If autism isn’t a single condition, why do we lump everyone who’s autistic into the same bucket? You’ve got the people that like trains and struggle with social cues and are sensitive to sound, and the people who broke their carer’s arm because their DVD boxset of Dexter’s Lab had a disc in the wrong place, and yes both are autistic, but it’s unhelpful because when someone says they’re autistic, you have no idea what that means.
I know there’s levels depending on how much care you need, but nobody’s going “I’m level 1 autistic” in daily conversation. It’s not like cancer where you can say “I have cancer” or “My dad died of cancer” and you can then say “It was prostate cancer”, because everyone knows what that means.
If autism isn’t a single condition, why do we lump everyone who’s autistic into the same bucket?
Why do we talk about the autism spectrum like it’s a disease (or a bunch of diseases)? The only problem with autistic people is that they live in a society that is made for non-autistic people and it actively punishes them for being different. Kind of like with LGBT people, though I’d say a lot worse in this case. There’s nothing stopping people in the spectrum from functioning similarly or better than ‘regular’ people, other than the aforementioned society.
The only reason is that more is known about cancers than about the physiological basis of different psychological conditions. Psychology often has to work at the level of grouping symptoms because it’s difficult and takes a long time to discover any neurological and/or genetic causes behind them.
If autism isn’t a single condition, why do we lump everyone who’s autistic into the same bucket?
What categories could they use from the start to differentiate subconditions to avoid this? Experts couldn’t say if it was one disease or many, but they could tell they’re all closely related.
Investigating health is hard and only hindsight is 20/20.
Asperger’s used to be a categorisation, but they got rid of it because 1. The guy who came up with it was a Nazi and used it as a means of segregating those he didn’t intend to murder from those he did, and 2. the border between Autistic and Aspergers was pretty vague and whether you got the diagnosis was dependent on the culture of the clinic doing the diagnosing and not any objective criteria.
I dunno, it feels (obviously irrationally) a little bit insulting that there isn’t a categorisation, because by lumping everyone who previously had Asperger’s in with Autism, it doesn’t matter how well you mask, as soon as you mention you’re autistic, everyone thinks you’re one wrong word away from having a meltdown. Nobody sees levels, they see Autism, and what was formerly known as Asperger’s, where the latter are a bit weird, and the former are in need of serious care.
If autism isn’t a single condition, why do we lump everyone who’s autistic into the same bucket? You’ve got the people that like trains and struggle with social cues and are sensitive to sound, and the people who broke their carer’s arm because their DVD boxset of Dexter’s Lab had a disc in the wrong place, and yes both are autistic, but it’s unhelpful because when someone says they’re autistic, you have no idea what that means.
I know there’s levels depending on how much care you need, but nobody’s going “I’m level 1 autistic” in daily conversation. It’s not like cancer where you can say “I have cancer” or “My dad died of cancer” and you can then say “It was prostate cancer”, because everyone knows what that means.
What about the different STAGES of cancer?
It used to be a binary “you have cancer or you don’t”
We’ve learned more and adjusted the spectrum of cancer severity. Why not the severity of autism (I know it’s not progressive, but it is a spectrum!)
Well there goes the last shred of doubt I had that I’m high masking AuDHD.
It’s not new information, and it’s simple stereotypical stuff, but something about the way you phrased it made it hit different.
My kid is exactly like me, so learning how to deal with my issues is doubly valuable.
Why do we talk about the autism spectrum like it’s a disease (or a bunch of diseases)? The only problem with autistic people is that they live in a society that is made for non-autistic people and it actively punishes them for being different. Kind of like with LGBT people, though I’d say a lot worse in this case. There’s nothing stopping people in the spectrum from functioning similarly or better than ‘regular’ people, other than the aforementioned society.
I’m with you… it won’t kill them and it’s not progressive. It’s not caused by a pathogen. It’s not a disease like polio or measles.
If a parent would rather have their child die, or no child at all, rather than an autistic child, they shouldn’t have children at all.
The only reason is that more is known about cancers than about the physiological basis of different psychological conditions. Psychology often has to work at the level of grouping symptoms because it’s difficult and takes a long time to discover any neurological and/or genetic causes behind them.
What categories could they use from the start to differentiate subconditions to avoid this? Experts couldn’t say if it was one disease or many, but they could tell they’re all closely related.
Investigating health is hard and only hindsight is 20/20.
Asperger’s used to be a categorisation, but they got rid of it because 1. The guy who came up with it was a Nazi and used it as a means of segregating those he didn’t intend to murder from those he did, and 2. the border between Autistic and Aspergers was pretty vague and whether you got the diagnosis was dependent on the culture of the clinic doing the diagnosing and not any objective criteria.
I dunno, it feels (obviously irrationally) a little bit insulting that there isn’t a categorisation, because by lumping everyone who previously had Asperger’s in with Autism, it doesn’t matter how well you mask, as soon as you mention you’re autistic, everyone thinks you’re one wrong word away from having a meltdown. Nobody sees levels, they see Autism, and what was formerly known as Asperger’s, where the latter are a bit weird, and the former are in need of serious care.
Cancer also has “stages” that people generally are aware of.