Do you ever feel like all change is bad?

That's awesome Sperg good on you.

I've been doing volunteering at my local funeral home. Finding it gets me out is good for me and I'm enjoying helping support people during difficult times.

For me, it very much depends on what it is that's going to change.

A good many years ago, the green light had been given to demolish a local hospital, which I was completely against. The original hospital building had once been a Georgian mansion. In my opinion, it was (from the outside, at least) a beautiful building steeped in local history. Had the plan been to keep the original building and convert it into apartments, it's a change I feel I could have embraced. Sadly, the land it was built on now forms part of a housing estate.

On the flip side of the coin, an area of my local town was flattened some years ago to build a Tesco Extra. I felt it was what my town desperately needed as it had turned into something of a ghost town. As far as I was concerned, it was a change for the better.

Peter said:

At what stage in our lives do good spontaneous things stop happening? At what stage do we stop meeting new people we can make a connection with?

With regard to the first question you posed, I find myself wondering if it's a matter of lowering your expectations... possibly. I guess it depends on what you consider to be good spontaneous things. I can only speak for myself, but there have been times in my life when spontaneous good things have happened... Simple things that I have perhaps been oblivious to, or not fully appreciated. I've no idea if any of this is making any sense, so apologies if I'm doing a lousy job of trying to explain what I mean.

As for meeting new people we can make a connection with, this is something many of us can struggle with, especially as we get older. To be honest, I think it can be something NTs can struggle with too. With the odd exception, the handful of friends I consider to be part of my 'inner circle' and feel a sense of connection with are people that I've known for decades.

people say change is good, i disagree for me its never been positive

"Crack that whip! Give the past the slip."

Martin said:

I often feel that the physical aspects of my past are being systematically erased.

Get to building a pyramid - much harder for them to get rid of.

All you need is 5,000 slaves, a few million tons of cut stone blocks and a few whips to get started.

I'll expect to see results by next weekend ;)

I often feel that the physical aspects of my past are being systematically erased. The house I lived in until I was three - bulldozed decades ago, my infant school - knocked down and rebuilt, the fields I played on as a child - now a motorway, the school I attended from 11 to 14 - now a housing estate and the university hall of residence I lived in for three years - now an Aldi and its car park.

To be fair, this could’ve been a discussion of its own, there are a multitude of tangents that this one could take..:’D

Then that makes you a ‘citizen’, checking your impulses to-my-mind is to mute your desires, if you could not do that in a civilised-society then they would do it for you and your standing would likely be diminished, which would limit your social-mobility.. and thus minimise the harm you do to the community.

DeSpereaux said:

In order to live in the world you have to be prepared to face it, only the meek can do that successfully, you cannot be meek if you do not have a sword to unsheath.

That is the arguement the right wing in the USA use to limit gun control - you need guns to be able to stop other people with guns etc.

In the UK there is very strict gun control and even the police have very few gun carriers yet the gun crime rate in the UK is very low, a tiny fraction of what the USA has.

I believe you don't need those teeth or thorns is the society you live in has the appropriate controls to require you to need them, and indeed in relation to autism there are safeguards in place and being added that should ensure we do not need to develop our own aggressive responses.

I can continue to elaborate, with prompting, so feel free..:)

It’s got nothing to do with ‘evil’, it is not ‘evil’ that the world is monsterous, just as it is not evil that lion has teeth or a rose has thorns, it is surely tragic but not evil.  
In order to live in the world you have to be prepared to face it, only the meek can do that successfully, you cannot be meek if you do not have a sword to unsheath.
Evil is that extra-flair that the out-of-control bring into the world, men also have to be prepared for that, if they are to inherit the earth as-it-were..

A good point.

There are times when I have thoughts that I would consider monsterous (eg there are times when I see a drug addled teen robbing an old grannie on the local TV and I wish I could take an iron bar to the teens head, but I hate myself for feeling that way.

There are probably reasons of addiction and abuse leading to the act and who knows if that old grannie hadn't been abusing children her whole life etc - I should not jump to a conclusion on minimal evidence and an extreme reaction of violence will not solve much and will just end up with me in prison.

Not acting on them does not mean they should not be there. Their very presence limits the potential for fairness and deceny in society.

DeSpereaux said:

Because the world is monsterous..

Is that flawed logic?

The world is pretty much a corrupt place but it does not mean we should be corrupt ourselves to perpetuate that evil. Likewise I would suspect that perpetrating the monstorous behaviour (ie inhuman by definition) is not a way to better society.

I assume there are other arguements at play here and I'm curious as to what they are - thanks for engaging in a discourse about it as I know my view is only one take on it.

I think the notion of restraining acting on ones desires is very different from 'muting' a desire. If I'm hungry walking through the supermarket I don't pick up food and start eating on the way to the check out. Doesn't stop me being hungry though.

Because the world is monsterous..

DeSpereaux said:

men SHOULD be monsters,

I'm genuinely curious as to why you think this.

I think that a person is out of control if they cannot mute their desire, don’t get me wrong men SHOULD be monsters, but monsters that can mute themselves and punish themselves, monsters that can’t mute themselves need to be prevented.. otherwise society can’t function rightly..

I felt the same about the 100£ transformer I saved up for that broke in 10 minuets of my buying it. When I realised how flimsy this toy was I was a lot less impressed with it ... However I still think giant robots are cool. If you offered me an actual gundam I wouldn't say no.

T said:

You might be very rigid in that way, but a lot of people are fluid as hell. 

Yeah I think that might be true. But autistic people tend to be more rigid and I guess I'm one of the more rigid autistic people. So let me re phrase it this way. Society often asserts that everyone is flexible. That all desire is mutable. I know this to be a lie.

I just was enamoured with the six different objects (IIRC) that it fired. I can truthfully say that how the other kids might look at me did not factor...

Still doesn't. When I discovered I preferred "luxury" cars, it was because of what the car offered me, (a better, more relaxing drive where I can actually hear the music at speed, and better protection in the case of an accident). 

If I cared about how  car made me look, I'd probably choose different (more rubbish) cars entirely, like everyone else seems to.

Johhny Seven was presumably an advertising gimmick, and I discovered that it was poorly made and it's functioning unreliable or poor in some areas, which is what killed my desire when I finally got my hands on one.

The Raleigh chopper conferred on me the same experience when I finally got a go on one. In fact I crashed hard at a little over 25MPH when some poor sod lent me one to try out, and still can show you the scars today.   

I was taught to be a "good loser" at games when I was very young, and I had an uncle who provided a good example of a bad loser, when they let him play at Christmas, and ("winning" is a very strong desire, at least in me!) and in real life I've noticed that people can focus way too much on recent or impending  defeats whilst failing to continue playing the game to a high standard..

Or maybe I'm just wired up in such a way that desire is less strong in me than in others, which might explain why I'm happier than most to make decisions from a morally right perspective (as I see it) rather than just focussing on winning at any cost.