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Comment by djaro | Hacker News Reader

I mean, it's classified as a disability for a good reason.

I would guess that even if this platform has more autistic people due to being tech focused, autistic tech nerds and programmers are on the extreme end of high-functioning. Many low-functioning autistic people will never be able to have a job or live by themselves.

This is the same issue as high-functioning ADHD'ers saying "ADHD is my superpower", meanwhile people with severe ADHD do significantly worse than the general population in basically any metric, up to having a lower life expectancy.

This isnt to say its morally bad, theres nothing wrong with being autistic or having ADHD, but it is a disability. Just like someone who's deaf can live a totally happy life but still be disabled because they are not able to hear, someone with autism is disabled because they are not able to process social cues at the same speed, even if they are a great person and have a good life.

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"Have a disability" and "broken" are not synonyms.

There's no judgement or moralizing in having a disability. Autism and ADHD like you mentioned are disabilities.

But the people who have them are not broken. Having a disability means some part of your life is more difficult. But that's very very different from you as a person are broken.

For example, if you can fix the environment and the person can now function equally to someone without a disability, then maybe it's the environment that's broken. If you can fix the social expectation and suddenly the person can function equally, then maybe the society is broken. Even if you cannot accommodate the person's needs, insinuating they are broken is not a great framing -- it creates a sense of pity rather than constructively looking at means to support them.

What is strange about the disability is when neurotypicals attack autists. It takes less then 1 second for the negative bias to trigger.

If you see a person without legs, do you tell him he is a piece of shit because he can't run? So why harass autistic people?

That's just people though, if you walk around with a scar on your head you'll see lots of knee-jerk immediate reactions. Some people are able to mediate those initial reactions and be kind, others just go with it and treat people poorly. Yes - some people are a'holes, and treat those without legs poorly.

The same is true of basically anyone that doesn't fit into what you typically see - there's always some people that will treat them poorly. It's unfortunate, but was probably adaptive during our evolution, and something we just have to deal with today.

> If you see a person without legs, do you tell him he is a piece of shit because he can't run? So why harass autistic people?

If you have not yet realized it, here is a black pill for you: most people are deeply manipulative and bullying basically all the time. For example nearly all social rules that are commonly accepted in society are basically about which kinds of manipulations and bullying of other people are accepted by most people vs not.

With this in mind, the answer to your question

> So why harass autistic people?

is trivial: because it is currently socially mostly accepted.

> If you have not yet realized it, here is a black pill for you: most people are deeply manipulative and bullying basically all the time. For example nearly all social rules that are commonly accepted in society are basically about which kinds of manipulations and bullying of other people are accepted by most people vs not.

This is, in fact, not true.

Yeah I agree. I think autists pretty much live in a dystopia.

They have to hide themselves because it's socially acceptable to harass them.

It's been proven multiple times that neurotypicals refuse to interact with autists automatically https://www.nature.com/articles/srep40700

Their experience of the world is a disorder "to be cured"

If the future is here but not evenly distributed then the dystopia is here but not everyone lives in it. Some maintain it.

You went from "Neurotypical Peers are Less Willing to Interact with Those with Autism based on Thin Slice Judgments" to "refuse to interact with autists".

What exactly are we doing here?

You are right, thats not what I should have written there.

> For example nearly all social rules that are commonly accepted in society are basically about which kinds of manipulations and bullying of other people are accepted by most people vs not.

Can you elaborate on that?

Name a social rule

Unspoken rules have no name, they are learned implicitly

State a social rule

What else but pity should I feel toward non verbal autistic people?

Compassion?

Love? Affection? Friendship? Camaraderie? Care?

All the stuff you feel towards any other human?

> Have a disability" and "broken" are not synonyms

They really are. Like, you can alter the environment all you want but someone who needs glasses to see has broken eyes. Is it super common and do we have a cure? Yes and yes, but it's still, you know, not working. Disabled. Busted. Broken. Whichever word you pick isn't going to change the reality.

"That person is disabled" and "that person is broken" fundamentally are different. You are supposed to fix broken things. We don't fix disabilities. We can support them, treat them, assist them.

Yes, having a disability is hard. But the person is not broken.

> We don't fix disabilities

What? Why not?

Some we can and do. But many are not things that can be.

It depends, and that’s the point.

It’s such a wide concept. Essentially it boils down to how a brain processes sensory information and at what point it becomes overwhelmed.

We all have tolerances set at different gauges. It’s a disability if it’s at odds with the environment a person finds themselves in.

The problem is assuming the social cues are important at this point in evolution.

I'd say the opposite is true, frankly. I'm more worried about people's inability to follow simple instructions, like making a hamburger correctly.

Social cues are important for reproduction. An autist guy might not notice when girls are attracted to him. So the chances of reproduction are lower.

As an autistic man, I'm still not convinced women are attracted to men. At all.

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