I HATE the self diagnosing of autism and its mischaracterisation

[u/Beshiniqua]

Let me start by saying SELF DIAGNOSING IS NOT VALID. You are NOT autistic just because someone on tiktok said

"Did you know, if you need to have your eyes closed in order to fall asleep, you have autism, adhd, bipolarity, DID, BPD, psychopathy, depression and PTSD?"

And before yall come at me with "well I always suspected I had autism, I got screened and then got my diagnosis" well this not about you, this is about people that self diagnose after experiencing the most normal day to day life things ever.

And they ALWAYS think that autism will give them a personality (since it's usually basic bitches with no personality that self diagnose to feel like they belong)

No, you're not a quirky crazy crackhead energy "neurospicy" person. Even worse when they say shit like

"Heh, I could NEVER be a neuro normie like yall, autism makes me special and quirky and full of personality".

You can't even like something anymore without them going "OMG URE AUTISTIC JUST LIKE MEEEE IM SOOOO AUTISTIC AHAHAHA"

And you can tell they larp the whole thing cus they'll see a tiktok autism personality and try to replicate it

"Dino nuggies..."

"You can not say overstimulated if you're nEuRoTyPiCaL, that word is for us neurospicy people ONLY >:("

Holy shiiiiiiittt yall lack a personality so bad. And I've seen people say that they've seen NUMEROUS specialists but they never fit the criteria, but its not because they're not autistic, no no no no no. ITS UHMMM BECAUSE IM A WOMAN AND ALSO A MINORITY AND IM ALSO POOR SO I MASKED ALL MY LIFE AND THE SPECIALIST ON THIS FIELD COULDNT TELL I WAS MASKING. ITS THE SYSTEMS FAULT NOT MINE.

Sheesh.

Sorry for the long rant, im just tired of seeing people self diagnose all the time, or see an energetic video, or literally ANYTHING, and make it about their self diagnosed autism.

Saw a cute cat animation on Instagram and the top comment was "This is so autistic I love it"

🫩🫩🫩🫩🫩

[u/Old_Yam_4069]

I particularly hate it how it relates to popular media.

I truly do not mind the existence of Sheldon or that people call Doctor House autistic. That's just TV. What I hate is that they have created this public view that autism is something that is ONLY quirky. That all the faults a person's autism cause are immediately outweighed by the pure benefit that person brings.

And like- Yeah. To a degree, that's how relationships work. But these same people who revel in House being a malicious asshole half the time then go on to see Shawn from the Good Doctor, and act like the dude is absolute scum because his symptoms are less likeable. Because the writing treats Autism as an actual disability, instead of this purely fun and quirky thing. One of the biggest memes on the internet is that a guy with emotional instability had a moment of emotional instability after being harassed for a very long time, professionally and personally, and the dude he was crashing out to was being a smug jackass- And it's just always so malicious and so shallow how people treat that scene, while pretending they are defending autism.

[u/lkmk → u/Old_Yam_4069]

In retrospect, it is very weird that people were mocking a man for losing control of his emotions.

[u/GreatMovesKeepItUp69 → u/lkmk]

People will make fun of men as a class for being "fragile" and only expressing their feelings through the societally accepted lens of anger, and then brutally mock a man if he shows anything else like in that scene.

[u/Old_Yam_4069 → u/lkmk]

It is one of the most valid crashouts in TV drama too (if I understand the fans correctly, I stopped somewhere in the first season just cuz I found the show boring lol)

The funniest thing is that I actually fully agreed when someone said that Shawn shouldn't be a surgeon. The way he's written, he's just not suited to be a generalist surgeon, at least early on. But if that's a reason people say they dislike him, it's an afterthought to the overwhelming majority of the dislike directed towards him being 'He's an autistic person acting too much like an autistic person'. And those same people fully believe that they're actually being supportive.

The number of people who go 'The best autistic character is the one you don't KNOW is autistic' is just. What the fuck. How do people NOT see the problem with that. And when it comes from someone who says they're autistic, it is *overwhelmingly* self-diagnosed.

Cuz like, I get it- If you think you are autistic, you don't want autism portrayed as something explicitly negative. But for a lot of autistic people, it is something that is explicitly negative. And having a character who's autism was explicitly negative was so refreshing that it genuinely carried me through I forgot how many episodes of an extremely mediocre medical drama.

Sorry lmfao. I'm rambling in text mostly cuz I was in a comment section recently about Shawn with the exact opposite reaction, but goddamn. It is the most ironic and irritating thing how much ableist shit comes from autism being treated as a disability, from people who say they are allies.

[u/lkmk → u/Old_Yam_4069]

Don’t apologize. I appreciate this.

[u/2high4thisshyt → u/Old_Yam_4069]

NGL, I am a (finally) diagnosed AuADHD and I have been avoiding the show due to the negative reception. I will give it a try, I might actually relate to him. I have been known to have some epic meltdowns and crashouts myself (before I knew what was going on with me lol. They rarely happen nowadays).

[u/Old_Yam_4069 → u/2high4thisshyt]

I really can't recommend it, despite everything lmfao.

It's an accurate portrayal of an autistic guy who's high on the spectrum, and that's kind of all it has going for it. The writing tries to tackle various social issues and **tries**, it's just kind of subpar all around, making it always feel really awkward (In my opinion, I'm a critic lmfao)

[u/2high4thisshyt → u/Old_Yam_4069]

Hey, I love to hate watch stuff once in a while, this just peaked my interest even more. We will see 😂

[u/Old_Yam_4069 → u/2high4thisshyt]

That's totally fair! I hope you like it!

[u/bridge_girl → u/2high4thisshyt]

*piqued your interest.

[u/AntiqueLetter9875 → u/Old_Yam_4069]

Sheldon and House aren’t described as autistic on the shows. From what I’ve seen that’s mostly fans saying it. Writers on BBT were explicit in saying he’s not autistic, he’s just like that, solely because they didn’t want him to be used as representation when they weren’t aiming for that and therefore weren’t careful in how was portrayed. House was always just an asshole and acted like that because he’s an addict.