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Comment on Apparently I'm autistic? in ~health.mental
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Comment on Is there a name for the "this is not who I am" defense? in ~talk
Kopi Link ParentHe is referring to the defense in the title, not the motto.He is referring to the defense in the title, not the motto.
Neither you or your son have Autism unless you or your son get a formal diagnosis. Self-diagnosis is incorrect; self-referral (believing you or your son may have Autism and therefore seeking a formal assessment to determine) is correct. Intelligence has a weak negative correlation with psychiatric disorders, therefore if your son is intelligent it is less likely that he has Autism. People with Asperger syndrome are commonly thought to have average or above average I.Q., but that is because it arbitrarily had an artificial minimum of 80 I.Q. to diagnose and therefore it was inflated.
It is also preferable to use intelligence, such as g or I.Q. rather than the term 'Gifted' due to the latter term being vague.
I have a formal diagnosis of High-Functioning Autism and I see many self-diagnosed people online who claim to have Autism yet their presentation does not match the diagnostic criteria. They often claim to have normal empathy or hyper-empathy which is empirically untrue. There is a large ideological movement to normalise Autism and present it as a 'neurodivergency' rather than as a disorder, pathologising legitimate research and condemning anyone who refers to it. This is why the claims of intact or hyper-empathy are so prevalent on the internet; to present a pleasant facade to make the concept of Autism socially palatable to the average person.