If the term was never used, it wouldn't be readily explained by charities like the NAS or Scope enough to warrant explanation in the first place and I don't think ten years ago is very long in medical terms for when it was used by my practitioner at the time.
Green Gecko wrote:I'm kind of confused who "they" are.
If the term was never used, it wouldn't be readily explained by charities like the NAS or Scope enough to warrant explanation in the first place and I don't think ten years ago is very long in medical terms for when it was used by my practitioner at the time.
"They" refers to practitioners who use the DSM, of which are are still some in the UK despite being an American publication.
The change only dates back to 2013 so it'll obviously be some time before it becomes widespread to not use the term "Asperger's disorder". Though, I must add the general trend is for psychologists to not use diagnostic terms such as "Asperger's disorder" at all. The general advice from the BPS, for instance, is to "treat the person and not the disease".
That sounds like good practice. Sad it reminds me I still need to go to neurological clinic, I had an appointment I missed while visiting my grandad who was dying, and they wrote my family address where nobody opens anything instead of to me. That was about 9 years ago, and the waiting list is at least 2 years, but never heard anything since about a proper investigation despite asking. I'd really prefer to know more specifics like my learning difficulties that I had done by a consultant educational psychologist, instead of this badge that generally refers to some kind of social retard in popular colloquialism. It's a real shame how hard it is to receive accurate diagnoses. It is not hard to get for example my spine looked at as I just fell down the stairs last week, but it takes seemingly forever to look at the brain unless it is causing physical pain. But the psychological pain experienced under various everyday scenarios is massive for those with autism, it really is very unfair.
Having said that, there are hundreds of thousands or perhaps even millions out there with no recognition at all or even understanding of their own. It's extremely distressing living life feeling that there is something deeply wrong with you and you don't belong anywhere. Seeing now that Asperger was a nazi collaborator and/or a fascist, it's very strange to think that some of his observations formed a foundation for identifying the condition. Apart from the person, I do think it's similar in how nuclear power is both a source of ceaseless death and ceaseless energy. It makes me wonder just how many inventions and how much science has been developed by awful people. Or indeed those on the spectrum, such as Einstein or Tesla, quite probably I think.
I think that a lot of good work is being done lately to remove the stigma from discussing mental health, and social and behavioural conditions, encouraging more people to discuss it openly, and seeking help where necessary. Above all else, the last decade or so has been better for mental health than any amount of experimentation by Nazis and/or fascists.
Most people use it to mean forms of autism without associated severe learning disability. As in, people with high-functioning autism have a higher ability to function.
I find the entire notion of the disorder kind of dubious; not that I doubt people have problems. It's just that if you draw a straight line from 'neurotypical' to 'low functioning autism' then probably every man and his dog is on it somewhere to a greater or less extent.
It seems to me that we live in a society that prizes extroverts and dismisses the talents of introverts, who are almost certainly passively discriminated against in every stage of the recruitment process and most lines of work. I can understand why people who are quite introverted and maybe further down that line than normal would want to gain some kind of label that protects them against that discrimination, but ideally we would have a society that is not actively hostile towards anyone whose talents lie outside the realms of social butterflies. We should be more inclusive of everyone rather than being as obsessed with labels as we are now; which applies to all manner of other areas of identity politics you could mention.
Last edited by Meep on Fri Apr 20, 2018 10:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Green Gecko wrote:It is still used both derogatorily and clinically only experts disagree on whether it and high functioning autism are the same thing (they are). Its existence seems to linger mostly because it is popularly used to describe someone with low social functioning and an intensely narrow range of interests or obsessions even though that is not universally true, and so in some ways it feels like a scapegoat for autism, but it is a worse stigma in my view, because it is used in this way. It is the equivalent perception of "dyslexic" versus "someone who can't write or is thick", the former is generalshic, the latter tends to more judgmental. We don't have different words for dyslexia so it is very strange that we do for autism. Hopefully the negativity brought by these revelations will see it fall into disuse.
I much prefer the form autism, I even embrace how it is used jokingly, because you can describe autistic behaviours even if someone isn't autistic while remaining somewhat descriptive. Whereas Aspergers (ass burgers etc as just seen above) seems to have become some kind of wilfully stupid Americanism for people who are strange or simply idiotic.
Aspergers, as a word, describes to me someone who is a functioning version of Autism. I.e. high intelligence, reasonably social, high tendency to be obsessive. Outwardly, you'd never really know. You couldn't say that about autism. I'd be more upset if someone said I was autistic then if they said I was aspergic.
Meep wrote:I find the entire notion of the disorder kind of dubious; not that I doubt people have problems. It's just that if you draw a straight line from 'neurotypical' to 'low functioning autism' then probably every man and his dog is on it somewhere to a greater or less extent.
It seems to me that we live in a society that prizes extroverts and dismisses the talents introverts, who are almost certainly passively discriminated against in every stage of the recruitment process and most lines of work. I can understand why people who are quite introverted would and maybe further down that line than normal would want to gain some kind of label that protects them against that discrimination but ideally we would have a society that is not actively hostile towards anyone whose talents lie outside the realms of social butterflies. We should be more inclusive of everyone rather than being as obsessed with labels as we are now; which applies to all manner of other areas of identity politics you could mention.
I like that. Isn't it funny how the extroverts are usually strawberry floatin crap too? It's an ego thing - those with the least talent seem to have the biggest egos. I know fellas who can barely read, yet they think they're next in line for PM. Then the ones who are 'quiet', unassuming, reserved, are usually the ones with the most intellect, yet they have no idea how to promote themselves, and often have low self esteem.
Sadly that's not really true. A low % of people with a diagnosis including Aspergers have a job according to the NAS, maybe more with Aspergers or HFA have a job because they are not necessarily outwardly autistic or displaying overtly abnormal or disruptive behaviours. But the vast majority cannot get into work, and most suffer from mental health difficulties due to the stress associated with trying to fit in and be successful as society sees it. And it's not so much to do with ability to function in society either, it's ability to really function at all i.e. get dressed appropriately, cook a healthy meal without getting anxiety because you dropped a fork and it was loud and nasty or you left the hob on distracted by a cat or trees whispering and burnt the kitchen down... To communicate with even just family or one or two friends in a productive manner without 7/10 times escalating into some ridiculous misunderstanding or feeling able to say nothing at all for fear of saying the wrong thing. Most autistic people in work or out and about are functioning because they are coping or strategising in their own way, or with (rarely) support, but that's always at risk for example sudden changes to established patterns or sensory overload.
I think the danger with generalising autism to mean introverted which is at least 50% of people when occurrence of autism is much lower is that it makes it easier for people to not take the condition seriously. If an autistic person has learnt to cope within normal society for example at a public school, public transport, shopping etc it's normally through a chaotic process of intense learning for many years without guidance, and so while the symptoms and effects might seem invisible, they are still there. Those people are incredibly lucky but not necessarily fortunate either, they are very much the exception to the rule and normally those high functioning autistics cope by supplanting normal basic communication skills and mannerisms with a high degree of analysis with the intellect. Nobody has taught them to deal with loud public places, echoic exam rooms, or how to comprehended a bus time table when sodding nothing transpires as logically promised amongst a billion other demands on daily living that are normally simple tasks, with a high tendency to over complicate and obsess over tiny things. If everyone is "probably a bit autistic" or similarly "a bit ocd" then those that are struggling simply because they are trying or able to overcome that threshold where it is even worth trying to be independent and live with the condition, it's really easy to dismiss the difficulties. And it's very easy, perhaps easier, for the ones managing to break down under a huge amount of stress pretty much pretending to be normal and sustaining that degree of effort for long periods of time - all the the while, under the pressures of stigma and in order to at least seem and feel normal and therefore successful as presumed then, little to nobody is aware this is going on at all. That's what it means to be high functioning autistic, it is a case of being grateful that you are able to get dressed, make toast and gooseberry fool by yourself (most of the time), read (probably slowly or too fast with poor comprehension, which isn't really reading at all and sometimes just memorising or mechanical reading, or effectively retaining the wrong things or in a jumbled up order) and speak words, albeit with bizarre inflections, droans, muttering, swapped consonants and syllables and all sorts. Being essentially shy isn't even half of it, although maybe that's where it begins because with earlier intervention and understanding of the difficulties, an autistic person might grow to be a functioning or high functioning person, but still autistic. And they might be a high functioning autistic person and not participate in society whatsoever, except maybe through some preferred outlet like the Internet, music, art or some other thing.
The main use of a diagnosis is to aid understanding and access what little support is available, but it is not really even in an ideal sense a diagnosis inferring that the world or society is wrong. It is saying how an individual is more or less capable in certain, quite specific faculties. Whether the world changes or not the person is still going to have the same struggles. If the world changes their struggles aren't going to disappear. Street lights aren't going to get dimmer, the sun isn't going to stop flashing, traffic isn't going to drop below 110dB^2, super markets aren't going to stop lining up packets of biscuits or ketchup a mile long under fluorescent lights and air conditioning while the security guard wonders why that guy has his hood up and headphones on and sunglasses on indoors, humming a tune and jerking erratically while getting lost looking for oat cakes only to ask them incomprehensible questions like, "can I help you? I'm not only a security guy" These very "normal", very mundane things don't get easier because they themselves are normalised as distressing or more people come out as being purturbed, even disturbed by them. It's both a blessing and a curse to have a badge that dermarcs oneself as a fundamentally different from "normal" people (which don't exist. Statistics exist, yes, but those statistics don't bring normal people into existence), but we are a very, very long way from that difference or abnormality as it generally stands today being so fluid and compatible with the everyday that it is no longer relevant.
Earfolds wrote:Actually, they don't use the term Asperger's disorder any more. It's long been replaced by the range of Autism Spectrum Disorders, or ASD. Diagnoses that don't fall under Autism Spectrum Disorder now come under Social (Pragmatic) Communication Disorder.
Yeah what he said. High functioning ASD seems to be the most appropriate fit for what was previously referred to as Aspergers.
