Published on 12, July, 2020
I've realised that among my various aspie social blunders one of the biggest ones might be rolling right over social capital in environments where it seems ambiguous or where there's no clearly definable clique.
In real 'face to face' life there's a sense that you don't say certain things around people in social leadership because it seems to suggest that you have no clue what the pecking order is or that there is a pecking order, a lot of that pecking order has a fair amount to do with who does what (the problem that a lot of people put a lot of work into various things and it doesn't show on the surface other than how people regard them), and if you're going to speak cleverly you have to do it in rather small groups and be sure you're not accidentally peacocking over the leader without providing anything of equal or greater value in terms of drudgery with respect to group involvement.
I've also noticed that intellectual conversation and people who are into it often get frowned upon because they irritate people in this manner. That makes me wonder, if I find myself online in various places - whether Facebook or other similar venues - and garnering the silent treatment simply by being even the slightest bit chatty or outgoing, it's like there's very much a 'That's great that you posted that, or that would otherwise be a good article or good piece of music but.... who the **** are you again?'. I'm talking about big forums where people come in from all over the place and don't know each other (not the NAS forum).
Any thoughts on the mechanics of that? Are there philosophical mechanics that I'm missing in my observations above or is it really as simple as everyone being lukewarm about liking anything that certain other key people haven't ? It seems like powerfully uniform behavior, I do watch them exclude a lot of people routinely and it can be tricky to spot the rhyme or reason. If it's just small-mindedness I can get over it, if I'm actually being a rascal on some level though I'd rather know it and withhold that sort of thing for the odd times where it actually would be intended as received - otherwise it's a simple communication failure and not one I'd want to continue on with.
(Disclaimer: This post is based on one I saw someone post in another Autism forum. I've edited it slightly to reflect what is true to me from the post. I'm using this person's post as they express it better than I could myself.)
Interesting topic. I guess it depends on the forum and the platform. I know for example that some of the forums associated with my Ham Radio hobby have some members who always seem to be on the lookout for someone asking an innocent question so that they can demonstrate their superior knowledge and experience (rather than actually answering the question asked in a kindly way). Also Twitter seems to exist nowadays simply for people to throw insults at each other, or repeat entrenched and polarised views to show their prowess and allegiance with one side of the argument.
I must admit though that I've never seen the "Nice point but who are you?" insult.
Maybe come back with more specific examples?
Thanks for the reply, it wasn't so much people were saying anything insulting to me, it's more they were ignoring things I'd posted.
I made a friend locally who was a musician and he posted on my Facebook wall a few times, so I gathered he wanted to have contact with me.
So I replied to one or two of his posts on his wall and when I would all his friends would go quiet, and sometimes even he ignored what I'd said, like I'd killed the mood.
I think it's because they wrote everything in short hand. They wrote like this:
Nice one lad!
Smashed it!
Awesome mate
I wrote a couple of sentences that went into detail which might have been perceived as "intellectual". I got the feeling that was where I'd gone wrong.
So my curiosity is was I being a ****head? A show off? Or was it just small minded-ness on their part?
That's just one example. Sure I could think of a better one if I had a better memory. Sorry!
In the style of Jeremy Clarkson on Millionaire, "Here's what I think".
I'm imagining that you, like me and many others reading this thread, get interested in and excited about stuff that others simply don't. An anecdote; in my final years at school, I remember reading on the back of a vinyl copy of some classical music the phrase "enharmonic modulations'. I didn't know what it meant, and Google was at least a decade in the future, so I was stuffed. Until I was talking to a school friend at some event or other and I remembered that said friend had recently passed Grade 5 piano. I asked him. He said he didn't know, but why didn't I ask the church choirmaster who was a few yards away. I did. Basically, he said "****ked if I know!" I couldn't believe that these comparatively experts in music theory didn't know. I now know, from observing myself over the decades, that I've had a habit of orienting my knowledge and language towards the disciplines of the people I'm talking to. So for instance, if I meet a french teacher, I'll dig out my french knowledge. If I have to write to a solicitor, I write like a solicitor does. If I meet a psychology teacher, within minutes I'll be talking about the Johari window, projection, Jung, the shadow etc. Here's the thing; 'normal' people don't do this, apparently. Who knew?
So, in the context of those anecdotes (which, if I'm wrong, I hope they are simply amusing), might it be that you've gone in deep and incisive and excited (and, in all probability, been 100% accurate and full of insight and a desire to praise etc) and the others on the thread have gone "OMG!" and not known how to react?
If I'm wide of the mark, please excuse & hopefully you'll just find this funny :-)
Nessie said:OMG, I actually didn't know!
.....does this make you wonder what else you don't know about typical behaviour? It does make me wonder. And then you're into the problem of "I don't know what it is that I don't know" and you're unable to ask anyone about it because you don't know what it is. :-)
I'm done with Christmas Cards said:I now know, from observing myself over the decades, that I've had a habit of orienting my knowledge and language towards the disciplines of the people I'm talking to. So for instance, if I meet a french teacher, I'll dig out my french knowledge. If I have to write to a solicitor, I write like a solicitor does. If I meet a psychology teacher, within minutes I'll be talking about the Johari window, projection, Jung, the shadow etc. Here's the thing; 'normal' people don't do this, apparently. Who knew?
OMG, I actually didn't know! I've always assumed that, to get the most out of people, you need to be fully-conversant in their specialist subject.
No wonder doctors used to find me so irritating talking on their level without a medical degree. They were always like, "Oh, did you study Biochemistry then?" Er, no. I have the ability to read and think. Duh.
Roswell said:we're overachievers by habit
Touché.
Thank you, Jez. Where's my invite to come on Who Wants to be a Millionaire?
That rings true. When I was having appointments with a psychologist I kept researching psychology online and at the appointments was talking to them about on their level, and they were taken aback, they found it quite amusing, asking what I had been reading. Obviously most people don't do that. Perhaps as we Aspies have always struggled to fit in, we're overachievers by habit!