As a person suffering from the disease that belongs to the autistic spectrum myself, I recall the old official American report claiming Vladimir Putin has Asperger’s syndrome. Leave the aspect that the report may have had some side intentions (discredit him in his official ranks etc.) and let’s take a look at the notion itself. Since I didn’t find any opinion similar to mine (even because some claim he is a psychopath) on the internet, I will kindly present it.
Psychiatry has been waging war in the field of diagnoses for a really long time. As Isaac Newton famously proclaimed: “I can calculate the motion of heavenly bodies, but not the madness of people.” And it cannot bear more truth. Imagine the time of Einstein’s Theory of relativity and they had little clue what schizophrenia, autism and Borderline personality disorder were. But because they were humans only little research was funded (and currently is funded).
They have observations, statistical correlations (notably factor analysis that measures IQ (g factor)) and that’s it. Limited biomarkers, overlap of symptoms, subjectivity, heterogeneity of disorders (every individual has different manifestations) and little knowledge we have about how the brain functions create the lousy outcomes nowadays psychiatry possesses.
The American famous psychiatrist Allen Frances said that current diagnostic manuals are not meant to be worshiped, but are obligatory in some way so he raises suspicion at the psychiatrists that do either of it.
No matter how biased (both generally and because of the commercial interests of Big Pharma that overlooks the most needy patients while overprescribing medicine to people who don’t need it) the diagnostic manuals are, these are somehow the best up-to-date data that ordinary people have.
The prevalence of autistic diagnosis’ cannot be more crazy. 60 years ago, roughly 1 in 2000 people was autistic. That corresponds to what my own psychiatrist says as he diagnosed 5 persons out of thousands of people while he met a lot of people with autistic traits. Five fingers on one hand.
The diagnosis doubled up tens of years later and we have every 50 (circa) people diagnosed with autism in 2024.
While something like Asperger’s syndrome most likely does exist, the incidence inside the autistic spectrum (what we know about autism) may be disputable (but it may be tens of different diseases in the human brain). And now the final! The most up-to-date manual (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5)) canceled the diagnosis of Asperger’s syndrome leaving only the term autism intact!
The International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems (ICD) presents more diseases among the autistic spectrum.
But why do I boldly claim that Vladimir Putin has no Asperger’s syndrome? He may have autistic traits and limited affective empathy, but surviving on the raft among the sea full of sharks? Are you kidding me? I know someone may object that nobody ever had a professional mental assessment of Vladimir Putin, but I highly doubt the diagnosis.
He was a chief of the FSB (formerly KGB), he is the sitting president of Russia now and a diplomatic kingmaker. Tons and tons of requirements for why you need to understand people and expose their intentions. You just cannot have such deficiencies in people suffering from autism as I do have.
Alright, you can object that Putinist Russia is about money, power and he must have a certain IQ and talents. And I do agree. But you still cannot be an autistic person.
And his psychopathy or sociopathy? If he were a sociopath, he must have done tons of impulse-made problems that would absolutely destroy his up-the-ladder path. If he were a psychopath, he must have also impulsive behavior that would thwart his path to the highest circles. And both of the labels share one thing – understanding of people.
So why does he do what he does? Just look at the Russian culture and traditions! Thousands of rulers nobody had accused of autism and psychopathy (except for some figures) and they had little respect for human life, maybe even no respect. And led thousands of wars.
Of course, that was history. Nowadays people are affected by humanism and enlightenment to the degree that their moral circles are larger… Wrong! It is Russia.
Not only does Putin believe he is a messiah, convincing himself through thousands of cognitive biases, fallacies and formal logical mistakes, but he is followed by his criminal yes-sayers. An ordinary Russian – even despite the propaganda – is backing his actions.
He is a strong nationalist, cruel, introverted person and has psychopathic traits, but psychopathy or sociopathy is something different. He may even have autistic traits but he remains out of the diagnoses, period.
If you want, read these quotes about Russian people – here.
Leave a Reply