Asperger’s — The Jewish Syndrome?

 

June 19, 2012

mamet.jpeg
Is an egoism bordering
on autism a racial characteristic?
 Is it a kind of genius?
Playwright David Mamet (left)
  an Ashkenazi Jew, suggests
 it accounts for the many famous
 Jewish film producers directors.


Between .2 and .6 per cent of Americans suffer from it. 

Asperger syndrome (AS), also known as Asperger’s syndrome or Asperger disorder, is an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) that is characterized by significant difficulties in social interaction, alongside restricted and repetitive patterns of behavior and interests. It differs from other autism spectrum disorders by its relative preservation of linguistic and cognitive development. Although not required for diagnosis, physical clumsiness and atypical use of language are frequently reported.[1][2]

The syndrome is named after the Austrian pediatrician Hans Asperger who, in 1944, studied and described children in his practice who lacked nonverbal communication skills, demonstrated limited empathy with their peers, and were physically clumsy. (Wikipedia)

by David Mamet
(from his book Bambi Vs Godzilla, 2007)

I think it is not impossible that Asperger’s syndrome helped make the movies.

The symptoms of this developmental disorder include early precocity, a great ability to maintain masses of information, a lack of ability to mix with groups in age-appropriate ways, ignorance of or indifference to social norms, high intelligence and difficulty with transitions, married to a preternatural ability to concentrate on the minutiae of the task at hand.

This sounds to me like a job description for a movie director. Let me also note that Asperger’s syndrome has its highest prevalence among Ashkenazi Jews and their descendants. For those who have not been paying attention, this group constitutes, and has constituted since its earliest days, the bulk of America’s movie directors and studio heads.

Neal Gabler, in his An Empire of Their Own points out that the men who made the movies – Goldwyn, Mayer, Schenck, Laemmle, Fox, – all came from a circle with Warsaw at its center, its radius a mere two hundred miles. (I will here proudly insert that my four grandparents came from that circle).

Widening our circle to all of Eastern European Jewry (the Ashkenazim), we find a list of directors beginning with Joe Sternberg’s class and continuing strong through Steven Spielberg’s and the youth of today.

There was a lot of moosh written in the last two decades about the “blank slate”, the idea that since each child is theoretically equal under the eyes of the law, each must, by extension be equal in all things and that such a possibility could not obtain unless each child was, from birth, equally capable – environmental influences aside – of succeeding in all things.

This is a magnificent and majestic theory and would be borne by all save those who had ever had, observed, or seriously thought about children.

Races, as Steven Pinker wrote in his refutational The Blank Slate, are just rather large families; families share genes and thus, genetic disposition.

Such may influence the gene holders (or individuals) much, some, or not at all. The possibility exists, however, that a family passing down the gene for great hand-eye coordination is likely to turn out more athletes than without.

The family possessing the genes for visual acuity will likely produce good hunters, whose skill will provide nourishment. The families of the good hunters will prosper and intermarry, thus strengthening the genetic disposition in visual acuity.

Among the sons of Ashkenazi families nothing was more prized than genius at study and explication.

Prodigious students were identified early and nurtured – the gifted child of the poor was adopted by a rich family, which thus gained status and served the community, the religion, and the race.

The boys grew and regularly married into the family or extended family of the wealthy. The precocious ate better and thus lived longer, and so were more likely to mate and pass on their genes.

These students grew into acclaimed rabbis and Hassidic masters, and founded generations of rabbis; the progeny of these rabbinic courts intermarried, as does any royalty, and that is my amateur Mendelian explication of the prevalence of Asperger’s syndrome in the Ashkenazi.

What were the traits indicating the nascent prodigy? Ability to retain and correlate vast amounts of information, a lack of desire (or ability) for normal social interaction, idiosyncrasy, preternatural ability for immersion in minutiae; ecco, six hundred years of Polish rabbis and one hundred of their genetic descendants, American film directors.

Thanks to  Stephen Hsu

Related – Asperger’s Jewish Social Ostracism

Comments for “Asperger’s — The Jewish Syndrome? “

Adam said (June 19, 2012):

That is curious. I have a son with Asperger’s and both my wife and I have Ashkenazi lineage. I had never heard of this theory of origin and as such I will look into it further.

In response to Martin: the condition is very real and has caused real hardships for my son as he has been teased and harassed by school mates and even some adults we have known. It’s quite sad really as he is a particularly well mannered and well behaved (especially by comparison to his peer group); and yet, he is bullied because the little indicators of having Asperger’s.

Furthermore, even though we have Ashkenazi grandparents we are equally European (My wife Ashkenazi (a Roth), Dutch and German and I with equal parts Norwegian and English with Ashkenazi from the German side) I find no reason to blame or denigrate all Ashkenazi for the acts of a few — the same as with any other race. In my lifetime I have seen many unbelievable atrocities committed by the “good” people in our Midwestern communities.

Another point that I like to make (though it may be difficult to establish the validity). Israel, originally, was comprised of 12 tribes. Eleven of them had vanished and it is reasonable to believe they were dispersed among some the the nations of the known world — like Europeans as well as East and South of Israel. So, though it is impossible to know, many people alive today could have ancestral lineage to ancient Israel…just something to consider.


Martin said (June 19, 2012):

You can include scientists/technologists in “AshkenaziJews with Asopergers” as well as Bankers, as well bureaucrats like the Global Dictatorship of Bureaucrats in the Communist one world Government.


Henry Makow is the author of A Long Way to go for a Date. He received his Ph.D. in English Literature from the University of Toronto. He welcomes your feedback and ideas at

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