#20 Correcting
Written by SAPL on September 3rd, 2008 in Socialization.
In the world of Aspergerness, there are usually 2 colors: Black and White. It’s either right or wrong, with no possibilities of shades in between. However, for many Aspies, the color palate can be expanded slightly to allow for times when others forget what color an issue should fall under: That color is red-for correction.
Aspies love to correct, both people and inanimate objects. It is an innate tendency that they attempt to conceal though numerous methods-biting the tongue or lip, pretending not to see or hear the mistake, or maybe convincing themselves that there really is another way of looking at it. But sooner or later, a huge volcanic-like reaction will occur in their bodies and minds, forcing them to tell the world just how things really should be.
This is helpful at times. We’d all like to know when there’s spinach on our teeth. If you hire an Aspie as your personal assistant, you ensure you’ll never be in the presence of your future in-laws with an unzipped fly. Ditto for bad grammar, incorrect or twisted facts, mispronunctiations, and your tendency to strech or leave out parts of a story. “There aren’t 12 monkeys at the zoo. Three of those are actually chimpanzees.
A tender moment between a couple can quickly be ruined by the Aspie’s need to correct. “You’re eyes are as blue as the sky,” will quickly be followed by, “The sky is more cyan than regular blue. If you think my eyes are cyan, that’s fine, but blue isn’t the best descriptive word if you’re going to be using the sky as a simile.” This same partner was rebuked last week for writing a love letter rife with spelling errors that the Aspie circled in red and returned.
A lover who finds him or herself in this situation can be redeemed by the all time symbol of couple apology and makeup: Buying a gift for the Aspie partner. Red pens and white out make good stocking stuffers as well as books containing titles like, “Myths Uncovered,” “Secrets Exposed,” and “The Truth About,” as they give the Aspie the reassurance that you agree upon the core values of any good relationship: trust, love, and a strong sense of telling each other and the rest of the world how everything that comes out of their mouths or is written by their hand is completely screwed up.
If you’re an Aspie and think something in this post is amiss, please correct it by saying something in the comment box.
September 5th, 2008 at 1:27 am
“to allow for times when others forget….”
hysterical!!!!!!!!!
November 10th, 2008 at 1:40 am
[…] programming field, but got annoyed when people wouldn’t listen to him and do things the right way. So he decided to start his own company, BitTorrent, a brainchild born from nine months of him […]
May 31st, 2009 at 6:38 am
Really? Nobody’s called you on “mispronunctiations” yet?
August 5th, 2009 at 3:22 pm
And “strech”. Don’t forget that we correct ourselves plenty of times, when other people could care less. Actually, in our opinion, they could care more.
August 5th, 2009 at 3:23 pm
And “you’re” – in place of your – pet peeve!!!
March 27th, 2010 at 8:45 am
See? This is why we make such good editors and proofreaders.
August 12th, 2010 at 1:18 pm
knew that there was one character out of place in 23,000 lines of code.
took 18 hours.
found it.
works.
yeah!
May 27th, 2011 at 6:37 pm
That should be “couldn’t care less”. If you could care less , then you must care at least a little bit. Don’t correct my placement of the full stop at the end of the first sentence. I’m British; that’s how we do it.
August 19th, 2011 at 9:29 pm
I am an Aspie. I think something in this post is amiss. Rather, I think some things in this post are amiss.
First, I’ve noticed that no distinction is made between the hyphen and the dash–a fatal error (please note that this use of the word “fatal” is strictly figurative, whatever that means). This applies throughout the list. Presumably your encoding or whatever (programming is not my special interest) does not support the dash character. But you can circumvent this, as I did above, by doubling the hyphen to represent the dash (in case you are inclined to object, know that Bryson would defend my use of “but” to begin this sentence) . Otherwise, the reader is left wondering what sort of strange color “red-for correction” is.
Second, the comma in the pseudo-sentence “Aspies love to correct, both people and inanimate objects” should be removed. I understand that you intend to have a pause for effect, and that you use the comma to convey this. However, it leaves the sentence illogically partitioned; everything after the comma is meaningless. This leaves “correct” without a direct object, making it seem intransitive. Now, if you added the words “whatever they can” before the comma, then “correct” would be clearly transitive, and the link between it and its two objects after the comma would be clear. I consider this option inferior to removing the comma.
Third, another dash-hyphen mix-up makes it sound as if Aspies attempt to conceal their tendency to correct others by biting methods.
Fourth, “volcanic-like” is redundant because “volcanic” means “volcano-like”, hence you are saying the reaction is volcano-like-like.
Fifth, “mispronunciations” is misspelled as noted by That Dork.
Sixth, “stretch” is misspelled as noted by petitvulcan.
Seventh, the double quotation mark after “chimpanzees” is missing.
Eighth, “you’re” is incorrectly used for “your” as noted by petitvulcan.
Ninth, “all time” should be hyphenated.
Tenth, “white out” is dangerously close to the Bic trademark Wite-Out.
Thus ends my comprehensive list of things that are amiss in this post. Apologies for R.E.P. insofar as I am capable of being sorry for being right.
August 28th, 2011 at 6:09 pm
I suppose I must have exceeded the limit on how many things I could correct. Dear me!
September 14th, 2011 at 1:22 am
I have aspergers and I don’t really agree with the seeing the world in black and white thing. It might just be me not fitting my stereotype, but I often try to encourage the opposite in people. I can see how it may sometimes come across that way, but it might just have to be with extreme and passionate opinions with no hold back. I do think a lot about philosophy, so maybe my opinion is based on knowledge. Hope this helps.
BTW: So far I think the posts are hilarious. Good job.
September 14th, 2011 at 1:24 am
Oh FFS, I totally fell into that one
January 2nd, 2012 at 10:43 pm
You forgot a ” after chimpanzees.
February 8th, 2012 at 10:40 am
I know, that’s what sucks about being Aspie, it’s so annoying. It however makes me a great writer and scientist. I catch and see all those seemingly unnoticed details instantaneously. I do all the stuff others can’t because they’re brains are just not designed to handle it, and I can work alone, versus a team of 20. That’s the funny part, it can take up to 10 people to replace my skills. If only the socializing aspect could be more standardized and facial expressions easier to understand, then life would make so much more sense.
Then again as an Aspie, I have to say, our kind is always right.
May 7th, 2012 at 4:46 am
Jiminy: As somebody who is interested in written language, and who believes it is important for written text to be as clear, or otherwise as true to a writer’s intentions, as possible (a passion it seems we very well may share), I really appreciate your first entry in this thread, and, in particular, the observation you make about the article’s potentially-confusing failure to distinguish between the hyphen and the dash. However, it appears to me that you may have made the same error in your own writing. Contrary to what you report in the parenthetical aside in which you tout the superiority of the preceding text you entered, putatively achieved through your use of two consecutive hyphens to create the effect of, or to effectively create, a dash, it appears that—ironically enough—you effectively neglected to follow the very advice, and the concomitant instructions, that you offered the writer of this blog entry, potentially leaving a reader to wonder what a “dash-a fatal error” is (and what this item or phenomenons’ relationship to the hyphen might be).
As much as I enjoyed composing the preceding paragraph as an exercise in playing with language, I do most sincerely hope my pointing out this error—typographical or otherwise—stirs more appreciation and enjoyment than agitation, annoyance or embarrassment, in you, and trust that it will, given the fondness with which you seem, and forthrightly claim, to regard correctness in writing. (Seriously, I really feel that way.)
Sincerely, and with warm regards,
Thomas
(P.S. To type an unbroken em dash (“—”) when using a Mac, press “Shift+Option+’Hyphen'(-)”.)
November 6th, 2012 at 3:28 pm
You wrote “color palate”, geez, it’s always been “palette”, don’t you use photoshop?
February 19th, 2013 at 5:42 pm
“If everyone was a neurotypical, I doubt there could be civilization or science. We would probably still be hunter gatherers.”
If everyone was an “aspie” I doubt there could be enough people doing the mundane work of caring for unpredictable, noisy infants. We would probably be extinct.