NBC has started a new show called Parenthood that airs on Tuesday evenings at 10/9c time. The third episode will be on March 16th. The character Max Braverman in the show portrays an eight-year-old recently diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome. The first and second episodes introduced Aspergers in a unnecessarily frightening way to parents, as can be seen in the full-length videos NBC has on their website for Parenthood.
It is good that Aspergers is getting attention, but it’s also highly important that Aspergers is introduced into mainstream society properly. NBC’s Thursday night show Community already started openly displaying an (adult) Aspie character through Abed. That Asperger introduction was a bit rocky at first, but it seems to be settling into a positive light. How Max in Parenthood moves along in regard to developing the reputation of Aspies is yet to be seen.
What television networks now need to do, especially since using the word “Aspergers” out loud, is to plug in the Aspie label everywhere it belongs so that society can realize how diverse the Asperger population is. Those who have received a lot of exposure to many different Aspies speak tell the truth when saying, “If you’ve seen one Aspie, you’ve seen one Aspie.” Aspies really are like snowflakes in that regard.
The pilot of Parenthood that aired on the 2nd of March shows Max struggling with an art project in class. Not all Aspies have that kind of trouble with motor skills; e.g., Van Gogh and Mozart. I could well relate to Max’s frustration when he was trying to follow the line on folded paper to cut out a heart. Even though I could probably cut with better precision than my other classmates in elementary school, when it would come to a task I could not do anywhere near as well — for example, having to stand in front of a class and talk — I would be as affected by how others would react to my frustration as much as Max was in that clip. I wouldn’t physically assault others like he did. Instead, I turned my anger inward and depressed myself. As I grew up, that pattern resulted in self-destructive behavior.
A parent of an Asperger child left a comment on NBC’s site saying that the taunting and the bullying depicted (in Max’s classroom art project clip) are mild compared to the real world. He is absolutely correct about that! Kids are very mean and love to attack those who they know are too sensitive to take it. They know what they’re provoking. They do it because they know they can get away with it. To them, it’s fun to put others down. It doesn’t change as these kids grow up either. These NTs as adults continue to perfect their skills at bullying; all throughout life they enjoy this game and get away with it. It gives them warped power. It’s a mental illness for which there is no cure. The American Psychiatric Association would never put that into their Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.
When I was in elementary school, students were told to draw maps in the classroom and to make book covers from paper bags. Those two things I excelled in. It was also the only time I was popular. Because others knew I wanted acceptance, they hovered around me waiting their turn for me to help them with their maps or book covers (help as in doing it for them). As soon as they got what they wanted, I went back to being either ignored or bullied.
Whenever anyone presents Aspergers in a negative light (i.e., labed as being a: disease, disorder, disability, handicap, condition, etc.), they are still continuing to bully the Asperger population. The only difference is that it’s being done in a deceptive and subtly sophisticated manner — like a sugar coated pill society has no clue what they’re swallowing. If people would not have the kind of tunnel vision Adam Braverman did when he was having his first conversation with Dr. Pelikan about Adam’s Aspergers, maybe there would be greater hope for people to figure out the obvious instead of paying ridiculous amount of money to hear what they should already know.
It’s supposed to be practical to want your son to not go to school in a pirate outfit so he won’t be permanently labeled as weird by his classmates. I can understand that. But, what I have trouble to understand is how a parent can overlook something far more important. Dr. Pelikan stated the key to an Aspie child’s success in life is his parents’ involvement; more specifically the parents must enter into their Aspie child’s world as much as they are able to learn how their child thinks differently from the rest of the world. It’s no different than being successful at anything else.
What makes a great deer hunter is someone who knows how a deer thinks. Even though drops of water don’t think, to be the best at fixing leaks, you must immerse yourself into the way a drop of water would travel. To be a great actor requires being the character whom you are playing. It’s like connecting the dots — you absolutely must have communication and each person has to understand the other as much as possible. This takes time, work, and dedication.
There is a woman who recently contacted me wanting my consent to be quoted in her book, along with 49 other adult Aspies. She is a parent of Aspie children. It’s because of her love for her children, and not knowing about Aspergers before those children grew up, she has dedicated the past three years of her life to search for answers as to why her one Asperger son commited suicide. She learned that the truth about Aspergers isn’t stemming from the professionals; it’s coming from the adult Aspies. People display intelligence by knowing where to focus their attention and this lady is the type of person who will have the most impact upon helping to straighten out the mess that fools are making when trying to educate the public about what Aspergers is.
Side notes — On the two Wednesdays after Parenthood aired the night before, the amount Aspergers was googled topped the records. I was pleasantly surprised by how entertaining the show is. Monk, Mr. Bean, the IT Crowd, and Breaking Bad are now pretty much the only shows I will watch. Desperate Housewives is becoming too distasteful for me lately. The only other show besides Parenthood that NBC surprised me with as worth watching on occasion is Community.
