How to respond to 'Aren't we all on the spectrum'

Botty said:

Neurotypicals are NOT on the spectrum as far as I am concerened

It is important to realise that Neurotypical is currently not a formal medical category. It is a word made up by us to identify someone who is not neurodiverse.

This, however, does not mean they cannot have neurodiverse traits. They can have many of our traits in various mixes and indeed experience some of our struggles with them, but it does not stem from the same source (ie the brain development).

This is probaly why it is a fairly common expression amongst the non neurodiverse community. They can identify behaviours like ours so think they are the same even when they are not.

Botty said:

How do you reply to this cliche? 

It depends on what sort of impression you are trying to get across to them.

You can explain the traits you have and how they affect you and ask if they have the same.

You can talk about meltdowns and ask how often they have the complete loss of concious control over their bodies when the stress gets too much.

You can ask how often they get excluded from social situations because your brain cannot keep up with the interactions, how you get marginalised and bullied for being different and how these situations can leave you unable to function for long periods of time.

In the end it is their lack of understanding that is behind this and it may stem from lack of real interest (ie ignorance) or bias (ie prejudice) or whether they really don't understand it but are interested (ie the rare few good ones) - each has its approach.

However I find that afte doing this sort of thing 20+ times that I get rather bored of it and just say "yeah, whatever" and move on. Life is too short to waste time on these people that are 90% unlikely to be interested in actually understanding - all in my own experience / opinion of course.

Botty said:

Neurotypicals are NOT on the spectrum as far as I am concerened

It is important to realise that Neurotypical is currently not a formal medical category. It is a word made up by us to identify someone who is not neurodiverse.

This, however, does not mean they cannot have neurodiverse traits. They can have many of our traits in various mixes and indeed experience some of our struggles with them, but it does not stem from the same source (ie the brain development).

This is probaly why it is a fairly common expression amongst the non neurodiverse community. They can identify behaviours like ours so think they are the same even when they are not.

Botty said:

How do you reply to this cliche? 

It depends on what sort of impression you are trying to get across to them.

You can explain the traits you have and how they affect you and ask if they have the same.

You can talk about meltdowns and ask how often they have the complete loss of concious control over their bodies when the stress gets too much.

You can ask how often they get excluded from social situations because your brain cannot keep up with the interactions, how you get marginalised and bullied for being different and how these situations can leave you unable to function for long periods of time.

In the end it is their lack of understanding that is behind this and it may stem from lack of real interest (ie ignorance) or bias (ie prejudice) or whether they really don't understand it but are interested (ie the rare few good ones) - each has its approach.

However I find that afte doing this sort of thing 20+ times that I get rather bored of it and just say "yeah, whatever" and move on. Life is too short to waste time on these people that are 90% unlikely to be interested in actually understanding - all in my own experience / opinion of course.