How do you make friends with someone that’s famous?

I know this is an old post but it's such a great, thoughtful reply. I hope Mark saw it. 

What about starting an environmental project, group project, a conference, fundraising or something that benefits the environment? Then she might actually reply. 

Too much to unpack so I'll just focus on the last section.

Mark said:

Why would someone not want to give me their time and make a little bit of effort to get to know me (or anyone, I don't want to make this just about me)

Because people lead busy lives, getting to know a total stranger from scratch probably isn't top of their priority list.

Mark said:

just because it takes a little bit more effort to sit down and write an e-mail rather than just say a casual "Hi, how are you?" when they see an acquaintance at work or wherever? The acquaintance at work isn't entitled to their time either.

Exactly because that interaction is happening naturally, sharing a work environment necessitates a degree of civility if not legitimate interest. besides we should all know by now when a NT (who isn't your good friend already) asks "how are you?" they never want the real answer it's just a polite throw away line to acknowlege the presence of the other person. Also that civil recognition that smoothes out the work environment isn't really their time, even when interaction happens naturally like that because it's likely perfunctory not genuine so it isn't a sign they want to to socialise with their coworker outside of work.

Mark said:

I'm just honest

Ditto so don't take this the wrong way but after reading a lot of what you said here's the final advice: Just learn to take no for an answer and don't stalk anyone.

🐝 Bees 🐝 (they/them) Autism resources in bio #stoptheshock #NothingAboutUsWithoutUs said:

Mark said:

Why does it work like that? Why can't I be friends with anyone I want to be friends with, whether I've met them before or not?

Because forcing someone to be your friend when they don't mutually feel the click with you is creepy if you don't respect their lack of interest and right not to associate with anyone they don't want to.

Well I wouldn't force them to; obviously friendship is 2 way. Why wouldn't they treat everybody equally though?

🐝 Bees 🐝 (they/them) Autism resources in bio #stoptheshock #NothingAboutUsWithoutUs said:

Mark said:

Why should Greta Thunberg or whoever miss out on a great friendship with possibly the nicest bloke in the whole world,

We only have your word for that, none of us know that you are nice, and saying you are in such terms sounds pretty arrogant, if you spoke to Greta like that I can see you probably made her feel uncomfortable.

I can confirm that I am possibly the nicest bloke in the whole world, and I'm not arrogant, I'm just honest. But why should I miss out on a friendship with the nicest girl in the world just because I don't meet her "naturally"?

🐝 Bees 🐝 (they/them) Autism resources in bio #stoptheshock #NothingAboutUsWithoutUs said:

Mark said:

just because she doesn't meet me "naturally", and has to make a bit more effort to get to know me?

This is just being autistically blunt because it's a hard truth: you are not entitled to her time or energy. You are giving off bad vibes actually, and I can read that even though I'm autistic. If you are serious about being a nice guy and not just "nice guy" then you need to work on respecting other people's boundaries, managing your expectations, and how you present yourself.

Why would someone not want to give me their time and make a little bit of effort to get to know me (or anyone, I don't want to make this just about me) just because it takes a little bit more effort to sit down and write an e-mail rather than just say a casual "Hi, how are you?" when they see an acquaintance at work or wherever? The acquaintance at work isn't entitled to their time either.

I didn't read all the replies Mark but what you're doing is kinda like stalking and um you can maybe just see if you can meet up with her or something idk 

Sorted, thanks! Please forgive the many typos in it - read it in an Officer Crabtree voice (from Allo Allo) if that helps. My attempt to fix them is what brought the wrath of Askimet's 'spam' judgement somehow... I think.

Hi Mark,

You seem to be experiencing difficulties with a parasocial relationship, which is the name for our relationship with public figures. They occur by one side spending time and emotional energy on another person who is completely unaware of their existence. This is common with many people (not just neurodiverse people) forming connections with celebrities and internet personalities who share their life online. 

There are three types of parasocial relationships: entertainment/social, the most common and healthy, through intense/personal (where someone has compulsive feelings towards a celebrity), to borderline-pathological which includes uncontrollable behaviours and fantasies directed towards a celebrity. 

From your post, it appears you have moved from social to personal.  It is important to remember that 1) their public personalities are cultivated for consumption and are not entirely accurate to who they are in private - you will not know a person due to reading about them in the news or on Wikipedia; 2) public figures are much more discerning with their relationships due to their standing in society in order to keep themselves safe and mentally well; and 3) the profiles of public figures are not maintained by the person themselves, rather a PR company or management team. 

Lines can be crossed when the parasocial relationship expands beyond entertainment/social which causes uncomfortable feelings. Having worked with many online content creators, I have seen that this is distressing both for the person being targeted as well as the person experiencing the parasocial relationship who may not understand why their advances are not being appreciated/accepted. From my experience, these parasocial relationships never transfer to real life friendships.

I understand this is difficult but, as others have said, friendship is a mutual agreement, and it is also formed on shared bonds, connections, experiences, and references. Your relationship with Greta is already one-sided as you have learned about her and have a desire to contact her multiple times. It is good to remember that Greta is her own person with her own life, interests, and relationships. As you mention, she is also autistic, so may likely have her own difficulties forming and maintaining relationships where she needs to protect her energy and well-being. No one is entitled to anyone's time or attention, you need to respect the choices of others as they are their own individiual people. It is important not to try not to get caught up with the idea of someone and obsess over a hoped-for relationship with them to the point you push aside real-life relationships.

I once read someone describe the ability to make friendships as a muscle that needs to be trained. This is harder for neurodiverse people but gets easier with practice. Parasocial relationships are a shortcut for this practice, in the same way, steroids are shortcuts to developing actual muscles. For neurodiverse people, these types of relationships are attractive workarounds that unfortunately provide no real benefit.

One great thing I have learned is not everyone will like you and you can't control how other people feel but, for every person that isn't interested, another will be. There are many people in the world that you can meet through things like shared interest groups, both online and in person but, again, it is always good to remember people are individuals and may not either vibe or have bandwith for more friendships. 

Good luck!

Mark said:

Why does it work like that? Why can't I be friends with anyone I want to be friends with, whether I've met them before or not?

Because forcing someone to be your friend when they don't mutually feel the click with you is creepy if you don't respect their lack of interest and right not to associate with anyone they don't want to.

Mark said:

Why should Greta Thunberg or whoever miss out on a great friendship with possibly the nicest bloke in the whole world,

We only have your word for that, none of us know that you are nice, and saying you are in such terms sounds pretty arrogant, if you spoke to Greta like that I can see you probably made her feel uncomfortable.

Mark said:

just because she doesn't meet me "naturally", and has to make a bit more effort to get to know me?

This is just being autistically blunt because it's a hard truth: you are not entitled to her time or energy. You are giving off bad vibes actually, and I can read that even though I'm autistic. If you are serious about being a nice guy and not just "nice guy" then you need to work on respecting other people's boundaries, managing your expectations, and how you present yourself.

I looked that up but all I can see are fringe stories citing a ‘Hollywood gossip blogger’. Sounds a bit wonky 

I posted on here yesterday but it got flagged as abusive. My appeal seems to have been unsuccessful. It was a nice post though, honest! Well meaning anyway. 

The problem is that you do not have the means to begin interacting with Greta. You are unlikely to meet her in a library or park etc. The only access you have is probably used by thousands of people each week and someone with a high profile will have a filter system of people vetting communications between you and her. No doubt she gets unpleasant messages and even death threats, imagining that an email you might send would be picked up and read by Thunberg herself is just that, imagining. Giving you false hope is just unhelpful.

I have a harmless version of this feeling. It’s when I realise that there is an inherent and inevitable trade-off in the people who bring us solace and comfort. There are real-life people we like who nonetheless reserve the right to decline contact outside of set communal contexts if any, cease contact entirely, or reduce/alter contact. Even sudden ghosting by a one time friend, though extremely painful, must ultimately be met with radical acceptance. It’s the only sane and healthy thing to do - suffer the pain of loss, of missing them, but nonetheless accept their decision and find a way to carry on. They are entitled to it, and you have a responsibility to behave appropriately to yourself, them, and good ethical values.

The other end of the scale is those people who are 100% guaranteed friends for life. Who, no matter how you behave, how badly you mess up in life, will never desert you, and will always give you comfort and a lifeline in a crisis. I’m talking of course about FICTIONAL characters. They’ve always been there for us, they are reliable and kind and witty and funny. And fight for us and against the forces of sadness and loneliness and corruption. And give us hope and the strength to venture out the door (or choose, guiltlessly, indoors and self care when it’s needed) even in one’s darkest times. But… it’s only because they don’t truly know us. We can only hope that if they did, they’d like us and stay in touch. Because we love them so much. It’s strange to have that moment of realisation that someone like the Doctor or any of their companions  (or any real life but impossibly unreachable except by message in a bottle person - to the point they might as well be fictional- person, like Greta in Mark’s case) will never actually know us, or of us, or all the hours we’ve spent ‘with’ them admiring from so close and yet so far. But while that revelation could be dispiriting, look at the rewards: someone who will never let you down, can still touch your individual heart profoundly, and who if she did get to hear of you via some  chain of coincidences would deeply appreciate your desire to express what she means to you. The closest to that we can have (most of us)  is the rather lovely compromise of ‘fan love’ - unconditional, endlessly giving, creative, kind, generous. And sometimes , just sometimes, there’ll be a right and appropriate place for a moment of grace with that person - an autograph, a photo with your hero, a kind word or several exchanged. A moment for  them to embody purely this moving sentiment and revelation: ‘I know what I have meant to you, I’m so glad I’ve given you that, I hope I always do. But this is the reality of what I can be to you as just plain old ‘me’: someone who looks you in the eye, sees the unconditional fan love in the individual, sees the glimpsed YOU-ness of you, knows that you wish you could express everything that I and then character I played have meant to you, understands that you will instead stammer awkwardly through a request to have a book or photo signed, that you will freeze in that moment, overcome by the enormity of its eclipse-like transience,  that you will feel shaken and off balance and strangely empty afterwards (but only fir a while, I promise), that you will look back on this moment like it was a dream. Knowing that any trace of your face, voice, name have faded from my mind with the sunset. List in the crowd. But valued beyond words nonetheless. And your resumes distance is crucial, appreciated, healthy, … and inevitable.’ 

Im sorry, Mark, it’s hard I know, but please find joy in your unconditional appreciation because selfless love, fan love, of those who inspire us is about as pure and redeeming of our souls as anything in this life ever will be. 

Martin said:

Because friendship has to be a mutual arrangement. You have a desire to be friends with Greta, but she knows nothing of you, and probably has thousands of contacts, from the multiple millions of people who find her interesting, every week.

But any relationship starts with knowing nothing of each other. Talking to someone new at work or pming someone on here would be the same.

Then after communicating with each other for a while, you do get to know each other, and find out whether you like each other or not.

Hi Mark, I certainly want to be more sympathetic than some of the replies on here. I think fixating on a famous person and feeling like your life would be better if you could just be their friend is something some of us autistic people go through. I certainly did when I was younger, although mine were more tennis players and sportspeople than political figures. 
You're not a stalker or creepy, please don't think that.

What I would say is 2 things. Firstly its impossible to really know someone from their Wikepedia page or their online profile. The real Greta Thunberg might be nothing like you imagine her to be, she may not even be a nice person I don't know. You may not get on how you imagine

Secondly, I think longing for famous friends is something we do when there is a void in our lives that we are trying to fill, perhaps one we are not even aware of. Maybe try to make some online friends on here or on other forums. If you feel able to, maybe see if there are any autism groups in your local area or groups that share one of your interests. That might be an easier way of making friends than the million to one shot of befriending someone famous

Happy to talk if you need

funny thing is greta got all of her ideas by doing this very same thing.

do you know the origonal environmental protestor was a guy named ted kazynsky... he was also called the uni bomber... greta thunberg before she got this famous contacted him in prison by sending him letters, she adores him and bases her ideas off his ideas... which should scream a massive warning about how extreme views greta actually has.

but it also kills peoples claims that greta is left wing, ted kazynsky isnt left wing, he was right wing environmentalist and said that the left wing is the enemy of the environment and will claim to be for the environment just for publicity and fake political points while destroying the greenery and the trees around them. ted considered the left wing to be the true enemy of the environment... given greta gets her ideas from him i find it hard to judge that she is left wing like others claim she is.

it may actually be better for someone to write a letter to ted kazynsky instead.... hes in prison, hes got nothing else to do but read random letters people sent him lol maybe through him you can get to greta if she is still in contact with him. mutual friend contact ya know...

Mark said:

Why does it work like that? Why can't I be friends with anyone I want to be friends with, whether I've met them before or not?

Because friendship has to be a mutual arrangement. You have a desire to be friends with Greta, but she knows nothing of you, and probably has thousands of contacts, from the multiple millions of people who find her interesting, every week.

i did this with jeff bezos, he said he was giving away all his money and i told him ill take some of it lol never got back to me on that lol

Why does it work like that? Why can't I be friends with anyone I want to be friends with, whether I've met them before or not?

Why should Greta Thunberg or whoever miss out on a great friendship with possibly the nicest bloke in the whole world, just because she doesn't meet me "naturally", and has to make a bit more effort to get to know me? Why should people who meet the nicest people in the world by happening to work at the same place or whatever have an unfair advantage in terms of making friends?

I'm open to the possibility of a friendship with anyone in the whole world. I don't understand why most other people wouldn't be the same.

My former pen friend did this on Twitter. Find this creepy. I used to follow celebrities on social media fan page. 

Really, it is usually the other way round, a friend becomes famous and remains a friend.