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Standing up for your values might be decided to be a pathology - If you're autistic


This article picks apart a bunch of biases by the researchers of a given paper. The object of study was the differences in behavior between a group of autistic people and a group of non-autistic people when choosing between prioritizing value for oneself or value for the community.

I recommend reading the paper itself too. If that is, understandably, too much for you, I suggest you go for the introduction, the conclusion, and the segments mentioned in the article.

in reply to SuddenDownpour

This is very interesting. I’m not diagnosed but strongly suspect I’m on the spectrum and the article rings true for me.

I generally avoid confrontation but I will gladly ruin a whole conversation if I feel like someone else believes something I find immoral or unethical

This entry was edited (1 year ago)
in reply to SuddenDownpour

@SuddenDownpour Pathologizing aside, this matches up with another thing I've seen pointed out as an autistic trait that backs this up: value based identity vs group based identity.

Allistics typically tie their identity up in the groups they're a part of: family, work, church, town/city/state, etc

Autistics tie our identity up in our values: what we do, impacts we've made, accomplishments tied to our values

This is why you hear things like "snitches get stitches" because group loyalty is considered more critically important than values, or how we're seen as turning on the group when we call out how the group could be improved.

This would especially make sense in the mentioned study because when you take away the group it takes away the impact to their identity while our identities don't care if someone is watching.

in reply to SuddenDownpour

You need to take care of yourself first. Don't set yourself on fire trying to help other people.
It's ok to say no if people are always asking you for stuff.
This entry was edited (1 year ago)
in reply to r3df0x ✡️✝☪️

@r3df0x @SuddenDownpour That's not remotely what this is referring to and it makes me wonder if you read the article at all?

They were comparing public vs private actions of allistics vs autistics and basically determined that autistics are more likely to be charitable/kind without needing recognition or attention to it.

The real findings:
* We're less likely to differ our choices based on whether or not they're perceived
* We're more kind by default

What you're talking about is a separate, but also common thing, called fawning. A trauma response that many of us also have in which we do whatever we think a person wants to avoid perceived threats and harm, even if that action itself causes us further harm.

This test did not examine fawning and did not examine charity at great personal cost. It was just whether or not someone would act charitably at personal expense or uncharitably at personal gain... an allistics basically were only good when people were watching while autistics were consistent regardless.