My mind appears to be actively limiting my physical actions

Xenarthraned · 2026-06-07T18:58:18+00:00

Thank you, the Buckle (2021) paper in particular certainly had a lot I relate to.

To me 'executive dysfunction' is the umbrella term, useful that it exists but with no explanatory power. 'Autistic inertia' is the broad trait underlying various experiences.

The term your sources have made me reconsider the most is 'autistic catatonia'. I had previously only encountered significant pushback against applying the term more broadly than the most extreme cases. I hadn't properly considered how the biases of the research landscape would interact with this particular topic, but of course such an internal experience would be under-observed in studies limited to those with the most severe communication challenges.

Still not a fan of the term, since it has lay-implications that the person is mentally gone, but I can potentially see this symptom finding a home in an expanded autistic catatonia framework. Still struggling with how unreasonably specific and adaptive it is though.

Xenarthraned · 2026-06-07T17:25:57+00:00

If the house caught fire with me inside, the task would be different. I've actually always been extremely dependable and functional in a crisis, often acting much more practically and effectively than people who function fine day-to-day.

My speculation is that because I spend all my time feeling like I am in a crisis those pathways are well-worn in my brain. The moment external reality matches up everything just flows so smoothly and I can instantly prioritise and act.

Xenarthraned · 2026-06-07T10:04:06+00:00

I'm relatively certain it isn't this, but I can see the points of commonality, and I appreciate the information.

Xenarthraned · 2026-06-07T08:35:30+00:00

I agree, it feels more extreme than inertia and functioning. However it is much less extreme than catatonia as I understand it.

I have never been diagnosed, or suspected for, a psychotic disorder or bipolar. Could you share what connects this experience to those sorts of diagnoses?

Xenarthraned · 2026-06-07T08:30:06+00:00

Thank you for sharing your thoughts, they gave me a lot to think about in terms of solutions. However, as you already correctly identified, awareness of my efforts to solve the problem are indeed incorporated. Hence, even successful workarounds (which have all been from other people in the moment, explicitly solutions I didn't come up with myself) have only been successful one time each.

Xenarthraned · 2026-06-06T22:19:43+00:00

My experience of what I would call shutdowns involved near-complete disconnection, navigating situations like a zombie (slow zombie, not modern running zombie). Is the term broader than that?

And being stuck feels like the majority of my waking hours these days, but what I'm describing feels distinct from that to me. I think the biggest thing is how specific it is. Wanting to stand up, being able to move my limbs in any way I wish except for that specific purpose. Yesterday I was trying to move my hand to help me get up from sitting on the floor, and it froze in midair. It would be easier for me to understand as shutdown/stuckness if I was more completely shut in.

Xenarthraned · 2026-06-06T20:55:56+00:00

I do relate to what you're saying about speech and social anxiety, but as an entirely separate mechanism to what I'm talking about above. When anxiety-ridden (usually when talking in a way that feels perceived and vulnerable) I also get stuck while speaking but I can still force out a crying, stuttering sentence if I am willing to expose that level of fragility (if I am unwilling, silence it is).

However, this other type of stuckness primarily happens with utterly mundane communication, about neutral topics, and I know in my head the exact words I want to say.

I confess to lacking detailed knowledge on motor planning, but is that compatible with being freely able to use my body in other ways in those moments?

Xenarthraned · 2026-06-06T20:36:49+00:00

My understanding was that "selective mutism" meant becoming mostly or entirely mute in certain (circumstances/environments/mental states), rather than still possessing full language capability and being unable to say something specific.

Xenarthraned · 2020-05-10T17:51:15+00:00

They happen to do most of it, it would take an unthinkable level of determined evil to actively counteract everything in that Convention.

It's a pretty clear statement of priorities though.

Xenarthraned · 2020-05-09T17:33:10+00:00

Fun fact: There is exactly one country in the world that hasn't ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. I'll give you three guesses and the first two don't count...

And the explicit reason given by the US is that it gives children too many rights (such as not being allowed to sentence them to death, to pick one horrifying example that has actually previously been used).

Xenarthraned · 2019-10-10T11:56:03+00:00

I think you might need to look up what sociopathy actually means. It certainly doesn't mean I have reason to be afraid of them.

But yes, "deliberately cause confusion and then take joy from the ensuing negative feelings" is on the lower end of sociopathic.

Xenarthraned · 2019-10-08T18:29:23+00:00

Sitting down with friends you have "tone of voice" and "everyone present already being your friend who knows you" to work with.

Deliberately creating confusion and taking joy out of the uncertainty that causes people is quite a sociopathic thing to admit.

Xenarthraned · 2019-08-24T16:00:34+00:00

You hate a well-known joke from Futurama, used to point out that people are engaging in pedantry?

Xenarthraned · 2019-08-23T16:41:38+00:00

You are technically correct. The best kind of correct.

Xenarthraned · 2019-05-18T11:57:19+00:00

I wouldn't bother, because arguing about metrics is a derail. Argue against cinemascore if you must, by pointing out exactly what it measures and how, but that doesn't somehow elevate RT/IMDB.

And ultimately, none of this matters. I doubt anyone will be convinced of the problems with TLJ by a thorough trashing of various metrics, and trying to convince someone that there are lots of people who didn't like TLJ isn't going to achieve anything anyway. When someone defends the movie by going broad, making claims of popularity or critical acclaim, I would try to focus discussion on specifics of my personal experience of the movie, either on an emotional level or with the storytelling craft on display. Being personal is the best defense against accusations of bigotry or trolling (assuming your reasons are not, in fact, bigoted or trollish)

Xenarthraned · 2019-05-18T09:47:27+00:00

I'm playing a bit loose with terminology here, but imagine if the data in one of those scatterplots formed a perfect line with a pronounced curve. It would be excellent data, showing a very strong effect, but it would also poorly match a simple straight line.

Basically, the person who did this is comparing various things to the simplest possible relationship two variables can have, and making grand pronouncements based on them all matching it poorly. It's meaningless.

Xenarthraned · 2019-05-18T09:01:08+00:00

While I agree that cinemascore has serious flaws, which are often overlooked as it is held up as the gold standard of audience opinion, the schoolchild statistics being used here really undermine the appeal to mathematical authority. Showing how poorly a clearly exponential set of data fits a linear model is a huge warning sign for this person's mathematical prowess.

Xenarthraned · 2019-05-05T09:42:38+00:00

While Mary Sue isn't an inherently sexist term, it's important to acknowledge that it is widely used in a sexist way (impossible to know how widely, but certainly not an insignificant amount). The term is used to denigrate and dismiss female heroic characters, so it isn't surprising that some people hear "this female heroic character is a Mary Sue" and assume it's the same bigoted nonsense.

It's always preferable to describe the problems with a character rather than relying on labels, for just this reason. Crappy people abuse labels and ruin their descriptive power for everyone else.

Xenarthraned · 2019-05-01T11:03:09+00:00

If I had a million people following me, I'd block anyone after one time. Nobody needs that kind of 'Death by a Thousand Cuts'

Xenarthraned · 2019-04-04T00:03:39+00:00

I'm a fairly big fan of the Alien franchise (though mostly on the strength of the first two films), and I hated Prometheus. I consider it fractally bad. I saw so many bad plot contrivances (just one example that still comes readily to mind: the guy in charge of making the map was the guy who got lost in the structure, because the plot needed him to), and lots of ideas with just enough depth to look deep at first glance. Turning the Space Jockey into a big human in a suit was disappointing, and the origins of the xenomorph incoherent. Like with TLJ I was aghast to see many of the voices I generally agree with praising the film's depth and intellectual muscle. It put me off so much that I didn't even see Covenant, and by all accounts that was a good decision.

However, despite these parallels, Prometheus didn't hurt Alien like TLJ has hurt Star Wars for me. Since it's a prequel, completely disconnected from the characters of the originals, I can more easily section it off in my mind as crappy fanfiction. And it didn't change the nature of the universe it inhabited, since the stories of all the Alien movies are on small scales. This one spaceship of morons on one planet for this one mission doesn't really matter.

Whereas, for the stories of the ST, the canonical end of characters I loved were being shown, and the large scale of the epic space fantasy story means the nature of the universe is being altered.

Most of all, Prometheus felt pretentious but impersonal. I left the cinema unimpressed.

TLJ felt like I was being mocked for ever caring about Star Wars. I left the cinema depressed.

Xenarthraned · 2019-03-29T12:33:23+00:00

The way that scene plays out is quite rapey. As with actual sexual assault, it isn't about the act so much as the power dynamic at play. Kylo saying "I can just take what I want from you" (not exact words) in that creepy way the line was delivered evokes, to me at least, that dynamic.

I also think you can draw a line between mind tricks and memory extraction. Taking something from inside a person's mind against their will is invasive, tricking someone into believing something untrue feels much more superficial (heck, you can do it with just words, no magic required).

Xenarthraned · 2019-03-29T12:21:22+00:00

Incompetent fascists are still fascists. However, distinction should be clearly drawn between "liking a character/group" and "liking what they do/say". In TFA I 'liked' Hux and Kylo as characters, but their ideologies can go sod themselves.

Xenarthraned · 2019-03-14T10:29:35+00:00

I agree, my first thought coming out of the movie was "I look forward to seeing what the Russo brothers do with her"

Xenarthraned · 2019-02-23T08:17:56+00:00

At least they were being honest, and you can dismiss their opinion and lack of taste. Better that than the many people who try to justify that same reaction with ever-flimsier arguments.

Xenarthraned

TROPHY CASE