Criminal Minds
Growing up in Texas seriously curbed The Boy’s tendencies toward becoming a master criminal. Our fair state, after all, had a habit of executing the mentally retarded. At least until the Supreme Court intervened.
But can nothing stop the criminals with Asperger’s rampaging among us? Slate.com’s Erica Westly considers in a very good story the neurological framework of the autistic mind that might predispose it to, say, hacking into US computers in search of UFOs, or murdering and dismembering someone, or acquiring large collections of child porn. The story argues that curiosity and obsessiveness push these people into trouble.
Intention is such a murky thing to prove, as is awareness, for that matter. Anything below an IQ of 70 is considered mentally retarded, but do those tests prove you haven’t got a conception of the value of human life? Of suffering? Westly’s story references a 2004 study conducted by Simon Baron-Cohen (who is indeed Borat’s cousin) and Sally Wheelwright, which says that autistic people have a hard time feeling empathy — and therefore perhaps paves the way for committing crimes against other humans. As the autistic get more involved in the workings of society through jobs and online interaction, this question of intention and awareness will become increasingly relevant.
As for The Boy, he’s kind of ridiculously empathic — he’ll throw a fit if someone at the dinner table gets agitated. He’s been known to throw up when someone gets really upset.
Which makes him probably a lousy criminal, but a good student of human emotional states. With all these autistic criminals running rampant, maybe what we need now is a crime-fighting neurodiversity squad — cue A-team music. The Boy would have a job and get to drive around in a van all day. Because he, too, pities the fool.
Oct 26th, 2009 1:41am
