What do the Richter Scale, Beethoven's 9th Symphony, Pokemon, the book Subhuman Redneck Poems, the first modern abstract paintings, Newtonian physics, the book Born Free, the song Get Free by the Vines, Microsoft Corporation, the Official Monster Raving Loony Party, BitTorrent, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, the transistor, Ireland's Constitution, the Blues Brothers, the Turing Test, the movie Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Enoch Powell's "Rivers of Blood" speech, the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey, Einstein's theory of relativity, the La Sagrada Familia basilica in Barcelona, and this silly blog that you are now reading all have in common?
The List now has 86 names in it.
http://incorrectpleasures.blogspot.com/2006/09/referenced-list-of-famous-or-important.html
6 comments:
Here's another diagnosed autistic famous artist for you: Peter Howson.
I'll check this artist out, but I'm thinking "If I've never heard of the guy, is he really famous?" I try to make my list different from the rest by only including people who are at least famous or highly respected within their own field, and not include people who would probably be complete nobodies if they weren't famous FOR being autistic.
This is a quote from the article about Howson:
"This is one of Howson's most unguarded moments, and yet it really teaches something about him. Throughout the interview, he describes himself negatively, almost as if disgusted by himself. Yet MacKay calls him "such a good man", and he actually comes across as far nicer than he says, far nicer than many who paint themselves more sweetly. It's doubtful that he has more faults than anyone else; he just strips himself bare more. "
I've recently been reading an essay by Les Murray (Australian poet self-diagnosed) and I'd say exactly the same thing about Murray. It's a thing that I've seen aspies doing many times; listing with an obsessive thoroughness and in meticulous detail every single one of their personal problems, character flaws, past misdeeds and embarrasments, and boring shit that I'm not interested in about what they used to think about their parents, and then they might explain the lot with some highly suspect conclusion that this dreadful stuff is wholly or partly due to AS. Quite frankly I'm sick to bloody death of reading such stuff. I'm sick to death of reading the depressive public self-examinations of aspies who are only half-recovered from difficult life events. I hate that people read such stuff and assume we are all as messed up as the latest aspie train-wreck reported in the media. I know NT criminal child-abusers who wouldn't admit to any of the stuff that some aspies would divulge to a lamp-post.
Another similarity between Howson and Murray that I find interesting; the article says that Howson was saved by "god and art" and Murray wrote that he was saved (from the grip of depression) by his art which is poetry, and Murray is also a deeply religious person.
I also think it's interesting that David Bowie, Sylvester Stallone, Madonna and Jack Nicholson are celebrities who like Howson's work. I think all of those celebs have an aspie "vibe". Bowie has played 3 aspies in movies (Man who fell to Earth, Warhol and Tesla), Stallone has an autistic son, Nicholson played a character who I think was kinda AS in the film "As Good as it Gets", and Madonna, well, I think people like her music more than they like her. Every famous aspie is in some way connected to others of a similar psychology ......
Yeah -- I know what you mean about aspies who blab all their problems to the world. Somebody really needs to explain to these guys that modesty is not a virtue when you're part of a group that is under attack.
I'm reminded of a story I saw a few years ago about a young couple from the city who knew nothing about wildlife. They went hiking in a forest and came across a grizzly bear. Hoping that it would leave them alone if it didn't see them as a threat, they decided to lie down and stay quiet.
Of course, the bear promptly decided that they looked like easy prey and ate them. When you encounter a large predator and you're not armed, the best thing to do is make as much noise and look as big and threatening as you can. That's also the best course of action when dealing with predators of the human variety.
I think it's important to note that these aspies who make mountains out of their not particularly extraordinary human failings and ailments don't seem to think of themselves as members of any group of aspies, and that may be why they don't seem to spare a thought for how their ramblings make aspies-in-general look.
I've been in the situation in real life a few times when I've had to explain to other aspies that some of (certainly not all of) their problems, or problems of people who they care about, are quite common problems and are things that one might expect to happen in a life-time. I think there may be some aspies who focus so narrowly on particular problems that they don't notice that other people have the same issues , and there's no need to go looking for "answers" or an explanation, as it's ordinary, predicatable stuff. The result is they end up looking very obsessive, ignorant or egocentric. Of course, many neurotypical people do the same thing, they might get some quite common disease like cancer or asthma, and they ask "why?" or Why me?" when from the point of view of an unaffected bystander it's all quite unmysterious and ordinary.
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