A small scale and probably more common example—a friend who lost his job because his co-workers and his immediate boss didn’t trust him because he wouldn’t pad his expense account.
I think the problem was that having a non-standard moral system meant he was too unpredictable.
Admittedly, (and I only have his account of his life) there was another problem—he has Asperger’s and he’s a large guy. Neurotypicals (perhaps only neuroytypical men) would automatically see him as physically threatening.
If you want to offer advice about the situation he was in, please make it hypothetical. At this point, his depression and anxiety are bad enough that he’s on disability and not in the job market.
For another example, note that whistle-blowers need legal protection to keep their jobs. In the case of the man who released the Abu Graib photos, he needed protection because of death threats.
Where does signaling absolute honesty fit in a world where many people make it unwelcome?
A small scale and probably more common example—a friend who lost his job because his co-workers and his immediate boss didn’t trust him because he wouldn’t pad his expense account.
They were probably worried that he would inform on others for padding their expense accounts. Someone who follows a stricter set of moral rules, but doesn’t plan to force those rules on others, should be sure to clarify that they don’t mind others following less strict rules, within reason, and wouldn’t make trouble over them.
From what my friend told me, his Asperger’s meant that he was very bad at getting neurotypicals to trust him.
Also, his explicit thinking was that he had no way to figure out when to bend the explicit rules, so he was going to follow them. This might imply that if the rules changed to require him to report people who were breaking them, he’d comply.
These sound like two problems of the same class. To avoid similar future problems of this type, your friend should study how NTs create and enforce social norms, probably with reference to game theory.
Many of the social deficiencies that are typically a part of AS can be worked around by explicitly thinking out chains of reasoning that NTs perform instinctively, and then practicing that kind of thinking enough that it becomes (relatively) instinctual. Social skills are skills.
A small scale and probably more common example—a friend who lost his job because his co-workers and his immediate boss didn’t trust him because he wouldn’t pad his expense account.
I think the problem was that having a non-standard moral system meant he was too unpredictable.
Admittedly, (and I only have his account of his life) there was another problem—he has Asperger’s and he’s a large guy. Neurotypicals (perhaps only neuroytypical men) would automatically see him as physically threatening.
If you want to offer advice about the situation he was in, please make it hypothetical. At this point, his depression and anxiety are bad enough that he’s on disability and not in the job market.
For another example, note that whistle-blowers need legal protection to keep their jobs. In the case of the man who released the Abu Graib photos, he needed protection because of death threats.
Where does signaling absolute honesty fit in a world where many people make it unwelcome?
They were probably worried that he would inform on others for padding their expense accounts. Someone who follows a stricter set of moral rules, but doesn’t plan to force those rules on others, should be sure to clarify that they don’t mind others following less strict rules, within reason, and wouldn’t make trouble over them.
From what my friend told me, his Asperger’s meant that he was very bad at getting neurotypicals to trust him.
Also, his explicit thinking was that he had no way to figure out when to bend the explicit rules, so he was going to follow them. This might imply that if the rules changed to require him to report people who were breaking them, he’d comply.
These sound like two problems of the same class. To avoid similar future problems of this type, your friend should study how NTs create and enforce social norms, probably with reference to game theory.
Many of the social deficiencies that are typically a part of AS can be worked around by explicitly thinking out chains of reasoning that NTs perform instinctively, and then practicing that kind of thinking enough that it becomes (relatively) instinctual. Social skills are skills.