Their artists have an intricate worldview that makes perfect sense for them, their environment, and their families, but their work was initially viewed by Europeans as junk because the viewpoint and use of media seemed so strange. Later these paintings were exoticised; finally Europeans came to MANAGE and CONTROL their artists’ output. Today the pictures’ true value is only beginning to be recognized and understood. See any parallels to the history of the disabled?

If they DIDN’T avoid that, their ideas would totally implode on themselves…….they wouldn’t fit their special widget patterns.

Oh believe me, we totally get that you are “beneath words” in this post. But we don’t think that words are somehow better than you……as some bullies may interpret it. The word “beneath” in this instance doesn’t necessarily mean below the level of intelligence…..it just means that your “normal” or perhaps “natural” form of communication occurs……say…….if communication is an onion…….your natural way of communicating is a level beneath the level words come in. Correct?

As far as I can tell what they do is one of two things:

1. Make up something about me. Then proceed to sift through my writing for something that they can stretch the meaning so far that it breaks, in order to “support” the crap they made up.

2. Read through my writing until they find something that sparks off an “Aha! I could bend this past the breaking point to make her really look terrible!” moment. Then proceed to do so.

One of the posts they did that to was about the way I smile when I am terrified or disgusted (like many other neuroatypical people). They twisted this into meaning I am a sociopath that derives enjoyment from horrific events.

Another post they did it to was one in which I compared performances I made as a child, to being completely unable to avoid really unusual behavior in front of large groups of people. It was fairly obvious that I was talking about the anxiety of being stared at and judged while doing things absolutely beyond my control. But of course they said it meant that my stimming and tics were a performance.

What really struck me about those two things, is the fact that if I really were a sociopath or someone pretending to be autistic, those are two posts I would never have written. Why put stuff out there calling attention to such things if that were really my motivation? But of course the bullies frame it as “a moment of rare honesty” or suchlike.

That’s the other thing they do — they read through stuff I have written and divide it into “honest” (stuff they can try to use against me) and “dishonest” (stuff that they can’t use against me). As if they somehow have this deep insight into my brain (they ought to work for the “justice” system if that were the case). It also plays into the thing they do where they try to stand the world on its head, and so, for instance, during periods when I have been very “lost”, or dishonest, or other things like that, they portray that as the times in my life where I have had the most awareness and integrity. And now that I am very aware who I am, have a great deal of integrity, and do my absolute best to be honest (including avoiding communication on autopilot and stuff like that), they portray me as some combination of dishonest, lost, confused, etc.

Then there’s the really strange thing they do where they take some event in my life that I have talked about in public before, and claim to have just discovered it. Like my drug use, having been to college early, going to a school mostly for rich kids (but avoiding the fact that I have always pointed out I was unusual there just by being middle class, because they have for a long time wanted to portray me as rich for some reason), having spoken and walked before in my life, etc. If anyone points out I’ve written these things, they go “Oh well then she hid them by writing about other things”, such a no-win situation they try to create.

The one thing they try to avoid at all costs is that you could take any person in the world and do the same exact things to manipulate people’s opinions of them.

That would be another example of bullying……especially if whoever claimed that didn’t let you clarify or just ignored your efforts to clarify. It’s one of the harder kinds of bullying to deal with…….because you have no recourse……you just have to kind of get over it by yourself, and for autistic people who are prone to perseverating on thoughts and stuff its a real painful b*tch to get over. (I know most autistics perseverate but some do more than others….we’re classic examples)

How do you (and I mean anyone here…not just one person) deal with that kind of pain?

just wondering if you know Ubu web :

http://www.ubu.com/

lots of art stuff there

Your writing communicates to me something from the layers beneath the words. When I read your writing, I’m getting the meaning of the words, phrases and sentences like I do when I read anything else, but I feel like I’m also getting more–sort of a feeling of little doors and windows opening, looking under stones, noticing things I hadn’t known were there. Your words are doing much more than most writer’s words do.

Very cool, and very impressive – thank you!

You’re right, everyone’s different.

I probably live in your “eighth layer”: words have always been where I live and experience, to the extent that I tend to remember and think in word strings, remember people and places almost by text descriptions, and remember music by remembering the lyrics. I envy people with better visual, spatial or kinetic memories and perceptions than I have.

I’m probably uncommon in the degree to which I Think in Words, but it’s complicated by most people *thinking* they think in words, while their experience is probably richer and more nuanced than mine socially and visually and in terms of things like music.

I have a few pure-sensory perceptions that I know I haven’t thought out in words or read in a book, but they’re relatively uncommon.

S.