i haven't seen the new thing

The school system is traumatizing for neurodivergent kids. 80% of the special ed teachers I encountered were actively making the situation worse for me and the other kids, and it’s crazy to me how ablest the way we deal with autism, adhd, intellectual disabilities, and emotional disregulation in schools is

Imagine telling an elementary schooler they’re being manipulative 😭😭😭

As a metaphor for being punished for not understanding, I think the part where the Clock screeches until their ears bleed is perfect. A direct punishment for asking questions about things that are "accepted"

I absolutely DESPISE the social concept that people cry to manipulate others. Recently got legit traumatized by the assumption, cuz I was having a breakdown about the death of my mom and being homeless as a result, and was told by my family that I'd made the person who offered to let me stay "a few days" uncomfortable enough to withdraw the offer because I was crying out of fear over what would happen after that imposed time limit was up. That I was trying to manipulate them into letting me stay longer. Dude I WAS JUSTIFABLY, UNDERSTANDABLY TERRIFIED. I was having BIG EMOTIONS. I CRY when I have big emotions. I'd just lost my most important person. I hate it that I'm not even allowed to be sad and vulnerable about that without folks thinking I'm trying to manipulate them.

When I was in special Ed I claimed that tomato isn't a vegetable because my father said so and she tried to shut me down so hard she called my dad and he then told her off about the scientific classification of tomatoes.

As an an autistic adult who was only diagnosed a few weeks ago, I'm shocked that interpreting the series through the lens of autism isn't commonplace since the titular phrase of "don't hug me, I'm scared" is very much how I feel when I'm overwhelmed with strong emotions and the excess stimulation from physical touch would just send me over the edge

"to call this place evil implies a clarity of purpose that I dont want to attribute to anyone involved" goddamn does that line go hard

"people who don't care to understand you and seem to believe you can't understand them" i've never had someone explain something i've felt so clearly that it terrifies me before

Hearing Patricia yell out "You were supposed to fucking listen to me!" hit really close to home in a way i don't have the words to describe yet

God, as an autistic person, that part about being told your reactions to things are 'wrong' literally made me cry. I could never understand what reaction I was 'supposed' to have to something. When I was younger I broke my arm but I didn't want to get in trouble for 'being dramatic' or 'over-reacting' so I downplayed the pain I was feeling. I didn't see a doctor for 3 days and ended up really messing my arm up and then still getting in trouble for 'lying'. Anyway, I've been in therapy for 6 years now...

17:35 the "no, you're lonely" line reminded me of how I (also autistic) had to do all those 'how to make friends' programs as a kid and how I felt like I was fine with the friends I had, it was like all the adults around me decided that I should be lonely even though I wasn't.

I'm gonna throw out my surface-level reading of episode two. The part where the trio starts to age and rot away and then instantly snap back to normal as if it was all happening in their heads? That's what it felt like the first time I processed the conception of time. It was always passing, no matter what I did, and someday I was going to die. And all the adults around me had already normalized compartmentalizing this fact, so none of them understood why I was crying. All they had for me was "Don't think about it." Sure. I was five.

The phrase "this situation is a 2 and your reaction is a 5" just unlocked some kind of cord childhood memory

The part about 'being told I'm being manipulative and crying wouldn't get me what I want' is very relatable to me. Especially because I'm a really easy crier, adults would always say it to me. Like, no, I'm not crying because I want to manipulate you. I'm crying because you're yelling at me while I'm already overstimulated and currently want to die.

to me the final episode of the webseries represented the horrific realization that all your trauma was NOT YOUR FAULT, and sometimes the people who *say* they're just trying to help are fucking lying to you. sometimes, a teacher just likes that they have power over you, and get to hurt you emotionally or even physically with little to no repercussions. even more, its about the idea of systems. notably, when red guy gets to that machine, roy isnt like... already there, adjusting the nobs and dials, he's just letting the scene play out, uninterrupted. we never even see red guy or yellow guy's dad build the machine, or even time pass between roy first seeing red guy performing and the introduction of the scene. i honestly always thought that the machine was older than either of them, and roy had just decided to use it for his own ends, seemingly just because he likes punishing his son. there's a quote from roy in an interview the creators did with the characters, and roy has one line of "my boy's eyes have grown arrogant and rude, and for that i shall take him on a trip to punishland", which i honestly relate to in my own autistic way. we dont really see yellow guy grow arrogant or rude in the show, but i quite often got told i was back-talking when to me i was just... having a conversation, or asking some questions. also roy's arm being hella long in the final episode could be a reference to the 'long arm of the law'? in which case you could interpret the machine as like... the prison industrial complex, and the puppets' attempts to learn as like... try and failing to comply with the law and the orders of authority figures in a way that feels honestly pretty autistic coded to me. idk i personally feel that the media theory is stupid anyway but i really enjoyed the final episode.

i watched the first episode of dhmis a couple days ago, when i first heard the 'green is not a creative color' line i jokingly thought to myself 'hey that's something my art teacher would say' only to go to school the next day and have my teacher tell me something ridiculously similar, we were doing a project where we paint architecture from different countries and we had to chose what color to paint the background, i was doing gothic french architecture so i wanted to use dark blue, grey and purple to make the background like stormy looking, my teacher came up to me and was like "blue and purple? those aren't very france colors" LIKE WHAT IS A FRANCE COLOR ?? WHAT DOES THAT MEAN ?? so i ask her that and she says "oh like the flag like red white and blue" i just ??? does she think the only colors people can associate with countries is whats on the flag??? she also told me "when you look at blue and purple do you seriously think france?" like i dont look at red white and blue and immediately think france either 😒

Imagine seeing a show called “Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared” and NOT immediately seeing the parallels to autism and the treatment of neurodivergent and disabled children. Then again, I can’t imagine NOT being neurodivergent, so I can imagine seeing this work through my lense would be hard for a lot of these plot theorists too.

I also feel like the leaves and sticks part is like teachers giving you a task that you don’t understand, but everyone knows exactly what to do, so your just left there not knowing what’s happening

I avoided special Ed as a kid but this video helped me understand why I hated school so much and so deeply. It really helped me accept the feelings of horror I felt about that system but suppressed because they were "wrong" and school was "normal."

As someone who is studying to be a teacher currently it horrifies me how badly non neurotypical kids have been and are still treated in school by some. I will try every day in my future career to do better than that, especially since I might not be neurotypical and relate to many feelings that you have described in a lesser degree.

the “arrange the sticks into your favorite color” part is frustrating for me specifically because the characters IMMEDIATELY arrange them as the colors spelled out; it’s the type of incomprehensible instruction that everyone else in the class would just intuitively understand, but I’d have no idea how they came to the correct conclusion or why they’re able to do that and I can’t.

I initially did not realize you were a furry so when you said "my puppyhood" it hit me like a train

On top of that, the actual title makes more sense now- the last thing I want when I’m overstimulated/having a meltdown is being trapped in a hug

I have ADHD, and let me tell you. My 5th grade teacher yelled at me because my desk was messy in front of the class, she then proceeded to dump the entire contents of my desk onto the floor and I sat on the floor and cried while I picked everything back up. Oh and it was my birthday too I remember. She made me write endless lines of "I will not talk back" because, again ADHD, I would often blurt stuff out without thinking. I couldn't deal with the stress so I began pulling out my hair (trichotillomania) and I had to wear a baseball cap because the bald patches became noticable, which isolated me from my peers. So yeah, the education system isn't kind to neurodivergency.

there’s nothing worse than a neurotypical person thinking I “don’t have empathy” because they aren’t willing to do the work to empathize with how I empathize. Specifically the one that always gets stuck in my craw is when someone is talking about a bad thing that happened to them, and I say “I get how you’re feeling, a similar thing happens to me” and they complain about me changing to subject to be about me. Like buddy I’m literally just demonstrating fuckin’ empathy

Immediately after the end of this video, I started idly singing the first song to myself, and LITERALLY the first three lines are "What's your favourite idea? Mine is being creative!" "How do you get the idea?" "You just have to think creatively!" like holy SHIT?? "do [x]!" "how do I do that?" "just do [x]!!" GODDAMN ms taxxon this analysis is SPOT-ON boss

I remember watching a video analysis of Opal. I stopped once they started naming characters and then started going on about how opal is actually a grown woman who's visualizationing herself as young and her children are actually the adult characters. Thank you for being the right amount of analytical

I always did see DHMIS as a satire on neurotypical absurdity.

dhmis has a constant theme of "the world works differently than you do, will never explain how it works, and will punish you for not working the way it wants you to". it's handled really well and definitely hits really hard as someone who grew up with both adhd and autism, but wasn't diagnosed until adulthood. before watching this I had always felt like yellow guy was autistic, but this video really helped confirm it and help me pin down why exactly the series means so much to me (edited for typos)

As an autistic person, the "I love this tree and I love this stick and-" "No, no, that's not how it's done" really spoke to me too! There are so many instances from my childhood of me trying to mimic the social conventions I saw around me and being told off and/or ridiculed for doing it 'wrong'. The ending of 4 really gets me too for the same reason as you! Thank you for sharing your feelings on all this

Oh my lord you had no right to jumpscare me with superflex like that 😭. I hated that our issues as neurodivergent children were alwaus reduced down to evil villains and bad things. It made me feel like i was evil and bad. I was "worry wall" . Thanks school, its almost like my parents were going through a messy divorce and for an autistic child, it was such a sudden and scary change it caused me stress outside of the home. But no, reduced down to an evil villain instead of letting me process the subject in a healthy way. They also knew none of us wanted to do it so they promised us a pizza party at the end of the year. Never got one. I don't even think they planned one. The utter betrayal.

What you said about crying affected me as well as a kid. Probably not as much as you but crying was what i was haunted by every day. I cried at minor inconveniences, when i got a question wrong or didnt understand the subject, when we played games divided in groups and my group wasnt competitive or competent enough etc. I hated crying and always tried to supress it bc everyone, including my parents and relatives and teachers said i was being manipulative and if i cried i would automatically be in the wrong. What the fuck. I want to cry even just thinking abt this because this shit still haunts me to this day. Kids bullying me and calling me a crybaby was not affecting me nearly as much as my parents not taking me seriously and thinking i was faking it. Fuck this shit man

"No matter what it was, I always had the wrong feelings," This...this made tears brim in my eyes. I'm autistic myself, and I've always felt that everytime I express my feelings, it was always somehow not appropriate to the situation. I would be too excited to have a strawberry cheesecake shake from sonic, but not excited enough to watch fireworks on forth of july. I would be overreacting to being blinded by florescent lights, but underreacting to watching the same cartoon scene on repeat. It would be wrong for me to be talkative, but it's also wrong for me to be quiet. I'm both not enough and too much, and that makes me the ultimate dichotomy. In other words: fear me mortals, for I'm benevolent and will never try to hurt you.

Once, during an afterschool program, the counselor or whatever you call them told us we'd play a game where we tie balloons to ourselves and try to pop them--last one with a balloon intact wins. I raised my hand and told her that popping balloons scared me. She coldly told me I could go next door and read. I was elated with the prospect, but so confused and distressed by her hostility that I couldn't fully enjoy myself. This kind of interaction defined much of my childhood. I thought about that through most of the video.

10:09 “No matter what it was.. i always had the wrong feelings” is actually a sentence that made me cry. i’m 15. i’ve been diagnosed with adhd for 2 years? and i recently brought up me possibly being autistic with my therapist, they had me take a test and i scored 217 with the average allistic score being 60. She says she’s very confident i belong on the spectrum and i am as well. my screenings aren’t for a few months cause that’s how that works sadly. but, ever since i had the appointment with my therapist i’ve felt so so connected to autism and the community and just, the words that people with autism say i’m able to resonate with so much. it was hard for me to even realize i had asd because, fun fact i have lots of memory issues and cannot remember the majority of my life from before 2021. so it was hard for me to realize patterns that have always been there. anyway. ur video is great

the way you substitute words like childhood to puppyhood or hands to paws is SO ADORABLE 😭💗

I’m sorry, what??? Pigs handcuffed you to a chair at age 6? What the hell

It definitely can easily drive me to tears when I see a sad/vulnerable person in a situation where no one will listen to them and they're obviously scared and not ok and it feels like not a single person is trying to help or understand- the horror of an infant being scoffed at by its caretaker for daring to have needs.

so i havent watched dhmis in years and not once after i got diagnosed with autism. this video made me cry when you started explaining how the instructions of arranging sticks into your favourite color didnt make sense, because it made me remember every confusing social interaction, every assignment in class that made me cry, because it was too vague and every time i have ever felt unintelligent because i didnt intuitively understand something that others just did. I just realized how much i subconsciously ignore everything i cant understand by virtue of logic or asking. And why i then get unbearably distressed when i dont understand a task i have no choice but to do.

I also grew up with autism, and my policy quickly became "if you dont care what i say, you'll care what I do." So I got really good at causing damage and lying. If they hadn't tried so hard to force me into line, then I wouldn't have tried so hard to destroy the line. Basically, I understand your story

What's weirdest to me is that Becky and Jo _have_ stated that the sort of idea behind the teachers is they're trying to explain these big, all-expansive concepts in dumbed down formats. They weren't really even SUPPOSED to be puppets of an evil mastermind as much as they just don't know what they're talking about because they're trying to make concise explanations out of complex subjects.

I love this interpretation. I've grown up undiagnosed autistic, and I've spent my entire life confused. The neurotypical world simultaneously feels dull and uninteresting, full of skewed priorities and rules no one cares about, and at the same time loud, unpredictable, and overwhelming. That is a feeling that dhmis captures perfectly. I don't know how to explain it, but it's perfect.

The part about the word empathy being poison hits really hard for me personally, because people have assumed I don't have empathy just on the basis that I have autism, but the reality is I am very often overwhelmed by it and it causes me to shut down at times. If someone is in distress, in a piece of fiction or otherwise, I will dwell on it for unhealthy amounts of time, I'll imagine how it might feel to be in that person's position and it'll fill me with grief as if someone I knew had died and at the same time a visceral fear as if it's only a matter of time before I end up in the same distressed scenario they had just experienced. It's why I can't watch most slasher films and have to actively distract myself if I see a torture scene in a piece of media. I actually do feel empathy I just can't express it well, but because many people around me are relying on spotty pattern recognition they assume a deeper insight to my inner thoughts than they actually have. To them, empathy isn't about listening or putting yourself in someone's position to understand how they might feel, it's about fucking faulty pattern recognition. Fuck

The part “YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO F)(KING LISTEN TO ME” made me shiver, and now I’m streaming tears, it hurts to listen to that on a daily basis… as a person with ASD, (diagnosed btw) i shut down my emotions and ñ that was my breaking point

Wow wow wow. The reveal that your caretakers were not using the scale as intended is just heartbreaking and terrifying. The horror of being misunderstood due to laziness/incompetence is so real.

This made me remember what is now one of my favourite details in the series, and actually realise why I connected to it so much. In ep3, when yellow guy's told that love is a feeling he says, "because I'm hungry!" But he's told, "no, you're lonely." Yellow guy didn't actually give any indication he was feeling lonely, in fact he mentioned a completely different feeling. But in the eyes of the teacher, not being with friends and not knowing how to 'love correctly' meant he was lonely. AND THIS IS THE GENIUS PART!! Later on in the song the yellow guy says, "even me? But I am lonely" in a way that's sad and dejected. He was never actually lonely! But he was told that he was, and internalised it. And that was _me._ That was my childhood. As a kid I loved playing by myself. I was a very happy kid! It's not that I didn't like other kids, I was happy to play with them if they wanted. But I was also quite content to be in my own, wonderful little world. But the adults were _not_ content with that. Teachers were 'concerned' I wasn't playing with the other kids. My parents tried everything to make me. They banned me from playing my imagination games. They got teachers to 'pair' me with a kid each break that was made to play with me. At first I was just confused and annoyed. I tried to tell them I wasn't unhappy, I liked my own company, but they didn't listen. They told me that the way I was before was sad. It was wrong. It meant that I was _lonely._ And so eventually, I internalised that. I carried that with me my whole life. I stopped being content with just me, I had to be _liked._ and if people didn't like me (because who likes the weird autistic kid amiright?) Then that meant I was bad, and I had to change. I had to put everyone's needs before mine, suppress my real interests, be someone else, anything to be accepted so I wouldn't be lonely. But these days I've realised that when I am alone, I'm not lonely, I never was. I don't need people to like me or accept me, I like me. That can be enough. I hope you realise that too someday, yellow guy.

Tbh Harry was a character I related to heavily as an autistic person: everything feels weird but I may as well just accept it “it’s 9:30 there’s fish everywhere” *shrugs*

The line 'I was expected to give something that was only given to me in theory' hit hard, man.

31:20 "It's almost painfully apparent that these teachers have no idea what they're doing, and I think that's a 100 times more chilling." As a former teacher, I couldn't agree more. I'm so sorry for what you had to endure.

I had to pause the video at “you were supposed to fucking listen to me”. I had to take several deep breaths. I don’t even know what I should say, but that struck me so viscerally that I can’t say nothing. This has been such a trauma for me that if I’m talked over a few times in a row I’ll completely shut down. Thank you for sharing

this video reminds me of the time when i , an autistic person was in class. the teacher was talking about the blue whale challenge ( a trend which involved pressuring teens into self harm and $uicide). there were graphic images shown like people carving a whale into their arm. I told the teacher I wanted to leave the class because the bloody images disturbed me , and they said "ok". That day scarred me. They were trying to warn us about the challenge but they just traumatized us by showing elementary schoolers gore.

The stuff you said about special ED makes me feel really lucky that people thought I was neurotypical for basically my entire childhood.

The worst part of having a panic attack is the reaction of “you are being disrespectful and manipulative” from a parent so I feel that. I don’t have autism but I do have adhd and I’ve been viewed as a burden my whole life by the school system. I hope this rings a note with others. Having your desk facing the wall or put in the hallway, never knowing what’s going on and having your only friend be your home room teacher. School is so absolutely absurd and the belief that everyone is supposed to just figure it out or get left behind is not accurate to the outside world.

This video made me realise why I found this series scary growing up. Not the gore or violence, but the overstimulation and how the teachers treat the characters. The way the teachers act was very similar to the teachers I had, and of course the overstimulation was similar to what I had to experience everyday as a child with undiagnosed autism. The teachers didn't listen to me, and other adults refused to listen when I told them something upset me, while my parents never forced me to do things that I didn't like, student counselor's and the like thought making me do things like talk to my classmates or go out into crowds would help. It never did and made it so much worse for me.

As a fellow autistic furry, this video speaks to me so deeply. Luckily for me, I didn't have to deal with the book or special ed because I was diagnosed as an adult, but that created its own whole host of problems that I can feel really deeply when I watch DHMIS. The strongest one that I feel is Yellow Guy's constant grasping to understand and being shot down. I felt that too but the lack of diagnosis just led to me feeling inherently broken. I'd like to add my own interpretation to love episode. As an autistic person, I found that I experience and show love differently from other people. I show it through homemade gifts, giving away my belongings, and extremely strict self control that makes me able to attempt to show that I care for and am interested in others and also to make conversations go more smoothly. Other humans really like the gifts, but the self control annoys and confuses them when the cracks show. They seem to think that if someone has to put in effort to connect with them then the person doesn't really care about them. Which is baffling to me because isn't someone caring about you enough to put in extra effort for you a very blatant show of love? It feels like my love is only valuable when it results in tangible gifts rather than the intense mental and emotional effort that exists behind the scenes, even though if I didn't put in that effort they'd be even angrier. And that's not even to mention the deep bond that I feel with inanimate objects that makes people think I'm ridiculous or childish. And that's what the love episode feels like. Yellow Guy sees everyone explaining how they love. Then he gets excited to join in and share what he loves as well. Then he is chastised and told that he doesn't love the correct way. They explain the correct way to love and it makes literally no sense and seems to completely miss the point of love in the first place in the eyes of those on the outside. Then he is aggressively shoved into their form of love and everyone he knows is there. It is loud, terrifying, and overbearing. And he has no chance but to try to join that form of love.

There's something terrifyingly real about authority not being malicious but rather just not understanding and being incompetent, hence why so many try to seek out grand theories of master manipulation hoping for a simple explanation to all plights, when in truth it's just flawed humanity

i’ve always hated getting my picture taken. something about it feels fake, like lying, and recently i realized why. when i was little, i’d smile my biggest, most genuine smile, happy to be in the moment, but then my parent would stop everything and say “no, ACTUALLY smile.” my real smile wasn’t right. looking back on all my old pictures, i’ll admit, i kinda smile funny, but i look happy. i don’t have many pictures of myself nowadays, and the ones i do have i look uncomfortable. i don’t like getting my picture taken, because even though i’ve tried my best to “smile right”, i can’t do it. i really appreciate the thoughts you put into words in this video, i’ve related to the themes of dhmis but hadn’t been able to quite figure out why until now!

one of my strongest memories of special ed was that I was working on something but couldn't focus because two teachers who were supposed to be helping were whispering loudly to each other, and I spoke up about this saying they were being loud and it was making it hard to focus and they laughed at me for not knowing what speaking loudly means (because they were whispering)

"YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO FUCKING LISTEN TO ME!" I felt that.

The ending actually evokes more of the feeling of coming to grips with disability. The computer isn’t controlling the teachers: it’s Red Guy coming to terms with it. He realizes that understanding it won’t make him any happier. So he unplugs, and starts over. Ready to make the most of it with his friends Or it’s just bees, who knows

This might just be me, but Roy running it doesn't seem to me that he's intentionally evil, but he's trying to help and trying to "fix" his kid, but doesn't understand him enough to do it without hurting him (Which I'm now realising describes my relationship with my own dad. Yikes)

Honestly, I'd say the third episode got amplified for me with being aromantic asexual alongside autistic, it's the same exact confusion just on a more literal level of "i don't do heteronormative love" and just being told it's the way. I recall an experience once where a teacher was trying to lecture me about deciding to skip a very social high school event, and at one point he goes "in the future, when you finally meet the one who makes you heart flutter, and makes you feel thing-" and i just interrupted him saying "I'm asexual." and he replied "that doesn't matter anyways when you find your special one and then (SHE) asks ..." and like it was a script, the way it's always been that any deviation is immediately rejected. This was a much more neutral experience of being denied deviation of what constituted loves, but it's one I think about a lot. EDIT: saw this in replies, I'm aroace myself and felt the need to clarify that with the "heart flutter" response by adding aro clarifier. I mean, I still know the teacher was talking about "marriage" and by extension attraction on those terms (plus conflation of romanticism and seuxality), but just think it's good to note that even if it was meant to be about romantic attraction (which it isn't) it still was just like "i am not hetero-anything" and being ignored in that regards. i just like saying "asexual" to mean "aroace" to other people who aren't used to ace terminology, which is my bad

as someone who repressed a lot of my time in elementary school, your superflex rant brought me into a horrifying cinematic supervillain flashback like i was recounting my entire tragic backstory

11:50..."crying won't make us do anything for you" I swear grown ups really thought litteral children are trying to manipulate them by expressing an emotion in the only way they know

there's also that thing where autistic kids are often literally taught the "right" and "wrong" ways to play with toys. like some kids just wanna organize all their toys into fun patterns instead of engaging in "imaginative" play & they're taught that that's wrong. It relates on an extremely literal level to the scene with the orange in DHMIS1.

this reminds me of how i was treated in a first grade "rapid math" test... one day a question of "0-1" was the final question and I knew whole heartedly that it was "-1", I asked the teacher and she told me "that even though I was right I should not know that yet and that if it wasn't in her answer book it will be marked wrong"... maybe it was stubbornness or pride... but i doubled down... when i received my paper back with a "-1 see me" and had a discussion with the teacher about following orders and rules when they were given... i cried... and i still haven't forgotten... jesus

Its crazy how nobody ever talks about the name of the show like its insane the name says so much and nobody gives a shit about it

the sheer horror of having your feelings, motives, behaviors, and ideas prescribed to you while your valid feelings are ignored is so intense. so many times have i had a meltdown made worse by the *weaponized ignorance* of those around me, forcing me to scream at the top of my lungs in frustration, and being abused further for it. brb gonna cry

this vid triggers the fuck out of me; thank you for making it. I wish i didn't feel so powerless about the plight of autistic kids. It's so fucked they're still being treated that way today. It makes my heart ache.

I'm autistic and afab my younger brother autism was picked up on mine was not. But I remember the constant terror of school, the idea of being wrong for nothing. I learned to charm the adults around me, I was every teachers pet because if I wasn't I knew I'd be in danger. I wasn't good at keeping friends. But I made sure that every teach I could loved me so I would get the benefit of the doubt. The concept of the "good girl" saved me. Once I was in secondary though I couldn't charm 6 different teachers a day. So just tried to disappear and not get noticed. I'm sometimes so angry that no-one noticed my autism until I did at nearly thirty. But the way autism is treated in schools scares me to my soul.

I was diagnosed with Asperger’s and ADHD when I was 7, and though the way in which I'm autistic doesn't personally disable me since I've been lucky enough to grow up in an accepting environment both surrounded by a lot of other ND people, my ADHD very much does. Still even all the way in _9th grade_ I had teachers at my _special ed school_ telling me to 'just do it' when I told them my ADHD paralysis/executive dysfunction was making it impossible for me to start on my work Edit: and my god I am so happy that I'd never heard of the books you brought up before. If I'd read those I would've hated and felt ashamed of myself even more than most people around me calling me 'lazy' because of my ADHD and subtle childhood emotional abuse and manipulation already made me. It fckn baffles me that some adults raising or teaching autistic people would just see who they are as something to 'hide' or 'fix' and makes me realize all over again just how lucky I was that the adults around me treated me like an actual human being and not a problem to 'solve'

Your character sprites convey your emotions so well 😭

28:18 - Having lived with people on the spectrum for a long time when I was younger, this is tragic. I can't believe your teachers used the book to tell you what number you should be at rather than using it as a way to understand you. That is legitimately quite shocking.

The summer after 9th grade, my dad sexually assaulted me and my world understandably fell apart. I watched dhmis over and over that entire summer, and it became a weird comfort I guess. What I got out of it was the depiction of everything being seemly fine then suddenly being thrust into a nightmare and with each episode it seems like no matter what they try, they're still stuck in hell. I bit dark but no one else understood.

I'm undiagnosed, probably faked/masked my way into my 40s, but have been trying to unravel the tangled knots I have that got me here. I've been knowing I need to find a therapist (preferably one who is open to the idea of autism existing outside of kids of rich parents). I also haven't seen more than a few episodes of DHMIS because of the gore element. But goodness gracious this speaks to me, and has pulled the blanket off of an undigested knot of weird little things that could be trauma I didn't even realize I had, that someday I may be able to vomit at a therapist. Thank you. Even to this day people won't listen to me, and somehow try to read between the lines and guess what I "really" mean, rather than take my words at face value, and it's frustrating and lost me jobs. And since I'm in the US, that means loss of healthcare to help deal with this mentally, until I deteriorate enough to be "worth" getting help. Until then, it's a lonely struggle of X steps forward, +/-X steps back.

10:46 I think I'm "body-snatched", larger groups make me uncomfortable. "Oh no, you aren't being involved in the group? That's wrong!" Also it's amazing to me that people are not only able to tolerate loud places like music concerts, but ENJOY it. Headphones are my thing.

Wait... I cry so often, at the slightest thing, I get mildly criticised and start bawling. My parents said it was me just trying to make them feel bad for me. Other people do this too? I swear I thought there must be something wrong with me for crying so often. And hearing it said that others people thought it was manipulative... holy shit that's what they were implying this whole time? That's insane

Jesus Christ. I'm also neurodivergent and working as an aide at a school, and I was appalled to hear that you were restrained every time you had a meltdown. I was trained that you should never do that if there is any other option available. It should be reserved for ONLY when the child is a danger to themselves or someone else (at age six the latter is fairly unlikely.) So things like, having the kid lightly push you or try to grab something from you don't warrant it. Usually, during meltdowns, you can give the kid some space, maybe give them a toy to help them calm down, let them take a break, and then calmly talk later. And, telling anyone, kid or adult, that their feelings are wrong does not help them emotionally regulate, if anything it'll make it worse. Everyone has different triggers and ways of viewing the world. That story was horrifying and I'm happy to use that as a model for what not to do in my job.

I never understood why people feel "dread" when watching Jack's videos. Even when the implications end up being deeper, the video itself usually feels comforting

Even the name "don't hug me i'm scared" is pretty good for describing autism as often when autistic people get overwhelmed (with any emotion) they may not like / behave strangely to touch

I absolutely love this read. Also, I feel like your interpretation explains the title really well... "Don't hug me, I'm scared" is something I could absolutely see a panicked, overstimulated, neurodivergent child saying. A simple request from a child, asking for a very basic boundary in a time of distress, that, let's face it, most adults would bulldoze over and ignore. "You're scared, of course you need a hug!" Oof. I am right there with you feeling the invalidation hurts.

wow... my sister has mostly blocked out any memories she has of being in special ed class, but this brought back all of my memories of the stuff I was told happened to her by our mom once I got home every day. It was an overstimulating hell hole for her every day to the point where she did not develop and regressed in some aspects. My mother took her out of public school before she started 6th grade; she is now a brilliant artist, wise, intelligent and is able to be her own person. (this is the biggest comment I think I have ever posted.)

As I person who doesn’t have any mental disabilities/disorders, I just wanted to say that I found this analysis of DHMIS very entertaining. It was also interesting to see how certain scenes or made you feel instead of the “objective interpretation”. It was also interesting to here about your experience with autism which made me realize that the school system for neurodivergent people is terrible and very traumistising.

I felt this so much. What you said about the love episode, 100% true: in the end it’s very clear it’s a cult analogy BUT as a neurodivergent aro/ace spec person who also happens to be non binary and sapphic the concept of heterosexual marriage is something that always kind of scared me. It was really hard for me to even understand why people got married or had sex (it didn’t help that people would tell me “you’ll get it when you grow up”, because guess what, I grew up and I still didn’t get it. If you don’t explain to me why I would want to date why are you shocked I don’t understand), but when I finally kind of got it I also realized that 1 I’ll probably never experience love in a typical way, 2 my gender doesn’t fit into the love expected from me, and 3 even if I was cisgender I’m still romantically attracted to women only, which being afab also doesn’t fit with heterosexual love. So it’s like I’m triple far away. When I came out I always found kind of weird that the phrase “love is love” was used as a queer slogan. What if I don’t feel love that way. I’ve only ever liked one person romantically, and it was a very very subtle crush where I had no intention of dating. I don’t “love” in that way. I don’t and have never wanted a romantic parter. Also, the food episode. I was diagnosed as neurodivergent at around 14 and still don’t have a more specific diagnosis (my psychologist says I’m probably autistic and I’m getting tested in a month or so). So, as a kid I was always told that I was just picky. About clothes, about food, about the smell of the soap, about the places we would go to (I hated crowded and noisy places because haha I have sensory overload induced panic attacks since I was like 4). I was just spoiled and picky, and had to do stuff even if I didn’t like it. So I was forced a lot in my childhood to eat foods I do not tolerate. I would cry and sometimes throw up. My parents tested me for allergies but when I was allergic to no foods they were told I was just being a brat. So, I developed an eating disorder. And the episode about food made me uncomfortable the same way food does. First off it was gross, but also, the gray weird thing also looked gross WHICH IS EXACTLY MY EXPERIENCE. Food is too complex and makes my senses go crazy and weird textures make me throw up, but also bland and tasteless stuff is uncomfortable to eat and it’s also gross. My eating disorder is also very restricting in terms of touching or smelling uncooked or cold food, so if I wash the dishes for example I have panic attacks, and if I cook I also have panic attacks. So I can’t cook for myself. I depend on other people to feed me something I’ll hopefully be able to eat. And that is also a feeling very present in the episode. The weird guys who sing are feeding the protagonists and it’s awful food. And I relate to that because to me most food is awful. The gore aspect of the episode also is something I relate to, because I have intrusive thoughts. Often times I’ll have intrusive thoughts about weird and gory places where my food could have come from. I know I’m just projecting, but also, isn’t that the point of art in general? That you relate it to your personal experience? Idk man AND ALSO, the title is don’t hug me I’m scared, which YES PLEASE DONT HUG ME. I hate physical contact. I feel like that’s a pretty common autistic trait, so I can definitely see a neurodivergent interpretation of the show. Great video.

I grew up with undiagnosed autism (combination of being a girl, living in a rural area, and my brother having more destructive autistic traits than me sucking up all the attention) and god hearing you talk about how no one listened to your feelings is fucking REAL. I was a very emotional and sensitive kid and I would cry really easily about anything that upset me, and the adults around me just kind of started *ignoring* me after a while. Like "oh what are you upset about *this* time?" and "you're being too sensitive." It really fucked me up and I still have a hard time being vulnerable around people and especially crying around people because I'm so used to automatic rejection when I cry. I was *not* too sensitive, *they* were all just shit at understanding me. Also, this line: "I'm autistic" *looks down* "I'm sure this is incredibly shocking news for you." Cracked me the fuck up. Well done.

Sometimes I'm frustrated over being missed by the system, but hearing so many horror stories makes me thankful I wasn't diagnosed until adulthood.

The name “Don’t Hug Me, I’m Scared” is inherently neurodivergent.

"No matter what it was, i always had the wrong feelings" o o f i felt it like a punch at the gut

Hi, I'm also autistic. One part that really hit close to home for me was the whole "No, you're lonely, I can see it in your eyes" line. I often didn't like to hang out that much with other kids. I disliked large groups, or physical games. I preferred to play by myself, alone. I remember teachers trying to get me to play with other kids, and my parents trying to get me to make more friends. But I never cared for it that much. I had a group of friends at school but we were kinda the not very active not very sociable guys. When I got into highschool it became weirder because the whole highschool romance phase started but I never took part in it. I don't recall having any crush or feeling interest in girls at all. I never had a highschool girlfriend or engaged in any of that. At first my parents were weirded out by my disinterested approach to the opposite gender, and they even asked me outright if I was gay, and I told them no, I just didn't want to have a relationship. Today, I'm 24, I have a career and a job, and I still haven't really figured out the whole relationships thing. I had a crush once, and it did not go well.

I felt that "You were supposed to fucking *LISTEN* to me!" resonate in my soul. Absolutely loved this video. It was super raw and honest, and it felt so validating to hear someone else on the spectrum say these things. I could probably write an entire thesis on all the different moments i had to pause and reflect on how much one of your horror stories reminded me of one of my own. We need more people like you Patty, people who have the ability and courage to speak out and try to get NTs to understand the harm their abject refusal to understand us does, that *they* are the ones who need to change, not us.

This video didn't just give me the best analysis of Don't Hug Me I'm Scared that I have ever seen, one that retained the horror of the series, but the ending accurately captured a problem that ruins a lot of horror for me- when the surface level, incredibly effective horror, is thrown out in favor of explaining everything, ruining what made it scary in order to please The Theorists. Thank you Patricia.

As an Autistic person, I’m 12 minutes in and I want to cry. This isn’t a criticism of the video (haha reference). I’ve never had anything explain how it feels to be told constantly that your emotions and reactions are wrong all under the guise of help. Thank you for making this video 💕

ok, as an autistic person, I need you to make like 7 more video essays about your childhood experiences, because you just gracefully put together parts of my own experience that I couldn't fucking explain or understand myself let alone cope with in therapy and tell anyone else about. seriously, man, thank you.

holy shit the incredible five point scale. that brought back memories i didnt even know i had also: the "being told that you, a child, were being manipulative for crying" is another deep cut. i remember one time in my early teens i had a meltdown at my psychiatrists office and was sobbing and jabbing myself in the head with the stylus of my nintendo ds and the psychiatrist was just standing there, calm as anything, explaining to my mom that i was "just doing it for attention". definitely some kind of horror premise in there

As an upcoming teacher, I purposefully selected to hear a seminar on autism because I didn't know much about it, but felt like I couldn't be just uninformed when one if the children I'm meant to teach, care for and socialize struggles, feels left alone and not understood, it would break my heart to leave a child so alone because of my ignorance. You pointing out the clear interpretation really helps to reinforce what I've learned - just how diverse autism is, how many problems come from a lack of understanding, how important it is to include the childs feelings and ideas when working on solving problems, etc.

I also relate to the clown painting scene, i remember this clear memory of drawing a dog and a cat with my best friend during spanish class, we were the best at the class and the topic bored us so we drew pictures. Like come on, we are 10 yrs old give us a break. The teacher tore out my drawings, shredded them with her hand while screaming, threw them to the trash and kept yelling until the bell. How was that supposed to make me listen? Ive always gotten distracted and stuff and i always drew on my books, even at high school. It keeps me awake when im bored lol. Anyway im still not over that memory

As a fellow autistic person who has been bludgeoned over the head throughout my life by the assumption that my identifying as female is not possible because autistic women are way more rare, I deeply appreciate your confidence in talking about this so unabashedly. I severely struggle with self advocating, and seeing others so adament is inspiring. Your work is quite impressive and I express my utmost support for your art in the weirdest way I can.

Something that struck me recently while rewatching dhmis 5, was the sheer ominous discomfort of the raw meat Character looming over Eugene. ESPECIALLY when he puts his arm over his shoulder like that. There's something so visceral about the duck character being loomed over by an image of meat; his own living flesh, stripped of it's personhood and meaning, reduced to a commodity for the consumption of others. And I can't quite put my finger on it, but after watching this video, I do feel like there's an autistic interpretation in there somewhere.

DHMIS for me is the visual representation of being surrounded by friends but feeling absolutely alone