#I get the autistic experience varies drastically

[cure-icy-writes]

Regarding the transgender and autistic coding of Octodad: Dadliest Catch.

To preface: this essay will be in two parts. One with spoilers, and one without. The spoilers will be hidden under a cut, and optional. 

Octodad: Dadliest Catch is a 2014 action/adventure game in which the protagonist, known only as “Octodad”, is an octopus masquerading as a human man. If it sounds ridiculously goofy, that’s because it is. Octodad rarely takes itself seriously, and that works to its credit.

Now, before going any further, I want to take a moment to lay some groundwork for the premise of the game and how it relates to otherness. Octodad, being an octopus, is fundamentally Other. He is a nonhuman in disguise, he is living a lie, et cetera. The concept of beings that disguise themselves as human is an old one, from Greek gods seeking hospitality to changelings left behind as supernatural brood parasites. They are shapeshifters and deceivers, whose stories are born from the fear of Otherness. And more often than not, these beings have malicious intent.

But Octodad, fundamentally, does not. He is a loving father and husband who hides his identity out of fear. He is Other, and this otherness isn’t portrayed as predatory or evil in any way. And viewing this story through the lens of Octodad, controlling his actions, the player gets to know a little bit about him.

Back to the trailer— Octodad’s gameplay is showcased, and it’s immediately obvious that the control scheme isn’t exactly typical. Players must control each limb individually, resulting in sloppy, uncoordinated movements. Octodad stumbles through the grocery store, across a play set, leaving destruction in his wake. He isn’t trying to make a mess, unlike a certain goose, but rather, this is the natural result of what he is. He’s literally a fish out of water— and yes, he is a fish if you’re pedantic enough about cladistics, which I am going to be for the sake of this metaphor. 

The control scheme is deliberately messy, a stylistic choice that forces the player to constantly remember that Octodad is something Other, and the resulting mistakes have consequences. The levels are designed in such a way that even an experienced player will have to make a mess at times, and it comes with a sense of shame— after all, a normal protagonist could do this. Mario could platform his way through this grocery store with no problem! But Octodad can’t. He slips on banana peels and breaks open crates and spills fruit all over the linoleum. And the UI forces you to be constantly aware of when others are watching, furthering that sense of shame.

The game won’t punish you for slipping up sometimes. But the mess you’ve made, the judgmental gazes of the NPCs, will. You are an imposter, facing a constant uphill battle to perform difficult and unnatural tasks that are effortless for the humans around you. They cannot see that you’re an octopus. They do not know that you’re an octopus. So long as you are wearing your suit, no one can tell, even with the tentacles and bulbous head and suckers on your limbs. But they can see your mistakes, and your failures.

How does that relate to autism and transgenderism? Well, let’s start with autism, since the transgender coding is mostly in story spoiler territory, while the autism is largely in the gameplay mechanics. Autism is a pretty broad spectrum, and it’s difficult to point at something and definitively call it autistic-coded when the autistic experience varies so drastically from person to person. But Octodad and his Otherness, even as a silly octopus, strongly parallels autistic masking.

Octodad’s enforced sense of shame strongly resonates with the autistic experience— constantly aware of eyes on you, always messing up because no one explained the rules to you properly, or struggling with sensory issues or executive dysfunction when everyone is trying to convince you that your experiences are normal and you’re just being dramatic. And in that sense, it’s cathartic to see Octodad, because he is unmistakably and undeniably Other. You cannot say “Oh, honey, everyone’s a little octopus, you’re just not trying hard enough,” to an octopus the way that neurotypicals often do with autistic people. You cannot deny him his Otherness which causes his struggles.

Remember the changeling story I mentioned earlier? Changeling myths and autism are inextricably connected, and far too often, they demonize autism. The problem with trying to define humanity in a way that excludes imposters that pretend to be human is that you will inevitably end up excluding and hurting people, particularly those who are neurodivergent, queer, disabled, or otherwise in a minority. So, if you cannot define humanity without excluding humans from the definition, then it serves to reason that broadening your scope will include non-humans. And this is portrayed as an unambiguously good thing, to acknowledge the humanity of an octopus.

Real life isn’t like Among Us, where the imposters are murderous freaks who unhinge their jaws and chomp off the top half of their fellow crewmates before hopping into the vents. Sometimes, they’re scared people who go through life hurting because they tried to be normal until they forgot who they were.

And now, let’s examine the story and talk about the further coding it contains. The first thing that catches my attention is Octodad’s morning routine— coffee. It seems innocuous at first, but it’s later revealed that this is the only reason Octodad has the ability to walk upright, because he’s constantly self-medicating with caffeine.

There’s a very domestic portion of the game where you see just how much Octodad adores his family, he does the chores for his wife whom he loves a lot, and then— he survives a couple murder attempts. His neighbor knows he’s an octopus, is a chef at the local grocery store, and is the main antagonist of the game. He breaks down the fence between their yards with some sort of nightmarish combine-harvester machine that nearly sucks in Octodad, but the situation is resolved quickly enough. Then, just a little later in the day, he goes out to the grocery store, where the chef finds him and chases him with a knife, threatening to turn him into moderately priced sushi. Interestingly, though, is the fact that Octodad seems more worried about his wife finding out than the fact that he’s an octopus than the threats on his life. We don’t know how often these happen, but he just brushes this off and hopes to keep up the masquerade a little longer. He has to be human, he has to be normal in order to be loved, and nearly dying alone to his murderous neighbor is a small price to pay. And… it’s sad, honestly.

The real meat of the game, though, is at the aquarium. Octodad is frankly terrified of this place, but he can’t tell his wife why. There was a scene that stuck with me— it’s meant to introduce you to the fact that the Biologist enemies are a threat who will recognize and out you, but it made me think about TERFs. They always claim they can spot trans people, as if there’s some secret sense for it, as if a world in which women are subject to random and invasive genital inspections is somehow better than a world where the lady in the bathroom stall next to you is standing up to pee.

After getting through the first part of the museum, Octodad has to find each member of his family and do some minigame puzzles. The kids are absolutely adorable, but what struck me was the conversation with Scarlet, as she grows frustrated with Octodad’s secrecy. He sleeps downstairs, he somehow “made more” when the printer ran out of ink, he lost a limb in a plumbing accident but it somehow grew back, and he’s keeping things from her. He won’t have an honest conversation, and she’s getting frustrated.

Take a moment to imagine the veneer of metaphor peeled away. Imagine you have been married to a man you love for ten years, but you know he’s hiding something from you. He doesn’t sleep in the same bed as you, never wanted to consummate things, and you’ve respected his privacy and consent, but he won’t explain why. He’s ecstatic about raising kids together, but he doesn’t want biological ones. There are these instances you can’t explain, like his sudden insistence on buying a shark plushie from IKEA, or the time you caught him mailing a tank top (was it a tank top, really, because you never got a good look at it) to someone and he looked guilty. You find a list of names, some of them crossed out, and wonder who these women are. He never wants to look in the mirror or have pictures taken. You love him and you want to respect his privacy, but the secrets are driving a rift between you.

Imagine it from the other side, now. You have been married to the woman you love for ten years. She doesn’t know you’re trans, and you’re terrified she’ll leave you if she finds out.. She didn’t seem to mind when you told her you didn’t want to get horizontal, but she doesn’t know it’s because sex in this body makes you dysphoric. You love your children so much, they’re the light and joy of your life, but you can’t help but wonder if your wife wanted to have them the old-fashioned way. You try to escape what you are but it’s getting harder to repress. You know she suspects something. You ended up with a binder, and sent it to someone you met online. You bought yourself a Blåhaj and you don’t know why it was that desperation had seized up in your chest when you saw it. You spent ages on name websites, looking for the perfect one, writing them down to see how they felt. You have the most amazing wife in the world and she is slipping away because you couldn’t keep pretending.

Scarlet asks Octodad to meet her at the shark tank when he’s ready to have a real conversation. And the shark tank is where things get interesting— the chef is there, waiting. He cuts off Octodad’s clothes with a cleaver, and tosses him into the tank, yelling, “Go back where you belong!”

The thing about the coding of Octodad is that it’s never a consistent one-to-one. That particular line? Could be read as immigrant coding, out of context. But then, looking at how easily he moves in the water compared to the flopping rag doll movements on land. He no longer has to mask, he no longer has to hide himself and navigate a world that is hostile and judgmental to him. 

And he’s miserable. He misses his family. And he’s determined to find them, and save them from the chef. So he sets off to do exactly that. 

There’s a series of objectives to complete to get there, but the one that stuck with me? Sneaking into the women’s bathroom. Granted, it’s for the purpose of going through the vents and causing a diversion in the break room, but it still strikes me that Octodad, who presents as a male human, has to sneak into the women’s restroom. And this is presented not as some scandalous affair of a peeping Tom, not a forbidden thing, but just an objective. That’s where the proper vents are, after all. 

On a sillier note? You walk into the aquarium in a shark suit, and you have to cause a diversion. So now, rather than Octodad’s clumsiness being a source of shame, it’s his strength, and it’s a point of pride. He’s an octopus! He’s excellent at making messes!

And then there’s the grand finale— it’s corny and dramatic and there’s a cafeteria on fire, and the truth is out. He’s an octopus.

And Scarlet? She says she was expecting so much worse. She loves her octopus husband exactly as he is, and no matter what adjustments she has to make, she knows her family will be stronger for it. Because now, she has the chance to love her husband in his entirety, in his Otherness, and she takes it.

Octodad is a story about an octopus walking around in a suit and pretending to be a normal human man, but it’s also a story about being closeted, masking, living in fear, and finally realizing that the love remains. That there are people who will love you as you are, genuinely and truly, tentacles and all.

[mischiefmanifold]

How Do My Autism, PDs, and DID Interact/Intertwine?

Disorders mentioned in this post: autism spectrum disorder (ASD), attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), tourette syndrome (TS), fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD), dissociative identity disorder (DID), antisocial personality disorder (ASPD), narcissistic personality disorder (NPD), and schizotypal personality disorder (STPD)

(This post was requested by a mutual, I hope you find this (somewhat) helpful and I apologize for taking a million years to post it 🙃)

I have a whole host of disorders, pretty much all of which affect my personality, identity, and way I interact with the world around me. A lot of people look at the combinations of disorders I have and tell me I can't possibly have them (this is especially popular with autism and ASPD, as well as autism and STPD), when I do in fact have them and they suck ass.

To begin with, since I have DID, my other disorders vary drastically in symptoms from alter to alter. It is important to note that individuals with DID will likely only be diagnosed with other disorders alongside DID if most or all of the frequently fronting alters show symptoms and those symptoms impair the whole. Disorders like autism, Tourette, ADHD, and FASD are system-wide disorders due to the nature of their development. Personality disorders are usually diagnosed at the discretion of the therapist or psychiatrist who is doing the diagnosis.

My combination of autism, NPD, and ASPD resulted in an individual who lacks essentially all empathy, is very isolated, and is really sensitive to perceived slights or criticisms.

I have the psychopathic subtype of ASPD, which means that even if I didn't have NPD I would have narcissistic traits. Alongside heightened NPD traits, I am also more prone to violence and aggression (it is important to note that most psychopaths and individuals with ASPD are not criminals or extremely aggressive). Features of psychopathy that I display are typical antisocial behaviors (disregard for societal norms and rules, essentially), increased aggression and violence, lack of empathy and remorse/guilt, and manipulative and deceitful behaviors.

When it comes to autism and ASPD, the only real trait my presentation has in common is a lack of empathy. Communication problems can arise for individuals who have both disorders, but for different reasons (my ASPD communication problems are almost exclusively related to my disregard for others and lack of remorse; while my autistic communication problems stem from a fundamental misunderstanding of social norms, sarcasm, facial expressions, gestures, and figurative language). Individuals who have ASPD will not experience any developmental delays like autism (delayed speech, social ineptitude, etc.).

My ASPD and NPD go hand-in-hand pretty well. The earliest memory I have of exhibiting antisocial behaviors is at age 8 when I would repeatedly steal candy from my friend's school locker because I felt I deserved it more than her; the theft just escalated from there. I was very good at getting people angry with me so I could take out my anger on them.

I don't feel that my autism and NPD really have that much in common, honestly.

If you would like to learn more about ASPD, its history, and the psychopathic subtype of ASPD, please visit this site: https://psychopathyis.org/what-is-a-psychopath/

[neopronouns]

I’m asking this as an autistic person but why are low empathy and low compassion considered fine? Empathy and compassion mean just.. caring about things. Why are we saying that not caring about anyone or anything is normal? I experience empathy/mild hyperempathy and don’t understand how someone wouldn’t feel that way. Someone who doesn’t have empathy or compassion sounds like an asshole. Like how is that a symptom of a mental disorder/disability? That’s just a basic emotion? I don’t mean to sound rude but I’m seeing a lot of people get absolutely dragged for saying things as basic as ‘having empathy is good’ and I don’t get it.

first off, empathy and compassion are not simply 'caring about things'. let's compare sympathy, empathy, and compassion, three terms that are often confused with one another:

sympathy: feelings of pity for another person's misfortune

empathy: the ability to understand and share another person's feelings

compassion: similar to sympathy, but additionally implies that one has a desire to help the person they feel pity for

these are often linked (especially compassion, as it often follows empathy or sympathy) but are distinct. notably, none of them are just 'caring about things' and none of them are just 'a basic emotion'; these are specific reactions one has to situations they encounter, which can vary drastically based on a number of factors.

i'm going to primarily address low empathy after this, since low empathy is a recognized symptom of a number of disorders and it genuinely should be destigmatized.

empathy is literally experiencing the emotions one recognizes in another person. it's an uncontrollable, subconscious reaction to emotions the person picks up on around them. empathetic reactions can occur whether or not you care about another person, whether or not you know them personally, etc. essentially, empathy is 'being in a person's shoes' in the moment.

low empathy is a common symptom of a number of mental conditions. this is because many disorders affect how one navigates social interaction and interprets others' emotions. a person with low or no empathy can't simply choose to care about a person's feelings and suddenly experience empathy; they genuinely do not have the ability to feel what another person is feeling for whatever reason.

here are some neurodivergencies that can cause low empathy and how:

autism: autism causes social deficits, notably including the ability to read another person's body language. if an autistic person can't read a person's body language, that makes it much harder to figure out what emotions they're feeling at a given time, which is necessary to experience empathy.

cluster b personality disorders (aspd, bpd, hpd, npd): cluster b disorders often cause dysfunctional patterns of social behavior. these pds often affect one's self-image or ego and cause emotional disturbances, which both make it much harder to understand what another person is feeling and, in turn, feel those feelings.

trauma: any trauma-related disorder can cause low empathy. ptsd/cptsd, personality disorders, dissociative disorders, and more can affect one's empathy. trauma can, for example, cause a person to become highly focused on their own wellbeing in order to survive, which may result in a lack of empathy in typical social interaction. trauma can also cause high empathy (it seems trauma generally affects empathy for a lot of people).

alexithymia: alexithymia is the term for struggling to recognize and express emotions. this includes both one's own emotions and the emotions of those around them. alexithymia is a very common symptom of various disorders, especially neurodevelopmental disorders. according to current research, over half of all autistic people experience alexithymia, which just adds to the number of low/no empathy autistics.

traumatic brain injury: injuries to the parts of the brain that handle empathy, emotion, and social interaction can cause low empathy

as you can see, low empathy is much more common that one might assume. this is why people are criticized for implying that having low empathy is bad; low empathy is uncontrollable and a symptom of many disorders, which makes these statements either inherently or overtly ableist.

having low empathy doesn't automatically make you an asshole. your actions matter more than your internal experience; a person with low empathy may not be able to take on another person's feelings, but they can still help them in some way. it's the same for people with high empathy — experiencing another person's emotions along with them doesn't necessarily mean that you will be kind to them or offer them assistance.

importantly, a person with low/no empathy can still care about others or take actions that indicate care. you can experience sympathy and compassion without experiencing empathy (though you don't have to experience those, either, to be a good person). you don't have to be able to experience or understand another person's emotions to recognize that they're struggling.

this is a long post, sorry, but it's an important issue. being ableist is never okay, no matter how unpalatable you find the symptom.

[olderthannetfic]

I'm getting some real specific vibes from the anon who feels talked over in Discord conversations, because that was me a couple decades back. So here's some practical advice.

My guess is that to them, you're "doing it wrong" and your participation in the conversation feels like a brick dropped in the river, whereas theirs feels more like the flow of the river itself. To break past this you're going to have to study and learn.

Sit quietly and listen to the conversations without participating (this is easier in text than voice), listen to how the conversation ebbs and flows, how the speech hands off from person to person, how a joke that people laugh at is told, how a new topic that gets picked up is initially broached. You're looking for style and method, not content; it's not just the joke itself that makes them laugh, it's how the joke teller places their joke into the rest of the speech.

All of this is going to vary drastically between different groups. People of different ages and different cultural backgrounds are all going to do this differently, and there will be a lot of variation between different fandoms and friend groups, as well. Some will come naturally to you and some won't. I'd strongly suggest finding other groups and seeing if you're a better fit. Also try different sizes of groups and see if that helps things feel more natural for you, and if online voice chat isn't cutting it, online text chat or face to face conversations might be ideal (I feel awkward and horrible and kind of overwhelmed whenever I'm in voice with more than one person, but text chat flows very naturally for me and feels more like a native language).

Also try different contexts of conversations; I find it a lot easier to understand the flow of conversation and and get along with people if we're all engaged in the same activity together. eg, I'm a lot more comfortable in a video game chat where everyone running the same dungeon together than I am in a general hangout or fandom chat where everyone is off doing their own thing while talking with each other. The same or the opposite might be the case for you.

My guess is that you're ND (I'm autistic, that's where I'm coming from here) and something about the way you communicate just isn't meshing with the people you're trying to talk with. You might find that groups of people with the same labels as yourself are easier to converse with (for example, I find other autistic people so easy to understand I don't even need to try, but neurotypical people took years of practice to understand).

It's unfortunate, but it's not personal (unless you or they start being dicks about it and making demands), and it's absolutely something you can learn. And it really is about finding the kind of groups that work for you than about trying to insert yourself into a random group and force it to work out.

Experiment, look around, find the places that want you and try not to be upset or blame others or yourself when a place that looks fun turns out to just be grueling work.

--

[nyarmand]

30 days of autism acceptance except i haven't been doing it so you get 15 all at once

April 1st: Introduce yourself. Talk about who you are as a person. Your age, hobbies, special interests, family, etc. Anything you feel comfortable sharing.

I'm Penny, I'm 19, I love cats and writing and music and my brain skips from fixation to fixation like a rock on the surface of a pond. BUT special interests are law and Sherlock Holmes. I have a lot of siblings that I picked out myself and one sibling that I didn't but we don't talk about him. When I die I'm going to become a ghost and go around the world playing everyone's pianos

April 2nd: Post your redinstead photos today. Alternatively, you could talk about what autistic pride/autism acceptance month means to you.

I don't post photos but I think that autistic pride is great. Like yeah, I have problems with my autism sometimes, but also it literally shapes my personality so... That's Me. And I'm going to be proud of that not self-hating about it thank you

April 3rd: How do you feel about dating/romantic relationships? Have you dated in the past/are you currently in a relationship/do you eventually want one? Do you feel that your experience of autism/stereotypes around autism and relationships impacts this?

I would like to have a girlfriend someday... I don't really care about the stereotypes, I don't pay attention to them.

April 4th: Are there any topics regarding autism that you feel don’t get discussed enough?

did you mean: autism in general

April 5th: What was school like for you, or what is it currently like for you if you are still in school? Elementary, high school, post-secondary?

I'm one of those kings who got homeschooled because my parents knew everyone would torment me in public school. But I did go to a co-op for a while and that was pretty cool mostly. I met my best friend there who is ALSO an autistic icon. Now I am in college and it sure is an experience but it's not a bad one.

April 6th: Are you able to drive? If so, was it difficult to learn? What was difficult about it? If not, do you use any alternatives?

I am not but I plan to try and learn soon.

April 7th: How are you with sarcasm and/or metaphors/figures of speech? Do you interpret things very literally?

Sarcasm my beloved! I use it so much. Metaphors too, but a lot of the time they make no sense to anyone except me. And yet somehow I still take things literally a majority of the time... Sarcasm for me, not for thee.

April 8th: Talk about friendship. How important are friends to you? Do you find it hard to make and maintain friendships? Are your friends generally supportive? Is there anything about having friends that confuses you?

I love having friends. Genuinely makes me insane when my friends are loving and supportive of me. Unfortunately I have no idea when someone counts as a friend so I just sort of fake it until I make it and then have difficulty maintaining it because I don't know the proper amount of communication or other such things that I should engage in. Which kinda sucks. My autistic friends are great though because we can have conversations consisting entirely of sending fanart of a single character back and forth for an hour. Allistics wish they were us.

April 9th: How has the pandemic impacted you? Has it changed routines? Do you like or dislike masks? What do you wish allistics and neurotypicals knew/understood about how the pandemic is impacting autistic people?

Well, in terms of autism, the pandemic has been... interesting. My hand sanitizer usage has of course increased drastically. I like masks because I don't like being perceived. I love to be unknown. I wish people knew they're annoying the hell out of me with their scaremongering, inability to use logic, and anti-vax sentiments. Not This Shit Again.

April 10th: How important is representation to you? Is the representation that is out there generally good or bad? What is your favorite piece of representation? What you like to see more of in autism representation? What would you like to see less of?

I loooooove representation. Unfortunately there's not a whole lot of canon autistic representation and when there is I find it usually sucks, but I take my icons. Sherlock Holmes is autistic and you can never tell me otherwise. Data from Star Trek may be an android but he's still autistic as fuck. I want more positive representation and less 'the poor autistic person trapped inside their own body' bullshit.

April 11th: What are your thoughts/feelings about masking (a term for when autistic people hide their autistic traits)? Do you mask?

I hate that anyone has to, but yes, I do mask a lot because otherwise I get treated like shit. I don't hate allistic people, I just think they could at least try to act a little autistic sometimes...

April 12th: Is there anything you find hard to do because of being autistic? Is there anything that you find easy?

I LOGIC EVERYTHING. Plus I'm very good at making connections other people tend to miss. On the other hand, sensory overload leaves me in hell on a worryingly regular basis. Plus, well, y'know. Socializing.

April 13th: How much preparation and planning do you need before doing new things, or even for familiar things? Do you need to be totally prepared ahead of time or are you more comfortable with being spontaneous/just going for it? Does it vary for you depending on the thing or the day?

PREPARE ME FOR NEW THINGS OR ELSE. If it's familiar I can be more spontaneous about it but I hate having new things sprung on me. My parents always used to try and get me to do things without telling me what and it was really upsetting. Glad they cut that shit out.

April 14th: What do you like about being autistic?

I like that it makes me very cool and funny and smart. I like being able to logic things other people can't. I like how I view the world. I like a lot of things.

April 15th: Do you work? If so, what is that like for you? Are you open about being autistic at work? Alternatively, how open are you about being autistic? Do you tell a lot of people? Or just a select few? How do people normally react when you tell them? If you don’t tell people, then why?

I'm just trying to deal with college right now. I'm usually pretty open about being autistic because that way I can spot the ableists right away. I refuse to hide who I am because of some assholes who don't know how to deal with anyone who isn't like them. Most people ask a lot of questions, but it's largely fine.

[saltycharacters]

WAIT WAIT Uri and I have the same stuff goin on that's so cool!! I love that you're making your characters neurodivergent! If you need any help writing his disabilities I'd be happy to help :)

 Aaah I’m so glad!!! Yes, I’m trying hard to diversify my characters and this definitely includes neurodivergence :^) I thought Uri was a good character to include!!!

I could always use advice on how to write characters that are neurodivergent (or in any minority group really)!! Even if I’ve heard from a knowledgeable person already, or know about it myself through extensive research, or even if I experience it myself- I like to hear from multiple sources so I can learn about different experiences and create varied stories. Repetition even helps me remember what to avoid and what to include. So I’ll cherish any piece of information I can get!!

In terms of this subject specifically, currently I especially need to hear about:

-Autism

-OCD

-Dyslexia

-ADHD

-Dyscalculia

-Bipolar Disorder

-Hypersexuality

-Psychosis

-Disassociation

-Any other mental illness/disability/disorder/symptom(s) you’d really like to see represented in media/characters, I know these are definitely not all of them

So If anyone would like to add in their two cents about their experiences with any of these, (if you do not personally have these experiences but want to talk about it, make sure to let me know it’s not from personal experience because as accurate as you may think you are, it isn’t gonna be as accurate as a first person account), then some of the things I want to know is-

-Do’s and Dont’s of writing the character with said label (it can be from personal opinion/experience or just something you know I should avoid and/or incorporate) ((this can also include terms/slurs/names I shouldn’t use))

-Stereotypes/myths about the label

-What type of characters you would really like to see belonging into these groups (ex: more autistic POC/adult/women characters, more ocd characters that are messy, etc)

-How you (or other if this isn’t first person) experience difficulties from day to day life with it (or just experiences in general)

-How you deal with it/coping mechanisms/things that make you happy or de-stress when you’re having difficulties

-Ways a society could be more friendly and helpful for people with such a disability (after all, my verse isn’t earth and the societies/rules are very flexible, so include anything you can think of.)

-Anything else you want to add

You can give me your input through messaging, or an ask or replying to this post or even contacting me at another site. I’ll be very grateful for your input (even links to other’s stories are great, as long as you’re 101% they’re trustworthy) and I’ll record it and it’ll drastically help me in creating accurately diverse characters. Thank you!

[sparklyjojos]

hey i sent you an ask but internet problematic here so i dunno if it was sent? As someone with no experience with neurodivergent people i was hoping you could elaborate what you have previously said about Kars in JORGE JOESTAR (and other characters maybe) seeming neurodivergent. Like, i'd love to know your headcanons about jojo characters regarding this, as well as reasoning for the headcanon's (optional, but i'd love it)

(wow this one sure took me a long time to answer, sorry!)

oh boy, this would be an extremely long post if I included all other jojo characters I headcanon as nd so I’m just going to focus on Jorge (the Japanese one) and novel Kars for now

this won’t be a “this character definitely has x thing”, but just pointing out traits and dialogue that may interest someone who wants to headcanon/write these characters as nd

am I going to be reaching with some of those? yep! but if the Jorge Joestar novel itself taught me anything, it’s that:

so, you know. I see what I wanna see.

(tw: mental illness, trauma, ptsd, suicide - all in the Kars segment)

Jorge:

 – the sheer difference in introductions is telling: English Jorge talks at length about his family, his classmates, his gay puppy crush, and anything else you’d expect to be major concerns for a kid. Japanese Jorge? social life haha what social life, HOPE YOU’RE READY FOR 10 PAGES OF PUZZLE SOLVING

 – no really if the very first thing someone says after seeing all your memories is that you sure spend a lot of time on puzzles then that’s some deep interest you have, a bit of a stereotypical hobby there but whatevs

 – hyperfocuses a lot??

 – (exasperated Kars who’s been trying to get his attention for a good minute:) “You have a bad habit of not hearing when people speak to you.” (Jorge:) “Yeah, if I’m focused on something else. Sorry. What?”

 – tunes out of one phone conversation with Bruno like 3 times

 – figures out how time-based Stands work specifically because he has experience with his internal sense of time getting royally fucked up whenever he’s deeply focused

 – was inattentive (and hyperactive?) as a young kid to the point it affects how the memories on his disc look like: “I was a fidgety child, and the image rarely focused on [Joseph] for long. I wasn’t interested in his story.”

 – visual thinker, good with patterns, can make complicated mental maps and solve slide puzzles in his mind

 – his memory is really good until it isn’t (as far as he’s concerned Funny Valentine’s Stand is called Dirty Whatever)

 – very particular about meanings of words and names, etymology (his arc starts and ends with him pondering over the kanji of his own name, knows latin names of various species like Hydrangea or Ursus maritimus and what they mean literally, that “sorry that name’s taken” line when Rohan calls something a Beyond, etc)

 – doesn’t like (is distressed by?) clutter and things/details being WRONG. (“If details don’t add up right I get agitated, and start searching for a better way. This trait has lead to my room being very clean, and made me a great detective.”)

 – infodumps to Rohan about polar bears of all things, and there’s a moment when he stops talking almost mid-sentence after mentioning they’re called Ursus maritinus and instead of speaking out loud he just thinks to himself that “The scientific name was given by John Phipps in 1774” as if he just realized that’d be Too Much detail to share, I feel you Jorge

 – (after Erina says he has a characteristic soft smile) “I do? I mean, I guess people do say I look like an idiot.”  

 – gets urges to laugh at very bad times (”Cars’ whispered response had an air of such grim realism that I almost started laughing, but he was watching me suspiciously. Whoops.”)

 – sometimes blurts out things, often fails one-liners, even when he pre-plans what he’s going to say something else may come out (“I’d thought of all kinds of things to say, but what actually popped out in that moment? (…) I have no idea what I meant by that last bit but I said what I said and had to live with it.”)

 – sometimes impulsive, like yeah let’s just get up in the middle of the night and search through a 10 km^2 area on a bike for something unprecised while you have several death threats to your name, this can’t possibly backfire

 – (after Jorge quite literally blows himself up by impulsive carelessness) “Cars was still laughing. “You really don’t think things through.“”

 – small point that’s made moot by paranormal things like that being real in the jojoverse, but his tendency to see signs and messages meant for him everywhere and in every event, and insisting on coincidences not being mere synchronicity gives off a different vibe than intended (at least at the beginning before he knows Stands and Beyonds are a thing)

Kars:

 – honestly I could just slap the definition of “neurodivergent = with their brain functioning differently from what’s seen as ‘normal’ in the population” here and point at his backstory in this book and be done with it

 – remember everything I’m writing is on top of his canon image of an asocial genius scientist with poor affect (or, in the anime, varying between stone face and painfully exaggerated expressions) who has a connection with nature and animals, which I guess can? be seen as some type of autistic coding (unfortunately in this case it dovetails into “a loner with autistic traits = snaps and kills everyone” type of coding sooo maybe let’s not go there)

 – novel Kars talks about how when he was younger he didn’t even know that feeling sympathy and wanting to have emotional attachments with others –was a thing– (apparently his race wasn’t capable of it??), and he had to sorta consciously try to understand and learn it through reading human fiction. It came off to me like he relates better to fictional characters (and maybe animals?) than to his race or humans, too

 - ^^(that backstory’s a bit unclear with how it’s told; either just like his race he doesn’t have the drive for social bonding, empathy etc. and his understanding of others is made purely on the intellectual level - that’s relatable for some nd people - or he DOES have those things in a drastic difference from everyone else of his race, which I guess makes him nd by definition. It’s… complicated.)

– on the topic of “consciously learning how to sympathy” - there’s a few times in the novel when he’s a prick not because he wants to be but because he genuinely doesn’t understand why the other person would be upset (”Cars, sorry, but can you put me back at my old height?” “?…isn’t the view better?”), but if that person explains how the thing is upsetting he then backs off like “oh okay” (when Jorge is disturbed about the women’s heads thing - “Yeah. But I just feel sorry for them. I can’t watch this.” - Kars just goes “I see.” and makes them disappear). He still has to work on the “taking your private memories without asking” issue tho

 – that moment in the backstory where Kars became deeply aware of just how flawed and “not up to own potential” he was which launched him straight into unhealthy perfectionism and desire for control and power as a way of dealing with it? relatable

 – and that thing where him becoming much more chill is preceeded by the realization that he can’t ever - and that he doesn’t have to - become an infinitely perfect being without weaknesses, and that he’d still have worth and meaning even when he’s not performing to some ridiculous self-imposed standards?? GREAT, and I love to see lines like this one coming from him: “Cars smiled. “I have no desire to be the leadingman.””

 – he talks about how traumatic events and your emotional reactions to them (“feeling like you’re dying”) can damage your soul. Since he claims to have experience determining soul damage, and the only souls he worked with before belonged to 36 other Karses, we can assume he’s talking about himself as well. (and it’s kinda obvious that having everyone you love die in

 – ^^^also worth noting that even if Kars knew a lot about brains biology-wise, he missed out on practically all of modern psychology after 1939, so of course the way he relates to trauma and mental illness would be different, and more informed by what he learned having spent most of his life around ancient civilizations in the Americas - the concept of soul loss. And it’s not like the book doesn’t wink towards it in other places (English Jorge dissociating during torture is described as him having learned how to remove his soul from his body)

 – Light Dancer Kars speaks about how he wanted to commit suicide, then in the same paragraph says that he and our Kars feel “the same sadness”, which, wow. Earlier there are scenes where you can interpret Kars’s behaviour as passively suicidal; he doesn’t seek death, but if something (burning upon reentry while saving the humans, fighting Dio) did kill him, he wouldn’t mind that much

 – this one is very subjective because you can interpret these moments as just him being very lost in thought / focusing on healing (Jorge sure does), but: when faced with intense emotional stress - like hearing Light Dancer Kars’s existential speech, or almost getting killed because he chose to shield the humans from harm - Kars has a tendency to go non- or barely verbal, motionless, unresponsive to outside stimuli (including people trying to get his attention by calling his name) and staring at one thing / into space, ignoring even a zombie attack or that they’re pressed on time in alternate!Morioh. When I first read it I assumed he just dissociated really hard (ptsd-related?), or was in a shutdown

 – if you pay attention to what traits Kars seems to be holding in high regards - either through saying that X is a good thing about humanity, or bemoaning that humanity doesn’t have X (that he ofc does) - they’re stuff like creativity, perseverance, attention to details, pattern-based thinking, the desire to “figure stuff out”, and good memory. AKA traits often (though not always) increased in autistic people

 - at one point he says: ”In the end, you’re just another human. You see a mystery and think, ‘How odd!’ and put in on a shelf somewhere.” I’m sorry but even in context it sounds like “apparently people can see an interesting thing without instantly getting fixated and wanting to know and understand everything about it right there and then, what the fuck”

 – he tends to be either very invested in what’s going on or bored, no inbetween, and avoiding that boredom is a high priority (”And it seems I’ve run out of time to eat you all… But I wasn’t bored.”)

um yeah that’s all I can think of rn