I have Asperger's, is my contribution even gonna help for this private beta?

Question

Just front up: This is not about ranting I literarly see 2 options how this site is expected to be and need help to understand which of them is the supposed one.

I have Asperger's what made me when I signed up for this sites proposal, looking forward for an tool, to use in developing ways of getting used to how people react and what one might expect from me.

Thats so far about me.

So what I thought this page will be about, is finding ways in respect to ones mentality and/or ethics to find fit into general expectations to interpersonal skills. Under that asumption I asked How to react to an excuse if it wasn't "Ok"? Where I state that it is not an option for me to say "It is ok".

I didn't wanted to go into more details in the comments so I'm posting it here now: Saying "It is OK", is like lying for me in such a situation. And thats not OK to me, what would bother me for days. (I mean it bothered me for over a year, that I felt insecure about how to react on that). And saying "Don't be that pedantic. Just say 'It's OK'" Isn't an option for me, since the asperger related patterns I'm having simply prevent me from doing that.

But since every of the many answers told me to simply say "Its OK", I now feel like I missunderstood this site, or maybe even¹ missunderstood what are interpersonal skills are meant to be.

So the second option I'm seeing it is meant to be like, there is just wrong and right, therefor if I dont want to take the right way its implicite the wrong way I'm taking. If the site is meant to develop in that direction, please jsut tell me right here in a fair way that I missunderstood it, sicne then I think there is sadly not much value I'd be able to add to this site.

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¹ Whats actually not even unlikely due to.... you know what I assume.

Answer 1

We aspies may have learned a lot of interpersonal stuff from books and trainings and websites, stuff that comes natural to NTs. That is an advantage.

NTs may learn subconsciously by copying each other. We aspies find it harder to construct an inverse model of human behaviour, i.e., a mental map F{observation → mental state}. Most NTs do that without even thinking about. "How do I know she's flirting? It's obvious, just look!". Useless!

We aspies, we think about it. So although we may have less answers, where we do have the answers we may be very well suited to answer it. We may be better able to formulate why things are the way they are.

That's why I'm convinced that aspies can very much be of help on this site.

Answer 2

Commenting on your specific post for a moment, you asked a question expecting an answer that would work for you specifically, but you did not provide the necessary information for someone to answer in that context. The social tools needed for someone on the autism spectrum are often going to be very different than those who aren't having developmental difficulties in social interactions. That should have been central to the premise of your post.

Having said that, I do believe this site could be useful for folks dealing with social situations under various forms of adversity. Some folks might be pathologically shy; others might be facing difficult physical circumstances. It's possible we may hit a point where a situation is so specialized, it would be irresponsible to host such questions without creating a more specialized interest group.

But until we hit that point, I think such questions and answers are fair game in these situation. But I think it is important to stay vigilant and assure these questions are being asked and answered in the correct context before simply guessing what will help that person specifically.

Answer 3

I feel that there are two parts to this and both of them should make you feel welcome:

Asking questions

As a person with Asperger, you should feel welcome to come here to ask about dealing with people in your life - considering your diagnosis. I'm sure there are many questions that you may have about how to interact with non-Asperger people. I encourage you to use a tag to classify your Asperger-specific questions as some people may have experience dealing with this and have specific advice.

Answering

Particularly in questions about individuals with Asperger wishing to interact with non-Asperger people or the reverse - a non-Asperger person trying to get advice on how to interact with someone with Asperger, you should have a great deal of insight into these - particularly in the case of the latter. While not all Asperger people react the same, personal experience is always welcome, particularly when supported with data.

Non-Asperger related posts

As it relates to other topics, the guiding rule of SE is to show your work, support your claims so if you want to help answer questions about general interactions, please feel free, particularly if you can support your responses. Much like on English Language Learners, even people learning the language are welcome to write answers. The community votes on every post to show whether they support the answer or not. If your answers are off-base, the community will likely down vote them but that tells you a lot, too... Please don't silence yourself because of it, though... consider what you're told in response to your posts and think about it!

We welcome answers from everyone as long as they are willing to accept that others may not agree with them.

Answer 4

Yes, I think the input of a person with Asperger syndrome or otherwise on the spectrum is valuable, both as a question asker and as an answerer.

Even if your question or answer is not Asperger-specific, it may be helpful for you to mention that you're on the spectrum to provide additional background info.

And remember: on Stack Exchange, if you get an answer that you don't find helpful, comment on it to explain why, vote it down, and consider editing your question to make it clearer what sort of answer you're looking for.

Answer 5

I'll address your question. It attracted at least five answers, most of them upvoted, so it is a contribution to the site.

You may be wondering why your question didn't receive upvotes. It was not the clearest question in the world, and it did come from an unusual perspective, which your meta question helps explain.

The viewpoint of someone with Asperger's syndrome (which I have) is valuable on the site. A well-written question about Asperger's will be too.

Answer 6

The top two answers (at present) said, very well, quite a bit of what I was going to say, so I will leave those points alone for the most part. In that regard, just count me as a voice in agreement with my peers' responses.

First, I do feel that it is very fitting and appropriate for you to see, and have an expectation of using, the Interpersonal Skills site as a tool for...

"...getting used to how people react and what someone might expect from me."

Again, I agree with others who have stated that you could learn a lot and teach a lot, both because a lot of interpersonal skills are common sense and because non-typical advice is just as worthy as what "everyone knows," as long as it suits the stated situation.

Mostly, I wanted to address your two current views of the site. As I interpret (and translate) your post, what you have found here so far has brought you to see the site as either:

• "this page will be about finding ways in respect to ones mentality and/or ethics to find fit into general expectations to interpersonal skills" [...will be a place to learn, with respect to one's mentality and/or ethics, how to fit into general expectations with regard to interpersonal skills]

or

• "there is just wrong and right, therefor if I dont want to take the right way its implicite the wrong way I'm taking" [according to the answers, there is just wrong and right – if I don't want to take the right way, then the wrong way I'm taking will be impolite.]

In theory, I think the site is pretty much supposed to go along with the first of these impressions. It's fair to say (and fairer still for you to intuit) that answers should consider the OP's mentality and ethics, just as they should take into effect the region (or culture of the region) where the OP is from, and all other background information and extenuating circumstances included in the question. In my opinion, this can definitely include various disability aspects.

As with any tidbit of information that might alter the situation (and thus, the advice), however, the OP should be clear about it in the question, and as clear as possible about how it does or could alter interpersonal relations or, heh, other aspects of reality. Only with everything on the table and all of it spelled out clearly can even the most conscientious adviser hope to give good feedback. [Note: I am not saying that you failed to do this in the question you cite above. Maybe you did and maybe you didn't; right now I'm just talking about the minimum standard of input required on this site to receive the maximum standard of output.]

Your other perception of what this site is or might offer is fairly accurate as well. I mean, we do hope to attract people who can see more than black/white, day/night, wrong/right, and who'll take the time to consider the finer nuances of the question, but ... it's the internet (open to everyone), there's no entry fee (in a general sense, when people don't have to pay to participate, they don't put in as much effort and the quality of output suffers), and a lot of the people in the world today are either too narrow-minded, too impatient, or they don't have the attention span needed to thoroughly think things through.

It is this fact that is behind one of the major flaws of this site: mediocre (or even poor) answers will bury good answers if they resemble the voters' own personal experiences – hello, a good answer is supposed to reflect the OP's situation! Sorry about the run-on sentences and ranting. What I'm saying is that you shouldn't necessarily take answers – even popular ones – as exactly correct for your situation, as a lot of answers don't reflect the intended mission of the site, which is, I suspect, something like this:

Every question will receive the best possible answer from anyone who chooses to leave one; of those, the best answer will rise to the top as the wider community applies great consideration to the question and to every answer before voting.

Please note, there are a lot of great people here doing a lot to keep the place on track. Yet, while there is little we can do to ensure that others apply the standards of that mission, they're not the ones asking if their contribution will be a help here. No, that would be you. That gives me great hope that if you choose to keep that standard in mind, your contributions will be of great help here! And if you will keep in mind that the site has great benefit but is far from perfect, you will probably be able to find some help here, too.

Answer 7

People with Asperger syndrome are usually very intelligent people in terms of their analytical skills, but they are lack of emotional intelligence which can affect their interpersonal communication skills, so they have to learn things which other people takes this for granted (so they may not understand your struggles). However in most of the cases emotional behavior can be learned (or at least learned how to mimic), especially from the websites like this within environment you're living.

You should obviously ignore any rude comments (or flag them) addressed to you and remember you've free choice of accepting any answer you find the most suitable for your needs. Never assume everybody else has right. We all came from different background and we all here to learn, that is the goal of this website, so don't be easily discouraged by few intolerant comments.

Obviously everybody can contribute to the website as being different isn't wrong, but it comes with some advantages by seeing things from the different angle therefore the learning goes both ways (nobody is perfect).

If certain things aren't the option for you, ideally you should clarify them in the question, so you can avoid any misunderstanding in the future, ideally by explaining the reason behind it, so people can learn more about your background and what would you expect.

Answer 8

The people were answering the question on the basis of the information that they were provided in the original question. For the vast majority of people, the correct advice is indeed to just say, "It's okay" regardless of their misgivings.

If you had included that you have Asperger's in your question, then you would most likely have received different answers that would have helped you better.