I can’t image HR getting a complaint that you aren’t making small talk, and saying “That’s outrageous! We’ll demand his medical records right now!”

HR exists to keep the company from getting sued, and I think there’s a lot less risk for them to tell one employee “He doesn’t want to talk to you, deal with it.” vs demanding medical records for a non-work-role related issue.

In response to a customer support message. https://www.resetera.com/threads/to-anyone-who-is-curious-no-you-cannot-transfer-your-steam-account-via-a-will-you-can-only-take-your-games-to-your-graves.875634/

You said you were out sick for 4 weeks? Do they know why? Maybe you could spin that, say “sorry, I got some scarring in my throat and talking can make it worse, so I really need to only talk about work or I’ll be up all night in pain”. Or something like that.

Or you could try “sorry, I like working with you, and I know I’ve talked in the past, but I need to admit that I have Asperger’s/autism, and trying to make small talk is very stressful for me, so I hope you’re not offended but I feel like I’m going to burn out unless I make some changes like sticking to only work-oriented discussions from now on. Thank you for your understanding.”

Bonus points if you type that up and hand it to people, like you can’t even tell it to then directly.

I know both my answers are “lie in a way that makes you look abnormal” which you may feel like isn’t something you should have to do. Which is true. But you want to minimize them thinking you’re judging them, and they KNOW you are able to talk, so the best way I see is to make them think it’s a problem you have, not about them.

🤷‍♂️ Good luck!

I vote starvation. I think a big percent of the world will starve, with a few countries holding out. A bit later I think all those people will starve too, with only like 20 billionaires surviving. And then when THEY run out of food a few years later, I dunno, they’ll OD on drugs?

HARRY DID YOU PUT YOUR NAME IN THE GOBLET OF FIRE, YOU PIECE OF SHIT!!!

It does sound crazy, but some of their echo chambers have spent YEARS repeating two conflicting messages 1) we need to use violence to “fix” the country and 2) anyone who actually tries to organize any activity is an FBI member trying to arrest people. It’s true that a sane person still wouldn’t try to go kill politicians by themselves, but it’s no surprise to me that some of those members eventually do come to the “I am the only person who can fix this” conclusion.

To get out of those spirals, I just remind myself that I’ve probably forgotten hundreds of things other people probably regret saying/doing, and odds are most people probably forgot mine. Even if I’m sure someone didn’t forget it, I doubt they ever think about it anymore.

“and all your income from these calls will go to zoom”

If the names are listed vertically, than obviously the name on the bottom is carrying all the ones above it.

I’m gonna guess the original version of this joke said “crashed” instead of “fell over”, cause then it would actually be ambiguous enough for the premise to work.

Hating someone your whole life is great in movies and video games, where the hater uses their drive, intelligence, resources and lack of concern about any consequences to pull off some really amazing revenge. But in the real world, I think most of us aren’t willing to go to the lengths needed to properly pay our hated back to someone. So if we can’t act on our hated to the level we feel they deserve, then the only person who would suffer from that hated is the person caryring it around, day after day. Of course, never forget what they did, you don’t want it to happen to you again, but forgiving isn’t about letting them off the hook, it’s about allowing yourself to start feeling good again.

That being said, feel however you want to feel, I ain’t the feelings police. But that’s how I see it.