Can a straight, white male liberal ever truly suffer at the hands of our culture?

[hifiguy]

77. The counselor who first diagnosed me

had me take a bunch of tests and I scored highly on all the Asperger's metrics. What cinched the case was when I told her I live exclusively in my own head - it's almost impossible for me to tell what others are thinking or feeling. I also don't have strong emotional reactions to things that aren't mediated - I don't get upset at things that happen in real life but external experiences - movies, books, music, etc - stir strong emotional responses in me. A psychiatrist reviewed them and concurred with her conclusions. I was born "gifted" and the first counselor explained giftedness and Asperger's can reinforce and mask each other, and I have always had obsessive interests - I memorized baseball statistics and car models when I was a wee lad. I can be very outgoing but only with people who share common interests. I am a motor-mouth when with other musicians, hi-fi nerds, comic book geeks (back in the day) but just have nothing to say to people I don't share interests with. I am basically Data and have no problem with the Geordis of my world.

Law school was a bit different - sharing the common experience is a lot like being in the Army together. There's always something to talk about in the first instance and a number of friendships built from that shared experience as other people and I learned more about each other. I tended to gravitate towards the intellectually curious and quirkier personalities, of which there a fair number at an elite grad school.