Can you share your qualifications that demonstrate how you are able to make any form of diagnosis on your "friend"
Did you miss that?
Unless either party has an actual set of qualifications to diagnose, then neither should be pronouncing one way or the other.
It could be, it could also be that people are finding a "reason" for their behavioural issues/predicaments.
It's far too complex (even for qualified professionals) to be making broad statements.
The poster is claiming without any evidence other than the "friend" was "self-diagnosed", which doesn't tell us if the "friend" was right, or not, and adding that they knew the diagnosis was wrong because of other claimed attributes.
I'm honestly shocked at the response to me pointing that out.
If you want to go round making judgements on peoples' mental health without any qualification to do so, and post that judgement on social media (which Hacker News is) then I will call you out for that, every time I notice.
People come to these comments claiming to be all about science, all about serious thinking that's not found on other social media, but then this trash gets posted and people calling it out get attacked.
This might as well be on Reddit, or Facebook.
My step-son is diagnosed. He is on the spectrum. He was non-verbal for longer than most children and low-verbal for years after that. He has fine-motor challenges and operates on an emotional level behind those of his peers.
If he's being an ass, we let him know. He knows his condition is not an excuse for his behavior. He needs to know how to cope with and navigate the world around him. Autism awareness and advocacy is about not shaming people for wearing ear protection in public. It's about recognizing that texture aversion is a thing. It's about knowing to extend grace when appropriate. It's not about letting people be shitty.
He may be autistic, but he does not get to interrupt us. He does not get to derail conversations into his interests. He does not get to ignore his hygiene. Instead, we try to teach him to be patient. To be polite. Strategies to make necessary things a part of his routine.
The biggest difference is that we do these things with compassion and with the realization that some things are more difficult for him. Rather than what we did in the past, which was browbeat autistic people into masking.
You can disagree with someone's self diagnosis all you like, but there's absolutely NO WAY for you to make a diagnosis yourself unless you are actually qualified to do so.
Please try to understand the difference.
Only now are you even acknowledging that it could be in error as well.
And without an actual medical diagnosis, we shouldn't treat him as autistic.
There, you have your out for your poor responses.
So it is (or rather, seems like to me) a double whammy psychology of having their point be demonstrably misunderstood while it is also (seemingly) being rejected by down votes. (Again, just explaining, not justifying.)
(Also, I cannot help but notice the irony(?) of this misunderstanding and the necessity of this explanation in a thread on a post about autism. No shade to anyone, just making the observation.)
Where is the "good explanation"?
The first thing he did was demand qualifications of the poster. Exclaiming he's diagnosing something. He started aggressive.
I then pointed out that his friend also made his self-diagnosis with the same qualifications.
He then got all huffy and basically said "So you agree his story is rubbish", which is also rather aggressive. And all through this, he's been dismissive and condescending to people. And everyone else has been rather polite to him even with his attitude.
And I don't think anyone is misunderstanding him. Everyone acknowledges his point that the poster is likely not a qualified professional. However, they are pointing out that neither is his friend. And I also pointed out, diagnosis or not, there's no excuse for being an asshole. Being autistic does not give you carte blanche to treat people like shit.
So it's more like his refusal to understand everyone else's point. And likely why he's getting downvoted. But that shouldn't matter. So, you know, stay awesome, dude.
It was in the comment four up from my first one in this thread.
> No, he made a diagnosis - neither party appear to be in a position to do so.
(They also gave other explanations elsewhere in the thread but that is what I was referring to because it is enough for a reader to understand the point and you actually replied to it.)
Their point is that the other commenter should not have written "The dude isn't autistic" because that is a negative diagnosis rather than an agnostic statement.
> So it's more like his refusal to understand everyone else's point.
Others were failing to make substantive points against the commenter in question because their point was going misunderstood. It took a few back-and-forths to get to the actual point (in fairness, that's because of the vagueness in their initial comment) but that point is consistent with what they've written in this thread.
> I firmly believe you're a sock puppet.
Genuinely, I read this as feedback that I empathized well given that I'm not. But especially because I disagree with their point. (The presumption that the first commenter meant "The dude's not diagnosed" is very reasonable and obviates the other commenter's point, except as a general reminder to be more careful with phrasing, which their question wasn't.)
> Genuinely, I read this as feedback that I empathized well given that I'm not. But especially because I disagree with their point. (The presumption that the first commenter meant "The dude's not diagnosed" is very reasonable and obviates the other commenter's point, except as a general reminder to be more careful with phrasing, which their question wasn't.)
FTR I read your initial comment as being critical (but fair) of my posts. How the person you are talking to missed that and jumped to you being me is quite the jump.
Honestly, re-reading everything, I think that paragraph is too harsh. In particular, that presumption of their intended meaning is not reasonable. They clearly meant "the dude's not autistic", which you correctly called out as a diagnosis. I appreciate your thoughtfulness.
Let me know if you ever discover if that friend really exists.
Actually, this is how a diagnosis could be phrased by a particularly informal doctor. You mean to say it's not a valid diagnosis because he's not a doctor, which is rather the point.
> ignores the larger issue
Indeed, they wrote a comment in reply to what I can only assume is a pet peeve (I do hear and read a lot of careless negative assertions like that where they are not warranted; it's a worthy pet peeve) to bring up a smaller issue in the context of the bigger picture, while otherwise not addressing the other point. I think it's a reasonable assumption that they meant to do that.
I guess to this point, didn't you notice me also doing that? I'm just commenting on the things I want to comment on. I haven't mentioned what I think of the friend in the story because I haven't seen a reason to. Everyone knows being entirely self-centered is shitty.
But since I'm here, I guess I should comment on it. I wonder about that person and what their problems are. Why would they do something so anti-social? It's likely there's something else going on. Perhaps more to the point, it's unlikely there's nothing going on. Maybe it's actually autism. The idea that it's nothing and they're "simply terrible at accepting responsibility" is naive and, frankly, disrespectful. It's sad to me that nobody's wondering about OP's friend and everybody just takes OP's story at face value. I mean, if OP isn't qualified to diagnose but readers just roll with their diagnosis anyway, it's rather obviously unfair to the friend who has a similarly-qualified claim but is assumed by their former friend to be a scumbag.
And I even mentioned that even if he were autistic, it's never an excuse. A diagnosis is a tool for self-reflection, not a get-out-of-trouble-free card. So he's still shitty for using a diagnosis as a reason to be shitty.
People are taking OP's story at face value because it doesn't warrant investigation. It's minor enough that even if he were lying, it doesn't matter. The story is banal enough that it's likely happened to someone at some point. It doesn't require the display of credentials or anything like that. And no one is asking us to do anything about either side. Dude was just sharing an anecdote. That's why people are taking it at face value. Because to do otherwise is to dedicate too much energy to something that doesn't matter.
Whatever it's worth to someone else to tell a lie, it's worth to me to correct it.
> So he's still shitty for using a diagnosis as a reason to be shitty.
You're getting one side of the story and saying that doesn't warrant investigation. Empathy is literally the opposite of that. You do not have any reason to believe the friend was being shitty. OP didn't provide that.
Please don't post insinuations about astroturfing, shilling, brigading, foreign agents, and the like. It degrades discussion and is usually mistaken. If you're worried about abuse, email hn@ycombinator.com and we'll look at the data.[1]