Having read the whole thread now just wanted to say thanks to those that shared.

The way I see autism is more like being tuned to a slightly different frequency, it's not a mental 'disability', it seems like a different (even elevated in some cases) way of functioning compared to 'normal' people.

We're social creatures and autistic people don't always have the toolkit to deal with that environment, instead focusing their energies elsewhere. Sometimes this can be a great thing, a lot of geniuses (both scientific and creative) have definitely featured on the scale somewhere IMHO.

It's something I've read up on and I would suggest others do the same before throwing titles around

He doesn't show any of the traits

I apologise if my other post came across in any way as dismissive to the OP, it is just it bothers me when people claim autism regarding people on shows like this or with respect to characters in films and so on.

It is utterly true that autism is different in every person and the spectrum is vast. I work with people who are autistic and they are not at all alike. I see many severely autistic children who have no speech (but still are all utterly different) and many children with very mild diagnoses - almost all of whom are more confident and 100% of whom are able to speak more than I did as a child.

The thing with autism is it is a different way of the brain working and a different way of experiencing the world. A person with autism will have some degree of social impairment... and thus will display some level of social awkwardness most likely (it might not be a deficit though - it may be someone is too in people's faces for example) but this is because they experience the world in a different way (it can of course be compounded - if the world is confusing, you can of course feel doubly awkward!) However, a person might be the quietest mouse of a person you can imagine (I used to be called mute by some as a teenager as an example) or might have absolutely crippling social anxiety and they would not be autistic.

I would say, as a general state of things, if a person is able to analyse the feelings and motivations of another person and understand these accurately and completely, it is unlikely they are autistic no matter what else. Of course, this is a hard thing to define.

I will also say that many of the children with mild autism are some of the most creative children I have met. And though people do of course equate incredible skills with autism and this isn't overly common, I do also know a few children who are able to do absolutely incredible feats. And even those children I know who have no speech at all, they understand some things other children might not.

I think we should celebrate that every person is different, but I don't know whether it is an actual bad thing or just my own issue that it irritates me when people make armchair diagnoses like this. It isn't the case with Andy, but I find that people tend to assume someone who comes across as very shy or doesn't talk to other people much may be autistic and this is not remotely what autism is about (which isn't to say no-one with autism is shy of course!)

With respect to Andy, I think he can be empathetic but he sometimes lacks emotional intelligence. For example, that time when Sam was talking about his dead Grandma and Andy explained how there was no such thing as a supernatural event. Andy thought he was being honest, but he didn't think about the fact that Sam was talking about his Mum and dead Grandma and speaking your own absolute truth is not always the thing to do!

Sorry, this was a bit of a rant. I am no expert on autism by the way. I don't diagnose it or anything, but in any case, I think why label any person with any condition. A person is who they are. In any case, if a person has some condition, does that really matter? Still, just see them as their own individual self for that is who they are.

Much love.

As a note, Aspergers was officially discontinued as a diagnosis in 2013, in DSM-5 (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition). There were too many items on it's checklist. I went back to being just regular weird.

I think Andy is just trying to be tactful around people who are prone to fly off the handle. His (foolish?) doggedness may be down to his journalistic background. A good gameplayer would be trying to avoid noms.

With Charlie/Jason, Georgina, Marco, Hughie etc, I think there'll be enough material for DSM-6 when this series is done.

PS. Does BoTS still have bit on the Psych? That seemed to add value... sometimes.

PPS. Smileys may have been artificially added to this post.