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No, no. You don't get it. You have Autism

David23

When I was in University, I joined the local Dungeons and Dragons club. I was met by a DM, called Austin, Austin was a jacked up guy who studies psychology and liked to bodybuild. All the player gathered in the room. It was a session of Dungeons and Dragons.

For record, the DM knows I am autistic. When another player named Greg started making bigotted jokes during session 0; sexism, homophobia, racism etc and I would angry and upset at it, Austin would take me to the side and slowly "explain" the joke over and over again until "I got it" saying my autism got in the way of humour.

When I tried to leave, he would stop me and try to "reason it out", ask me to explain my reason. He would then deny anything, then would explain that I just don't get it, it's just a joke all for laughs. He then tried to get me to "get the jokes" again. He would constantly say to other players that "I don't get social cues so don't mind her" and would list any symptoms of autism I would show at the game and say to the players to not be angry and that my brain doesn't function as normal.

Parents

  • To be honest (and I may be way off base here) this might be a case of Austin confusing autism symptoms with preferences for humor. My personal preference is topical humour or anything off the wall. I hugely admire comedians who take things and flip them around (the really smart ones do). I'm with you that bigoted jokes aren't funny - and I wouldn't need them explaining, I completely understand this type of humour which is exactly why I don't find it funny. I don't care how many people are laughing.

    Here's the thing. And I may be wrong because I don't know what exactly was said or how it was said. But my impression is that as a psychology student this guy probably fancied himself as a bit of an autism expert - even more so because as you say, he was spotting things and calling them out but attempting to tell the other players "not to get angry". In a sense I think he was wanting to portray himself as the expert placing himself as your advocate. Does that mean I'm sticking up from him? 

    No, he could just have been really clumsy in how he was supporting you or there may have been some bizarre social power-play going on. Not to mention a whole ton of assumptions just because he knows a little bit about the condition. That of course doesn't mean he knows how to treat people as people, or how to show you respect for the person you are and not see you through the eyes of a diagnostic label.

    I don't know. I can easily imagine this scenario either way as this guy being a know-it-all and absolutely clueless with his "helpful" behaviour or something more sinister where he was playing games with you.

    The line about normal functioning brains did get my hackles up -  it's probably a fault of the discipline. When I flirted with psychology (a while ago now) autism fell into a sub-field of psychology perversely titled "abnormal psychology" - it's a vile, loaded term and should be dropped from undergraduate study and text books. Autism is also termed as a "disorder" - again another loaded term which to an inexperienced student ends up dividing society into so-called "normal" people and then "people with disorders" or "abnormal". Unconscious bias anyone?

    Folk can do really stupid things with the very best of intentions. I'll call myself out on that because I know I still do. By trying to "explain things" and "reason them out" he may have honestly thought he was helping you. But, if he'd been as smart as he thought his psychology studies made him, he would have known when to shut up, step back and allow you to leave.

    Knowledge without wisdom is a dangerous combination. 

Reply

  • To be honest (and I may be way off base here) this might be a case of Austin confusing autism symptoms with preferences for humor. My personal preference is topical humour or anything off the wall. I hugely admire comedians who take things and flip them around (the really smart ones do). I'm with you that bigoted jokes aren't funny - and I wouldn't need them explaining, I completely understand this type of humour which is exactly why I don't find it funny. I don't care how many people are laughing.

    Here's the thing. And I may be wrong because I don't know what exactly was said or how it was said. But my impression is that as a psychology student this guy probably fancied himself as a bit of an autism expert - even more so because as you say, he was spotting things and calling them out but attempting to tell the other players "not to get angry". In a sense I think he was wanting to portray himself as the expert placing himself as your advocate. Does that mean I'm sticking up from him? 

    No, he could just have been really clumsy in how he was supporting you or there may have been some bizarre social power-play going on. Not to mention a whole ton of assumptions just because he knows a little bit about the condition. That of course doesn't mean he knows how to treat people as people, or how to show you respect for the person you are and not see you through the eyes of a diagnostic label.

    I don't know. I can easily imagine this scenario either way as this guy being a know-it-all and absolutely clueless with his "helpful" behaviour or something more sinister where he was playing games with you.

    The line about normal functioning brains did get my hackles up -  it's probably a fault of the discipline. When I flirted with psychology (a while ago now) autism fell into a sub-field of psychology perversely titled "abnormal psychology" - it's a vile, loaded term and should be dropped from undergraduate study and text books. Autism is also termed as a "disorder" - again another loaded term which to an inexperienced student ends up dividing society into so-called "normal" people and then "people with disorders" or "abnormal". Unconscious bias anyone?

    Folk can do really stupid things with the very best of intentions. I'll call myself out on that because I know I still do. By trying to "explain things" and "reason them out" he may have honestly thought he was helping you. But, if he'd been as smart as he thought his psychology studies made him, he would have known when to shut up, step back and allow you to leave.

    Knowledge without wisdom is a dangerous combination. 

Children
  • in reply to Ethan
    Ethan said:

    Here's the thing. And I may be wrong because I don't know what exactly was said or how it was said. But my impression is that as a psychology student this guy probably fancied himself as a bit of an autism expert - even more so because as you say, he was spotting things and calling them out but attempting to tell the other players "not to get angry". In a sense I think he was wanting to portray himself as the expert placing himself as your advocate. Does that mean I'm sticking up from him? 

    No, he could just have been really clumsy in how he was supporting you or there may have been some bizarre social power-play going on. Not to mention a whole ton of assumptions just because he knows a little bit about the condition. That of course doesn't mean he knows how to treat people as people, or how to show you respect for the person you are and not see you through the eyes of a diagnostic label.

    Yes - but I'm still betting on the whole bunch being ASD so just so many misunderstandings and overreactions on all sides,.