Comment by dmunoz | Hacker News Reader

Comment by dmunoz | Hacker News Reader

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It's not just journalists. Both Amazon's Betas and HBO's Silicon Valley could not resist the temptation to make Asperger's jokes in their first episodes. HBO's Silicon Valley's usage even made it into the trailer. To be fair, I suppose an argument can be made that the shows are reflecting the common view of people in technology.

It's weird to me, because I don't think being nervous around people you're not familiar with is at all odd. Plenty of people I have worked with are very shy around new people, but absolutely open up as you get to know them. I don't think many of them at all are with any significance "on the spectrum", ignoring the trivial argument you can make for everyone being on it to unnoticeable degrees.

In "Silicon Valley," at least (have not yet seen "Betas"), the people who toss around Aspergers jokes tend to be unsympathetic rubes or dolts, like the farmer in the third episode.

To an extent, yes, the audience is meant to laugh at the protagonist's expense when these jokes pop up. But he's getting the last laugh in the end, and the show makes that pretty clear.

For whatever it's worth, the show's leads really don't come across as having Aspergers. They come across as being socially awkward, perhaps even to a painful degree. But Mike Judge & co seem pretty sensitive in drawing that line. They might go for a cheap laugh every now and then, but we're not meant to take those "diagnoses" literally.

I don't know if it's OK to make those jokes, but it's infinitely preferable to say it out loud explicitly and deal with it with humor than to just make fun of them for being weird and acting different like on big bang theory, where sheldon is clearly modeled after someone on the spectrum but with few redeeming qualities.

I guess it's more acceptable to make jokes about a mental illness that (a) has been abandoned as meaningless, and that (b) can make you rich and/or famous (Bill Gates and Albert Einstein were both assigned the diagnosis).

It can't be compared to the cruel jokes I would hear in school about anyone below average either physically or mentally. It's in a different category.

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