#7 Facts And Trivia
Written by SAPL on July 18th, 2008 in Hobbies and Special Interests.
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Aspies love facts and trivia and many times this makes up the special interest the Aspie has spent countless hours learning about. Like the special interest, the facts the Aspie retains could be about many things, including science, technology, literature and so forth.
One of the reasons Aspies love facts so much is because unlike the rules of other parts of the neurotypical world such as facial expressions and implied meanings, facts are hardfast and black and white and are much easier to grasp. They are a sure thing to cling to in a world where the Aspie constantly has to guess whether Heather really meant what she said when she said “I never want to see you again,” since she’s said it so many times and in 48 hours never fails to call again professing her undying love.
Facts and Trivia can be a way to impress fellow nerds, geeks, and possibly other Aspies at the latest Science Fiction convention where a social structure might exist and the “Alpha Geek,” is always the one who has the most facts to throw into the conversation.
They also provide reassurence and security. Let’s say Joe is going over to Bill’s house. Bill is a slob who cleans 1x a year maybe, leaves 2 month old dishes on the counter, and whose vacuum serves more as a statue in the living room-the kind of statues that obviously set off security alarms when you move them because otherwise he would have used it by now. “It’s okay,” thinks Joe, recalling the facts he learned from Immunology. “The skin is the largest organ in the body which provides the 1st line of protection against microbes. My skin will protect me from Bill’s plague, and if not, there are plenty of NK cells and other white blood cells that will ward off any illnesses.”
Occasionally, facts can be used as defenses and to re-establish superiority. Jenna’s catty friend casually mentions that Jenna has wide hips. Jenna responds by recalling that studies show women with fuller thighs and hips but small waists have better lipid profiles and have more intelligent babies. Depending on how much she values the friendship, she might go so far as to add that by comparing their two hips, her children will definitely be intellectually superior and will probably end up working for hers one day. For neurotypical translation, that’s Asperger language for Jenna basically calling the catty friend a “bitch.”
July 28th, 2008 at 6:57 pm
[…] and phrases describing scenery and conversation that never took place to begin with. The Asperger would much rather read facts or other useful information that could be put to good […]