klog

I was speaking with m1 in the ILUG chatroom today, and he mentioned an online autism test on Wired.com.

When you fill that out, and submit it, though, you will be shown the source code of the script which was supposed to calculate the results.

To get it to work, download the source, copy it into a .pl file, and upload it to your own server into your own cgi-bin (chmod to 755 before uploading). Then open up the test, use Firebug to edit the ‘action’ parameter of the form to point to your machine, and there you go!

If you want to try it out yourself, my copy of the file is here: http://verens.com/cgi-bin/autistic.pl - go to the wired.com form, change its action using Firebug (”inspect” the form, and click the action parameter to change it), then fill in the form and submit.

I scored 32, by the way, which is not quite the social animal I’m sure everyone takes me for, but also not extremely autistic. (of course, a few of those questions were confusing, so I may have got them wrong )

Today, I add a new tag to my wordpress collection.

Yesterday, Jareth’s psychiatrist, the jazz-playing Michael McDonough, verified that Jareth is autistic.

This was not a snap decision. Jareth has been in observation for over a year now. Almost every week, I’ve taken half a day off work to bring him to sessions at Enable Ireland. the Monaghan branch is very very friendly.

Some of the signs of his autism:

• He will be four next month. He has not spoken a single sentence yet.
• He expresses excitement by jumping up and down and flapping his hands
• He has extraordinary sequencing ability - can write numbers from 0 to whatever, and letters from a to z. Also the reverse - z to a, whatever to 0.
• His drawing ability is more complex than one would expect of a three year old.

There are more symptoms (see here for the more common characteristics), but they are not as visually obvious.

So why am I putting this in my blog? Surely one non-technical post this month is more than enough?

Well, if you are reading this blog, you are probably a technical person. And you probably exhibit those same characteristics. Are you very good in some areas (programming, for example) and other people think you are anti-social (even if you don’t think so yourself)? Do you fidget?

The reason I say all this is that I see myself in Jareth. As a child, I was always alone, I was nicknamed “Einstein II” because I had a great ability in maths and general knowledge (the maths ability stagnated as I got bored with school), I still fidget (rocking, finger tapping), people say I am antisocial and arrogant and even sometimes obnoxious although I really don’t see it at the time and am always surprised when someone says it.

Autism is about 80% genetic, and there is a 4.3:1 ratio of male to female incidence. this means that if Jareth’s autism is hereditary, then he most likely got it from me than from Bronwyn.

There is a plus side, though - I grew out of most of the symptoms, and I think he will as well.

Also, his abilities are perfect for the 21st century - his interests lie in areas that are perfect for engineering, programming, or other technical careers. I think he’ll go far.

Autism is not a bad thing. It is just another way of approaching life. There is no cure, but autistics say that they don’t want to be “cured” anyway.

My son enjoys his life, even if communication is frustrating, and I would not have him any other way.

okay - “nigger”. this word is so bloody annoying. It’s not even the word itself, which is just a colloquialised version of “negro”, but rather the stupid stigma which has risen around it.

Bronwyn likes to watch Big Brother. Personally, the show annoys me - it’s composed mostly of very stupid people who will soon be very rich for no good reason.

Last year’s season included a scandal where a group of girls bullied Shilpa Shetty. What people should have been annoyed at was that bullying had taken place, but that appeared to take second place to the fact that Shilpa is not british. So?? Bullying is bullying, no matter where someone was born!

Now, this year, an eejit on the show uses the word “nigger” in a mis-guided effort to be cool.

“Wazzup my nigger”. Is that okay to say? Apparently, it is okay to say if you have dark skin (”black”? no-one has black skin - dark brown, maybe). If a non-”black” person says the word, they are immediately and incontrovertibly branded as racist, and have absolutely no defense. Stupid? Yes.

The problem here is not that “nigger” is an insulting word, but that it is apparently only insulting if it is used by a “white” (pink, maybe - how many people do you know that have white skin?) person.

The problem here, then, is that the actual usage of the word is racist. If used by a white person, it is insulting. If used by a black person, it is not. I wonder if Channel 4 would have given out at all if one of the black people on the show had used the word? They haven’t so far…

It might be tempting to ban the word, but that leads to extremity. What if people then start saying “wazzup, N?”, where ‘N’ is obviously a shortened version of “nigger”? You cannot ban a letter.

It’s all stupid.

I like to think I am not racist. Who knows… am I? After all, I did just write the word “nigger” a few times!

Just to make it absolutely clear, as Bronwyn has read through tis article and not gotten it - I am annoyed that people misunderstand where the racist connotation is with the word “nigger” - I’m annoyed that only black people can use it without being branded - that is racist. The word itself is racist as well, obviously, but to say it is okay for some and not for others is bloody stupid.

Another “by the way”. Bronwyn does not like me to even use the word “nigger” in this article, even though the whole thing is about the word. I believe that if we hide away from it, then we perpetuate the whole stigma against the discussion of the word.

Yes, the word is an insult, but we should still be able to talk about it.