Is autism an excuse for bad behaviour?

I have not read any of the replies before I have posted. Tbh I am not sure if I will on this thread and that is because I am vulnerable to suggestion. When I see something like autistics are doing something not desirable like bad behaviour it is like my mind can try and suggest it to me and it is a ton to fight off.

I will say this, I do like the extract from what someone else wrote on this forum...I will quote and link to the post. I do like this.

“ASD has caused a great many problems for me. It does tie in to my behaviours as a child and as an adult. However, having ASD is not an excuse to blatantly go against the wishes and requirements of God. I still have free will and free choice”.

https://community.autism.org.uk/f/miscellaneous-and-chat/8684/jehovah-s-witnesses-with-asd

I like the above quote and agree in essence, although I will say many autistics those who are classically so especially level 2 and above. Many may not even know about the details/descriptions of autism. They can act in disruptive ways not even being told a thing by anyone. It is instinctive to them. Sensory sensitivity can lead to disruptive behaviour and it did for me as a young child and does affect me today. Many of those level 2 and above will be affected by sensory sensitivity and we need to try and find ways to help people when struggling.

You can feel like wanting to escape your head at times for real, it can be difficult at times.

Disruptive behaviour can be explained and people shouldn’t try and take as an excuse to do bad behaviour as that is something different.

I been told that cause I was going through my diagnose that I can’t use my diagnose if at the time as an excuse for my behaviour. So since November I had to leave my family home and sofa service 

I would have thought if you are diagnosed with Tourettes it would be an excalent and valid excuse for swearing. It's not just a hollywood movie thing. about 10% I think of people with Tourettes have 'bad language' outbursts. Not just random rude words. Whole complex vulgar sentances.

Low startle reflex does feature heavily in my life as well. Even a sudden question at the 'wrong' volume can make me jump out of my skin, so beeped horns, kids screaming at close quarters, a shout from one person to another, they seem to jolt me badly in a way that most seem to be immune to. It's weird sometimes to notice the contrastive calm in people around me as my adrenaline spikes and heart starts pounding due to some out of the blue noise. I try to suppress the (mostly) irrational anger it brings forth, but once in a while I'll swear reflexively more out of alarm than aggression or anything similar. 

Thanks!

I agree AH, I really dislike these sort of rhetorical questions, when asked them I often refuse to engage with them which angers the questioner, they always say its a simple question, but I don't see it that way, these sorts of questions often have no right answer and seem to be asked to make the responder feel bad. Also in real life there are so many variables, it's never "simple".

I’m sure if it was me as Janet I would have gone crazy or even worse for misleading my friend and causing such a tragedy. 

"Researchers who used this scenario.... found that people with autism were more likely to blame Janet for her friend's death than people without autism. Most normally functioning people understand the death of Janet's friend was accidental, because Janet didn't realize the jellyfish were poisonous, they said.

But people with autism may perceive morality differently than normally functioning people because they focus more on the outcomes of situations, rather than the intentions of the people in those situations said study researcher Liane Young, a researcher at Massachusetts Institute of Technology."

(Source: https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/perception-morality-different-when-you-have-autism-flna1C9466876 )

I was just curious to find out what people on here thought of this. I like your reply Catwoman, as it highlights the need for more information that I believe we tend to have. I thought of these questions:

- Didn't the friend research where they were going before the trip and find out for herself whether there were dangerous jellyfish there?

- Does the friend have a learning disability that means she has to rely on Janet to tell her what situations are safe?

If neither of those are the case, I would say that it's not Janet's fault - the friend is an adult who made her own decision to swim there. This is supposed to be the neurotypical way of thinking, and due to theory of mind we're not supposed to be able to imagine what someone is thinking, but if I were Janet I think I would feel guilty, even though I knew intellectually it wasn't my fault.

I’m not sure what being NT or ND has to do with this situation honestly. It could be anyone. 

I agree AH, although I don't get why people get offended about swearing. I know what you mean about the screams of small children, there's one over the hedge, she practically puts me in a spontaneous low earth orbit, when she screaches and she does it about every 30 mins, it's why I don't use my garden as much as I'd like.

This makes me sad. There are people trying to use ND conditions in general as an excuse for bad behaviors (example swearing and Tourette’s vocal tics). I have a strong moral compas and try my best to do the right thing and to not hurt anyone. Well, if a mother of a little child gets offended because I cover my ears because her child’s scream feels like electric shock, then sorry, not sorry. But I’m not complaining or shouting at her or her child, I totally understand that children scream, including mine. I think that nowadays there are lots of people who only look for an opportunity to get offended probably to get some attention. The line is in my opinion not clear, when something is actually offensive and when it’s someone exaggerating. It’s all subjective. But I’m absolutely against using conditions as an excuse for bad behaviors. 

Is Janet the NT one?

Is there no longer such a thing as a genuine accident or mistake?

Did Jane's friend have an unexpected allergic reaction to the jellyfish stings?

In researching about the difference in how autistic and Neurotypical people perceive right and wrong, I came across this:

"Imagine this: Janet and her friend are kayaking in a part of the ocean with many jellyfish. Janet had read that the jellyfish aren't dangerous, and tells her friend it's alright to swim. Her friend is stung by a jellyfish and dies."

 is she to blame?

I can’t disagree with any of that Peter

I think part of the point is there is a space between acepting that autism is an excuse for an issue and ignoring the issue alltogether. If an autistic kid is punching his teachers autism 'might' be a valid excuse but it doesn't mean they should ignore the issue. Just that taking a punishment aproch will be counter productive. Because punishments are designed to show people they are at fault and disuade them from repeating it. Punishing autistic kids for things caused by their autism isn't productive. It just encurages more conflict. Because they don't feel agency in their situation and the punishment only enforces this sence of lack of agency. Adressing the triggures for the behaviour and focusing on coping stratergies for them is more productive.

I would argue the same aproch is often true for adults. If an adult is causing unreasonable disruption because of their autism a punishment aproch is not good. And if the 'disruption' is just some hurt feelings I feel the consequences are way to low to ever justify a punishment aproch.

It’s a fair question, and a complicated one.

In my own case meltdowns are rare and are provoked by things I shouldn’t have had to put up with in the first place. I don’t know if that’s true for everyone else. My point being that they are effectively a response to mistreatment and therefore to some degree defensible. (I should also say I’ve never been violent even in these circumstances).

However, if someone is having a violent meltdown it’s not really fair to expect parents or teachers or whoever to accept being punchbags.

You speak a lot of sense!! On most if not all of the above. My inner knobness only comes out among a very close set of people.

The fact we know some behaviour might be classed as bad is what may lead to internalisation and thus self implosion. We know the manifestation of the opposite will be unacceptable to those around us. Neither are pleasant.

On further thought with regards to the OP, these people on social media (not the OP, obvs) might be attention seeking whether they're aware of it or not. Or maybe feel they deserve special considerations. I'm very glad I don't partake in any of this (viewing etc) there's enough going on inside my brain, without more fodder.

Let's just ALL be a bit kinder and understanding of others and ourselves. If people want to play up to it, let them. IMHO! 

I suppose it depends on one's 'spiky profile' etc. In my own case I think my autistic wiring has made me a compulsive people pleaser, accommodator, neurotic diplomat, mirrorer, and 'receivier' rather than 'broadcaster' of mood. Thus, most of my life has been spend in a state of bad behaviour being the most unlikely think I'm going to inflict on someone. And yet, because of over-calibration on that front, I've also put up with bad behaviour to me way more than I should, and have generally been one of the least assertive people on the planet. But that is changing, and the diagnosis (and therapy) has helped me get a little better there, maybe even a lot. In lost of small ways, nothing dramatic to the outside observer. And yet I think that finding that place between authenticity and performance in these life skills (ie. not just swapping one type of masking for another) is crucial to reducing frequency of burnout. 

I'm grateful not to have been the inverse of what I'd described, but I know that the lever is indeed thrown the other way for many autistic people and I think that's overall the harder hand to have been dealt. Is it therefore an excuse? Somewhat, but moreso (as others have said) a reason, and with increased self-understanding, the excuse side of it becomes less robust... except , not to acknowledge the same tightrope walk being an imperfect compromise in *that* context would make me a hypocrite. So, um... dunno. Complicated isn't it?! 

Consider also hw much better off we were when we did live under "draconian religious laws from early last century"... 

And we DO live under a dictatorship, it's just referred to as the "rules based order" and it dictates all aspects of your life, what you can say, what you can do. Hell you need to fill in a form, pay a registration fee and pass an exam just to fly a bloody drone in thsi country.

And try starting a business! (if you are a native) UK citizen) they have you wrapped up in dictats amnd fees and disbursements before you even get out of the gate.

If you are religious you can get arrested for simply praying in the street nowadays. 

If you complain on social media about policy that you don't agee with, then it's off to jail!

I'm not even saying that is a bad thing, you do need rules or at least generally held agreements to have a functioning society in which you can build a thing and not have it torn down for someone else to use as resources next day.

And how do you liek your rules prepared and presented? Made up on a whim by some cocaine fuellled politician, or other exalted and pamapered "elite" or carefully crafted over centruries by specialist philosophers living ascetic lives dedicated to getting the rules to be fair and just? Or perhaps even if you are confused adn a little bit morally deficient like me, then simply pick the exemplar of teh life of Jesus Christ and teh two simple rules he gave us to live by.  

It's not at all HARD to live a decent and harmless life, the rules really aren't that difficult to discern, but as humans we don't like the restrictions that following natural moral and mortal laws places upon our behaviour. 

Ok but putting my devils advocate hat on. Would you apply that to a child having a meltdown at school if it turned violent?

It's been my observation that never is a word people throw around too easily. There is usually some exception and rarely are they able to offer a rational justerfacation why the exception should apply in some cases and not others.