#i am also genuinely stupid and gullible and dont have any friends and cant navigate relationships . so he is special to me

[elevatortheory]

barry being autistic is just really funny to me its like a joke but also the idea of him being real rep is very special to me too i have talked about this a lot SORRY i like discussing it . i like saying things . barry as an undiagnosed adult makes perfect sense because obviously john sr. and fuches would not know or understand any of that and would not bother to really look into it further than "hes shy" -> "hes depressed" . and also him being genuinely really dumb when the mainstream Consumerized autistic character has to be exctremely smart and catty and quick-witted and sarcastic . they have to still function in society and still be extremely intelligent to make up for it and theyre obsessed with science and cars and whatever the fuck . <- i know there are characters who arent like this in media but i specifically am talking about the MainStream CONSUMERIZED form of quirky cute uwu autism thats gotten popular the past few years . the kind where all you have to do is be a bit awkward and be a bit obsessed with something . while barry is sincerely dumb and doesnt understand simple questions and doesnt comprehend relationships and is so gullible and so stupid and the only "skill" he has that "makes up for it" is the skill that also results in him being alienated and In fact is a trait we as the viewer dislike him for . barry being awkward and nervous and oblivious is a very specific part of his personality most noticeable in s1 but as time goes on and he starts to seem more "normal" it can still be viewed as masking via the scenes where his "mask" (version of himself he tried to build) cracks and hes just as awkward and weird and oblivious again . his behavior from tricky legacies to the wizard is one specific moment of that to me . functionally hes a "savant" in that hes extremely dumb with one specific skill/interest that hes exceptionally talented/knowledgeable about. though i dont know if id consider that FULLY because he isnt like. his special interest isnt guns lol but he does have lots of odd little fixations and traits and those fixations are also heavily linked to his PTSD and father issues/abandonment issues and his need for validation . well anyways barry being very messy and fucked up and flawed and his mental illnesses/disorders contributing to it and they create lots of real long-term problems in his life which , though exaggerated or shown in different metaphorical ways, can be very accurate to what real people w/ those illnesses/disorders and even real veterans and survivors of war and stuff go through . but even then we get direct proof that barrys awkwardness and shyness wasnt caused BY the war or by john sr. or fuches because he was already like that as a child. and also i just like to use him as an example of how things can be canon by being inferrable and implied in the text without having to be directly stated . you make a character who is extremely awkward, terrible at relationships, cannot understand tone, rhetorical questions, or metaphors, who is extremely gullible to the point it gets him into serious trouble SEVERAL times , and who is finally again i keep bringing up the rain man comparison AGAIN he is compared to raymond from rain man, possibly the most well-known autistic character (and movie related to that) in america i would think . so like . at that point its canon without them having to explicitly state it at all . what was the point of this. oh barry is just good representation of a severely mentally ill person and a good commentary of how society and organizations can fail mentally ill people . and sally also i would like to talk about sally one day but i need to rewatch early s4 for that probably .... . i am very mentally ill and i like talking about how it can be shown in media (thumbs up emoji) . i dont know if any of these words form a coherent sentence