I’m currently listening to the new album by Ladyhawke. It’s very good, if you’re into danceable indie-electro pop.
What the hell does this have to do with Mental Nurse? I mention it because Ladyhawke (real name Pip Brown) has just revealed to the media that she has Asperger Syndrome, the autistic spectrum disorder that’s like a Yorkie bar, because its supposedly-but-not-really Not For Girls.
She’s in pretty good company. Other musicians who’ve been known or speculated to be on the autistic spectrum include Beethoven, Mozart, Bob Dylan, Gary Numan, Craig Nicholls from the Vines and Peter Tork from the Monkees. Plus artists like Van Gogh, Yeats and Andy Warhol, the philosophers AJ Ayer, Baruch de Spinoza and Immanuel Kant, and writers like WB Yeats, Hans Christian Andersen, Lewis Carroll and George Orwell.
Anyways, I’m going back to listen to her really rather excellent album.
My heart is yearning, but Paris is burning, Paris is burning all night long…
What’s a girl with a not-quite-a-mental-illness, not-quite-a-learning-disability, not-for-girls kind of thang, going to do except become a rock-star?
My favourite probably-was-autistic? Nietzsche.
Had a damn fine mustache as well.
“Gott ist Tot!” – Nietzsche
“Nietzsche ist Tot!” God.
Here’s a Guardian interview, talking about the trouble Aspergers has caused her with video shoots.
In the Paris Is Burning video, Brown is shown walking down a street, shoulders hunched, looking as if she’d rather be anywhere else on earth. “That’s the best I could do,” she says. “You don’t know how many takes I had to do or how many times they yelled, ‘Less awkward! Shoulders back!’ I’m the most awkward person ever. I find it hard enough walking down the street, just putting one foot in front of the other, but doing it over and over on camera – it was painful.”
Watching the video, I see what they mean. That said, I thought looking sullen and awkward was supposed to make you edgy and cool? Or am I showing my 90s music roots by saying that?
I feel for her.
“They seem uncomfortable in their own skin” was how, I think it was Hans Asperger, described our presentation…
And a very good article on Aspergers in girls here:
http://www.newsweek.com/id/168868?tid=relatedcl
Interesting article, Socrates. And yes, “uncomfortable in their own skin” would describe nicely how a lot of people with aspergers come across.
She actually looks more uncomfortable in this video than in the Paris is Burning one.
I did not know that Aspergers is (or is seen to be) a predominantly-male thing. Interesting stuff.
PS. I also didn’t realise ‘autistic’ meant ‘unable to write a song that didn’t reference its title in its lyrics… several hundred times’. Call me an insensitive hipster douche, but when it comes to indie-electro pop of the implicitly-danceable variety, I’m sticking with Imogen Heap. But there’s a reason I save my music bitterness for my blog.
PPS. That said, I’m probably just bitter when it comes to Aspergers because I’m trying very hard to avoid being diagnosed with it.
PPPS. Is it wrong to have a postscript longer than your actual comment?
when it comes to Aspergers because I’m trying very hard to avoid being diagnosed with it
Top Tips:
Don’t talk about Star Trek.
If you can’t do eye-contact, wear a Jesus and Mary Chain T-Shirt and black eye-liner.
Don’t tell them about your collection of 1432 matchboxes.
Make sure you have at least 955 friends on Facebook.
Pay at least 6 people to pretend to be your friends irl.
Complain that you computer’s broke and you can’t fix it.
Get a ‘D’ in GCSE Maths.
Bitch about your best friend, having a fat girlfriend.
But seriously, it’s a diagnosis for life, despite the fact that some people end up only exhibiting ‘sub-clinical’ features by the time they’re in their thirties. (Digby Tantam claims that 80% of AS kids end up thus – But then Digby has many more faults than a silly name….)
Also, with a diagnosis, you won’t be able to join the army, navy or air force. You’ll probably have no chance of joining the Police, Ambulance Service, Coastguard etc.
The chances of you being accepted at medical school are pretty low; you won’t get pass Beakie if you want to be a Mental Nurse.
You’ll have to declare it as a medical condition every time you apply for a job.
On the upside, you’ll be eligible for practically non-existent services.
Tough choice.
>>Also, with a diagnosis, you won’t be able to join the army, navy or air force
>>Tough choice.
I’m not sure I agree with the ‘tough choice’ part. Also, would Beakie be susceptible to bribery?
But seriously, it’s a diagnosis for life, despite the fact that some people end up only exhibiting ’sub-clinical’ features by the time they’re in their thirties.
Indeed. Rather like some people with diagnoses of personality disorders. Another diagnosis that will get you that all-important access to non-existent services.
My primary school teacher told me I would be a ‘ladykiller’ one day.
I had no idea what it meant and was quite scared.
Its a diagnosis that has followed me all my life…
Re: PPPS. Is it wrong to have a postscript longer than your actual comment?
Yes, if you wish to avoid certain diagnoses.