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This article is a bit maddening. I find the beginning encouraging.... I’ve written before about how autistic people often struggle to know how to act

This article is a bit maddening. I find the beginning encouraging.... I’ve written before about how autistic people often struggle to know how to act around authority figures. Actually, that’s not true– we don’t seem to *care* how we act around authority. I like the distinction between unknowing and uncaring. I like the level of personal responsibility that this suggests and I wish the rest of the article continued in this vein. It makes us *really weird* to neurotypical people, who seem to accept authority happily. This is not correct at all in my experience. I don't think anybody loves submitting to authority just for the fun of it. Certainly there is a lot of personal calculus that goes into whether or not we accept a given authority. Cost vs. benefit. Whether we see a reason to respect the authority. Whether we see value in it. Social pressure. Of course this calculus will be different from person to person and from situation to situation, and of course neurotypicals and folks on the spectrum will tend to have a different view. But, "seem to accept authority happily?" Yeesh. It seems to imply an absence of thought rather than different criteria weights.

digging 3y ago
I suspect the author meant something more like, "neurotypical people live contented lives holding the belief that arbitrary authority actually exists." But I can't truly speak for them. Even before I fully reasoned it out, growing up I always knew that arbitrary authority doesn't exist for me. Sure a SME should be given more weight discussing their subject, and a parent understands dangers of the world that their young child literally can't comprehend. But many of us experienced "listen to me because I said so" as children, and continue to experience that in school and into adulthood in the workplace. It's meaningless, but many neurotypical people neither notice that it's wrong or understand why it's wrong, perhaps because their brains aren't wired a way to unconsciously detect those red flags.
- avgcorrection 3y ago
  I don’t understand how to interpret this comment. Are you neurotypical or not?
  - digging 3y ago
    No
- dEnigma 3y ago
  I don't like this trend of using the label "neurotypical" to describe one's idea of the most boring, unimaginative person one can think of, and then applying it to pretty much everyone that isn't on the spectrum. "Neurotypical" people range from absolute rebels who reject any kind of authority to people happily working for and supporting a fascist regime, and then everything in-between. There is no less of a variety of opinion and thought in them than in "neurodivergent" people.
  - digging 3y ago
    Well, ok, but that's not what I'm doing. I'm using neurotypical to describe people who don't have neurodivergent brains. I think there's arguments that there is no "neurotypical" at all, but it should be clear that when we're discussing autistic people, everyone who's not autistic is in the "other" group.
    - RHSman2 3y ago
      Isn’t it called a spectrum for a reason?
      - digging 3y ago
        What?
      - chownie 3y ago
        If the autism spectrum were represented as an input paradigm it would be a color picker rather than a number range. It is not from 0 autism to 100 autism, it's more like a combination of sensory processing, language, social communication and executive functioning differences.
    - soco 3y ago
      Either way, there are many other ways to "handle with" authority, notice also my quotes. These are even on different axes: understanding or not there's something going on, accepting or not what's going on, agreeing or not with what's going on, acting or not on what's going on... anything you simplify there between the two groups, will be wrong.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- JohnBooty 3y ago
  Context: I've never been formally diagnosed, but based on informally discussing things with therapists and various self-assessments it seems pretty likely to me that I'm somewhat on the spectrum, probably on the shallow end. Maybe this means I understand both the neurotypical and neurodivergent worlds a bit, or maybe it means I understand neither. But many of us experienced "listen to me because I said so" as children, and continue to experience that in school and into adulthood in the workplace. It's meaningless, but many neurotypical people neither notice that it's wrong or understand why it's wrong, perhaps because their brains aren't wired a way to unconsciously detect those red flags. I feel extremely confident in saying that everybody hates this. Honestly, it might be the first thing I've been certain of all day long. I'm less confident in this, but: I certainly also think it's possible that many on the spectrum underrate how much literally everybody hates because-I-said-so's. I know one other thing. If a person is in the upper N% of intelligence, "gifted" if you will, they will have a natural curiosity about how things work, and have probably improved many things in the past, and will naturally tend to chafe at doing things in sub-optimal ways for unexplained reasons, and will therefore tend to hate "because I said so's" even more than most people. Does autism sort of act like a force multiplier when combined with that trait? Maybe. Probably? I mean, one of the traits of autism is that we tend to need our own ways of doing things. growing up I always knew that arbitrary authority doesn't exist for me I think one possible issue is that neurodivergents can't understand the reasons why neurotypicals (sometimes) like authority, or seem to like it. Imagine Bubba, a guy with USA and police and military stickers all over his pickup truck. This guy just loves the imaginary absolute authority of the USA, right? It's probably more complicated than that. In the micro sense of things, he probably hates being told what to do just like the rest of us. He probably grumbles when paying taxes just like the rest of us. But he probably likes to imagine the USA as a superpower that will crush its/his perceived enemies. But maybe Bob just kind of wants an identity to cling to. Also maybe he and/or many of his friends and relatives are in the military, possibly because it's one of the few stable career paths for people without higher education, and he would like to think there is some kind of positive thing being done. Maybe he's sending a dog-whistle signal to "liberals" or immigrants. Or hell, maybe he does just have pride in the cool things that do happen in America. Maybe he's an American history buff! But for all of the complex factors in Bubba's enthusiasm for America, actually doing what America tells him to do probably isn't the part that delights him.
- ffgjgf1 3y ago
  > It's meaningless, but many neurotypical people neither notice that it's wrong or understand why it's wrong, That’s a very bold claim and I don’t think it’s that accurate. Rather maybe “neurotipical” are less willing to challenge “authority” when they have nothing to gain from that.
  - digging 3y ago
    You know, that may be true. In my experience most NT friends/colleagues don't seem to think about it all but it may be they're simply brushing it off, whereas instead it's unignorable to me.
    - lamontcg 3y ago
      Or they realize its not a productive strategy. I'm usually the first to notice and verbalize that someone with authority is a useless sociopath and things are going to turn out badly. This is never a remotely optimal strategy. Can't tell if other people see it, but realize they can't do anything about it and that talking about it is only going to be negative, or if they're really unaware (or just keep it in a "subconscious" unexamined box because they know that opening it up won't be useful). I'm generally shit at politics, although from time to time I've been able to figure out how to fake it.
      - digging 3y ago
        > This is never a remotely optimal strategy. I'm sorry that's been your experience, but I can't relate.
        JohnBooty 3y ago
        You've... had lots of positive experiences promptly deciding that your leaders are "useless sociopaths" before anybody else has, and being very verbal about it?
- hotnfresh 3y ago
  > But many of us experienced "listen to me because I said so" as children, and continue to experience that in school and into adulthood in the workplace. It's meaningless, but many neurotypical people neither notice that it's wrong or understand why it's wrong This would not be perhaps the most-universal example of arbitrary authority, played with in countless pieces of mainstream media, if neurotypicals were as you suppose they are. I think you need to go back to the drawing board on this one.
  - digging 3y ago
    Ok, somebody else explain why neurotypical people are content to obey arbitrary authority when they don't have to. I surely shouldn't have included that bit of speculation because all the replies to my comment have nothing to do with the actual point of the comment.
    - roughly 3y ago
      > are content to obey arbitrary authority when they don't have to. There’s two assumptions in this sentence that are frequently unwarranted. Additionally, sometimes it’s both easier and less costly to let certain things go. This is may be one of the areas of, well, neurodivergence: “it’s going to be a pain in the ass to fight whatever the hell this is, and I don’t care enough to do it.”
    - hotnfresh 3y ago
      The most likely explanation, I think, is that they dole out their fucks-given very differently than you.
    - RoyalHenOil 3y ago
      Consider the possibility that, as someone who is not neurotypical, you may not be accurately reading the contentment level of people who are neurotypical.
    - Jtsummers 3y ago
      "Content" is an assumption on your part. Higher tolerance for bullshit is also a plausible explanation. Or a difference in emotional intelligence and the corresponding understanding of (and willingness to play) the political game to get through the day. I'm not "content" with my management, but I know it's temporary and that I don't want to be unemployed in the interim and my pay is good enough that I'm not ready to nope out of here (if the pay was worse, or my fu funds weren't spent a couple years ago and not yet recovered, it would be a different situation).
- fallingknife 3y ago
  > and a parent understands dangers of the world that their young child literally can't comprehend As an adult I find that my perception of danger was actually much more correct as a child than the adults around me. They were, and are, paranoid and driven by moral panics. For some reason they were unable to comprehend that me walking a mile across an upper middle class suburb at 12 years old was perfectly safe, but I was. They feared edge case dangers like pedophiles and school shootings while us children made jokes about them. When there were a handful of shark attacks on the east coast and it made the news, the school banned students from swimming in the ocean on school trips. Driving for hours on the interstate was, of course, deemed safe as always.
- ska 3y ago
  To me, this sometimes seems like a first order response to a 2nd (or higher) order problem. Some neurodivergent people I've worked through this with have definitely unconsciously/consciously detected "red flags" and responded to them, but their modelling of what was going on was clearly reductive and sometimes obviously incorrect. I'm in no way suggesting it's universally true, but it's happened enough times to feel like it's likely, if that makes sense? Sometimes neurotypical people are seeing exactly the same data, but interpreting it differently.
tekla 3y ago
> I’ve written before about how autistic people often struggle to know how to act around authority figures. Actually, that’s not true– we don’t seem to care how we act around authority. I call bullshit. Autistic people can figure out how to operate around authority figures just fine when it MATTERS. If some autistic person is fucking around with an ATM in front of a cop that they know is there, but don't care, that's being stupid, not being autistic. I don't have to give a shit about how authority and power is granted to certain individuals, but it doesn't take a genius to realize that insulting the CEO in front of the company is not a good way to keep your job..
- handoflixue 3y ago
  Insulting the CEO is rude, because insulting anyone is rude. There's nothing special about the CEO that makes it rude only to insult him. The article even gives a better example here: casually introducing yourself to the CEO and making a joke. If the CEO feels insulted by this, it's because he has "Authority" and you are "not respecting it" - but wait, the other CEO I met really appreciated this! Suddenly it makes no sense. There's a special rule that this CEO insists I should know, but it's not even consistent with other CEOs. How am I supposed to know which authorities it's okay to make jokes with?
  - roughly 3y ago
    > How am I supposed to know which authorities it's okay to make jokes with? With experience over time. I think what I’m getting from this conversation is part of what’s being expressed here is a lack of awareness of social danger (don’t take that as a value judgement, just a statement). The way this looks to the rest of us is “how would I know which predator will attack me and which will not?” - and for the most part, the answer is: you don’t, so act accordingly.
    - distract8901 3y ago
      > I think what I’m getting from this conversation is part of what’s being expressed here is a lack of awareness of social danger You're confusing "being aware of" and "caring about". Autistic people are acutely aware of "social danger". It's something we deal with every moment of every day since we're old enough to realize we're different. For most, it's a deeply traumatic experience to deal with as a child. And by most, I mean nearly 100%. Common wisdom is that there are no un-traumatized autistic individuals. > for the most part, the answer is: you don’t, so act accordingly This tells me you fundamentally do not understand autism. "Act accordingly" is one of the defenses we have to learn. And we learn it totally alone. What behavior is and is not appropriate is one big stochastic experiment that lasts your entire life. We learn to observe people around us, but that's not enough. It's easy to mimic behavior, but we don't get the context or reasoning behind it until we get it wrong. Knowing how to act accordingly is the core problem in most autistic people's lives. It's incredibly challenging and very dangerous. We have a lifetime of trauma built up around this problem, which makes it extremely stressful to be in a situation where you don't know what to do.
tyingq 3y ago
> "seem to accept authority happily?" I don't know much about autism. I can say though, that while I might appear to "accept authority", that's not really true. In each case, I'm weighing the benefits and drawbacks of that, and choosing what to do. Often, if I disagree with an authority figure's position on something, there's more efficient ways to get what I want than public disagreement.
- flkenosad 3y ago
  I find this to be snake-like behaviour.
  - 0xfae 3y ago
    Which part? Sometimes the right thing to do is to speak up in public and offer a different opinion, sometimes the right thing is to have a private conversation. Maybe I'm misunderstanding, which part do you feel is snake-like?
  - stephen_g 3y ago
    Sometimes it’s one of the only ways to deal with difficult people in authority if you don’t want to just blindly accept their authority… As the saying goes, “don’t hate the players, hate the game”
  - JohnBooty 3y ago
    What do you consider to be the alternative? Fighting authority is (by definition) an asymmetric battle. There are "honorable" ways to fight authority. Frontal assault, or just plain old disobedience. Sometimes those are the best ways. Sometimes not.
  - tyingq 3y ago
    Consider that forcing people to hear, consider, react and "vote" on something in public might be the "snake like" behavior. Some topics require quiet reflection. Some topics do better with a secret ballot. Some objections are heard better in private, etc. Or, sometimes, it's just poker, and revealing your hand too early puts you at a disadvantage to someone else that's also manipulating the circumstances to benefit themselves. It's all regrettable, but that's the human condition.
bitwize 3y ago
You'd be surprised. "All men are created equal" was a radical statement, almost blasphemous, when penned; the idea that authority and hierarchy were inherent was just something about the world that was accepted, like the sun or even the existence of God, because how could the state of things be otherwise? And post hoc, we rationalized this implicit assumption by inventing the theory that differences in authority were not arbitrary, but based on the quality of the individual. More powerful people were better somehow. The word "aristocracy" means "rule by the best".
- yoyohello13 3y ago
  > More powerful people were better somehow. This is still the case in modern society as well. We've just substituted noble blood for money.
- RationalDino 3y ago
  The historical context for this was the belief that those in positions of authority were put there by God's will. And so to question the rightness of them being placed over you was to question God. With the most extreme form of this being the idea of divine right of kings. Because kings were given the most extreme authority, they must have the strongest sanction of God supporting them. It would be a mistake to think of this as a purely Christian notion, either. Divine right very closely parallels the Chinese notion of the Mandate of Heaven for the emperor. And Christian notions owe a lot to Plato. In particularly the Neoplatonic idea of the Great Chain of Being. Which (though the phrase has a separate history) can be summed up with, "As above, so below." So we are reflections of our rulers. If our rulers are just, we will be. If our rulers are unjust, we will also be unjust. If we upset the natural order by overthrowing our rulers, chaos will descend upon the land. Shakespeare did a great job of capturing the mindset in The Tempest.
RHSman2 3y ago
It is unfortunate that the neurodivergent/neurotypical us vs them argument is happening.
- belval 3y ago
  Well the inherent framing of neurodivergent/neurotypical really lends itself well to those kind of arguments. If it's a spectrum and we are all on it with only two words to describe it then we are bound to get that kind of low-quality discussion.
toasted-subs 3y ago
There's a high correlation between smart people and being on the spectrum. You can likely replace the word "autistic people" with smart people. Just playing the cards here, but if my IQ is 155 and yours is 120. Why should I listen to you? Especially when I see you making what seem to be plain mistakes, which not only hurt yourselves, but create a society where your kids will be less satisfied. Its not like I have the ability to make people do things, that would be a position of authority. Me not accepting me not being responsible for actions with plain evidence I was not in control. Not only proves the point those individuals are responsible for what happened to me, but their inability to accept they should be listening to me makes me most concerned.
- gherkinnn 3y ago
  There are many high IQ people who are not able to proverbially tie their shoelaces. Or, more literally, shower. So yes, please do listen to your not so smart colleagues. Thanks.
  - toasted-subs 3y ago
    Yeah, I actually live near ones of the finest establishments for studying the human brain and there are structural reasons why. Plenty of techniques to get those people working. Problem being it's pretty experimental.
- shadowgovt 3y ago
  > Why should I listen to you a) because other people listen to that person, and one person's smarts only outstrips the strength multiplier of followers in extraordinary circumstances b) because they're part of the tribe, and like it or not you're gonna be working with them. More useful to everyone to invest resources into figuring out what makes them tick than tuning them out. c) because responsibility is rarely as divestable as one might hope. If my team lead doesn't listen to me and then sets up the team to shit the bed, I can certainly document "I wasn't involved in this decision; I would have done it differently," but the response upper management's gonna give me is "If you knew a better approach, why didn't you coach the team lead to take it?"
permo-w 3y ago
>I don't think anybody loves submitting to authority just for the fun of it. I can think of some counter-examples
- klyrs 3y ago
  We don't even need rule 34 for that
- JohnBooty 3y ago
  It's hard to talk about anything sometimes, because with 8 billion people on the planet there are always some counter-examples. But to the point of the linked article, I think the author misses the point and insults neurotypicals and neurodivergents alike with the his assertion that normals just love them some blind submission as a default way of being, and autists just can't do that
  - permo-w 3y ago
    I think you may be underestimating the size of the population who are into control and submission. but I don't disagree, see my comment from yesterday where I say something similar[1] [1] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38075017 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38075017
NeuroCoder 3y ago
This article should probably be read through a more emotional lens than one of hard facts. Articles like this are littered with very specific details that don't accurately apply to many of the people in the group being described, but are perhaps accurate in spirit. It's also a common pitfall to advocate for ones own group at the expense of another group.
RationalDino 3y ago
I think that "seem to accept authority happily" is exactly how it looks to a neuroatypical person. With emphasis on "SEEM". Autism and ADHD both bring a lack of executive control. A lack of executive control limits our ability to comply with demands, including the demands of authority. The demands of authority generally include following the dictates of authority, while convincing authority that you're happy to do so. People with poor executive control can only act this way out of desire. We have to really, really want to. And so a neurotypical person's ability to do what they should (regardless of how they feel) looks to us like something you're doing because you want to. No matter what the truth might be. Yes, your internal experience may be entirely different. But, particularly with autism, neuroatypical people are often not very good at judging internal experience from external appearance. And so we may be fooled by the appearance.
- whatilearned 3y ago
  [dead]
- h0l0cube 3y ago
  > Autism and ADHD both bring a lack of executive control It’s not this but what I’ve heard labeled as ‘integrity as an obstacle’^. Many neurodivergent people (myself included) are governed less by social norms and more by authenticity. Conforming is counter to their very beings, and grotesquely undesirable ^ I’d call it a strength, but it’s a matter of perspective
  - m_fayer 3y ago
    I’ve had the experience of being a neurotypical partnered to someone with (well concealed) asd. That experience has left me instinctively wincing at the notions of integrity and authenticity. I now associate them with interpersonal and legal conflicts, professional upheaval, inappropriate “real talk”, putting out one fire after another. And every fire is accompanied by, “yes you were in the right, but tact, but choose your battles, but can we really afford the consequences?” I was always the one who was unprincipled, and exhausted.

digging 3y ago

I suspect the author meant something more like, "neurotypical people live contented lives holding the belief that arbitrary authority actually exists." But I can't truly speak for them. Even before I fully reasoned it out, growing up I always knew that arbitrary authority doesn't exist for me. Sure a SME should be given more weight discussing their subject, and a parent understands dangers of the world that their young child literally can't comprehend. But many of us experienced "listen to me because I said so" as children, and continue to experience that in school and into adulthood in the workplace. It's meaningless, but many neurotypical people neither notice that it's wrong or understand why it's wrong, perhaps because their brains aren't wired a way to unconsciously detect those red flags.

avgcorrection 3y ago
I don’t understand how to interpret this comment. Are you neurotypical or not?
- digging 3y ago
  No
dEnigma 3y ago
I don't like this trend of using the label "neurotypical" to describe one's idea of the most boring, unimaginative person one can think of, and then applying it to pretty much everyone that isn't on the spectrum. "Neurotypical" people range from absolute rebels who reject any kind of authority to people happily working for and supporting a fascist regime, and then everything in-between. There is no less of a variety of opinion and thought in them than in "neurodivergent" people.
- digging 3y ago
  Well, ok, but that's not what I'm doing. I'm using neurotypical to describe people who don't have neurodivergent brains. I think there's arguments that there is no "neurotypical" at all, but it should be clear that when we're discussing autistic people, everyone who's not autistic is in the "other" group.
  - RHSman2 3y ago
    Isn’t it called a spectrum for a reason?
    - digging 3y ago
      What?
    - chownie 3y ago
      If the autism spectrum were represented as an input paradigm it would be a color picker rather than a number range. It is not from 0 autism to 100 autism, it's more like a combination of sensory processing, language, social communication and executive functioning differences.
  - soco 3y ago
    Either way, there are many other ways to "handle with" authority, notice also my quotes. These are even on different axes: understanding or not there's something going on, accepting or not what's going on, agreeing or not with what's going on, acting or not on what's going on... anything you simplify there between the two groups, will be wrong.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
JohnBooty 3y ago
Context: I've never been formally diagnosed, but based on informally discussing things with therapists and various self-assessments it seems pretty likely to me that I'm somewhat on the spectrum, probably on the shallow end. Maybe this means I understand both the neurotypical and neurodivergent worlds a bit, or maybe it means I understand neither. But many of us experienced "listen to me because I said so" as children, and continue to experience that in school and into adulthood in the workplace. It's meaningless, but many neurotypical people neither notice that it's wrong or understand why it's wrong, perhaps because their brains aren't wired a way to unconsciously detect those red flags. I feel extremely confident in saying that everybody hates this. Honestly, it might be the first thing I've been certain of all day long. I'm less confident in this, but: I certainly also think it's possible that many on the spectrum underrate how much literally everybody hates because-I-said-so's. I know one other thing. If a person is in the upper N% of intelligence, "gifted" if you will, they will have a natural curiosity about how things work, and have probably improved many things in the past, and will naturally tend to chafe at doing things in sub-optimal ways for unexplained reasons, and will therefore tend to hate "because I said so's" even more than most people. Does autism sort of act like a force multiplier when combined with that trait? Maybe. Probably? I mean, one of the traits of autism is that we tend to need our own ways of doing things. growing up I always knew that arbitrary authority doesn't exist for me I think one possible issue is that neurodivergents can't understand the reasons why neurotypicals (sometimes) like authority, or seem to like it. Imagine Bubba, a guy with USA and police and military stickers all over his pickup truck. This guy just loves the imaginary absolute authority of the USA, right? It's probably more complicated than that. In the micro sense of things, he probably hates being told what to do just like the rest of us. He probably grumbles when paying taxes just like the rest of us. But he probably likes to imagine the USA as a superpower that will crush its/his perceived enemies. But maybe Bob just kind of wants an identity to cling to. Also maybe he and/or many of his friends and relatives are in the military, possibly because it's one of the few stable career paths for people without higher education, and he would like to think there is some kind of positive thing being done. Maybe he's sending a dog-whistle signal to "liberals" or immigrants. Or hell, maybe he does just have pride in the cool things that do happen in America. Maybe he's an American history buff! But for all of the complex factors in Bubba's enthusiasm for America, actually doing what America tells him to do probably isn't the part that delights him.
ffgjgf1 3y ago
> It's meaningless, but many neurotypical people neither notice that it's wrong or understand why it's wrong, That’s a very bold claim and I don’t think it’s that accurate. Rather maybe “neurotipical” are less willing to challenge “authority” when they have nothing to gain from that.
- digging 3y ago
  You know, that may be true. In my experience most NT friends/colleagues don't seem to think about it all but it may be they're simply brushing it off, whereas instead it's unignorable to me.
  - lamontcg 3y ago
    Or they realize its not a productive strategy. I'm usually the first to notice and verbalize that someone with authority is a useless sociopath and things are going to turn out badly. This is never a remotely optimal strategy. Can't tell if other people see it, but realize they can't do anything about it and that talking about it is only going to be negative, or if they're really unaware (or just keep it in a "subconscious" unexamined box because they know that opening it up won't be useful). I'm generally shit at politics, although from time to time I've been able to figure out how to fake it.
    - digging 3y ago
      > This is never a remotely optimal strategy. I'm sorry that's been your experience, but I can't relate.
      - JohnBooty 3y ago
        You've... had lots of positive experiences promptly deciding that your leaders are "useless sociopaths" before anybody else has, and being very verbal about it?
hotnfresh 3y ago
> But many of us experienced "listen to me because I said so" as children, and continue to experience that in school and into adulthood in the workplace. It's meaningless, but many neurotypical people neither notice that it's wrong or understand why it's wrong This would not be perhaps the most-universal example of arbitrary authority, played with in countless pieces of mainstream media, if neurotypicals were as you suppose they are. I think you need to go back to the drawing board on this one.
- digging 3y ago
  Ok, somebody else explain why neurotypical people are content to obey arbitrary authority when they don't have to. I surely shouldn't have included that bit of speculation because all the replies to my comment have nothing to do with the actual point of the comment.
  - roughly 3y ago
    > are content to obey arbitrary authority when they don't have to. There’s two assumptions in this sentence that are frequently unwarranted. Additionally, sometimes it’s both easier and less costly to let certain things go. This is may be one of the areas of, well, neurodivergence: “it’s going to be a pain in the ass to fight whatever the hell this is, and I don’t care enough to do it.”
  - hotnfresh 3y ago
    The most likely explanation, I think, is that they dole out their fucks-given very differently than you.
  - RoyalHenOil 3y ago
    Consider the possibility that, as someone who is not neurotypical, you may not be accurately reading the contentment level of people who are neurotypical.
  - Jtsummers 3y ago
    "Content" is an assumption on your part. Higher tolerance for bullshit is also a plausible explanation. Or a difference in emotional intelligence and the corresponding understanding of (and willingness to play) the political game to get through the day. I'm not "content" with my management, but I know it's temporary and that I don't want to be unemployed in the interim and my pay is good enough that I'm not ready to nope out of here (if the pay was worse, or my fu funds weren't spent a couple years ago and not yet recovered, it would be a different situation).
fallingknife 3y ago
> and a parent understands dangers of the world that their young child literally can't comprehend As an adult I find that my perception of danger was actually much more correct as a child than the adults around me. They were, and are, paranoid and driven by moral panics. For some reason they were unable to comprehend that me walking a mile across an upper middle class suburb at 12 years old was perfectly safe, but I was. They feared edge case dangers like pedophiles and school shootings while us children made jokes about them. When there were a handful of shark attacks on the east coast and it made the news, the school banned students from swimming in the ocean on school trips. Driving for hours on the interstate was, of course, deemed safe as always.
ska 3y ago
To me, this sometimes seems like a first order response to a 2nd (or higher) order problem. Some neurodivergent people I've worked through this with have definitely unconsciously/consciously detected "red flags" and responded to them, but their modelling of what was going on was clearly reductive and sometimes obviously incorrect. I'm in no way suggesting it's universally true, but it's happened enough times to feel like it's likely, if that makes sense? Sometimes neurotypical people are seeing exactly the same data, but interpreting it differently.

tekla 3y ago

> I’ve written before about how autistic people often struggle to know how to act around authority figures. Actually, that’s not true– we don’t seem to care how we act around authority. I call bullshit. Autistic people can figure out how to operate around authority figures just fine when it MATTERS. If some autistic person is fucking around with an ATM in front of a cop that they know is there, but don't care, that's being stupid, not being autistic. I don't have to give a shit about how authority and power is granted to certain individuals, but it doesn't take a genius to realize that insulting the CEO in front of the company is not a good way to keep your job..

handoflixue 3y ago
Insulting the CEO is rude, because insulting anyone is rude. There's nothing special about the CEO that makes it rude only to insult him. The article even gives a better example here: casually introducing yourself to the CEO and making a joke. If the CEO feels insulted by this, it's because he has "Authority" and you are "not respecting it" - but wait, the other CEO I met really appreciated this! Suddenly it makes no sense. There's a special rule that this CEO insists I should know, but it's not even consistent with other CEOs. How am I supposed to know which authorities it's okay to make jokes with?
- roughly 3y ago
  > How am I supposed to know which authorities it's okay to make jokes with? With experience over time. I think what I’m getting from this conversation is part of what’s being expressed here is a lack of awareness of social danger (don’t take that as a value judgement, just a statement). The way this looks to the rest of us is “how would I know which predator will attack me and which will not?” - and for the most part, the answer is: you don’t, so act accordingly.
  - distract8901 3y ago
    > I think what I’m getting from this conversation is part of what’s being expressed here is a lack of awareness of social danger You're confusing "being aware of" and "caring about". Autistic people are acutely aware of "social danger". It's something we deal with every moment of every day since we're old enough to realize we're different. For most, it's a deeply traumatic experience to deal with as a child. And by most, I mean nearly 100%. Common wisdom is that there are no un-traumatized autistic individuals. > for the most part, the answer is: you don’t, so act accordingly This tells me you fundamentally do not understand autism. "Act accordingly" is one of the defenses we have to learn. And we learn it totally alone. What behavior is and is not appropriate is one big stochastic experiment that lasts your entire life. We learn to observe people around us, but that's not enough. It's easy to mimic behavior, but we don't get the context or reasoning behind it until we get it wrong. Knowing how to act accordingly is the core problem in most autistic people's lives. It's incredibly challenging and very dangerous. We have a lifetime of trauma built up around this problem, which makes it extremely stressful to be in a situation where you don't know what to do.

tyingq 3y ago

> "seem to accept authority happily?" I don't know much about autism. I can say though, that while I might appear to "accept authority", that's not really true. In each case, I'm weighing the benefits and drawbacks of that, and choosing what to do. Often, if I disagree with an authority figure's position on something, there's more efficient ways to get what I want than public disagreement.

flkenosad 3y ago
I find this to be snake-like behaviour.
- 0xfae 3y ago
  Which part? Sometimes the right thing to do is to speak up in public and offer a different opinion, sometimes the right thing is to have a private conversation. Maybe I'm misunderstanding, which part do you feel is snake-like?
- stephen_g 3y ago
  Sometimes it’s one of the only ways to deal with difficult people in authority if you don’t want to just blindly accept their authority… As the saying goes, “don’t hate the players, hate the game”
- JohnBooty 3y ago
  What do you consider to be the alternative? Fighting authority is (by definition) an asymmetric battle. There are "honorable" ways to fight authority. Frontal assault, or just plain old disobedience. Sometimes those are the best ways. Sometimes not.
- tyingq 3y ago
  Consider that forcing people to hear, consider, react and "vote" on something in public might be the "snake like" behavior. Some topics require quiet reflection. Some topics do better with a secret ballot. Some objections are heard better in private, etc. Or, sometimes, it's just poker, and revealing your hand too early puts you at a disadvantage to someone else that's also manipulating the circumstances to benefit themselves. It's all regrettable, but that's the human condition.

bitwize 3y ago

You'd be surprised. "All men are created equal" was a radical statement, almost blasphemous, when penned; the idea that authority and hierarchy were inherent was just something about the world that was accepted, like the sun or even the existence of God, because how could the state of things be otherwise? And post hoc, we rationalized this implicit assumption by inventing the theory that differences in authority were not arbitrary, but based on the quality of the individual. More powerful people were better somehow. The word "aristocracy" means "rule by the best".

yoyohello13 3y ago
> More powerful people were better somehow. This is still the case in modern society as well. We've just substituted noble blood for money.
RationalDino 3y ago
The historical context for this was the belief that those in positions of authority were put there by God's will. And so to question the rightness of them being placed over you was to question God. With the most extreme form of this being the idea of divine right of kings. Because kings were given the most extreme authority, they must have the strongest sanction of God supporting them. It would be a mistake to think of this as a purely Christian notion, either. Divine right very closely parallels the Chinese notion of the Mandate of Heaven for the emperor. And Christian notions owe a lot to Plato. In particularly the Neoplatonic idea of the Great Chain of Being. Which (though the phrase has a separate history) can be summed up with, "As above, so below." So we are reflections of our rulers. If our rulers are just, we will be. If our rulers are unjust, we will also be unjust. If we upset the natural order by overthrowing our rulers, chaos will descend upon the land. Shakespeare did a great job of capturing the mindset in The Tempest.

RHSman2 3y ago

It is unfortunate that the neurodivergent/neurotypical us vs them argument is happening.

belval 3y ago
Well the inherent framing of neurodivergent/neurotypical really lends itself well to those kind of arguments. If it's a spectrum and we are all on it with only two words to describe it then we are bound to get that kind of low-quality discussion.

toasted-subs 3y ago

There's a high correlation between smart people and being on the spectrum. You can likely replace the word "autistic people" with smart people. Just playing the cards here, but if my IQ is 155 and yours is 120. Why should I listen to you? Especially when I see you making what seem to be plain mistakes, which not only hurt yourselves, but create a society where your kids will be less satisfied. Its not like I have the ability to make people do things, that would be a position of authority. Me not accepting me not being responsible for actions with plain evidence I was not in control. Not only proves the point those individuals are responsible for what happened to me, but their inability to accept they should be listening to me makes me most concerned.

gherkinnn 3y ago
There are many high IQ people who are not able to proverbially tie their shoelaces. Or, more literally, shower. So yes, please do listen to your not so smart colleagues. Thanks.
- toasted-subs 3y ago
  Yeah, I actually live near ones of the finest establishments for studying the human brain and there are structural reasons why. Plenty of techniques to get those people working. Problem being it's pretty experimental.
shadowgovt 3y ago
> Why should I listen to you a) because other people listen to that person, and one person's smarts only outstrips the strength multiplier of followers in extraordinary circumstances b) because they're part of the tribe, and like it or not you're gonna be working with them. More useful to everyone to invest resources into figuring out what makes them tick than tuning them out. c) because responsibility is rarely as divestable as one might hope. If my team lead doesn't listen to me and then sets up the team to shit the bed, I can certainly document "I wasn't involved in this decision; I would have done it differently," but the response upper management's gonna give me is "If you knew a better approach, why didn't you coach the team lead to take it?"

permo-w 3y ago

>I don't think anybody loves submitting to authority just for the fun of it. I can think of some counter-examples

klyrs 3y ago
We don't even need rule 34 for that
JohnBooty 3y ago
It's hard to talk about anything sometimes, because with 8 billion people on the planet there are always some counter-examples. But to the point of the linked article, I think the author misses the point and insults neurotypicals and neurodivergents alike with the his assertion that normals just love them some blind submission as a default way of being, and autists just can't do that
- permo-w 3y ago
  I think you may be underestimating the size of the population who are into control and submission. but I don't disagree, see my comment from yesterday where I say something similar[1] [1] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38075017 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38075017

NeuroCoder 3y ago

This article should probably be read through a more emotional lens than one of hard facts. Articles like this are littered with very specific details that don't accurately apply to many of the people in the group being described, but are perhaps accurate in spirit. It's also a common pitfall to advocate for ones own group at the expense of another group.

RationalDino 3y ago

I think that "seem to accept authority happily" is exactly how it looks to a neuroatypical person. With emphasis on "SEEM". Autism and ADHD both bring a lack of executive control. A lack of executive control limits our ability to comply with demands, including the demands of authority. The demands of authority generally include following the dictates of authority, while convincing authority that you're happy to do so. People with poor executive control can only act this way out of desire. We have to really, really want to. And so a neurotypical person's ability to do what they should (regardless of how they feel) looks to us like something you're doing because you want to. No matter what the truth might be. Yes, your internal experience may be entirely different. But, particularly with autism, neuroatypical people are often not very good at judging internal experience from external appearance. And so we may be fooled by the appearance.

whatilearned 3y ago
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h0l0cube 3y ago
> Autism and ADHD both bring a lack of executive control It’s not this but what I’ve heard labeled as ‘integrity as an obstacle’^. Many neurodivergent people (myself included) are governed less by social norms and more by authenticity. Conforming is counter to their very beings, and grotesquely undesirable ^ I’d call it a strength, but it’s a matter of perspective
- m_fayer 3y ago
  I’ve had the experience of being a neurotypical partnered to someone with (well concealed) asd. That experience has left me instinctively wincing at the notions of integrity and authenticity. I now associate them with interpersonal and legal conflicts, professional upheaval, inappropriate “real talk”, putting out one fire after another. And every fire is accompanied by, “yes you were in the right, but tact, but choose your battles, but can we really afford the consequences?” I was always the one who was unprincipled, and exhausted.