endemic bus malpractices

Here is an action towards a public office, citing disability discrimination on our behalf, that consequently they have a duty to act on, and they are not doing. Now, what is the point of having a disability discrimination law if we are not supplied with the means to pin down any public office to give answers according to it???!!

These 2 emails were to the "Bus Passenger's Platform", the complaints department of an entity called Passenger View which advises the Scottish government on what bus passengers need without at all having to ask bus passengers what we want it to say! When you complain to BPP about malpractices by bus drivers, usually it is on the bus companies' side and completely in their pocket. BPP will scrape the gutter for any excuse to find that the bus company couldn't have taken an absolute line on preventing the malpractice.

BPP is one of those bodies that exists to make it look like something is being done. In reality, even if you have been blatantly bullied by a bus driver and the advertised bus sevice blatantly not honoured at all, as long as BPP's decisions are discretionary it is utterly pointless to lodge a complaint to BPP. The only thing there is any point in doing, is to extract from each bus malpractice any aspect you can of distinct ill-treatment of a minority needs group, and lobby BPP about it, telling BPP it is acting illegally concerning discrimination unless it admits that its duty to make findings in favour of the minority need is automatic, not discretionary. You need to ask BPP to confirm this to you before you file an actual case to them. This is what I sought to do in the following emails:

Mar 5: I belong to [mentioned Elas and Sasn].

The vulnerablilities caused by Asperger Syndrome include a reliance on literal information, and lack of facility to make contextual guesses that information is not meant literally. This would include, that we more than other passengers can't be expected to guess, by cultural norm, that some information given in a bus timetable is less true than other parts of the timetable and may routinely not be honoured by the bus operator. It would be illegal disability discrimination to expect any such thing of us.

A consequence of this, is that it would be illegal disability discrimination against us, ever not to find against the operator, in a case where a particular service frequently jumps one of the stops it is advertised to observe, and the operator has ignored or evaded all efforts to pin them down committally to do anything about it. A case where there is always a 50-50 chance that the bus you want will sweep past the stop in the central dual carriageway lanes that block it from observing the stop, instead of taking the side lanes to observe the stop, and this is on a long distance service so that total wreckage of a day's travel plan is inflicted by it.

In any case of this nature, it needs only be established that the company is allowing the offence to happen, by its lack of committal answers, and that makes it a simple 100% certainty that the complaint would be upheld. Hence, it would be illegal disability discrimination to a recognised medical group who have public speaking outlets, for you not to agree that this is the case, to this enquiry in advance of an actual case being brought, or to be noncommittal about it.

It would be disability discrimination to insist that the actual case is brought before you take any position, because by so insisting, you would be keeping in existence a visibly provenly illegal margin of discretion against the position being an automatic certainty. You would be forcing the case to be a gamble instead of a routine upholding of a literal principle. You would be saying that in a case where the factual finding was that yes the events concerned have happened, it could ever be at all possible even in theory to find against a complaint of the nature described and to allow a bus operator to behave in this way.

Past experience proves the need to put the case's committal medical principle to you before being forced into taking any gambles on which way you might go if it is left to arbitrary discretion.

Mar 12 BPP's answer: [first an unnecessary para explaining what BPP is]

Unfortunately you have not indicated whether or not the bus company has had an opportunity to address your complaint. I would be grateful if you would advise this office accordingly. If the operator has responded to your complaint and you are unhappy with the response, you must sens a copy of all relevant correspondence to this office.

If the complaint has not been taken up with the bus operator in the first instance, I regret that BPP is unable to consider your complaint at this stage.

Mar 14: Yes, we are talking about a case here the bus company has had this problem repeatedly put to it over a year and a half, and has only gone from explaining each incident as an isolated driver error, to not answering at all.

I know the rules about sending correspondence with an actual complaint - I have experienced the process before. But I have not made any actual complaint to you yet. I was enquiring about BPP's attitude to a principle: the committally automatic wrongness in every case ever, of a bus service being allowed to persist in often jumping one of the stops it is advertised to observe, by passing it in the wrong traffic lane for stopping.

I pointed out the disability discrimination to a whole population group, that would be done if BPP refuses to take a position on this principle that would be known in advance to apply to any specific case of it that is brought to you. So that cases are not forced to be brought to you with the discretionary possibility of BPP choosing not to uphold the principle even if the facts are found to be as described.

Thank you,

- To which there has been no further answer. You can see that BPP is meticulously evading making any comment at all on the question asked of it. Does a complaint of this particular malpractice by buses have to be upheld automatically if it is established the malpractice happened? BPP is blatantly committing disability discrimination and acting corruptly to the oppression of bus users, by ignoring this question and seeking to hold onto a discretionary power to reject such a complaint.

Let me tell you where this bus malpractice has been happening - it is on an important trunk route. It is on Citylink's M91 stopping service from Edinburgh to Perth, some coaches continuing to Inverness. One of the advertised stops on the more frequently stopping coaches is at the south side of the Forth Bridge, the former tolls, which is still stubbornly being called "tolls" in bus timetables long after the tolls have been abolished. Quite often these coaches just charge past in the central lane of the dual carriageway and ignore this stop. It can happen in both directions, but mostly in the northward direction where the stop is located on an entry sliplane, so that if the coach fails to take an exit from the main carriageway it is then barricaded into the central lanes and can't access the stop.

For a year and a half I have had repeated cause to make complaints to Citylink about this, and the only answer they ever give is a one-off apology for the driver error in forgetting the stop. The first time they said they would remind drivers about it, but this changed nothing. They will never say anything committal specifying how they will force all their staff to observe the stop. Twice I have enquired on behalf of both Elas and our equivalent in Fife, telling them that aspies have no instincts to guess in some cultural way that their service's published details should not be taken literally! and formally asking which coaches they will guarantee for certain will observe the stop, if we should organise some group travel starting at that point. CITYLINK HAS IGNORED AND NEVER ANSWERED THOSE ENQUIRIES. THIS ITSELF IS DISABILITY DISCRIMINATION, THAT THE BPP's ASSISTANCE IS NEEDED TO STOP, YET WE LIVE IN A STATE WHERE THE BPP ITSELF CAN GET AWAY WITH BEING EQUALLY CORRUPT. If you are a visitor in the Year of Homecoming, this is the state of the state here. If you are an aspie as well, and if you are trying to head north of the Forth, you have cause to complain that you are left in unclarity how the hell you are supposed to plan travel in a state where nobody enforces the honouring of published transport services in reality. If you tell Year of Homecoming about this, do you find them committal or noncommittal about caring? - for that will tell you whether it's just a con.

Some other bus malpractices that BPP's attitude also encourages to happen, are these.
* A driver on Stagecoach who drives away from the present diversionary stops in central Edinburgh, with their long queues, before passengers who were well back in the queue can reach him, and visibly laughs about it.
* First refusing to give any committal answer that their buses can be hailed from the wrong side of the road, even when they know this evasion is an offence against road safety because it meant you had to run in front of a very late bus that suddenly appeared in Galashiels' one way system, and which still drove past you anyway,
* or even when you are walking from East Linton to Haddington in the evening because 3 successive of their buses have not turned up, ("mechanical failure!") and then one passes you on the road some way short of Haddington just when it's starting to rain.
* Drivers on First who refuse to believe that the fare you want exists, in First's preposterously muddled zonal system.
* Who insist that a day ticket is just an ordinary return, or
* who take a £20 note from you then refuse to give it back or to sell you anything but the fare they think you should want instead of the fare you do want. NB - I got signed for a free bus pass as a direct result of that experience, actually on grounds of the burden of coping with communication with bus drivers! and this establishes every aspie should get one. But that is no get-out from the need to enforce proper trading standards upon First too, is it? including sacking that driver?

The Green Party, which always insults our intelligence by saying please use public transport and save carbon, never takes any position on any specific transport malpractice. I asked their council candidate in 2007, for a position against First because of the Sunday morning trains that had repeatedly been leaving early from Dalmeny station, that I had twice in 6 weeks seen ruin the travel plan of a mother trying to take 2 small infants to Glasgow visiting family. I got, "If you will forgive me, I can only respond to your general query about public transport and accountability, rather than your ongoing problems with First." DON'T FORGIVE THEM - this is the worst offence that democracy's entire effectiveness is still abused by, it is NONCOMMITTALITY. If the Greens keep this up in the coming Euro election, they are committing a specific minority uncaringness upon the autistic spectrum, because we can't be expected to communicate successfully with corrupt bus or train staff or to observe corrupt unstated principles of how to get by despite them.

Maurice Frank

Asperger Syndrome and neighbourhood living

It's recognised that people with Asperger's are a lot less likely to live independently than the general population, once they have reached adulthood. I would like to write though, much of it from personal experience as an independent adult Aspie, about the situations that can be faced by Aspies who do make it to independent living.

Chances are if you live alone (most independent Aspies are just that, independent and won't be with a partner) you'll be living in a flat, and in turn it'll probably be in a communal stair, with anything from 6 to 12, or more, flats. The independent Aspie can be seriously stretched in such an arrangement. Many people living independently have problems with the antisocial behaviour of other residents, such as noise, groups of people loitering, vandalism etc. This can expose the independent Aspie to distressing situations from neighbourhood living. Sensitivity from stimuli such as noise do not help. Neither does it help when neighbours or locals notice your social and communication challenges and so pick up what they feel is a "differentness" in you.

I think that living in a stair or block of flats in close proximity with a number of neighbours takes a lot of social skill to cope. This particularly challenges Aspies. It's all very well if you keep yourself to yourself, but you wouldn't have space all to yourself but instead are sharing communal space with other people. Affordability becomes an issue especially with the problems many Aspies have with unemployment and underemployment. This can have a knock-on effect on where you can obtain housing. In turn that would increase one's chances of antisocial behaviour, as would the number of properties within any one stair.

I am an advocate of housing that is more specific to the independent adult Aspie where one way or another they may be protected from antisocial or nuisance neighbours, and will push for this to happen. One way to achieve this, perhaps, is for housing associations to allocate blocks for people with AS or autism, with support as appropriate, once need for the amount of housing is identified. It wouldn't necessarily have to be sheltered, but certainly out of the mainstream private or council housing, where you never know who is next door. But this way the independent adult Aspie could have a better go at a settled life.

By: An Edinburgh Aspie

Dragon's wings - by David Seagrave

GROW YOUR DRAGON S WINGS !

I weite this to explain what we do and how I can help adults with high functioning autism .I was diagnosed with Aspergers Syndrome in 2004, 50 years too late to avoid a blighted life when my troubles began in 1952 and it is a long and harrowing story .

I attended Red Hill Remedial School in Kent which so decisively moulded my character that my most important achievement in life is my burgeoning literary collection called The Socrates Of Charford It is about a fictional Welsh classmate Alan Wright from Charford in Avalonshire a fictional county between Glos and Gwent.Alan acquires that soubriquet because he invents a life affirming Standard to Live By called Contributionism and lives according to its teachings to become the headmaster of a similar school in my storyline.

Aristotle declared “An exemplary life is the ultimate beauty “.I struggle to emulate Alan but I am thwarted at every turn.I have offered a portfolio of edifying pursuits which I have practiced since my schooldays but I am in severe difficulties.I am bound to declare that I am simply appalled by attitudes in Scottish society that were absent in my days at Glasgow University in the late sixties.Leading contributors to the Scotsman and Herald all concur about the social evils that have grown in recent years .I am not I trust being a SNOB when I put across Alan Wright s Contributionism as a way forwards and quote a couplet “Moelwyn-Wright,our Leader –Guide/His Code of Conduct doth provide/A path to grace up mountains steep/Our way of life I vow to keep” allegorising Alan s middle name MOELWYN a 720m high mountain near Portmadoc his birthplace borne as his long deceased uncle s forename .MOELWYNHOOD is the state of maturity which all adults should grow into- as Socrates and Plato explained – the development of all the virtues – diligence, honesty,patience,imagination,.tolerance, good humour, single mindedness, ignoring adversity,thrift, foresightedness,lateral thinking, loyal service freely given,and steadfast adherence to Higher Principles in the face of evil

I have coined the expression “Growing Dragon s Wings” to denote a frame of mind where someone has reached such a mastery of worthwhile pursuits that distressing peculiarities shrink to insignificance and figuratively aloft on those dragon s wings he is beyond the reach of scorn.When I climbed Cader Idris 6 months after being maimed I had in spirit soared a thousand metres above the mindless common herd and small-minded .people like my late and devoutly Christian father.He practiced “Thomas-the –Tank-Engine-Christianity “ –that is Christian dogma at the reading age of 7 –and so did my mother whose intellectual level was that of tiddley-winks .She could not understand the everyday English of London quality papers let alone the contents of my university essays !

The shy sensitive ASD young adult needs what I call Moral Armament to cope with the evil people he must collide with on leaving school.My mentors at Red Hill School taught me about charlatans and crooks and the many deceptions practiced even in the 1950s .Today every high street is full of premises who se real purpose is to extract MONEY from gullible people such as gambling-machine arcades I was taught the mathematical proof how gamblers always lose their money and took it to heart along with much else I had assimilated at that school.During civil disturbances in 1981 when I was maimed I wrote playlets about a young man who got into trouble and the Court sent him to Alan Wright for treatment They illustrated the predicament facing young men today ,then too ASD adults are picked upon at work and by relatives so they end up isolated and embittered

I am simply appalled by the attitudes of some people in the corridors of power.Without naming them influential religious factions hold that involuntary peculiarities and mental illness is a sign of SIN in the individual and thus justifies unspeakable cruelty.The victims spiral into severe mental illness and alcoholism and crime and come before the courts as people so severely damaged that even my fictional Welshman might fail to heal the scars in their minds.Funding for mental health services is being cut and with that comes closure of facilities for ASD people.

I have been IN TROUBLE for disclosing my hurtful past in autobiographies which I will gladly share AND for explaining the principles behind Alan Wright s Contributionism which clash with religious authoritarianisms- who would all execrate me for being a threat to their moth-eaten dogmas that have no relevance at all in 21st Century society I am saying this in the expectation that I will again be in trouble even for presenting you with inspiring stories about ASD people like “Red Haired Roderick “ Now look out of the windows dear citizens and identify the bumps on the northern skyline Within an hour s hike along the Devon Valley Way you reach such places as Mill Glen Tillicoultry where I would like to take you to discover dare I say the God Within You And All About as you reach the Rough Confluence and sit high above it to listen to the tumbling waters and the wind s melody and behold the cloud-armadas floating high overhead, enjoy the moor-birds and the wild grandeur .Then I can show you how to make marvellous model buildings from timber found fly –tipped and on me I have a pair of Gripperbreeks that holds my false leg on -made from cloth dumped in a skip –and if permission is granted behold my photographs exposed chiefly in reloaded throwaway cameras – see views of Scotland and overseas – that illustrate what I do.

So give me half a chance and I will teach you my brethren how to rise beyond the reach of scorn as with unremitting effort as you master demanding pursuits you grow your Dragon s Wings

David Seagrave

Dignified roles - by David Seagrave

Will I ever be allowed to play a dignified role ?

Dignified roles have eluded me for most of the years since I moved to Scotland in 1991.I feel very acute loss of dignity unless I am “pulling my weight in society” This has arisen because of what happened as a boy and whenever I was unemployed.My father rubbed into me that I was innately flawed because I had no GOOD MANNERS and had forgotten things like christmas carols.A state of grace was conditional on holding down a job,and also by extension conforming to Christian values that meant REGULAR WORSHIP and Christian marriage and siring offspring.I was in permanent disgrace after a school expulsion in 1953 for preposterously trivial pranks where I was dared to misbehave by smutty minded classmates. I was convinced that I was a dangerous lunatic.I would be LOCKED UP FOR LIFE at Red Hill Remedial School which in fact was NO “Broadmoor for Boys” but an intellectual hothouse that has decisively moulded my character. In my father s eyes I had besetting moral failings for getting sacked because for instance I could NOT ADD UP salaries in the old money fast enough or accurately enough at the Inland Revenue .When I was sacked from a job at a London museum I was told to my face that I had been taken on against their better judgment and I would not get references from them. I threatened to end my life.I did not go head first into the Thames because I had a university application in the pipeline .I was then admitted to a mental hospital where I was fortunately allowed to attend A level classes and do Past Papers .Yet that short spell in a mental hospital was to debar me ever after from graduate level employment as I had to disclose it on every job application.It blotted my copybook as surely as a prison sentence for something really bad

It is a strange paradox that just before the sacking I had deliberately chosen to miss that 7.43 train from Hastings to London which piled up at Hither Green with the loss of many lives.I might have perished in the crash but a row with my father about that event has prompted me to write about my fictional classmate Alan Wright who dares to invent a better code of behaviour than Christian morality

After graduation the Permanent Disgrace of unemployment resumed and did not end until I was maimed in 1981 I wore my heart on my sleeve at interviews I soon realised that I could never become a university lecturer and my self esteem collapsed as a Catholic landlady made gratuitously offensive remarks that I was sponging off the State.The paradox of a triumphant recovery from the maiming led to a decade of halcyon years in Stafford but I hankered to climb every Scottish peak so moved to Cumbernauld in 1991.Apart from my roles in now defunct arts organisations and environmental pressure groups I have had NO dignified roles and my life has imploded into abject egocentric futility. Every time I offered to share all the lifelong fruits of my self-createdness I elicited humiliating rebuffs

My essentially fragile self esteem is rooted in my prowess at intellectually demanding pursuits which are frowned upon in Scotland precisely because they expand brainpower. I have been made to feel deeply ashamed of my interest in model railways yet I am the ONLY MAN in Dunfermline who builds railway models (as opposed to playing with Hornby or similar glorified toy trains) .When I die will all these models be DUMPED? . As I grow too infirm to climb lofty mountains I cannot contain my grief since so much of my self esteem is tied up with my role as the veteran amputee climber YET I am rejected by outdoor fraternities who call me a LIABILITY because I have a false leg !.This morning I received quite an insulting rebuff from an organisation because I had sent them “Grow Your Dragon s Wings “ and “Red Haired Roderick” which explicitly illustrate how we Aspies can rise beyond the reach of scorn by prowess at demanding pursuits of every kind The more I probe into the workings of organisations purportedly dedicated to the well being of people with medical conditions the more I discover that their real function is to aggrandise churchpeople with denominational axes to grind who enjoy lording over their clients and ramming their dogmas down their clients throats.Any display of personal initiative on the part of anybody with a distressing medical condition is seen as INSOLENCE .and a threat to the inflated egoes of the Christian people in charge of the organisation..therefore that person must be put down,belittled,ignored,and if he persists,be besmirched so badly that he is silenced as surely as if he was locked up as a certified lunatic.

Everybody needs to feel valued .I was jackbooted as a boy by authority for such preposterous reasons as looking up swear words in a dictionary ! (and how could I have possibly imagined then that far into the future I would be pursued by gangs of Scottish children who smashed the windows of my home, and stole NINE scooters,and how I was in trouble for mentioning the religion of my tormentors! ) Even though I feel proud of all my achievements I am forever plummeting into deep depression every Sunday because I am alone with nobody to talk to and reminded that it is the LORD S DAY ! as in my mind s ear I hear my fathers reprimands and feel that my very name STINKS of ignominy because I have failed to hold down a job.

Dignified roles are as necessary to our well-being as..a proper diet.We define ourselves primarily by our occupational roles.Mental illness supervenes as surely as night follows day if our self esteem is confiscated.We cannot exist in solitude ; and self-banishment only exacerbates our distress..Yet we collide head-on with dysfunctional Society as we think differently.We are as lost,in crowds of self-destruction-intent people,as surely as we are in pathless forests.As we have figurative periscopes that enable us to see far beyond the mindless mobs,we instinctively act in ways that preserve the environment .
Our habits elicit scorn,reprimands, , ridicule .yet we should expect congratulations .

Some of us have taken to heart the teachings of great thinkers down the ages.I am adamant that Socrates,Plato and Aristotle provided Mankind with a better Code of Behaviour than dogma-encrusted Christian morality. Plato declared that spiritually advanced people are those who have left the cave of ignorance for the sunlight of personal growth.He also explained the workings of the emotions ; three dark horses of Greed and Fear and Aggression and one white horse called Reason; and the Charioteer has to bridle the dark horses and allow the white horse of Reason to keep the Personality on the road of life long self-improvement Long before I studied Plato
in depth I had absorbed his teachings…at Religious Knowledge lessons led by a vicar!

So I created Alan Wright,the Socrates of Charford,as a role-model who lives his exemplary life by applying his exacting Code of Behaviour to everyday affairs.IF Alan was a real person I would right now be his loyal disciple –colliding head-on with small minded Christian people by seeking to lead trainloads of deserving people up mountains every fine Sunday and teaching them all my demanding hobbies on dark winter evenings.As everybody surely knows I was forbidden to emulate Plato and set up a one-man university for Aspies in Edinburgh ..because I live “in a foreign country “! the Kingdom of Fife ! yet it would not have cost the management a single brass cent as I can travel for free !.. they would still have objected because of imagined risks to Aspies on hikes in Holyrood Park ! and with soldering-irons etc.

“No man is an island” and those of us singled out for derogatory labelling still have to come to terms with Society which rejects us .I have been officially and indelibly besmirched on a Government disclosure form by Cumbernauld people (I must not mention their religion or that WILL land me in real trouble) There is a catch line in Sartre s HUIS CLOS “ I am the skylarks mirror,my darling “ ( uttered by the lesbian Ines Serrano that got the play BANNED till 1967 !) A skylarks mirror is someone who so frequently belittles anybody that the victim believes it and takes it to heart . Everybody sees themselves reflected in their neighbours.A well adjusted person can safely ignore the few who try to besmirch him. I have Alan Wright say “I see myself reflected in 5,000 windows.Does it matter if a few are dirty ?” The windows are the people of Charford , his neighbours. We with our social impairments do not find enough clean mirrors to be reflected in as we rightly distance ourselves from the moronised common herd .Yet this is the intractable heart of our collision with Society where all our talents count for nothing when we encounter the ingrained prejudices of people far less capable than ourselves in those disciplines where we shine. In Scottish society anybody with a morally neutral attribute is STILL a target for malicious besmirchment.as my experience proves. No matter how gifted the victim may be or what he might contribute to the common good he is judged for the peculiarity rather than all that is good about him.This is explicit in the very title “Red- haired Roderick”. Whereas when at Glasgow University I was accepted as a typical classic English eccentric .in Cumbernauld I felt like a Jew in Nazi Germany and that culminated in my own personal Kristallnacht in 2000 when mobs smashed my windows and I lived from hour to hour in fear of being SLAIN by gangs of children.

For all the beauty of the Scottish scenery I am desperate to quit Scotland I felt good yesterday as while walking I appreciated the whin in bloom by the roadside and reflected that if Mankind continues to wreck Earth quite soon there will be NOBODY ALIVE to thank God for the whin in bloom on a fine May evening I worked on a model viaduct and felt that it was utterly pointless to continue with that or anything else that I used to enjoy doing since I had NOBODY to share it with.I had offered those wanton fruits of my Asperger mind and was ignored or rebuffed with dark hints that anybody who dares to dissent from the motheaten Christian dogmas of our masters will be banished from society yet what DOES society offer me? Only FOOTBALL and SOAP OPERA and BINGE DRINKING ! No wonder I feel as I did in Cumbernauld that I am the ONLY JEW IN DUNFERMLINE so I dream of Stafford as my home town where I was valued as a hero ( who went on all night vigils in November watching for nuclear weapons convoys !) I wake in Dunfermline feeling that I am as bad as a paedophile.

Even if someone was a university professor he deserves to forfeit a dignified role in Society if he behaved like Josef Fritzl But myself ! the worst I can ever do to anybody is swear at them !

…then I have nightmares which are re-runs of the assault in my bedroom in 2005 with children ransacking my home and a boy holding my craft knife to my throat ,or equally scary re-enactments of events in Cumbernauld- glasses smashed by small girls and helpless as a bus bears down on me …I wake in terror far from Stafford and weep .

…and were I to try to teach my specialist interests would potential pupils land me in court because THOU SHALT NOT : use soldering irons; superglue; hammers,,saws,files,let alone a modelmaking lathe .THOU SHALT NOT develop colour films (still assuming I can buy colour developer ) and THOU SHALT NOT defile the sanctity of the LORDS DAY by taking parties of hikers to the Highlands ….this is Scotland in the 21st century fast regressing to Independence days when everybody pried into one another s affairs and made moral judgments about one another for such matters as their BEDTIMES!

Will I ever be allowed to play a dignified role?

David Seagrave

Social Dread

One thing that puzzles and annoys me is a feeling of dread for social situations were I'm expected to appear as a confident and sociable person.

I vividly recall, particularly in my teens, sitting around or staring out of windows, trying to muster up the will to go to a disco, party or even a prize giving event were I was expected to receive a prize. A part of me wanted to go - and felt I ought to go - but another part had doubts and these doubts quickly grew into an overwhelming dread. While in this state I couldn't do much except wait for the time of the event to pass by. Strangely, even now, sometimes, when someone asks me out for a personal social event, often someone I like and would like to meet, the dread comes back and I have to let the opportunity slip by.

Even, recently, I painfully recall not be able to participate in a work colleague's birthday presentation. I was friendly with the handful of people involved but participating in this social occasion was impossible at that moment. I had to leave my office and wander about the streets killing time until the event had passed. I felt very bad because I knew my colleagues would think I was behaving in a very unfriendly manner and it might sour subsequent relations.

I think part of the social dread comes from negative experiences from past social encounters. I'm now thinking about an occasion when I willed myself to go to the house party of a friend. I was determined to try and work out a way to enjoy myself. I was thinking that if I turned up then maybe it could happen by accident. It didn't work out - but still I tried to keep up appearances and hoped no one noticed my struggle.

It was obvious to me that there was a lot of hidden social language happening that did not register on my social radar. I'm particularly referring to looks, eye contact, facial expressions, body language and tone of voice. I would like to have tried to attract some women I liked the look of and thought might have some interest in me if they just got to know me - but I really didn't have the knack or knowledge to make this happen.

I also now know that these situations caused me sensory overload. I mean, my mind and senses were overwhelmed by a combination of dim lighting, assorted noises, music, talking, smells and close body encounters. I quickly got tired and focused my mind on the best exit plan. I find leaving particularly difficult and it could take me some time to execute my plan. I was very happy to get away.

I hope to gain a better understanding and do a bit better in these situations in the future.

Paul

Perceptions

No social flow or instinct naturally connects between you and the folk you talk to. That's the essential thing that makes AS. It shows in 2 key ways. You lack the feel to relate at a casual level, with this not being out of shyness but having no instinct for the other person's angle on your best way to relate to them. Your speech connects instead with the content of a meaningful subject, and you understand the exact content of messages, what is said. You have no learned feel for guessing unsaid details or social rules that alter the meaning.

So, say, a magazine website host asked me to write something, changed her mind what types of details she wanted, and took a huff because I hadn't guessed by social instinct more about what she wanted than she told me. You can't do that with aspies. Every part of communication must be worked on consciously. I'm the quieter type, for whom this means only communicating as necessary: I get quite lost at any conversation and just go quiet if surrounded by unfocussed chat. You ask me to do errands but only tell me half of what they are and expect me to guess the rest, then I get stuck. It's nice now to have an explanation for that. These limits on communication lead naturally into another classic trait, self-sufficient dedication to my interests. For a caring and politically intense soul like me it's a virtue to be criticised for my determination in banging on about an issue until it makes a difference. I get a feeling of knowing the world better, by putting things in comparative lists in their spatial or scale order. My teenage addiction was to transport timetables.

The further range of AS traits are non-essential extras. For instance, I don't have the trait of not understanding metaphors and taking them literally. This delayed me being sure of having AS at all because all books before 2003 used to assume this trait was always present. Then there's the fun of learning that other quirks to do with your body's sensitivity are part of your AS. My selection includes: arm fidgetiness, wearing shorts, using sleeping bags, and feeling jolted by sudden noises.

By: Maurice Frank

Asperger's in films

Asperger's in Films

There are many films about autism but only a few specifically about Asperger's. Despite the fact that the term Asperger's was introduced into the English speaking world by Lorna Wing in the eighties, the first high profile film to describe the condition did not appear until 1994.

The film is 'Nell'. It's a film about the discovery of a woman who had been brought up with extremely limited social contact and speaks a language known only to herself. She appears to have a learning difficulty. She's an innocent woman who is fearful of people and somehow wired into a deeper and more spiritual reality. Though she is diagnosed with Asperger's during the course of the film, her extremely unusual upbringing and uniqueness means she does not make it into my Asperger's film list.

There are many films in the eighties and nineties - and in earlier decades - that have tendencies towards Asperger's or include characters with Asperger's personality traits. They can include geeks, nerds, absent-minded professors, shy naive people, eccentrics and many aliens. The list of films I have in mind are too long to detail here, but I would like to mention 'The Man Who Fell to Earth' (1976), 'Being There' (1979) and 'Edward Scissorhands' (1990).

Towards the end of 2005, the BBC showed several films and documentaries about autism as part of an Autism Awareness Week. In a documentary 'My Family and Autism', Luke Jackson decribes his experience of living with Asperger's. I was very struck by the film and it made me think I might have the condition too.

The first key film on my Asperger's film list came out the following year. It is called 'Snow Cake' starring Sigourney Weaver as a high functioning autistic adult. The film intends to inform the public about the condition and to this end Sigourney and the other film crew worked hard to ensure the depiction of HFA was accurate.

The film is about an ex-convict who ends up sharing a few days with a high functioning autistic woman. She does not make eye contact and speaks in an intelligent, intense but rather cold manner. She has a compulsion for neatness and order. She likes to be alone. She's very aware of her neurological condition and spends a lot of time explaining it.

However, another dimension to her personality is an uninhibited solitary pleasure at simple things such as flashing lights, dancing, rolling around in the snow and even eating snow. This aspect seems to suggest an ability to switch to more classic autistic state. This aspect of her personality greatly adds to her attractiveness as a character though personally I found it hard to reconcile the contradictory personality traits. Still, the film presents a positive and strong image of a disabled woman.

The second key film on my list is called 'Mozart and the Whale'. It was released in the UK a few months ago though it was actually made in USA in 2005. I have not seen the film but only read reviews and watched the trailer a few times.

The film is about the relationship between two people with Asperger's who meet at an Asperger's support group. They are intelligent, talented, articulate and attractive people. The film seems to be a fairly traditional romantic story but with rather eccentric people. The characters seem to be presented as neuro-diverse rather than disabled people. It's a shame the film has not been released and distributed earlier in the UK. I'm hoping to find it on DVD soon.

In America, the 'Snow Cake' and 'Mozart and the Whale' are much mentioned in online discussion though they're not so well known here.

A third film about to join my list is called Ben X. This Belgian film is just released and will be showing at the Edinburgh Filmhouse at the end of this month, from Friday 26 September to 2 October. The film is about a young man who is bullied at school and retreats from the harsh realities of everyday life into an online fantasy world involving role-play.

The film has received very good reviews. Because of the importance of victimisation to the storyline, I expect the film will be a much less pleasnt or inspiring expereince than the first two films but I still think it's a film worth seeing.

Another film worth mentioning - though I have not included it in my film list - is 'Somersault' (2005). This is a fine and sensitively made film about a young woman who has relationship problems. If it were not for a few very contrived references to Asperger's - from which the director intends to make us think the young woman may have the condition - the link would be impossible to make. However, the fact a film is made about a person with borderline Asperger's - or possibly not - is in itself socially significant.

Finally, a film which may or may not have an Asperger's connection is just released in the UK but not available to view yet. The film is called 'Her name is Sabine'. It's a documentary about an autistic woman filmed by her sister who is a well-known French actress. From what I have read and seen on the video clips, the film is the story of a dispirited autistic woman who appears to be an able, attractive, talented woman - possibly with Asperger's - a few decades earlier. Her story is about how she regressed and how the medical system is supporting her.

Film Reviewer

Edinburgh Transport

EDINBURGH TRANSPORT

This article outlines some ideas for improving Edinburgh's public transport network, in particular the bus network.

Transport networks are a common interest among Asperger individuals, not least because they involve a lot of systemisation. I did a talk about the various types of transport in Edinburgh at a past ELAS meeting, and among other things the tram network and perceived missing links to Lothian Buses' network were discussed, especially a link to Haddington (currently served by FirstBus but not Lothian Buses).

I do not necessarily agree with the tram network, to start in Edinburgh in 2011, at least not in the form it will take. It will pretty much consist of one line (airport to Leith via city centre) and I feel that the cost of the network would have been better expended in high-quality bus corridors around the city. The routes that the trams will follow would be part of a bigger plan of such bus corridors throughout the city (not just one or two areas which the tram network will link).

This top level of high-quality bus routes, then, would be limited stop services, stopping only at certain well-used stops. Of course the existing network would exist as it is, but at certain selected 'designated points' spaced around the city would integrate with the limited stop services.

Some such limited stop services exist, mainly for commuters during morning and evening rush hours, but the idea would be extended to form a spider-web network in the city operating all day, with stops spaced more regularly than the typical limited stop network that exists. A good model of the type of service intended is the X48. Buses on this route are specially coloured in green, so perhaps a distinguishing colour like this could represent the top-level services.

Edinburgh has many radial bus routes, coming in and out of the city centre. Selected radial routes connecting to the designated points would be improved under the high-quality bus corridor plan. The radial routes would also, where practical, extend outside Edinburgh to nearby towns.

There are also routes connecting outer suburbs, evident from looking at a Lothian Buses map, but these are usually not well integrated into anything like coherent routes (there used to be full circular services such as the 32/52 but these were done away with a few years ago). Nor are these services always very frequent, including the 18 and 21 which are half circles around the outskirts of the city. But they are a key part of the plan for reasons including that Edinburgh's circular layout makes them practical, to avoid the city centre and its traffic, and because the designated nodal points such as the Royal Infirmary and Gyle/Edinburgh Park are areas visited by people from throughout the city.

I also envisage an inner circular route, something which Edinburgh lacks but would be useful given the density of inner Edinburgh in both population and services, and to integrate with the radial routes. Again, these could also act as a bypass of the very centre of Edinburgh (Princes Street/Old Town/New Town etc.). The idea is to connect points on the radial routes halfway between the city centre and the outer nodal points. I have made an attempt at defining such a route on the map.

The key nodal points would be:

North-east: Leith/Ocean Terminal
East: ASDA The Jewel/Fort Kinnaird
South-east: Alternating between Cameron Toll, a major bus interchange; and Edinburgh Royal Infirmary
South-west: Possibly Wester Hailes/Westside Plaza, which already acts as a major bus interchange.
West: Gyle/Edinburgh Park
North-west: Waterfront development

This would entail high-quality routes between the city centre and all of the above points. The nodal points would also be linked north-west to north-east, north-east to east etc. in a circular service. These routes could for instance be every 20 minutes. The east radial route would also extend to East Lothian towns like Musselburgh, Prestonpans, Tranent and Haddington (the last two could be served along the A1 alternating with a coastal route). The south-east route would extend to the towns of Midlothian, alternating in the different directions from the city. The west and north-west routes could re-open previously closed Lothian Buses routes, i.e. west to Livingston/Bathgate, northwest to South Queensferry.

Such a network is a good idea because of Edinburgh's very dense bus route network. This makes a top-level network a good idea, as a recognised, simple, well-spaced structure around the city would benefit travellers. Perhaps the buses could be similar to those used by Citylink, or Stagecoach Fife in whose network there is a similar idea of top-level routes around the county.

Map of suggested network lines

By: Mark

Red Haired Roderick

RED HAIRED RODERICK

I take my place on the rostrum and gaze at the children assembled with their anxious parents.I begin ,feeling anxious

“Once upon a time,everybody ,there was a sad little boy called Roderick and he had red hair and he was the stationmasters son of Invergarvary on the railway line from Glasgow to Skye.in the district called Stordart .He began attending the village school and he was very bright as he could read at three ;he rapidly grasped the principles of arithmetic; the village dominie told him all about the history of that country of which it is said “Land of hope,a fair domain/served by the friendly Nor-western train,that leaves dour Glasgow at the rise of the sun, I know the landmarks every one, from Finnieston tunnel to the mountains of Skye,all that pleaseth a tormented eye.” And know those landmarks he did for at first whenever he travelled on the train he would rattle off everything his teachers had told him; about the Ice age and ancient volcanoes,of the first peoples ,the Picts, who left their mark as place names and of later men on horseback and indeed those who had built the railway ; and he knew of the world beyond s Scotland s shore through his stamp-collecting .But the other children bullied him because of his red hair and though he was attentive in class he stopped talking,.That made his parents very worried.After school and during holidays he refused to play with the other children.A relative found him wandering in the hills ,and gazing at the ever changing skies ,or listening to the melodies of wind and tumbling waters.On visits to the wild coast of Stordart he would be out of sight and later spotted paddling in the rock pools or simply gazing at the views of airds and skerries ; and the snow capped Cuillins sometimes visible on the horizon. The dominie told his parents that she had caught him reading her Herald and treatises on geography for high school children; He sat at the front and wrote page after page that showed that he had an intellect far beyond his tender years.She taught him to draw and so he would be away with a sketch pad and come to the school with drawings of those landmarks in that ballad I quoted ,which she instantly recognised .At the age of ten he was given a bicycle and rode it far during the Easter holiday and came back with dozens of sketches .then after he was waylaid by older children in the summer holiday he went missing…

He was found in a fisherman s hut on the Stordart coast with a sketchpad full of drawings that he had done and he was taken to Glasgow to see an eminent doctor and he sobbed,sobbed,sobbed throughout the journeys and he simply would not talk .So the doctor knew the man we know of as Lord Trefoelwyn ,the headmaster of Treheol College in that part of Wales called the Welsh Marches, children the country of hills formed before the earth had an atmosphere either side of the railway from Shrewsbury to Bristol .His parents made the long journey to Delormebury on that line and the boy sat gazing at the countryside and when they arrived the boy drew from memory,children a view of Shrewsbury seen from the train-remember, children ,those lines “High the vanes of Shrewsbury gleam/Islanded in Severn stream” – that boy had but a fleeting glimpse of the town and there he had captured it,children, so the parents presented that sketch to the great Lord Trefoelwyn …

“So the great Lord Trefoelwyn said to the boy “When I was your age,young man I lived in my home town of Charford over the hill which has its own separate Welsh name ,Abercammaen .Then my father was promoted and we moved to Sussex where I began attending a grammar school. All the boys picked on me because I am Welsh so I ran away from school and even travelled without a ticket to my aunt in Romanbridge the cathedral city down the line.And I would not talk.Because of that I was sent to a remedial school near Maidstone that is the county town of Kent through which the Channel Tunnel railway runs.The headmaster unlocked my mind, young man so my ambition was to follow him …..Here I am to help you “

So the boy was enrolled at Treheol College where the great Lord Trefoelwyn taught him that his peculiarities were incidental and that all people ,that on earth do dwell ,now and forever were to accept,understand and master themselves.Lord Trefoelwyn was exceptionally tall and short sighted and went bald at age twenty eight so he is allegorised, as on a coat of arms as the Welsh Dragon.with glasses and bowler hat” (I display our famous emblem …)

…the boy met a classmate named Heidi from that flat part of Germany called Schleswig-Holstein that borders on the tideless,freshwater,Baltic Sea This girl had lost her parents in an appalling tragedy As she was enchanted with the mountainous scenery near the school they went out together and he taught her to draw,dear children; and he began writing poetry about his homeland,Stordart ,children so after lessons they cycled the byways of this district,Avalon ,which in Roman times was a kingdom under Roman suzerainty,children,because it paid taxes to Rome,children and known as Siluria ,children…..She taught him German and so they visited his parents and when they alighted his parents failed to recognise him! Smartly dressed and fluent in German he was explaining the scenery of Stordart in German to Heidi and neither parent could understand ! But they were so thankful for Lord Trefoelwyn who had correctly diagnosed what is called Aspergers Syndrome in their son. We have different kinds of brains,children.we who accept understand and thank God for it..Now Roderick and Heidi did so well at Treheol College that both went to Glasgow University and after graduating trained to be teachers.They joined the staff of Treheol College and all agreed that they like their classmates had grown dragon s wings . … I pull out a rubber dragon toy-with glasses and bowler hat ! and spread its wings I say that Lord Trefoelwyn taught all children with distressing peculiarities that they will be remembered,not for what they looked like or for habits like involuntary swearing ,but for the extent to which they struggled to master their infirmities of character and develop all their latent abilities by constant practice at demanding pursuits.He taught by the example he set ,even in his seventies leading his pupils up lofty mountains .So these children grew dragons wings so to speak by living according to the teachings of Socrates Plato and Aristotle notably to be inspired by the idea that an exemplary life is the ultimate beauty .Lord Trefoelwyn s life was that ultimate beauty dear children .He was no film star with his pebble lensed glasses ..I show the famous portrait of him on the summit of Moelwyn Mawr ….Roderick and Heidi got married ,dear children ,and are now jointly in charge of Bonavaig School for children like yourselves who are what is called high functioning autistics so let me present you with this memento of Roderick s own childhood –his anthology of poems and sketches produced in his days at Treheol College…”

I hand out a copy to every child in the hall and declare

“May this inspire you all to emulate my dear father .Red Haired Roderick “..

By: David Seagrave