Read on Twitter
I should just get my thoughts out instead of poking at folks' mentions, but boy, I really feel the collective frustration of "allistic people often ask questions with implied subtext, and assume autistic people are understanding that subtext instead of being direct", but
I wish the example being shared and cited (a tumblr post from 3 years ago) wasn't framed as, "here's a secret Neurotypical Cheat Code, the phrase 'watcha playing?' actually means 'can I play too?'" because that's not actually true! That's a great *example* of a miscommunication
caused by assumptions, but it's just replacing one specific meaning with another specific meaning, which is not clear communication! Especially since that meaning isn't universal to all NT people! Even if I were to try to universally "decode" the subtext, I'd say "watcha doing?"
is often used as a soft way to engage with your activity and see how you respond to determine if you're okay with your activity being interrupted to talk to them. That can *certainly* lead to assumptions if they read emotion or intent into your response that aren't really there,
but the intent after engaging could be any reason for wanting to engage a conversation, whether it's to join you, to talk about something else, or because they *do* want you to explain the plot, actually, they're curious and know you like to explain things you're interested in.
The solution is not to establish a codified set of Unspoken Rules That Neurotypicals All Know, because different NT people have different "rules" and assumptions, as do autistic people, as do non-autistic neurodivergent people, the solution is clearer communication.
(side note, yeah the post didn't even acknowledge non-NT, non-autistic people either but they did make an addendum that switched to saying "allistic" instead of "neurotypical" so I appreciate that - it did keep doing the same universalizing I'm complaining about though)
Yes I mostly mean neurotypical people need to communicate clearly and not assume their implied intent is going to be universally understood/people they talk to will be communicating through the same subtextual language, but also I see some autistic folks reacting to that post
like it's cracked the code for them, and I implore you to not take that explanation at face value either because it is also assuming a specific subtext is going to be universal! The better way to communicate is to ask for clarification if an interaction is confusing or you seem
to have been misunderstood, rather than assume that one allistic person's implied intent will apply to all allistic people.
Here's an allistic communication secret many allistic people don't know: they're bad at communicating with each other and make wrong assumptions there, too.
Here's an allistic communication secret many allistic people don't know: they're bad at communicating with each other and make wrong assumptions there, too.
(of course this thread was mostly "getting my thoughts out since I've thought about communication problems caused by assumed context a lot already", rather than trying to give advice I think everyone should listen to, but also for full context, I kind of danced around whether
I'm speaking from a place of being autistic or not and the answer is basically "I don't know", I definitely have ADHD so I'm not neurotypical but the possibility I might be autistic has only come up relatively recently in my life and I haven't investigated it much so far)
