I called The Friend and she complained about situation at work, saying there’s a lot of spiteful people there. She kept asking why people do those things because she never does. And in fact she doesn’t seem to be like that at all.

It is being said a lot that the atmosphere at work depends on good management. And yes, of course, if manager doesn’t support their employees or even make them afraid, they will treat other staff poorly, but I worked in a place once where the manager had no management skills and was often moody but staff was very supportive and friendly towards each other. I also worked in a place where manager was always making an effort to be understanding of individual circumstances, kind, supportive and even funny and everyone loved her – individually – because the atmosphere between staff was really bad with loads of bitchiness.

I did suggest to The Friend that possibly when people are required to constantly hide their true emotions for the sake of children, parents and patients, they may feel the need to get them out on their colleagues. Do you think that makes sense?

But then, when we finished the conversation, I had that idea that possibly people do those things because they are fighting for their social status. Possibly some neurotypicals need that?

What I noticed about neurotypicals however is, there’s no point asking them why people do things that are not very nice. They won’t tell you. They’ll pretend they don’t know. Because they are worried that admitting that they know that would mean they are like that – that’s why they know.

Even if they know that you’re autistic they won’t tell you so you’ll never find out.