The Unbroken Spectrum: Self-Hatred
A couple weeks ago I sat down to sketch out two mechanisms which serve to obscure the reality that there is no clear dividing line between autistic people and the larger population. What was to be a single entry grew to two, and then a pair of commenters to the second installment insisted that there was another group I had overlooked. Once I considered this, it became clear that beyond this third instance, there may well be more parsing to be done, with each distinct group having its own way of moving their own autism out of the way of our attention. It reminds me of that old paradox in which before you can get to your goal, you have to arrive at the half-way point to your goal, and then again, and again, on and on so that you can never actually arrive.
Which as it happens is not a bad metaphor for this pale end of the autistic spectrum that “shades out to normal.” In my previous entry at any rate, we looked at psychological projection among those with an autistic cognitive style. The gist of it was that for those who are uncomfortable with and in denial about their own autistic traits, autism seems to loom large in the world around them, and can appear for all the world to be an urgent external threat. Whether as leaders or as followers, such people can all-too-ironically become invested in “stamping out” in the world that which is native to their own character.
Two commenters wanted it known that that denial and projection seem to be absent in a certain group of autistic people who can be just as bent on “defeating” autism. Lili Marlene put it this way:
I’m not convinced that we need to look to an unconscious process – projection – to explain why some substantially autistic people hate the autistic characteristics of others. For a start, I’m happy to acknowledge that some aspects of autism are hard to like. I would also argue that for some self-hating part-autists they are so clearly opposed to aspects of their own psychology that they are better described as self-haters who love to share the hate around than projectors. My theory is that these people have seen autistic family members at odds with society and losing the battle, and have decided to take what they see as the easy path – siding with neurotypical society and adopting the value system of their neurotypical age peers, adding a few explicitly anti-autistic features just to make it clear what side they are on. It’s an attempt to be normal that paradoxically appears to lead to mental illness and alienation from family. Life is a constant battle for those who refuse to consider acceptance as an alternative. You make your choices and you live with the consequences.
It’s hard to find much to add to that. This from one of César Vallejo’s poems comes to mind as the kind of thought which might torment such people:
Well, on the day I was born, God was sick.
A quick Googling of that line turns up the fact that Robert Bly regards it as the voice of a naïve male who is still projecting his own shadow – but onto a God who’s turned in a subpar day of work, rather than onto others in this world. What we do in any case when we encounter such a person, generally, is turn away. Their clear message is, “I was not meant to be this way; I am God’s own mistake,” and the politest, most comfortable thing to do then is to put their self-described “defect” as well as those of others out of mind, to ignore it as best we can.
Even in cases which seem to contradict this message, in for instance the case of a Jonathan Mitchell, who steadfastly puts himself in the public eye as a self-pitied autistic person, the actual takeaway for observers is that they learn to look away from Jonathan’s oh-so-horrible burden. It’s not polite, after all, to stare. In this way people are taught that autism is “not supposed to be,” and people, being generally polite, well-meaning sorts, learn to oblige by not seeing autism whenever they encounter it in a social situation.
This is so even when and where autism is celebrated with pride, and there are of course people – whether or not they are aware that autism is a word which applies to their way of being in the world – who do celebrate their autism with pride, or who simply take it in stride. This too however can change, depending on the situation and context, on what stage of life they are in, and on what it is that’s at stake, be it sex, love, employment, or getting to be one of the kewl kidz. Yes, even for autistics this can sometimes matter.
The larger point then is that all three of these groups I’ve outlined so far – subjects of ridicule, projectors, and self-haters – all overlap and blur into one another. So long as one isn’t locked into projection for the long term, it’s possible to slide across all three roles and more in the space of a single day, not to mention a lifetime. All of which provides a sort of theater which tends to obscure the fact that there’s a lot more autism about, and closer by, than we realize. That final idealized goal in fact, of “absolutely normal person,” may well be one at which no one can ever actually arrive….
related: The Unbroken Spectrum: Ridicule
related: The Unbroken Spectrum: Projection
related: The Unbroken Spectrum: Stockholm Syndrome
related: The Unbroken Spectrum: The Shared Closet
Mark Stairwalt on 06/4/10 in featured, Society | 8 Comments | Read More
Comments (8)
There is a very clear dividing line between Autistic Disorder with approximately 80% of persons with an Autistic Disorder diagnosis also being Intellectually Disabled and Aspergers which, by definition has 0% of persons with an Aspergers diagnosis.
In real life terms there is a very distinct dividing line between those who live their lives in institutional and residential care of others and those who serve on the corporate board of ASAN, write novels and internet blogs, run successful businesses and are otherwise very independent and high functioning.
Harold, I’m not the go-to person for statistics, but I believe I have seen that figure debunked [edit: I now believe I was thinking of the debunked 80% divorce rate, but see my comment from June 6, below.] — and in any case, the act of taking a magic marker and drawing a line across a spectrum does not mean that that line is “there” in any meaningful sense. If you and others want to define your terms so that they match those suspiciously round numbers of yours, so be it, and so what.
In real life terms, the fact that there might be an apparent distance between different sorts of lives does not mean that that distance isn’t filled with other lives made up of characteristics that do in fact define a spectrum which runs unbroken between the sorts of lives you describe, and beyond.
Real life terms are messy, and yes, kind of gross. If you are the sort who happens to like all your foods to not touch each other on your dinner plate that’s fine, but real life, I suggest, is what happens in your stomach.
“This is so even when and where autism is celebrated with pride, and there are of course people – whether or not they are aware that autism is a word which applies to their way of being in the world – who do celebrate their autism with pride, or who simply take it in stride. This too however can change, depending on the situation and context, on what stage of life they are in, and on what it is that’s at stake, be it sex, love, employment, or getting to be one of the kewl kidz. Yes, even for autistics this can sometimes matter.”
Of course, the option that not everyone grows up in an environment that fosters “acceptance” and suffers from severe depression and PTSD as a result of life circumstances is never brought up.
The option that, God forbid, people might actually learn to love themselves, just a little, and be a bit more accepting, with no strings attached, never seems to be a named alternative because this option obviously cannot exist in the minds of so many (or so it seems).
Quote from Mark’s article:
” That final idealized goal in fact, of “absolutely normal person,” may well be one at which no one can ever actually arrive….”
Sounds like one of Zeno’s Paradoxes, or more likely an unrealistic goal. Years ago I proposed the idea that the world of medical science write a reverse DSM - a diagnostic manual for diagnosing people as normal and healthy, which I suspect may not as simple a task as it might appear. My fascination with evidence-based medicine was an inspiration for this idea - many different varieties of medical stuff-ups and malpractices can and do happen when medios don’t have a full evidence-based grasp of the condition of good health. A relative of mine was recently the victim of such a medical stuff-up - being told they had a serious illness that they didn’t have. My idea of a book about normality has attracted some positive interest in the world of science, and it is also nice to see that the idea of normal is being examined in a conference in which Larry Arnold will be a keynote speaker http://www.rihsc.mmu.ac.uk/event_news/news.php?id=80
Harold L. Doherty wrote:
“There is a very clear dividing line between Autistic Disorder with approximately 80% of persons with an Autistic Disorder diagnosis also being Intellectually Disabled and Aspergers which, by definition has 0% of persons with an Aspergers diagnosis.”
I’m sure if I looked I could dig up examples of people with an AS diagnosis who also apprently have subnormal IQ scores. Diagnosis isn’t science, it is just an element of medical practice. I want to know exactly where you got that figure of 80% for the level of intellectual disability in people diagnosed with AD. You should not quote such figures without being sure of that they have a solid basis in scientific evidence. I suspect that the figure you gave has as much scientific status as an apocryphal story. Stats about the level of intellectual disability in autistic people is currently the subject of some controversy in the pages of New Scientist magazine:
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20627620.100-autism-accuracy.html
Mr Doherty, I wonder if you have read this article, and if you have, what your thoughts about it might be:
“Are the Majority of Children With Autism Mentally Retarded?
A Systematic Evaluation of the Data”
Meredyth Goldberg Edelson
http://www.willamette.edu/dept/comm/reprint/edelson/
I have never understood why people who are clearly (and rightly) concerned with issues associated with intellectual disability become involved with the world of autism politics more than becoming involved with issues and organizations and campaigns that are explicitly about intellectual disability. Could you help me to understand this, Mr Doherty? Are you involved with educating prosective parents about preventing new cases of intellectual disability? Have you done anything to educate women about the serious dangers of drinking alcohol or smoking during pregnancy, or the proven risks assocated with a lack of iodine supplementation during pregnancy and childhood? There is evidence that folate deficiency and a lack of vitamin D from diet or sun exposure in pregnant women can impair development of the baby, including the brain and spine. Poor prenatal medical care, which is surprisingly common in the US, can cause all types of serious disability starting at birth or earlier. Are you campaigning to highlight and prevent such serious issues? I’ve made some attempt to highlight these issues online, but I’m happy to admit that intellectual disability is not the main focus of my writing.
[This comment got held for approval for some reason, and did not appear in this space until some time after the two comments which follow it. — editor]
Mrk with all respect, my information has not been debunked it has been confirmed most recently by a leading CDC expert Dr. Yeargin-Allsop. See my post and link:
CDC Autism Expert: 40% of Persons with an Autism Spectrum Disorder Also Have an Intellectual Disability
http://autisminnb.blogspot.com/2010/06/cdc-autism-expert-40-of-persons-with.html
The 80% of persons with Autistic Disorder having an ID was also set out in a brief by the Canadian Psychological Association to a Canadian Senate committee studying autism in 2006. The CDC expert’s info source was not stated but the CDC conducted two studies 2004 and 2006 showing 41-44% of all persons with an Autism SPECTRUM Disorder having an ID. Given that persons with Aspergers do not have an ID by diagnostic defintion te 40, 41 and 44 % figures approximate the 80% of persons who specifically have Autistic Disorder AND and ID.
Debunked? No.
Confirmed? Yes
Harold, I fear we are perilously close to being parodied by a webcomic, http://xkcd.com/386/. I’m sure it does matter — elsewhere — which of us is right about this statistic, but I have lost track, or never thought to check in the first place what relevance it has to the post you’ve commented on here.
I’ve contended that there is an unbroken spectrum, one that runs without gaps between non-autistics and autistics, and you have responded by reminding us that a LOT of autistic people are disabled. I’ve now allowed us to get sidetracked into a disagreement over how to count autistic people who are disabled.
Can you tell me why it is these figures are relevant to this particular post? For the sake of argument, let’s say the figures you cite are meaningful. What, then, do you feel they mean in the context of my contention that the autistic spectrum contains no gaps?
This very question of how we are to count disabled people has been examined today at Countering Age of Autism (link below). Further comments regarding these statistical issues can be posted directly to the comment thread at CAoA. Failure to do so may result in your comment being deleted from this page and re-posted there.
Comments which are germane to this post are welcome, as always.
http://counteringageofautism.blogspot.com/2010/06/number-issues-autism-and-intellectual.html
Mark
The distinction between those on the spectrum who are intellectually disabled and those who are not are reflected in the current diagnostic criteria for Aspergers which expressly excludes from an Aspergers diagnosis anyone with an intellectual disability.
In the real world the difference is seen in functioning levels. There are in fact many persons with Autistic Disorder who live in residential care, including institutional care. Then there are those who obtain Ph D’s, run successful business, sit on the Corporate board of organizations like ASAN etc.
Diagnostic definition differences and real word differences. They are huge differences.
I answered your last question to me and I will stop here given your deferral, for whatever reasons you may have, to the Countering Age of Autism site.
Thank you for your time.