conuly

Current Mood: apathetic

Or even very accurate

*le sigh*

Anybody care to go and correct any inadverdant mistakes? On anybody's part, mind, I'm not going to complain if you correct somebody else!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

goddess588.livejournal.com

suf·fer
v. suf·fered, suf·fer·ing, suf·fers
v. intr.
To feel pain or distress; sustain loss, injury, harm, or punishment.
To tolerate or endure evil, injury, pain, or death. See Synonyms at bear1.
To appear at a disadvantage: “He suffers by comparison with his greater contemporary” (Albert C. Baugh).

v. tr.
To undergo or sustain (something painful, injurious, or unpleasant): “Ordinary men have always had to suffer the history their leaders were making” (Herbert J. Muller).
To experience; undergo: suffer a change in staff.
To endure or bear; stand: would not suffer fools.
To permit; allow: “They were not suffered to aspire to so exalted a position as that of streetcar conductor” (Edmund S. Morgan).

[Middle English suffren, from Old French sufrir, from Vulgar Latin *sufferre, from Latin sufferre : sub-, sub- + ferre, to carry; see bher-1 in Indo-European Roots.]

suffer·er n.
suffer·ing·ly adv.
Usage Note: In general usage the preferred preposition after suffer is from, rather than with, in constructions such as He suffered from hypertension. Ninety-four percent of the Usage Panel found suffered with unacceptable in the preceding example. In medical usage suffer with is sometimes employed with reference to the pain or discomfort caused by a condition, while suffer from is used more broadly in reference to a condition, such as anemia, that is detrimental but not necessarily painful.

I hope this is the right place, Connie. From what I know of you I'd say that you suffer from autism in that it makes your life harder than it should at times, especially in the area of communication. Suffering is purely subjective, and while I don't see that you have a particular difficulty with communication, you feel that you do at times (correct me if I'm wrong). And it's not just people with autism that have that difficulty - we all do at times, I'm notorious for saying just the wrong thing.

You didn't actually come across as upset on the thread at grammargasm, you just sounded firm in your convictions as you always do.

And I'm always willing to explain what I mean. Keep biting me. And be aware that I think from a nurse's point of view - yep - the illness model.

From:

conuly

1. Dictionary.com sucks. Just on general principle, I say that. (not being sardonic, either)
2. This is definitely the right place. I just *really* didn't want to clog up that person's inbox with my pontifications, especially when I've got a post here.
3. Okay, on to the good stuff:

You say two things here that need discussion. Or three... why do you say I'm biting you? *confused*

The first is the discussion of suffering. While I'll agree that that is one definition of suffering that could apply, the reality is that language isn't just used to communicate ideas in a literal sense. It's also used to communicate... um... non-literal ideas. Bear with me while I say this properly. The word suffer has a lot of negative connotations, most of which are much more severe than "to appear at a disadvantage" (I will not use the "experience" definition, as I've never heard it and it seems uncommon). So if you say "this person suffers from autism" meaning "the autism makes this person appear at a disadvantage in certain (but not all) circumstances", that's nice, but there's no way to prevent people from hearing the more normal version "this person has a horrible debilitating condition called autism". It'd be really really cool if people would hear what you mean instead of what you say, but most of the time it's a struggle to get them to even hear what you say instead of what they think. No need to make it harder by saying things which may be unclear.

The other thing is the illness model. While I can see this perspective, it seems ill-advised. First of all, it only applies at all if you can prove there's an inherant disadvantage to one form of thought over another. You can't prove that. All you can prove is that autistics tend to have problems in a world full of nonautistics. I could just as easily say that nonautistics would have problems in a world full of autistics. Then they'd be sick. That doesn't make much sense, saying that illness depends on your perspective. In addition, you can easily say that certain aspects of autism make certain things easier. In some situations, it's a benefit to be autistic. That doesn't sound much like an illness either. Then there's the really important one - calling autism an illness means trying to separate it from a person's mind/thoughts. It's like saying there's a normal person with something else making him/her strange. This is not true. It is, in fact, completely nonsensical. People aren't anything but their thoughts!

*yawns* I'd be more coherant, but it's 2:13. Must sleep.

From:

goddess588.livejournal.com

Keep biting me = keep challenging what I say.

You're right about the reality of the word suffering. I seem to have this tendency to use words for their obscure meanings rather than their more common ones, and you're not the only one who's picked up on that.

To me 'illness' equals 'disorder' equals 'illness' and I use the terms interchangably mostly. Illness is on a continuum, as is wellness, in its broad sense. A disorder can be too, but the very word disorder implies that there is a difficulty in order - yep - we have it again - another word that can be twisted - so a shorter continuum, or at least one with a start point. And Aspergers is a disorder in the DSM-IV, though I know that others call it a syndrome. And the thing about the DSM-IV is that it says The disturbance causes clinically significant impairments in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning, which to me means that it's a disadvantage.

DSM-IV definition (http://www.isn.net/~jypsy/whataspe.htm)

Society decides what is 'normal' on that continuum, society (admittedly professed experts in that field) decides where the cutoff is for the beginning of 'abnormality' (I am so digging this hole deeper with all these words with negative connotations) and society decides where the point is that they won't tolerate people out and about, hence the Mental Health Act. Saying that nonautistics would have problems in a world full of autistics isn't even relevant, because autism is not the norm in our world. There is a disadvantage to being autistic in this world, when the majority of people think/process/interact differently, as you admit in your next post.

From:

conuly

while I don't see that you have a particular difficulty with communication, you feel that you do at times (correct me if I'm wrong).

No, you're not wrong. But please keep in mind that you see me in a special environment - online, in messageboards. Not only do I avoid the issues of real-life, I also avoid any and all issues of real-time communication. I have a lot of time to think and carefully formulate comments that are less likely to be misunderstood, and because people can't see my face or hear me speaking, they're more likely to give my comments the benefit of the doubt, because they know they can't depend on body language or anything like that. Even then, I get a lot of people telling me I'm rude and whatnot. Many times, I see this as a communication error on their part, but I'm the link in all these situations.

In real life, I've not only got to speak and hear and answer quickly, but I have to deal with people who think I'm doing something wrong when talking to them. And the words I use, which are okay when typed, aren't okay when spoken. When I use my l337 vocabulary online, it's okay. When I do so in real life, I've suddenly become condescending. How, I don't know, but.

From:

goddess588.livejournal.com

You've clarified that for me - thanks. I sort of know what you mean - I'm milder in print - maybe because I have time to think what I say. I'm not very subtle IRL.

What's 1337 vocab?