Elon Musk Reveals He Has Asperger's Syndrome In SNL Monologue, Watch

[appalachiablue]

CNET, May 9, 2021.

Elon Musk may not strike people as a natural comedian, but he gave it a decent shot Saturday when he hosted Saturday Night Live and delivered the traditional opening monologue. After an unusual cold open where Miley Cyrus sang and SNL cast members joked around with their moms the day before Mother's Day, Musk stepped up to the plate.

Dressed in all black, he told a friendly audience that he's the first SNL host with Asperger's syndrome, "or at least the first to admit it." Asperger's syndrome, or AS, is one of a group of neurological disorders known as autism spectrum disorders. AS is considered to be on the mild end of the spectrum. As our sister site Healthline notes, people with AS often have difficulty with social interaction, engage in repetitive behavior, standing firm in what they think and focus on rules and routines. Often, those diagnosed with the disorder have normal or above normal intelligence.

He also brought out his mother, model Maye Musk, fitting in with the night before Mother's Day theme. The billionaire businessman's monologue didn't ignore many of the things that made him pop-culture famous outside of his businesses, joking about how he took a puff of marijuana on Joe Rogan's podcast in 2018...

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/elon-musk-reveals-he-has-asperger-s-syndrome-in-snl-monologue-watch-it-here/ar-BB1gwp35

[Warpy]

1. Not surprising in the least

I knew so many when I worked at MIT, most of them cutting edge and able to make amazing inductive leaps that paid off, brilliant and rather odd ducks. It would explain a lot about Musk.

[canetoad]

2. Shocked

NOT!

[tenderfoot]

3. Is that his excuse for being an insufferable douche

Also, Dan Ackroyd is an Aspie. Making him the first aspie on the show.

[appalachiablue]

4. Thanks for posting, I knew about Dan A.

I don't keep up with Musk.

[USALiberal]

10. He's a business genius, no doubt about it. nt

[tenderfoot]

12. He's a business genius

SFW.

[ananda]

11. Yeah, he sure is a cold, heartless bastard!

I have never liked him.

But I generally dislike all billionaire control freaks
who think they own the world and other people.

[betsuni]

5. Recently an online friend of mine who's on the spectrum wondered if I had Asperger's.

No, just old-fashioned shyness. I don't think it's possible to be lazy, forgetful, not very smart, easily distracted, hyper sensitive, dislike repetitive behavior, be indifferent to routines and still have the syndrome. I just have the social awkwardness. My friend and Elon Musk are focused and ambitious and smart. I sort of have Asperger's envy!

[meadowlander]

6. It's a spectrum because you don't have to have all of the symptoms to be on it.

I don't have significant language difficulties (e.g. can't understand idioms, delayed speech as a child, missing social cues) but do have sensory issues, lack of social motivation and can hyper-focus on special interests when I want to.

The msn article in the OP did set off my inner pedant though. There isn't a "mild end of the spectrum" and a "severe end of the spectrum". There a spectrum of issues (social, language, sensory, special interests) which different people are impacted by to different extents. Ditto "high functioning" and "low functioning". I have a full time job and can mask basically all of my symptoms but put me in a noisy bar or a rock concert for ten minutes and I literally lose the ability to speak or think and have to flee the building at the first opportunity. Someone else with the same diagnosis could have social blindness that prevents them from holding down a job but not have the same sensory issues and be fine in those situations.

Especially if you are female and think you might not be an Aspie because you don't look like Sheldon or Rain Man it's worth researching "female" presentation of Aspergers which can be very different to the stereotypical "male" presentation. This is a great video which convinced me to seek a diagnosis:

All my friends in high school were Aspies and I had a lot of the traits but it never occurred to me I was because I didn't have the literal language issue and wasn't obsessed with Star Trek like my friends were. I was obsessed with cooking, dog breeds, maps, interior decorating, house floor plans, farm design, Led Zeppelin,etc. but there was no representation in the media of female presentation of autistic special interests which often focus on famous people and animals instead of kinds of washing machines, obscure machinery and cult sci fi shows.

[betsuni]

7. Thank you, but I have none of the symptoms except for being shy.

That woman in the video has nothing in common with me. Sometimes a shy cigar is just a shy cigar.

[meadowlander]

8. That's fine. I don't know you and am not trying to convince you of anything.

I was just pointing out that it's entirely possible to be lazy, forgetful, not very smart, easily distracted, hyper sensitive, dislike repetitive behavior, be indifferent to routines and still be on the autistic spectrum. I'm six of those seven things to varying degrees and still have a diagnosis - and not even a particularly borderline one. Four of them are irrelevant to an ASD diagnosis and the other three aren't prerequisites.

[betsuni]

9. Listening to that video was depressing, I couldn't even finish it.

It made me very sad. Opposite World for me.

[meadowlander]

13. OK then. I'm not invested in whether you are or aren't.

I'm just putting the information out there for other people who think they might be autistic but don't have every single symptom, especially women who are chronically underdiagnosed. Your original post in this thread was perpetuating misinformation about diagnosing autism which I thought it was important to correct because there is a big group of people over 40 who have ASD and were never diagnosed because they were in school before popular understanding of the symptoms (especially as they present sometimes in women) caught up.

I'm sorry that you felt the need to describe my life experience as "depressing" and "sad" but I'm actually a lot happier than most neurotypical people I meet. It's a question of knowing yourself, what you like and don't like, and designing your life to maximise your strengths (honesty, rationality, loyalty, passion, integrity) and avoiding situations you know are going to stress you out for no reason (going out for drinks after work; shopping at the mall during peak times). Not that big of a sacrifice at the end of the day. Everyone has a set of strengths and a set of hang ups and I'd take the mix that comes with autism over a lot of other ones any day of the week.