What would human society be like if the majority were Autistic?

It would be interesting to consider if the economy could continue to work in this situation.

While lower workplace stress would help, the challenge of getting so many different, spiky personality types to co-exist would be significant, workplace productivity would be much lower and the overhead of sick leave due to stress difficult for employers to bear.

We do not consume entertainment, clothes and "stuff" in anything like the way NTs do so the whole retail market would be a different landscape. Demand would most likely plummet although demand for services like therapists would skyrocket.

Lotus said:

Emergency services: emergency vehicle sirens would be quieter. Police would use drones to patrol their areas. Hospitals might have all single rooms, not shared wards, with internet access available to all patients.

This would lead to a much higher demand on the public "purse" to provide all these as well as the increased demand on therapy services, so tax would need to rise significantly from a much smaller workforce (since only around 20% of autists are in work if I recall correctly). Tax would need to be much higher.

The thought experiment is an interesting one, but we are not the most productive element of society and have much greater needs than most so finding a way to balance all this would be quite a prospect.

If consumables were geared towards people with sensitivities to things like seems, lables and fabrics, then maybe we'd have more things to choose from and would have more variety in our clothes? How much of the sameness in what people choose to wear, is because if we find something we like, that fits, and is comfortable we buy half a dozen or so of the same thing and have to hope they don't wear out before we have to find the next lot of clothes?

I think we would still have small talk, if you look at discussion here a lot of them are what could be considered small talk, we talk about fruit that goes off, tv programs, podcasts, gadgets and recipes. I think small talk might change a bit, sharing small snippets about our special interests for example.

I think we'd work as much and probably more of us would work, just because things would be set up in a way that suits us. Maybe we'd have less direct capitalism, although I'm sure the Musks of this world would still exist, and more co-operatives, mutuals and shared ownership models. Maybe everyone would have more than one type of work? A paid job and one thats more socially useful and satisfying?

I wonder if we'd need less therapists? It seems that so many of our problems are caused by a world that dosen't fit us, if it did fit then maybe we'd have fewer problems and we'd be having this conversation about needy NT's?

It's quite hard to fully imagine how different an austistic world would be, as if we were the dominant neurotype then we'd have created systems to suit as right from the start of societies developing and these "adjustments" would be built in. We'd have had 10,000 years plus to build societies, the world would look different, but by how much I'm unsure.I think there would still be competition and competitive stuff, I know some autists are very competitive and they might be the majority and people like me who aren't and don't see the need for it would still be outsiders?

It's interesting to think of what wouldn't have been developed as much as what would, would we still have had an industrial revolution? How would it have been different? Would we be as environmentlly aware as we are now or would it never have been nessercary?

TheCatWoman said:

I think we would still have small talk,

But is "small talk" the same for NTs and NDs?

I looked up what small talk is, and found that it's recommended that you start with a neutral topic like the weather. We've discussed this topic recently, but in terms of sensory difficulties caused by the heatwaves - I think NT small talk would be less personal, until they got to know someone well. Here are some examples given of how to do small talk about the weather, with possible replies from an autistic person in brackets:

 "Lovely day, isn't it?" ( "No, my neighbour's kids are screaming and my wife wants a divorce")

 "Looks like rain's in the forecast" ( Well, the pressure is falling and the humidity rising)

 "Did you order this beautiful weather?" ( Eh? Weather isn't a thing you can order!)

It advises to skip talking about books or movies the other person hasn't read or seen, but we encourage each other to talk about these things to give us ideas what to read or watch.

It explains small talk like this: "Small talk is about building a bridge between you and another person. It doesn't matter so much what you talk about, but rather that you start talking in the first place." But I find talking about trivia boring, then my mind starts to wander and I can't remember what the other person has said. I would rather they talked about something they really have an interest in, even if I haven't had the same interest before, because I could learn something - unless it's sport or celebrities that is!

Whilst I agree that small talk between ND's and NT's can be awkward, I think in reality it would be less so as we'd have all grown up with a different way of communicating. I think ND's would start with something more neutral like 'It looks like its going to hot today?', which would lead either to someone replaying with a flat, 'Yes', or they'd be expanding into 'Yes it does, I hope I have enough water in my water butt to water my garden', there are many conversational avenues that could come out of this, or the bus could come and it would end there.

Whilst I agree that small talk between ND's and NT's can be awkward, I think in reality it would be less so as we'd have all grown up with a different way of communicating. I think ND's would start with something more neutral like 'It looks like its going to hot today?', which would lead either to someone replaying with a flat, 'Yes', or they'd be expanding into 'Yes it does, I hope I have enough water in my water butt to water my garden', there are many conversational avenues that could come out of this, or the bus could come and it would end there.