You Can Do This

Dear my past self of three days ago,

Yesterday, I read a study that disturbed me because it dramatically changes how I see my self and my past. I wanted to make sure I broke this to you instead of you finding this information on your own because without a teaspoon of kindness, this information will feel deeply isolating. I’m here with you, experiencing the same world you are. Although your problems may be different from mine, we’re so different. We’re in this together.

First, I want to say that I’m really happy for your recent developments. You have tried to distance yourself from egoistic ambition and have been rather successful; you have chosen to prioritize happiness and prioritize decreasing your own suffering; and, you have embraced a greater humility about your own conceptions of the world. These are all good things. What I will say to you may push you to question these accomplishments. I urge you to remain confident in your path. Growing virtue and prioritizing taking care of yourself are never bad things.

So here we are where I break the bad news.

You know that oppression against Autistic people like yourself is a real thing, and you know that many people, including and especially therapists you’ve have, a deeply skeptical of this oppression’s existence and severity. But I know you’ve also struggled to put that oppression into useful words. So, I suppose the useful words I can give you are these: perceived deception, perceived competence, and perceived character. These are by no means sufficient to describe the whole of Autistic oppression, but I suggest to you that they are extremely useful ideals to try to describe a lot of memories you have that might have been more difficult to analyze in the past.

The study that I’m pulling from is called Autistic Adults May Be Erroneously Perceived as Deceptive and Lacking Credibility, and it was published in 2021. I don’t think I’m even yet in a level enough place to comb this paper a thoroughly as it probably deserves, but I have a few takeaways that I would rather you hear coming from me rather than coming from some cold empirical, peer-reviewed scientific paper. I may get some of the details wrong—though only because I still feel so disturbed myself—so forgive me for anything I recount incorrectly. Basically, the researchers took videos of Autistic people explaining that they did not steal some money that they did not, in fact, steal. They did the same for non-Autistic people as well.

Then they showed those videos to other non-Autistic subjects and then asked those subjects whether the person on the video seemed like they were lying, among other questions related to perceived deceptiveness, perceived competence, and perceived character. The researchers did not tell the non-Autistic subjects anything about the diagnoses of the videotaped individuals. And when these non-Autistic subjects said they perceived the videotaped Autistic people as deceptive, the researchers asked the non-Autistic subjects what made them feel that the videotaped Autistic people seem deceptive, incompetent, etc.

Researchers found that the non-Autistic subjects viewing the videotaped Autistic people saw these Autistic people as deceptive, incompetent, and of poor character. Researchers also found that these non-Autistic subjects, to their surprise, did not attribute their perceptions as caused by what we would consider stereo-typically Autistic behaviors such as gaze aversion, repetitive body movements, or flat affect. Rather, different non-Autistic subjects gave what seem to be rather contradictory reasoning for the same conclusions such as “he seemed very nervous” / “he looked relaxed” and “she felt uncomfortable at times” / “she carried a calm yet confident composure.” This suggests that non-Autistic subjects are feel that the videotaped Autistic people are deceptive and incompetent, but then are rationalizing why they feel that way. This is similar to the left brain rationalization in split brain experiments. Importantly, the researchers who ran the study also were not sure what specific attributes were causing non-Autistic subjects to perceive the Autistic individuals as deceptive and incompetent. They could only attribute non-Autistic subjects’ judgments to Autistic individuals “overall presentation.”

But perhaps the part of the paper that’s most painful is this last part. Eventually, the researchers did tell the non-Autistic subjects that they had watched a video of an Autistic person, and the researchers asked all the same questions again about deceptiveness and competence, etc. What they found was that when non-Autistic subjects knew that the person they were judging is Autistic, the subjects no longer saw the Autistic individual as either deceptive, or of poor character. But they did still see the Autistic person as incompetent.

I know you’ve struggled a lot with feelings of incompetence, and that is why I think this last past, while painful, is also very important for you to understand and internalize. The fact of the matter is that these findings demonstrate that most people will see you as incompetent, regardless of how actually competent you are. This has had major implications for you in your life, both for how others interact with you and for how you have often struggled with internalizing this feeling of incompetence in yourself. That is why I write this. I’m here to tell you: you can do this. What “this” refers to is not so important. But whatever you feel inferior in ability to do, please know you are very likely not. Yes, you will struggle with other people’s perceptions of your incompetence. Yes, you will struggle with your own feelings of incompetence. But know that you have access to this parallel, true universe that most others cannot access: you and all other Autistic people are much more competent than we are generally seen. With this small piece of information, this tiny and important truth, there is so much good you are able to do that would be impossible without it.

May you be free of suffering,

Future you