Embarrasment Squick
Ghost and I had a conversation about TV shows that hit my embarrassment squick and why, and I came to some realizations trying to explain it to him. I can watch Community with no problems, only have passing blushes for Coupling, Big Bang Theory with some squirming, can no longer watch It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia, and can't do even the first episode of Parks and Recreation without feeling like I am going to die of squicky shame.
And here's why: when other characters accept and deal with a socially inept character's quirks and faux pas it reminds me of how my life is now (post-social anxiety) and when they look at the inept character like they're crazy, ostracize or berate the character with no understanding or acceptance, it reminds me of having social anxieties based out of wanting so desperately to not be terrible at relating and connecting to people. And failing.
So I cried some, and I was snotty and blothcy-faced while talking about what one of the Sol Society (our high school poetry club) said to me about how my enthusiasm was great but I was kind of ruining things for everyone by talking so could I maybe not? Talk ever? Because I was offending people and then not apologizing when they couldn't explain why what I said was offensive in a way that I could understand and sometimes things would devolve into arguments . . . and basically the gist was that maybe if I couldn't manage not to be a disruption that ruined everyone else's good time that I should enjoy poetry by myself. Or at least that was what I took from what was probably meant to be a kind conversation about the need to magically read people's minds on what is and isn't insulting, and we were in high school so I get that they couldn't parse my behavior or articulate what they found offensive in my anarchist, anti-idiocy, anti-establishment, anti-wealth attitudes. I was 14; it was high school; I can cut us all some slack for the bad communication skills.
That time sticks out in my memory because it was the time that someone was nice about it. The others were more fist-based conversations where someone would accuse me of being a bitch and trying to start a fight, which I would respond to . . . by showing them my bitch-picking-fight skills. Which were awesome, BTW.
And then when I was fifteen I met someone who decided to teach me to how to lie and how to not get manipulated and her boyfriend who taught me how to like people and how to have a conscience. But acquiring a conscience after you have a solid memory of your actions is not like developing a conscience when you are three and can't remember every episode of wanting to hurt people deliberately. Developing a conscience at ~16 is more like being Angelus and then being Angel. The conscience you now have is like living in a hell you built, every fire is one you set, you forged all the pitchforks. It's personal, where before you were grinding along in a hellish teenaged existence with other teens in a high school that most of you resented and found horrible. So then you're in hell and even more alone than before.
So that was when I started being less awkward but REALLY FAKE around anyone not in a tiny in-group of people who understood and didn't give me the looks like I was a crazy person, like I was scary and might say something true but horrible at any moment, might flip out and punch somebody, like I was a pitiable reject like one of the characters on TV that I can't watch because it hits too close to home. I was one of the people who got those looks and even if the situation isn't familiar, the looks and the sense of rejection ARE.
I think that's why almost all Aspie females have social anxiety issues. We grow up with this expectation for us to be able to get along, and we're taught to judge ourselves and accept negative judgements from others based on that Procrustean metric. We're not socially inept, we're rude bitches; we're not disabled, there's somethingwrong with us. If we can't do it right even when we're trying so hard then we must only have the power to hurt. It warps the way we see ourselves until we have a crippled sense of our own agency. That's what an embarrassment squick is for me. My feelings of powerlessness are still there even if I'm not that person anymore.
And here's why: when other characters accept and deal with a socially inept character's quirks and faux pas it reminds me of how my life is now (post-social anxiety) and when they look at the inept character like they're crazy, ostracize or berate the character with no understanding or acceptance, it reminds me of having social anxieties based out of wanting so desperately to not be terrible at relating and connecting to people. And failing.
So I cried some, and I was snotty and blothcy-faced while talking about what one of the Sol Society (our high school poetry club) said to me about how my enthusiasm was great but I was kind of ruining things for everyone by talking so could I maybe not? Talk ever? Because I was offending people and then not apologizing when they couldn't explain why what I said was offensive in a way that I could understand and sometimes things would devolve into arguments . . . and basically the gist was that maybe if I couldn't manage not to be a disruption that ruined everyone else's good time that I should enjoy poetry by myself. Or at least that was what I took from what was probably meant to be a kind conversation about the need to magically read people's minds on what is and isn't insulting, and we were in high school so I get that they couldn't parse my behavior or articulate what they found offensive in my anarchist, anti-idiocy, anti-establishment, anti-wealth attitudes. I was 14; it was high school; I can cut us all some slack for the bad communication skills.
That time sticks out in my memory because it was the time that someone was nice about it. The others were more fist-based conversations where someone would accuse me of being a bitch and trying to start a fight, which I would respond to . . . by showing them my bitch-picking-fight skills. Which were awesome, BTW.
And then when I was fifteen I met someone who decided to teach me to how to lie and how to not get manipulated and her boyfriend who taught me how to like people and how to have a conscience. But acquiring a conscience after you have a solid memory of your actions is not like developing a conscience when you are three and can't remember every episode of wanting to hurt people deliberately. Developing a conscience at ~16 is more like being Angelus and then being Angel. The conscience you now have is like living in a hell you built, every fire is one you set, you forged all the pitchforks. It's personal, where before you were grinding along in a hellish teenaged existence with other teens in a high school that most of you resented and found horrible. So then you're in hell and even more alone than before.
So that was when I started being less awkward but REALLY FAKE around anyone not in a tiny in-group of people who understood and didn't give me the looks like I was a crazy person, like I was scary and might say something true but horrible at any moment, might flip out and punch somebody, like I was a pitiable reject like one of the characters on TV that I can't watch because it hits too close to home. I was one of the people who got those looks and even if the situation isn't familiar, the looks and the sense of rejection ARE.
I think that's why almost all Aspie females have social anxiety issues. We grow up with this expectation for us to be able to get along, and we're taught to judge ourselves and accept negative judgements from others based on that Procrustean metric. We're not socially inept, we're rude bitches; we're not disabled, there's somethingwrong with us. If we can't do it right even when we're trying so hard then we must only have the power to hurt. It warps the way we see ourselves until we have a crippled sense of our own agency. That's what an embarrassment squick is for me. My feelings of powerlessness are still there even if I'm not that person anymore.