Jim
Daniel, besides what NTSOG said (which is absolutely correct), that “proviso that Asperger’s is being intentionally misdiagnosed” makes those “data sets” about as reliable as the ones that prove global warming, or that liberals are “more evolved” than conservatives.
Some relevant personal info:
* My father, may he rest in peace, came from a stable two-parent family. He was never formally diagnosed, but his behavior pretty well screamed Asperger’s.
* My parents divorced when I was 5, and I saw my father only sporadically for almost thirty years after that. Yet I have a lot of his personality traits (for what it’s worth, I scored 42/50 on that AQ test), although I’d like to think that I’m a lot better socialized than he was.
* I’m married now for over two decades (thank G-d), and one of my children has been formally diagnosed with Asperger’s and another one with ASD (and, trust me, not for the government funding; it got them extra therapy in school, but other than that we’ve largely paid for everything out of pocket or through our insurance).
Granted that the plural of anecdote is not data, I think it’s fair to say that what I’ve presented above doesn’t support any notion of the underlying cause of Asperger’s/ASD having much of anything to do with the environment. (Of course, as NTSOG pointed out, it can be exacerbated by such factors.)
I did not like lying and to write “Love Jim’ was to lie.
Heh. I have the opposite end problem. I have never felt comfortable starting a letter to someone who was not friend/family with ‘Dear’. It has always felt absurd. “Dear Human Resources Administrator”…I mean WTF? Yet in all my years I have never heard any of you normals having this issue. Expressing fondness/affection for some bureaucrat in an office you will never visit, someone you have never and likely will never meet? It’s absurd. Is it any wonder sincerity has been lost in the modern world.
And on the ‘love’ end…as I find myself speaking to people who are good friends but not close friends, people a bit older than me, whom I sense that it’s entirely possible that I might be speaking to them for the last time, I frequently have to stop myself from awkwardly using that ‘L’ word. Especially as many of that generation are pretty much the last people on this earth that I GAF about.
A good quality hot sauce is what goes on Mac n cheese.
Hot sauce at my elementary school? Dude, we didn’t even have air conditioning. The iron in the water stained the white walls brown and tasted like licking a rusty pipe.
“My wife puts ketchup on her grilled cheese sangwiches.”
Clearly she married down. The world needs more like her…
Back in grad school in the 1970s I had an interest in autism. I heard about a group forming of people interested in this syndrome. The first meeting was pleasant and promising. But the second meeting was attended by a vocal contingent of angry radicals who pushed the group into a political action orientation aimed at protesting, complaining, marching, demonstrating…woke in the 1970s. That was also about the time I heard people saying things like “There are too many people on the planet.” and “It’s cruel to do research with animals. Use alcoholics. They’re useless bags of flesh.”
G’day Jose B.,
There are whining ‘militant’ autistics who play the victim/poor me ‘card’ and have been doing so for many years. As we all know playing victim is SOP for many groups of people nowadays. That’s why, I believe, that Jim Sinclair wrote his essay in 1993: “Don’t Mourn for us”. Such whining autistics seek pity from gullible, but well intentioned neurotypicals. I don’t want to be associated with such people who have little self-respect.
https://www.autreat.com/dont_mourn.html
Jim
Normally I agree with Daniel Ream’s posts, but he’s wrong about Asperger’s. My own experience, both as a parent with an Asperger’s son (and two neurotypical sons), and as a teacher, would actually imply the opposite. My own family and that of my husband are intact through every generation – no divorces at all – and the children I’ve taught who’ve had diagnoses of Asperger’s have also had two still-married parents.
My son – Andrew – had developmental delay: he didn’t walk till he was 18 months, didn’t talk till he was nearly three, and couldn’t draw or control a pencil until he’d been at school for a year or so. (Even now, his writing is almost unreadable.) He was diagnosed as dyspraxic when he was seven. However, the suggestion of Asperger’s came from his secondary school shortly after he started there (I’d never heard of it until they contacted me): it certainly wasn’t to get funding, which we’ve never had. (Our local authority isn’t well off.)
Again, the four Asperger’s girls* whom I’ve taught have all been diagnosed at the school’s suggestion: in their parents (all married) have realised that their daughters weren’t ‘normal’, but haven’t known why, or tried to get funding. In every case, the diagnosis has come as a great relief both to the parents and to the girl herself.
*Most of my teaching career has been spent in girls’ grammar schools [for non-UK readers, that’s a school which selects for academic ability – often very high in Asperger’s pupils: of the four Asperger’s girls I taught, three went to Oxford or Cambridge]. There are, as noted above, more boys diagnosed with Asperger’s than girls, otherwise I’d have expected to see more such diagnoses among my pupils.