> Faced with this sort of argument, a lot of people will pay lipservice to the need for things like body language, facial expressions, and eye contact, but as an antisocial autistic person, I am afraid that I can't bring myself to understand the importance for such things (if it even exists.)

That sentence is the key to the whole article. Koshka doesn't understand that multiple, simultaneous channels of information give richer information than the strict meaning of the text.

If you don't believe that information is conveyed through body language, facial expressions, and eye contact, then try watching a movie in a language that you don't understand, without subtitles.