Throughout my life, I have dealt with people who are ignorant with regard to those of us who are on the spectrum. They make assumptions instead of even attempting to find out the facts. I will list a couple of examples.
When I was younger, I loved setting clocks in electronics stores. One store I will never go to again is RadioShack (not all stores, mind you, just one). That one is their location at Fox Hills Mall in Culver City, CA. They didn't ban me, I decided on my own not to go back there. Here's why. They (falsely) blamed me for "Everything going off" (their words, not mine) a previous time I went in the store. This accusation was 100% baseless. Not even a microscopic amount of truth. Man, these people made me so mad that as I walked out of the store I said a few choice words to them.
In my teenage years, at the gym my dad goes to, I saw that some flat-screen TVs on the floor with all the cross trainers, exercise bikes and treadmills had fuzzy or snowy picture quality. I was tightening the coaxial cables going from the wall to the sets, in an attempt to fix that. Oftentimes, it worked. The rest of the time, it had no effect. After I left the locker room, getting ready to go home, the man at the front desk said angrily, "I got a complaint that you were playing with the TVs!" I responded, "I wasn't playing with them, I was fixing them." He rejected my explanation. So I just shut him up by saying, "I won't do it again." He said, "All right." I compare this to being in a court of law and pleading no contest, in that I accepted the complaint, but did not explicitly admit guilt.
The two examples above are about how I wasn't harming anyone, just ignorant people digging for something that wasn't there. The second example, especially, shows how good intentions can easily be misinterpreted and blown completely out of proportion. If you or someone you know, on the spectrum or not, has had an experience like this, comment below!
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