Autistic Ponies

[Ganondox 899]

So every often I see someone discussing their belief that some character or another from the show is autistic (a discussion on tv tropes about whether or not Twilight Sparkle and Fluttershy are autistic is actually what convinced me to watch the show in the first place, and then the first episode really struck a chord with me), and my initial is reaction is typically "what are you smoking", but then I start to entertain the idea, and search for other discussions about the character out of what must be some masochistic urge given how most of them end up going. Anyway, often a discussion on this forum is one of the top results (I believe that's also what introduced me to this forum), and generally what ends up happening is I end up chewing out up all the people who get angry at the OP for even making the suggestion. Not only do they tend be as ignorant about autism if not more than than whoever the OP is and thus they aren't in any position to make the call, but their attitude is toxic as it's greatly damaging to autistic people's attempts to relate with others. In order to understand I'll need to first explain autism, but I'll my personal opinion about this speculation and my view on where the characters fall can be found here (note that I wrote this a couple years ago, and I've since continued in my studies of psychology, so I might say a few different things now, but my general attitude is the same).

The reason why several characters in the show are ambiguously autistic is because autism is actually extremely hard to diagnosis in adults because of it's nature as a developmental disorder, and it's particular symptoms. There is a misconception that autism is just bad social skills, the truth is pretty much all mental illnesses disorders impair social skills. What sets autism apart is *when* it develops, some miscellaneous attributes which are considered to be restrictive and further inhibit the development of social skills, but tend to lessen with age, and the pervasiveness of it's social effects (which differentiate it from intellectual disability and ADHD, which also impairs social skills and often has those miscellaneous traits, but not to same extent). As it develops in early childhood, it throws off several developmental milestones, causing the problem to become much more severe than it initially was until those milestones are potentially reached. Once you get to adulthood, other mental disorders start showing up which cause several social problems, and over time people with autism learn social skills which mask the core traits of disorder. It's estimated around 10% of people with autism no longer meet diagnostic criteria by adulthood without intervention, while around 20% achieve the same level of functioning with early intervention, but few people would say they stop being autistic. This is especially true when people are asking "Is so and so character autistic" as generally they aren't really asking "does this character currently have a severe mental disability" but "does this character think like I do?". As such, it's extremely hard to identify autism in adults because it could be so many other things, and it could present in so many different ways. In order for an adults  As such, you can't really tell if an adult is autistic by their presentation, and you need information about their childhood history to make the call.

Looking back at our ponies and the ones we can see both them as adults and as children, we never get much more than a single a flashback, which is insufficient to make any conclusions as pervasive behavior must be seen across multiple contexts. All we can really say is Twilight, Fluttershy, and Starlight Glimmer all both had social problems both as fillies and adults, and Pinkie Pie has always been implacably odd. While I wouldn't consider autism to be the best explanation for ANY of their behavior, it's still in the realm of possibilities, so it can be discussed without making a definitive call either way. With the foals they are all clearly not autistic, though don't exactly act like normal children either. Which is kinda the point, it's a t-show. They're characters, not real people, so they aren't going to be 100% realistic. They're probably not written any disorder in mind, and when they are it's generally an equally unrealistic depiction of said disorder. They're still modeled after real people though, and people with psychological disorders are in fact real people, so fictional characters may be partly modeled after them as well. Thus there is plenty of room to speculate about the mental statuses of fictional characters without it being completely absurd. It's not like it was ever really about coherence of the idea anyway, it's imagination, it's a conversation. 

Aside from it just being a buzzkill, this is the reason it really ticks me off when people tell people to just not to do that; you're shutting people out, people who already have a hard enough time conversing as it is. These are people who naturally find it hard to relate to others, they're successfully relating to someone else even if they are just a fictional character, and then you're like "nope, sorry, you're too disabled to be like them, now stop ruining the things I like". Like does it really affect you to much? And considering people are finding it harder to socialize in normal situations these alternative venues may be more important for them, and such behavior is causing the environment to become toxic. It's not wrong for people to have ideas and wanting to talk about things, and ranting against people bringing up ideas is the last thing I forum needs to survive. I'm not saying you have to agree, as demanding such would be equally bad and if you have dissenting opinions I encourage you to share them, but just respectful and don't complain about people exploring. I can't believe I've seen this happen enough times that I actually considered it worthwhile to type all this up on the subject. 

TL;DR: The show has several characters who might be autistic, but probably aren't. Some people like to talk about that. Let people enjoy things. 

Edited April 19, 2017 by Ganondox

[Tiny Hoofs 200]

I think it's cool that all kind of people can relate to the Mane Six, even if they haven't explicitly been confirmed to have any mental conditions. While the Mane Six were probably never written with any disorder in mind, it's a great thing to have relatable characters to people of all walks of life. There's probably not as many relatable mentally ill characters as there should be (especially in children's TV shows) and I'd hate to rob these people of their fun.

I've related a lot with Twilight and Fluttershy in the past because I have Asperger's and socializing is very difficult for me (Pinkie is only best pony becasuse she makes me laugh the most ). I'd also be fine with more ponies with disabilities being introduced to the show provided it was done well. I actually hope the show touches on it more in the future.

[Jeric 46,850]

I'm posting this again to illustrate my point. 

I tend to disagree with this image. The wonderful thing about having been married to a PsyD credentialed clinician is that it brought into the home much reading material for me to get my grubby little hands on. It allowed for deep and meaningful conversations on mental health. I also have boxes and boxes of material on the subject.  There are many misconceptions on all of the above, and in an attempt to demystify then and fight the misconceptions online, new ones were created. But, in the end none of that matters, because of this:

"The birth of the reader must be at the cost of the death of the Author." 

That means that even if the authorial intent is that Rarity does not have OCD, any viewer is free to interpret her in such a manner. It's a valid aporoach if there exists any evidence to support that interpretation. I personally don't, and will occasionally debate these points, but it isn't my decision to determine how the content shown is interpreted by a fan. 

So yes, if they feel a deeper personal connection to Twilight by considering that she is somewhere on the ASD spectrum, go for it. 

[Ganondox 899]

On 4/20/2017 at 0:47 AM, Jeric said:

I'm posting this again to illustrate my point. 

I tend to disagree with this image. The wonderful thing about having been married to a PsyD credentialed clinician is that it brought into the home much reading material for me to get my grubby little hands on. It allowed for deep and meaningful conversations on mental health. I also have boxes and boxes of material on the subject.  There are many misconceptions on all of the above, and in an attempt to demystify then and fight the misconceptions online, new ones were created. But, in the end none of that matters, because of this:

"The birth of the reader must be at the cost of the death of the Author." 

That means that even if the authorial intent is that Rarity does not have OCD, any viewer is free to interpret her in such a manner. It's a valid aporoach if there exists any evidence to support that interpretation. I personally don't, and will occasionally debate these points, but it isn't my decision to determine how the content shown is interpreted by a fan. 

So yes, if they feel a deeper personal connection to Twilight by considering that she is somewhere on the ASD spectrum, go for it. 

Just a quick questions, is that a quote from "The Death of the Author", or is it from something else? 

[Jeric 46,850]

4 hours ago, Ganondox said:

Just a quick questions, is that a quote from "The Death of the Author", or is it from something else? 

It is! Roland Barthes famous essay discussing the limits of authorial intent.

[Ganondox 899]

9 hours ago, Jeric said:

It is! Roland Barthes famous essay discussing the limits of authorial intent.

I really need to get around to reading that sometime.