Saturday, November 8, 2014

Jerry Seinfeld: "I Think I’m on the Autism Spectrum "


12 comments:

Eric the Fruit Bat said...

Another possibility is he doesn't particularly care for other people.

Unknown said...

So many people who know nothing about Autism like to comment about Autism.

Dad Bones said...

What a snob. Why can't he be satisfied with dementia and Alzheimers like the rest of us?

KCFleming said...

It's also possible he's a narcissist, and he doesn't understand what other people are saying because he doesn't care, if it's about them.

Like the dog in the famous Far Side cartoon of the dog hearing Blah blah Ginger blah blah blah Ginger blah blah.

The argument against that is that narcissists don't crave insight about themselves or the world, they think they're just fine. So the key is whether their discussion about insight is genuine or bullshit.

Which is really hard to tell, because the interviewer is a narcissist.

ricpic said...

Autism, a big fancy word. How about shy?

KCFleming said...

Ricpic, the odd part was Seinfeld saying he didn't understand what other people were saying.
That's not just shy, it's odd.

Dad Bones said...

Maybe Jerry is losing his hearing. Perhaps a friend steered him to an audiologist which he heard as autistic....

Paddy O said...

"It's also possible he's a narcissist"

That's certainly the key emphasis in his television show.

ndspinelli said...

Brian Williams is in the upper stanine of pompous assholes.

Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...

I'm worried that narcissism becomes as much a wastebasket diagnosis as autism. There are already real concerns with the narcissistic psychiatrists revising the DSM trying to dismiss the clinical utility of the condition; no need to indulge the arguments behind their efforts.

Maybe there's something wrong with me, but I never got why people said his show was about narcissism, either. It was about not understanding the travails and rituals other people put themselves through because they didn't make any sense, not because they didn't care. And it worked comedically because their points were valid. A lot of (other ;-)) people do put themselves through complicated and difficult things that don't make any sense to us.

Of course, so did some of the cast, but they did that in unusual and funny ways that were easily called out or confronted. I don't think it was just protagonist roles that made it that way.

In any event, narcissism and autism IIRC have enough confusing similarities to often exist on the same differential.

Michael Haz said...

The characters on Seinfeld were fictitious. They could be, can be, anything someone wants them to be. But that doesn't mean the actors themselves have those traits in real life.

Seinfeld can call himself whatever he wants, but absent a physician's diagnosis, he isn't that thing. It's a bit, a comedy bit he performed in an interview.

ndspinelli said...

Haz, Bingo. And IMO a great comedian who never goes for cheap laughs. He's as clean live as he is on TV. I like dirty humor, but greatly appreciate those who can not work blue and still be great.