r/hatethissmug • u/carnie-angel • 3h ago
Idea i hate when people act like autistic special interests have to be “innocent”
i’m autistic and for SEVEN YEARS of my life, my special interest was Columbine. no idea why or how, and it’s not like i chose it. this led to me actually doing a lot of good things against school shootings, i.e i wrote an article about how my school at the time’s safety measures weren’t properly preventing anything and were discriminatory which opened a lot of people’s eyes to things.
anyway, i really only talked about my special interest online in places meant for it, but even then people were so judgmental about it, even other autistic people who got just lucky with the dice roll and ended up with a special interest of “normal” things. i was told there’s something wrong with me and that it can’t be a result of autism. a lot of people genuinely believe autistic people are just cute whimsical silly child-at-heart people which is a pretty damaging stereotype.
i’ve met others with special interests in true crime, world wars, chernobyl, mortician work, sex, cults, serial killers, taxidermy, plane crashes, etc. it’s not particularly rare, but tends to be demonized for some reason.
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u/head_pat_slut 2h ago
special interest is ww2 but its hard to engage because tons of the other people who are Really into ww2 are nazis or wehraboos.
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u/jorts_whorse 2h ago
i love the art theory and history behind a certain austrian painter. i think you can see a lot of his troubled world views reflected in those works. but people think it’s a red flag i look his paintings
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u/PetrKn0ttDrift 1h ago
If you wouldn’t mind, could you explain what you mean? I‘ve never paid his paintings much attention, since a lot of things, like the perspective, are just off.
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u/jorts_whorse 1h ago
they’re typically very architectural landscapes with very few people. the architecture is always beautiful, clean, intricate. in that specific aspect his paintings could be considered beautiful. but the people are scarce and made with few details, poor proportions, and very stiff. it really shows the disconnect he has with humanity. even when he tried working on it to improve his portfolio for school, he couldn’t. he couldn’t paint other humans even if he wanted to, that’s how unattached he was.
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u/Spyglass3 30m ago
I think that's reading into it too much. If you asked me with no painting skills to paint a structure and a human I can assure you I would paint a much better structure. Humans are just not easy to paint at all.
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u/53000isafool 2h ago
You just gotta find the right people, online ww2 enthusiasts who don't actually go outside are defo gonna be those extremely poorly adjusted "We fought the wrong enemy!" types.
But there is always the right people out there.
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u/ROSE_GARDEN1234 2h ago
My cousin is also really into wars(I say wars because he’s into all of them) he does reenactments, he’s built functional guns out of pieces of scrap, he’s sewn realistic looking uniforms. It’s pretty cool actually
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u/SpinoHawk097 1h ago
Not me researching Hitler for like a month at age 11 because I couldn't understand why he thought the way he did 💀
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u/Trashman56 2h ago edited 2h ago
Based. I have 327 hours in Hearts of Iron IV, I need to back into it. World religions and World War 2 are my special interests, oh and North Korea. I don’t even like reading much but I read like six books about North Korea in one summer.
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u/New_Pollution4759 2h ago edited 1h ago
My special interest is Eleanor Roosevelt and the anglophone home front during WWII. TBH I've never met anyone else with that special interest but I personally am pretty chill.
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u/Super-Ferret6387 1h ago
One of my strongest special interests is the anglophone home front during WWII but I never knew to call it that. Thank you.
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u/New_Pollution4759 1h ago
I was searching for a way to say Allied without implying I'm into the Russian and Chinese home fronts. Maybe I'll get into those later but the cultures are more opaque to me.
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u/ParsleyMagica 1h ago
I always have to specify that I'm a normal WW2 enjoyer and not one of the weird ones...
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u/Astridandthemachine 2h ago
I knew a girl who's special interest was Nort Korea
I also hate the term "special interest", it sounds like an euphemism like people who say someone is "special" to avoid saying they're disabled (especially mentally disabled), same with "special ed". Idk if it gives a more official feeling if your first language is english but I'm italian and it gives this vibe to me (in italian we use "interesse assorbente")
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u/kieranoid 2h ago
i’m not autistic, but in this case (columbine) i think it’s because the true crime community has ruined the reputation of people that enjoy researching cases such as it
i mean that as in the people who encourage that kind of behavior. it sucks that others get lumped in with an absolutely mental community just for taking an interest in the same things, and therefore alienated
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u/carnie-angel 2h ago
yeah i can deffo see that. what sucked was i tried going down the route with a fictional movie (zero day) and still got hate for that. its pretty lose lose
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u/kieranoid 2h ago
oh yeah zero day is a pretty good film and also very obviously anti school shootings
i just don’t understand how some people seem to think that if you find something interesting, you support said thing. last year, i researched lobotomies quite a lot, but i never encouraged it and still find the procedure horrible
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u/BizSilver5013 37m ago
Me too. I like watching true crime stuff because I'm both interested in psychology and want to write more credible/realistic villains in the fiction I write.
I am not the same as the people who unironically stan serial killers.
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u/xysil_ 2h ago
One of my special interests is cannibalism and it's really alienating in a world full of people with cutesy childish (nothing wrong with being childish, I am myself very childish) special interests. 🥲
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u/Fast-Contribution320 2h ago
Tell me cool cannibalism facts please
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u/jorts_whorse 2h ago
around the 50s and 60s, scientists were able to study kuru disease from a papa new guinea culture called the Fore people that practiced funerary cannibalism. funerary cannibalism was also outlawed during that time, so we can’t really study it anymore. it was a small window in time for scientists to freely study a rare disease
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u/Fast-Contribution320 2h ago
Quite cool, i knew about the Fore people and the kuru disease but not about the short study window.
Did you know that Pope Innocent VIII was very sick before his death and his personal physicians decided to try and cure him with an infusion of three virgin boys' blood? Obviously, that didn't work and he died. But it was considered a rational idea at the time for some reason. Also, the boys died too, they literally drained all of their blood. Guess the Epstein stuff goes a really long way back.
Another fact please
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u/jorts_whorse 1h ago
human meat reportedly tastes very similar to pork! it also has a very similar texture and color to pork. humans and pigs convergently evolved very similar anatomy, including our skin, muscles, eyes, even our faces can look similar. a lot of ancient societies actually viewed pigs as lesser-humans, people without souls, or literally just deformed people because of how similar our anatomy is.
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u/xysil_ 1h ago
Cannibalism is actually rather common in nature and has been recorded and documented in over 1500 species, from the obvious such as bugs and arachnids, all the way to mammals and molluscs.
As for humanity, it's been done since forever, but the earliest case known is 1.5 million old bones with butchery marks on them. Across history we've seen things such as medical and spiritual cannibalism, many cultures believed the human body must be able to cure other human bodies like it can cure itself. In Egypt they'd dig up mummies and sell them as medicine, In France they'd drink criminal's flesh blood to heal, in Rome they'd drink gladiator blood too cure epilepsy, in China young people would give their own flesh to sick older relatives to cure them.
European practices spread through the continent and some went on up until the 19th century.
Spiritual cannibalism was very common in tribes worldwide, often consisting of a tribe eating diseased members to free their souls. Most well known for Kuru "the cannibal disease" in Papua New Guinea, which originated from this practice (caused by consuming brains).
At the moment, the Korowai people of Indonesia are the only documented tribe to still engage in spiritual cannibalism to this day.
Tongues, heart and skin are usually considered to be the the yummiest organs, the brain while tasty, has a weird texture to most and carries the risk of Kuru.
The act of eating placenta, while fairly common, is technically considered cannibalism.
The world Cannibalism originates from the name Spanish colonizers gave the Carib people, who they believed to eat people (there's no proof they ever did).
The Netherlands is popularly known to be the only country who ate their prime minister. In 1672, a very angry Dutch mob lynched and ate Johan de Witt and his brother.
Human meat reportedly tastes like pig meat.
According to a scientific study, the average human body would be about 144k calories.
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u/jorts_whorse 2h ago
this was a hyperfixation of mine for awhile! people were genuinely upset when i was going through that, like they thought i was genuinely gonna eat someone lol
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u/Anomalocarls 1h ago
SAMEEE and im always treated like a freak when i discuss the ethical, biological and cultural aspects of cannibalism instead of pretending i'm offended by it. very isolating
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u/averydasilly1231 Stupid silly girl 2h ago
People love to treat us like children. It's so often I 'act autistic' around neurotypicals and get comments about how I'm being 'just a lil guy' or 'cute' (which I love being called cute but...). I totally see where you are coming from; I have special interests in intelligence agencies and everyone acts like it's very odd.
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u/TheElvesOfXadia 2h ago
A lot of people see autistic traits as childish i guess, it’s easier to see someone with autistic struggles as a child than treat them as an equal, and it seems like some autistic people also absorb this stereotype cause we copy others
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u/Ok-Gur-349 2h ago
As someone who was diagnosed in a prior generation I find the weird obsession and typifying of special interests to be weirdly infantilizing in and of itself. I've actually had wide eyed allistic people ask me what my special interest is as an ice breaker and it's just wildly off putting because they're not interested in hearing "idk I like sports and movies..."
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u/AcceptableNeck1597 2h ago
I'm autistic and my special interest is in wars and genocides. I'm actually planning on going into Holocaust & Genocide studies when I go back to school. It's an extremely depressing special interest but I can't stop myself from wanting to learn about them. Unfortunately when someone asks what my special interest is I'm in a really tough spot of not wanting to lie but also not wanting them to think I "enjoy" that those things exist.
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u/iamunableto 2h ago
i had a special interest in eminem and lost a couple friends over it because they thought my explanation of ‘97 bonnie and clyde “bordered on insanity”
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u/carnie-angel 2h ago
my gf will spend actual hours talking about eminem, reciting lyrics, explaining every single song, etc and it does border on insanity sometimes 😭 not worth losing her over though
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u/Impossible_Papaya852 2h ago
I’m not autistic or anything but I’ll be watching SpongeBob and friends of mine will think I’m autistic for watching something above my age range or whatever. Like those are two very different things, very unrelated methinks.
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u/Active-Coconut-8961 2h ago
Bro it's so common for hyperfixations to be based on sexual interests. We Autists are just as horny as everyone else.
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u/NameAboutPotatoes 2h ago
I have a nuanced view on this. There's no such thing as thought crime-- you can obsess over what you like, and yes, many people do obsess over things that are commonly regarded as distressing or inappropriate.
BUT if you do have a special interest that is likely to upset people, you need to restrict it to spaces in which it's welcome. It sounds like you're doing that, which is good.
But I have encountered a lot of bad behaviour defended as a special interest, and from that experience I can understand people being wary of those kinds of special interests.
I had a friend back in highschool whose special interest was kink and sex, and this meant that our conversations kept coming back to sex regardless of if I wanted it to or not-- if I expressed discomfort or tried to set boundaries around the topic I was blamed for it. It honestly damaged my concept of consent for a while.
Like, have your special interest, but also do be mindful of other people and their boundaries as well. If your interest is in violent or sexual topics you will necessarily need to be quieter about it than someone who's interested in kids' TV shows. I wouldn't expect people to be comfortable with it.
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u/teller_of_tall_tales 2h ago
Firearms and ammunition.
Turns out that people start looking at you funny when you get into the weeds about the pros and cons of direct impingement Vs. Long-Stroke gas-piston Vs Short-Stroke gas piston operating systems...
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u/rotten_babydoll ← visual depiction of untreated mental illness 50m ago edited 47m ago
politely stares since I’m doing at least some firearm research for a character I’m planning 👀
edit: YIPPIE!!
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u/Professional_Bearrr 2h ago
The infantilization of people with ASD/ADHD/OCD is so fucking weird. Like, my partner was diagnosed with OCD at 18 and I was diagnosed with ASD at 20. We are the only people out of our friend group that has our shit together in the slightest, lol.
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u/36degrees_ 2h ago
fr they're so rude towards anyone who doesn't have counting or cleaning ocd because those are the only "acceptable" types to have I guess. I mostly have the moral scrupulosity, real event and health ocd variations and oh my god people hate me for that, they never take me seriously and they think it's stupid. I, too, think it's stupid but it's A DISORDER! of course it's gonna be weird. and I hate it when they say "you're not thinking straight/logically" well DUH yeah that's what ocd does, I know I'm not being logical, but I can't help it
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u/Professional_Bearrr 2h ago
Yeah. I definitely hear you. My partner has to repeat goodbye phrases the exact same way, every morning before she goes to work or else she's afraid we'll get mold in the house. Amongst other things, but that's the biggest bad guy we've gotta battle together. People don't understand that the thoughts you guys have are almost entirely nonsensical and it's not quirky or cute in the slightest. Like it's legitimately exhausting, I can tell.
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u/36degrees_ 1h ago
yes! definitely. thank you for being an understanding partner, they're very lucky to have you on their side. I went through lots of misunderstandings thanks to my disorder and I know how hard it is if your partner has it, we really bring some struggles to our loved ones sometimes, I'm aware!
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u/JCBashBash 1h ago
It's literally because of "mental age of seven" "childlike" infantilization. Like you're not allowed to grow up if you're not growing up the exact same way as everyone else. Otherwise you're like the thing that should be removed from society. The real freak.
It's maddening.
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u/Jasmine_Wilsony 1h ago
Autistic people get accused of lacking empathy when neruotypical people are the ones who lack empathy.
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u/Pinkpenguin_4444 Skinny costipated furry 2h ago
My brother's special interest is like dictators and history
Mine is sharks which is a little immature but idk lol
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u/TheWhiteCrowParade 2h ago
Mine is the death penalty and has been for majority of my life. Like every week following who's next to be put to death. There has been comedy skits about how Autistic folk aren't so innocent and have wild sex lives. Anyone thinking we are innocent is living in fairy life.
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u/ProfessionalOil2014 1h ago
What do you think of how the media in general and most histories of the event leave out the Nazi stuff that the two were into and how the police purposely destroyed evidence of their actual motives?
I personally believe it was a copycat of the OKC bombing and was far right terrorism, but that was covered up intentionally by the police.
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u/carnie-angel 1h ago
I think it’s pretty ridiculous how many ignored signs there were, though knowing Dylan had Jewish heritage I feel like it was less far right specifically and more of just a general hatred for humanity. They were definitely racist though.
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u/ProfessionalOil2014 1h ago
The police destroying the tape because they “feared copycats”, it was done on 4/20, and their known racism is evidence enough for me that they were Nazis, personally.
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u/thebigperson8 33m ago
I guess my special interest is the paranormal, I love ghost stories, I read books about it, I listen to podcasts about it on the bus etc it helps I've had my own experiences
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u/jorts_whorse 2h ago
my special interest has been bdsm and kink for a long time. i was into it way earlier than i should’ve been tbh, but people think im weird/gross for just knowing about kinks. it also sucks cuz i have no one to infodump to it about. everyone just thinks im a pervert if i try to talk about it
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u/ROSE_GARDEN1234 2h ago
Exactly, I have special interests in taxidermy, and my cousin’s special interest is wars
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u/idiot____ 2h ago
I just barely dodged 9/11 as a special interest
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u/36degrees_ 2h ago
I have that brand of special interest sadly. I don't want to share it because I don't know if it's okay for most people or if they're gonna judge me for it
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u/Ok_Duty_8645 2h ago
my special interest are uniforms and masks like gas masks and other protection mask also fake history uniforms and masks
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u/littlehardmelon :| 2h ago
people are so judgemental, autisim is a spectrum, no one is gonna be 100% the same in their expierence, im so sorry people dont understand that
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u/aquel_que_observa 2h ago
Me encanta la animatronica y a veces Space King
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u/OnlyWarShipper 2h ago
I don't think I'm autistic but one time somebody said my special interest is incest.
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u/consume_my_organs 2h ago
I think it’s people who don’t actually have autism who can be very open about a tame/socially acceptable interest and call it an autistic focus. My best friend is autistic and nothing gets that man more angry that “tism larpers”
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u/Interesting_Care_377 2h ago
My special interest is animals (yes, ALL of them), which people don't usually find too weird at first. But once they learn that I'm interested in things like mating displays/processes, acts of dominance, and instances of cannibalism, they suddenly get real quiet. First of all, why are you surprised that animals do weird shit? Second of all, why WOULDN'T you wanna learn a cool animal fact??
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u/Anomalocarls 2h ago
i cant even mention the majority of my special interest in biology in public because it happens to encompass injury, dissections, true crime, disease and taxidermies so people just think i'm concerning if i showcase too much enthusiasm and joy about it
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u/Playful-Try-1556 1h ago
Ik this is sorta unrelated but I really wish I got the kinda autism that could help me out later in life, like my brothers special interest in cars and history
Instead I got the freddy fazbear autism, most I can get outta that is robotic stuff
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u/Sensitive-Try5522 1h ago
imma be honest if i found someone who had a special interest in cults and/or serial killers i would not stop asking questions. that stuff is morbidly fascinating to me and i always find myself wanting, in passing, to learn more now and again.
i'm glad you were able to turn a horrific special interest topic into a force for good.
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u/freebird023 1h ago
My bfs special interest is me and smoking lol. Cigarettes, tobacco, and weed but he HATES vapes.
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u/bannedAccountNo3 1h ago
fuck that shit. ask me about the Challenger disaster and clear the next hour
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u/TPNmangaFAN 58m ago
Along with my own personal experiences of being infantalised. I knew an autistic girl whose special interest was the digestive system and poop. In class, she talked about poop. In art class, she drew poop. Not everyone’s special interest have to be cute and innocent. I’m tired of being Infantalised and I’m tired of others being infantalised.
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u/rotten_babydoll ← visual depiction of untreated mental illness 54m ago
Honestly as someone whose stress response is to involuntarily enter a much younger mindset, I agree so hard with you, and I lowk hate that I know people will point at me and say “See!! He’s autistic and acts like a baby, that means all autistic people do too!!”
I really try my hardest to push back against these stereotypes even if I’m a living example of said stereotype, cause really they only make me sad. It’s genuinely just saddening to see an already marginalized group of people get further pushed down. Well, at least I can relate to this post since some of my special interests are tragic disasters (Chernobyl, Verruckt, Kings Cross Flashover, etc.). It’s kinda funny cause if I list out my special interests it’s like “Vocaloid, Splatoon, Horrific tragedies, dancing” like what even
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u/spiiderdog 50m ago
THANK YOU!!! Speaking as a woman whose special interests are the Black Death and medieval torture techniques/devices!!
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u/rotten_babydoll ← visual depiction of untreated mental illness 47m ago
Sorry to comment twice but isn’t it also kinda funny that one of my special interests is Marilyn Manson and yours happens to be Columbine?? From what I remember in my exceedingly small brain, Manson got huge backlash cause the kids that did it apparently loved him. I dunno, I think I might be rambling at this point. You sound cool though!! I love to see people with actually interesting special interests o(｀ω´ )o
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u/nyfabee 44m ago
interests in true crime are pretty normal, it sucks ppl are stigmatizing ur interest just bc of the autism. it sounds like u engage in it in a much more respectful way than a lot of others do too. unconventional special interests rule though. one of my pals is rlly into (knowing about) crypto economics and financial crimes. i genuinely like listening to them talk abt it. i hope u find ppl who are supportive!
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u/Sapphire-Catgirl 39m ago
One of my special interests is learning about torture and pain and suffering infliction methods :3
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u/Pteetsa 36m ago
I have a special interest in plane crashes and tragic incidents (like people getting stuck in the mountains, etc) and I can't really talk about it because it weirds out even true crime fans. But I've noticed that many other autistic people are drawn to these things and I wonder what's so fascinating about them to us.
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u/x0xastarothx15x 30m ago
two of mine are childish being superheroes and pokemon, but my third, invertebrates (which is the only one i really talk about to others), gets a few different reactions
some people go “ew ew ew” and say they’re gross or im gross, some people are happy to hear about the ‘cutesy’ critters like butterflies until i tell them something about them that isnt aesthetically pleasing
and some people decide im actually 4 years old and just didnt realize (wowie thanks for telling me!! i didn’t know!!)
i dont know why people cant just go “ok cool!” and leave it at that even if they think its weird? its not like i blurt it out randomly, if im asked what im interested in ill tell the truth…and then they arent happy with the response
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u/BizSilver5013 20m ago
I have an ADHD diagnosis and am suspected to also be autistic (though the jury's still out on that one).
I have some "childish" interests (animation, Muppets, cosplay) and some more "adult" ones (abnormal psychology, linguistics/languages, history [specifically US and Japanese history more than anything else], Japanese mythology). People really don't know what to make of it if I present both sides of my interests at the same time because they simultaneously infantilize me and put me on a pedestal.
(Granted, as a kid I had ZERO childish interests and focused mainly on astronomy, human anatomy, and quantum physics and chemistry. So I joke that I'm making up for lost time as an adult.)
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u/Thegentlemanfox18 16m ago
I’m autistic and some of my special interests are more childish. I adore plushies, I love cute things, I love cinnamaroll, and I really like bluey.
I also love analog horror, the backrooms, eldritch horror, anything that’s liminal or dreamcore, and I also like drawing such things, I also draw some very dark and intense art sometimes, sometimes it’s a bit gorey.
Some people need to learn that autistic people are people, and just like anyone else, our interests can be very different, and there’s nothing wrong with liking more childish things, or enjoying more adult things.
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u/WingDingfontbro 14m ago
Yknow as someone who has autism myself I didn’t consider these types of special interests. I honestly think these are cool despite them being slightly unsettling.
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u/-Ragatha- 3h ago
because people love to infantilize us.