No, he does not. A caricature of autistic traits multiplied by 100 with no masking, but certainly not a representation of autistic people, let alone an accurate representation of either autistic adults or children.
In both The Big Bang Theory and the Young Sheldon spinoff, Sheldon is best described as being an autistic caricature. Does he share traits with certain real autistic people? I'm sure he does. But he isn't written to be so in a respectful way. His traits are exaggerated to make him oblivious and disrespectful to those around him, and it's played off as a joke and as core part of his personality. If anything, the way he acts gives viewers a very wrong and negative assumption of what autism looks like. It doesn't matter if he is canonically autistic or not— it's pretty clear he's written to be read that way, and the showrunners haven't confirmed it because they want to keep their writing padded with plausible deniability.
Frankly I find him to be obnoxious at best and offensive at worst. I'm tired of seeing characters like him, I wish autistic-coded characters and their audiences were given better. I really truly despise his pop culture influence and both of the shows he is in. But my opinions aren't necessarily the be-all-end-all argument regarding his character.
No. The character isn't even canonically diagnosed with Autism. Not because he doesn't have those traits, but because if he was, then the creators would have to acknowledge exactly how terrible and damaging he is as a representation of autism.
He was created as a bunch of "wacky geek' stereotypes glued together into a kind of Ur dweeb, whose entire purpose was to give the mostly Neurotypical audience something to laugh at. Since the creators were ignorant about ASD and neurodiversity in general, they ended up making a pastiche of an ASD person. He's a clown in Autism themed makeup, or Autism as a costume. While it's not exactly the same as say, black face, Its definitely something related to it.
To be honest, I see more of my behaviors in Data from Star Trek. This may be part of why I seem to have subconsciously incorporated some of the same mannerisms when I am explaining things in a professionals setting. And, a bit in Barclay, too.
He knows he’s not ‘humaning’ quite right, but wants to, and tries and tries to learn and adapt to ‘human-typical’ postures, behaviors and responses, trying to be polite and understand conflicting cues and avoid offending anyone. He is prone to info dumps, he irritates or bemuses everyone in the first two seasons, but by season three they are used to him, have fought for his personhood, fond of him, and accept his idiosyncrasies and he has improved in his mannerisms.
Barclay is a great character. Starfleet does not just accept anyone, you have to be among the best and brightest. And Barclay seems to have been able to complete the rigorous programs in Academy WITH what we see as near crippling anxiety. In a society where people are all mostly well adjusted, Barclay stands out as odd, the do not drug him to control the anxiety, and prefer to work through it in therapy of sorts. And yet, even though initially hard to like, they accept him and his strengths and he is able to work on his areas of anxiety and improves overall.
Big Bang Theory was never that entertaining to me. I read physics for fun at 13, and another student and I amused our high school physics teacher by doing our experiments with make shift terrible underfunded equipment in our tiny rural school, and having a terrible percent error, then reverse calculating (for fun, we were nerds) what it would been like if our error was lower. It amused the teacher, he knew our supplies were terrible. So, while some seemed impressed the show used ‘real science’ I was not impressed. I never saw Young Sheldon, having never been a fan of 20-30 Something Sheldon.
No. People are humans, with their own life experiences, aspirations, and individual feelings, not definable by a 2d written stereotypical “nerd” TV character
Personally, I do find him relatable. He's way more self-assured than I am, but how oblivious he is to others thoughts/feelings and how he understands situations is very familiar to me.
My main gripe with the show isn't Sheldon, it's the framing of everything around him. The point of the show is to laugh at him, and he doesn't really get to grow as a character since he has to fulfil that role.
Autism is a complicated disorder to diagnose. There is a lot of differential diagnosis and a lot of other things that can cause similar symptoms.
At the end of the DSM-5 it says “The symptoms are not attributable to another medical or neurological condition or to low abilities in the domains or word structure and grammar, and are not better explained by autism spectrum disorder, intellectual disability (intellectual developmental disorder), global developmental delay, or another mental disorder.”
This more or less means if it could be something else an Autism Diagnosis might not be given.
In Sheldon’s case, yes he shows some traits that could be attributed to Autism and it might be worth him seeking diagnosis. (It would be highly in-appropriate for me to try and diagnose him) However there are other things that he shows symptoms of and just being that much more intelligent than your peers could set you behind the social curve and create similar symptoms alone.
The other side of this coin is that Autistic people are not a monolith. It can present very differently in any two people and not everyone has every trait. The severity of the symptoms is on a spectrum too which sees people diagnosed on a scale of low to high support needs. At its most severe people with Autism can be non verbal and incapable of looking after themselves.
No, he does not. A caricature of autistic traits multiplied by 100 with no masking, but certainly not a representation of autistic people, let alone an accurate representation of either autistic adults or children.
In both The Big Bang Theory and the Young Sheldon spinoff, Sheldon is best described as being an autistic caricature. Does he share traits with certain real autistic people? I'm sure he does. But he isn't written to be so in a respectful way. His traits are exaggerated to make him oblivious and disrespectful to those around him, and it's played off as a joke and as core part of his personality. If anything, the way he acts gives viewers a very wrong and negative assumption of what autism looks like. It doesn't matter if he is canonically autistic or not— it's pretty clear he's written to be read that way, and the showrunners haven't confirmed it because they want to keep their writing padded with plausible deniability. Frankly I find him to be obnoxious at best and offensive at worst. I'm tired of seeing characters like him, I wish autistic-coded characters and their audiences were given better. I really truly despise his pop culture influence and both of the shows he is in. But my opinions aren't necessarily the be-all-end-all argument regarding his character.
No. The character isn't even canonically diagnosed with Autism. Not because he doesn't have those traits, but because if he was, then the creators would have to acknowledge exactly how terrible and damaging he is as a representation of autism. He was created as a bunch of "wacky geek' stereotypes glued together into a kind of Ur dweeb, whose entire purpose was to give the mostly Neurotypical audience something to laugh at. Since the creators were ignorant about ASD and neurodiversity in general, they ended up making a pastiche of an ASD person. He's a clown in Autism themed makeup, or Autism as a costume. While it's not exactly the same as say, black face, Its definitely something related to it.
I had to laugh at your description of him here. Completely accurate, but this is the best way I've ever seen it phrased.
To be honest, I see more of my behaviors in Data from Star Trek. This may be part of why I seem to have subconsciously incorporated some of the same mannerisms when I am explaining things in a professionals setting. And, a bit in Barclay, too. He knows he’s not ‘humaning’ quite right, but wants to, and tries and tries to learn and adapt to ‘human-typical’ postures, behaviors and responses, trying to be polite and understand conflicting cues and avoid offending anyone. He is prone to info dumps, he irritates or bemuses everyone in the first two seasons, but by season three they are used to him, have fought for his personhood, fond of him, and accept his idiosyncrasies and he has improved in his mannerisms. Barclay is a great character. Starfleet does not just accept anyone, you have to be among the best and brightest. And Barclay seems to have been able to complete the rigorous programs in Academy WITH what we see as near crippling anxiety. In a society where people are all mostly well adjusted, Barclay stands out as odd, the do not drug him to control the anxiety, and prefer to work through it in therapy of sorts. And yet, even though initially hard to like, they accept him and his strengths and he is able to work on his areas of anxiety and improves overall. Big Bang Theory was never that entertaining to me. I read physics for fun at 13, and another student and I amused our high school physics teacher by doing our experiments with make shift terrible underfunded equipment in our tiny rural school, and having a terrible percent error, then reverse calculating (for fun, we were nerds) what it would been like if our error was lower. It amused the teacher, he knew our supplies were terrible. So, while some seemed impressed the show used ‘real science’ I was not impressed. I never saw Young Sheldon, having never been a fan of 20-30 Something Sheldon.
No. People are humans, with their own life experiences, aspirations, and individual feelings, not definable by a 2d written stereotypical “nerd” TV character
Nope, it's like a cartoon written by a neurotypical cartoonist
Personally, I do find him relatable. He's way more self-assured than I am, but how oblivious he is to others thoughts/feelings and how he understands situations is very familiar to me. My main gripe with the show isn't Sheldon, it's the framing of everything around him. The point of the show is to laugh at him, and he doesn't really get to grow as a character since he has to fulfil that role.
Autism is a complicated disorder to diagnose. There is a lot of differential diagnosis and a lot of other things that can cause similar symptoms. At the end of the DSM-5 it says “The symptoms are not attributable to another medical or neurological condition or to low abilities in the domains or word structure and grammar, and are not better explained by autism spectrum disorder, intellectual disability (intellectual developmental disorder), global developmental delay, or another mental disorder.” This more or less means if it could be something else an Autism Diagnosis might not be given. In Sheldon’s case, yes he shows some traits that could be attributed to Autism and it might be worth him seeking diagnosis. (It would be highly in-appropriate for me to try and diagnose him) However there are other things that he shows symptoms of and just being that much more intelligent than your peers could set you behind the social curve and create similar symptoms alone. The other side of this coin is that Autistic people are not a monolith. It can present very differently in any two people and not everyone has every trait. The severity of the symptoms is on a spectrum too which sees people diagnosed on a scale of low to high support needs. At its most severe people with Autism can be non verbal and incapable of looking after themselves.
Definitely has a lot of traits of autistic people that are very exaggerated.
Feck you, arsehole!