Laddo

Glad to hear it! I hope it all goes well - sometimes someone showing they care can make such a huge positive difference to an autistic person's life

You are big We are small We are losers You are cool You are smart We are fools You're the mechanic We're your tools This is your thinking Your beliefs and ideology Your esteem of self high and mighty All part of your psychology This is how you think You believe you know all But let me tell you a thing or two That might make you appalled The truth is You're our leaders But you know **** all!

Masseuse

^Agreed. Small steps are the best approach. Too much may overwhelm him and too little may lead him to think you don't really want to be his friend.

Hi Avivaa, first off just wanna say that what you're doing is really great! All too often people in the UK are denied access to useful books written abroad due to the language barrier, so your work in translating a Dutch book for English speakers is amazing I'll try to answer your questions as best as I can: 1. An official term for someone with ASD is simply 'autistic'. It can be used as both an adjective or a noun, for example 'An autistic child' as an adjective or 'He's an autistic' as a noun. I think (but may be wrong) the correct phrase is 'someone with ASD' rather than 'someone with an ASD', although it's tricky as there is so much debate among medical professionals regarding autism as a condition. 2. Usually for people with autism this is referred to as a 'special interest'. There is probably a more official term for this, but this is how it is mostly referred to. I don't think there's an English equivalent to the word 'fiep' unfortunately - we could do with one though, maybe we could borrow 'fiep' from you? 3. The closest phrase I can think of for this is 'support group'. You're right though, they're not a very common concept in the UK. Hope this helps!

Okay this thread is probably going to create a lot of controversy and debate but I have to say this. Does anyone else think that Western/white culture (I say 'white' because Western culture is almost entirely controlled by white people) is the major cause of humanity's problems? Rampant capitalism that causes people to step on anyone they see as less than them, constant stress and no rest, gossiping about each other and turning us against each other - all very white ideologies. Other cultures still actually have a concept of community, but what do we have? Nothing. We live in huge, anonymous cities where hardly anyone knows each other. Friendships now revolve around work. This is not healthy! And yet we are expected just to deal with it, act as if it's a natural progression of humanity when in reality, it's the fault of various global corporations being too greedy. And who is in charge of these corporations? White people, or at the very least people of different races who have become indoctrinated with the white way of life. What are your thoughts on this?

Okay let me try a little pilot. Please reply if you're interested: First Southeastern Aspie meet up Town/city: London Meeting point: Science Museum Date: 31st January 2015 (this can be changed to suit everyone's needs) Time: 11:00am Activities: A walk around the Science Museum. Let's keep things simple at first If enough people are interested, I will contact the Science Museum and let them know of our intention to visit. That way hopefully the staff will make any necessary adjustments so as to avoid as little stress as possible. If anyone is interested, please let me know here rather than PMing me.

'I got caned, so should everyone else' or any 'I do/did X so why can't everyone else?' seems to be the slightly narcissistic ideology of British people today. If it were as simple as that, then it would be perfectly acceptable for NTs to say to us 'I can socialise, why can't you?'. Such black and white thinking (which if often cited as an autistic trait yet actually seems to be a human trait) will be the downfall of this species.

To all the proponents of smacking children about to show your authority: does beating someone physically smaller and weaker than you not just reek of being power-hungry to you? Also, if you wronged someone, would you appreciate them hitting you? That's the message that beating kids sends out. It also teaches boys that it is okay to beat future girlfriends/wives later in life... But under the borderline fascist, Daily Mail ideologies that still run rampant throughout this country, that's probably ideal for a lot of people... It's disgusting and pathetic.

Well I've known many bullies and got to know them better as they've got older. Most of them do come from broken families and nearly everyone is insecure about something or other. People just have different ways of showing it. I'm not saying bullies should be sympathised with but I think it can be obstructive to just think of them as bad people as that way they will always continue to act as they do just to prove a point. Human psychology always goes far, far deeper than if people are just good or bad. That's the same kind of logic that causes people to judge and bully aspies in the first place. Plus, let's face it, we're all bad in some way or another. Everyone's actions affect another person negatively at some point in their lives. All we can do is try to reduce this by trying to understand one another better.

I was a naive idiot to think this would ever actually go anywhere. Sigh. Mods, can you delete this thread please?

Liberalism is a good thing! I really don't understand how treating each other with respect and dignity can be considered a bad thing. It just fits in with the 'anything different must be destroyed' mentality that starts the majority of wars and led to the extinction of all human species apart from homo sapiens. (Unless autism is a branch-off from a former species of human - personally I think this could be likely.) To me, strong conservatism is so narrow-minded. The whole concept is based on refusing to acknowledge or accept that everyone is different and tries to make everyone conform to the same views. It's essentially watered-down fascism. Liberalism is the only way to stop autistic people being mistreated as they are, not conservatism that teaches children that violence is the answer.

Are you saying should we beat children again to stop them misbehaving? That obviously has no positive effects either as there were still plenty of bullies back in those days, plus former bullies from those days have since grown up to become psychopaths. If anything it's just going to teach them that if someone wrongs you, it is acceptable to inflict physical pain upon them. This leads to behaviour like spousal abuse later in life. What we need to do is start actually talking to kids and find out why they misbehave and bully other kids. There's always a reason for bullies being the way they are, whether it's coming from a broken family, being bullied themselves or being physically, emotionally and/or sexually abused.

A few members have expressed interest in an aspie meet up for members in their respective regions. I've always thought this is a brilliant idea to unite aspies around the country and would like to spark some interest. Now this is all just ideas and obviously nothing is concrete yet, but with enough support and planning I see no reason why this couldn't go ahead. I think meet ups should be organised in a way that requires as little travelling as possible as quite a few aspies find travel stressful. Therefore the meet ups would ideally be organised into county or, in the case of larger, more densely populated counties, organised by county borough. The actual town or city in which a meet up is held would be decided by vote to be as fair as possible. Members within a region would volunteer to organise their meet up - this could be done by just one member or more, depending on how many people volunteer. Of course, a big priority would be on safety of the members. I was thinking that the 'safety in numbers' approach would be best for something like this - I think there would have to be a minimum of four members per meet up to ensure the safety of other members. I'm not saying anyone on this forum is dangerous or anything like that, I just want to ensure that no one gets hurt. Activities-wise, this would be up to the organisers of each local meet up and maybe decided by vote? Ideally the activities would not be somewhere too busy or crowded as this may upset some members. So what does everything think of this idea? Feedback is very welcome, provided it's constructive. I would be up for organising a Kent or southeast meet up if any other members were interested.

I feel the same way flyingmoccassin. All too often my GP has refused to refer me for psychotherapy in favour of putting me on an antidepressant which I know won't work for me. If you look up how most modern antidepressants work, you find that all they really do is slowly release serotonin. The euphoria produced by serotonin is only really effective if either accompanied by dopamine release (which is dangerous as it can lead to addiction) or if it is released in high doses. If you know exactly what the antidepressant does it makes them pretty ineffective - I'm pretty sure most antidepressants rely on the placebo effect, which is unlikely to work for intelligent, logical aspies. I know that just offloading some of my worries and training myself to think about them in an alternate light is the best way to treat my depression, and yet my doctors will always assume they know best. I would be very interested to hear a GP give an accurate description of exactly how the antidepressants they always palm off on people actually help with depression. Like every single detail on how the pill stimulates production and release of serotonin in the brain, the half-life of the drug, the other effects it has on the body etc. Also, does anyone find it odd how so many medications are regularly prescribed to people when they are essentially just slightly different versions of various illegal drugs? For example, ritalin, a drug often prescribed for ADHD, is very similar in chemical composition and effects to cocaine and carries all the same risks, including heavy addiction. Yet one is deemed safe while the other is not. It makes you wonder who gets paid off by whom to advocate the so-called 'safe' drugs

Groans

Very nice Mihaela, powerful stuff!

It would be nice to get some more feedback on this... I mean why view the topic if you're not even gonna reply to it?

I'm not so sure bullies do have high confidence. Sure, they have enough front to appear as if they're confident but I think deep down, a lot of them are actually deeply insecure. It's often the reason why they bully other people - to mask their own insecurities and to direct attention away from it. I've known many bullies in my time and they have usually had issues with family and such

The Valley of Fear by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Whoa, I've really fallen behind in all this! I'm absolutely appalled at how all this has turned out so far. It's sickening that the council and NHS can be so blasé about a vulnerable person struggling like this. I'm actually really angry on your behalf! I'm also very worried about the fact that you're having to walk 8 miles for your appointment. No one should have to do this, especially someone who isn't eating enough. Have you looked into online shopping? It might ease the stress of going to the supermarket a little, which in turn will help you to make decisions a bit better. I really really want to do something to help you but I feel quite helpless being on the other side of the country. Just had a thought: if the powers that be keep messing you about like this, maybe the members of this forum can collectively do something like create a petition to make the council and NHS actually start giving you some help? I seriously hope David Cameron and all his cronies get infected with a horrific, incurable, humiliating and painful disease for all the vulnerable people they have failed like this. It all makes me want to go to the Tory headquarters and smash things up.