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wondergirl2007 · 2 months ago

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Top 10 Characters Who Are Autistic

Autism. What exactly is autism?

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a neurological and developmental disorder that affects how people communicate, learn, and behave.

Autistic people may act in a different way to other people.

Some examples are:

* Finding it hard to understand how other people think or feel.

* Being sensitive to bright lights or loud noises.

* Getting anxious about social events.

* They may take longer to understand information.

* They prefer to be on their own.

* And they may act blunt, rude or not interested in others without meaning to.

People who have autism might face challenges that people who don't have it won't, but they're still very capable of achieving goals and living a happy and healthy life just as much as someone who doesn’t have autism. In fact, there are many well-known people with ASD who have achieved significant things in their life, including Albert Einstein, Tim Burton, Elon Musk, to name a few.

Now, why am I mentioning all of this? Well because I’m autistic myself, and I didn’t even know I was on the spectrum until like, last year. And I have quite a few friends who are also on the spectrum like me, so I can relate to them a lot.

But thinking back to when I was a child, I definitely had quite a few symptoms of autism, including preferring to be on my own, enjoying hobbies such as art and music, having repetitive behaviour, being sensitive to loud noises and not understanding sarcasm or figures of speech.

For example, if someone told me to “Break a leg!”, I might think they literally mean for me to break my leg, when really it’s just a rhetorical phrase, and I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t want me to actually break my leg.

Another example is when I was in primary school, I didn’t like the loudness of everyone talking all at once during assemblies, so I was given these headphones that would reduce the noise, and it did help, but one of my teachers didn’t like the idea of me wearing them, but when I got older, I was less sensitive to the noise, so I stopped wearing them.

But I’m not here to just talk about my experiences with autism, because as you can tell from the title, we’re going to be looking at fictional characters from TV shows and films who are also on the spectrum, and how I can relate to the characters.

For this list, we’ll be looking at characters from TV shows and animated films who either are autistic, or have Asperger’s syndrome. Characters from live action films or videos games will not be on this list. So without further ado, here are the top 10 characters who are autistic.

Quick disclaimer: Not every single on this list may actually be confirmed to be autistic, but I’m still including them on the list as they have autistic traits that I can relate to. With that out of the way, let’s get onto the list.

10. Elsa (Frozen)

I’m sure we all know the film “Frozen.” It’s the sixth highest grossing film in history and is based on the classic tale “The Snow Queen”. It has a unique story, catchy music and well-written characters. Out of all of the characters though, Elsa really represents what being autistic is like.

When Elsa was young, she became less social and communicative after she accidentally injured her sister, Anna, due to being unable to control her ice powers. After her parents pass away, Elsa is unable to understand Anna’s thoughts and feelings and doesn’t realise how much her younger sister needs her.

After Elsa becomes the Queen at her coronation, she becomes much more anxious and may have even suffered from sensory overloads which cause her ice powers to get the best of her and starts a glacial winter in the kingdom of Arendelle.

Elsa flees from Arendelle to create a castle made of ice on the distant cliffs, and prefers to be by herself, as she believes she’s a threat to the kingdom due to her ice powers and doesn’t want to do any harm to anyone.

Elsa's powers being a metaphor for being autistic is a valid and powerful interpretation that people are allowed to have and share. Actually, Elsa's powers are seen as a metaphor by almost every minority who suffers for being different.

How sensitive Elsa seems to be, how she seems to look at the world different from people around, how she moves, some repetitive gestures, the way she learns some behaviors from her sister and attempts to follow them because she understands these things are important -- even though naturally she wouldn't act that way, because it is a learned behavior.

Also, the song “Let It Go” was written by taking inspiration from an autistic relative of the writer.

It's important to remember the there's an autistic spectrum and that each person is different. Autistic people are believed to learn to mimic neurotypical behaviors under the pressure of being accepted -- or better said, tolerated. Even though it hasn’t been fully confirmed, I am very much convinced that Elsa could absolutely be autistic.

9. Lola (Charlie And Lola)

I grew up watching Charlie And Lola, and I could relate to Lola a lot. After rewatching the show, it’s pretty clear that Lola has autism. She has many autistic traits including:

* Only has one close friend (Lotta) because other people perceive her as being eccentric and very odd.

* Has been labeled a “very fussy eater” by her brother Charlie, probably due to sensory problems with food, which is something I can relate to a lot as I’m a picky eater myself.

* Takes everything very literally and doesn’t understand idioms or expressions (e.g. “Don’t make faces because if the wind changes it’ll stick like that” “Don’t watch too much tv or you’ll get square eyes”)

* Reading the same book all about bugs over and over again, to name a few.

I know it’s not been confirmed that Lola is autistic, but I mean, come on. It’s pretty obvious that she is. Lola is basically me when I was a child. I don’t have much else to say on this one, so let’s just move on.

8. Goo (Foster’s Home For Imaginary Friends)

Ah, Foster’s Home For Imaginary Friends. A classic Cartoon Network show featuring some memorable characters such as Mac, Frankie, Eduardo, Wilt, Bloo, and then there’s… Goo.

Goo was introduced in the third season of the show and is seen as an hyperactive, happy-go-lucky, overly imaginative and talkative African-American girl. Goo does seem to have some autistic traits, such as being spontaneous, going into detail about a subject (In a rather hyperactive way) and she’s incredibly hyper active in and outside of her mind.

Goo also struggles to make friends, which is why she creates her own friends, and even though most autistic people usually prefer being on their own, Goo would rather have lots of friends, but is unable to make friends because she thinks people find her annoying due to her hyperactive behaviour, especially after being yelled at by Mac about it.

I mean, I can’t really blame Mac for yelling at her, but I just felt so bad for Goo. I also struggled to make new friends when I first started high school, and preferred to do things on my own. I didn’t mind being on my own and times, but other times I did want to have at least someone to talk to.

Now I know just because someone can be creative or hyperactive doesn’t instantly mean they’re autistic, but Goo’s imagination is what helps her less insecure about herself and not just seen as this weird, annoying kid. Goo’s creativity makes her who she is, and she shouldn’t be ashamed of that.

7. Leni Loud (The Loud House)

Now, Leni Loud is seen as the stereotypical “dumb blonde girl” in The Loud House, and she reminds me a lot of Lindsay from Total Drama, but the reason why she’s on this list is because she’s the most relatable character in the show to me.

First of all, Leni has a special interest in fashion and she even makes various clothing in many episodes. Also, a lot like me, Leni has a lot of trouble when it comes to taking things people say literally.

One example can be found in the episode “House Music” in which the Loud family forms a family band. During the episode Luna tells Leni that she can sing backup and Leni ends up taking her words literally and singing the words “backup”.

And another example occurs in “Driving Miss Hazy”, when Lori tells Leni to make her bed Leni ends up taking her literally and builds her a bed frame from scratch.

As an autistic person myself I often have problems myself when it comes to taking things people say literally and I often have trouble recognizing sarcasm or when people are joking instead of being serious.

Next, like a lot of autistic people, there is evidence that she has routines that she follows such as in the episode “Space Invader” when she mentions that she brushes her hair exactly 50 times every day.

Finally there’s the fact that Leni’s stock pose is something known as raptor hands. Raptor hands is basically when you have your arms close to your body with your hands bent. Raptor hands can be common among autistic people and it’s pretty much Leni’s signature pose.

I think it might have been confirmed that Leni is autistic, and I saw a poll of the Loud House fandom about wherever you thought if Leni was autistic or not, and more people said yes than no, so Leni may actually be autistic.

6. Julia (Sesame Street)

Julia was probably one of the first characters who I’ve seen to be on the spectrum. She is a friendly girl who enjoys various activities including drawing and playing with her stuffed toy rabbit, Fluffster, but is sensitive to loud noises such as sirens and may not answer to someone immediately.

She also enjoys bonding with her neurotypical friends on Sesame Street, who often grow in their understanding of autism in the process.

Puppeteer Stacey Gordon, who played the role of Julia, uses her experiences as a mother of an autistic child to portray Julia in an authentic way.

Julia made her first appearance in an awareness initiative entitled Sesame Street and Autism: See Amazing in All Children, which was made to provide resources “designed to serve autistic children and their families”.

Sesame Street is known for taking on serious topics including grief, racism and adoption. And autism was no exception. Being autistic myself, Julia is a very relatable character.

5. Fred Jones (Scooby-Doo: Mystery Incorporated)

Fred Jones In Scooby-Doo: Mystery Incorporated has a LOT of symptoms of autism, such as:

Obsessive interests (specifically, traps), Not understanding other people’s emotions, being more drawn to things than to people, talking things too literally, being unable to recognise people's hints toward him, a need for a consistent routine, finding it hard to express his own emotions and getting upset if somebody gets too close to him.

I realise a lot of this was apparently done for the sake of humour, but the writers of Mystery Incorporated really seem to have unintentionally written Fred to be autistic.

I don’t have a lot to say about this one either, because I didn’t really watch Scooby Doo all that much when I was younger, but I did know that Fred was a very popular autistic character, so here he is on the list.

4. SpongeBob (SpongeBob SquarePants)

Yes, it has been confirmed that SpongeBob is indeed autistic by the voice actor himself, Tom Kenny, but he “never meant" for it to go public with his recent revelation about the iconic character being autistic after his comments went viral.

But SpongeBob has pretty much every autistic trait an autistic person can have, such as not being able to read social cues. It's hard for the guy to know when he's bothering someone, and he's not very good at reading the emotions of others. A lot of the comedy from the show derives from the fact that he doesn't know that he's annoying.

He also has meltdowns over relatively minor things, and is unable to handle his own emotions well. We've seen Spongebob, countless times, freak out over fairly petty things. Most of the time it's played for comedy, but for certain people (autistic or not) it can be relatable at times.

SpongeBob also takes things literally such as in the episode, “Squid On Strike”, Squidward told him that they would "dismantle the oppressive establishment” Spongebob interpreted "dismantle the establishment" as "destroy the building." So he did.

And most autistic people have one certain area of extreme knowledge/expertise that they refer to as a "special interest." Something that they feel extreme, almost obsessive, passion for. It's not hard to see that Spongebob's is his love of fry-cooking. Fortunately for him, that's also his job, and he's probably the happiest workaholic ever shown on television.

SpongeBob was definitely a character I didn’t expect to be confirmed autistic when I was younger, but after rewatching SpongeBob recently, yeah, I can definitely see it.

3, 2 and 1. Grim, Billy and Mandy (The Grim Adventures Of Billy And Mandy)

So, I started watching Billy and Mandy when I was around 14 years old, and I had no idea that the three main characters were autistic. In fact, I didn’t even see any autistic traits in them at first, but after realising that the creator of the show, Maxwell Atoms, is autistic himself, and also finding out that I’m autistic myself, this is one of the reasons why Billy and Mandy is one of my favourite shows ever.

All three of the characters are so relatable, as they all have autistic traits that I can relate to, from Grim taking things literally and being easily upset when thrown off from routine, to Billy’s repetitive behaviour and not understanding other people’s emotions, to Mandy hating being touched or hugged or finding it difficult to express her emotions, and prefers being on her own.

I’m pretty sure we can all see it, especially after Maxwell confirming that Grim, Billy and Mandy were all autistic in 2021. Heck, there’s a whole video about Mandy talking about autism. (With the voice being AI, because, well, of course)

But overall, I think that being autistic isn’t something to be ashamed of, as a person with autism can absolutely live a normal life with the right support and resources. Early intervention, education, and community support are key factors in helping people with autism achieve their goals and lead fulfilling lives.

Let me know in the comments which autistic character is your favourite and why. And if there was any characters I may have missed, also let me know in the comments. And with that, I’ll see you guys later.

#autism #autism awareness #frozen #queen elsa #elsa frozen #charlie and lola #fosters home for imaginary friends #foster’s home for imaginary friends goo #the loud house #leni loud #sesame street #Sesame Street Julia #scooby doo #fred jones #scooby doo fred #spongebob #spongebon squarepants #the grim adventures of billy and mandy

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