Autism, by its
definition, is a neural disorder that affects the normal development of social
and communicative skills, also involving the symptoms of repetitive and closed behaviors. Those
who have autistic symptoms usually cannot interact with other people, and find
it particularly difficult to connect with other people in emotional level.
The movie ‘Ben X’,
which deals with a story of an autistic teenager named Ben, helps us understand
what autism really is. We also get hints on what it’s like to have autistic
behaviors, and how the society – the normal people – should treat those who are
suffering from autism.
The movie begins
with the computer game Ben plays in his room; for Ben, who has been diagnosed
to have autism and found it difficult to interact with people in the real
world, computer game has been the only place where he can truly soothe his pains
and connect himself to others.
As the movie
goes on, we can see that even outside the game, the real world he views is
frequently overlapped with the imaginary scenes from the computer game. This
indicates one of the most significant, but often neglected, characteristics of
autistic people; they recognize the world with ‘their own unique ways.’
Ben, in this case, also has a feeling and emotion, and has his own way of interpreting
the world. Although he cannot interact well with others, it doesn't justify the
misunderstandings and harassment from the people around him. He feels anger,
shame, desire, frustration, and even, bliss as normal people usually do, but
what he only lacks is the way he can 'express' his emotions and thoughts to the
outside world.
The movie
reaches its climax, as Ben finds his own salvation from the computer game,
again. Although it may be imaginary, he finds a girl whom he had connected
online so far and starts to open his mind with the girl. Slowly he opens
himself to the girl, expresses his thorough feelings and emotions to her, and
finally finds his own way to sympathize with other people. He is healed. He changes.
But what about others?
What I want to
focus on after watching this movie is not only on Ben’s behaviors, but also on
those of other people around him, including his classmates.
In this movie, there is a scene where Ben is sexually harassed by his classmates in the classroom, and where he expresses his anger by breaking the windows. Seeing this part, I've realized that what really matters is how other people should have treated Ben. But then, Ben’s classmates now come and say, “We wanted to treat him normally, but he couldn't just accept us.”
At the end, Ben
commits suicide on the ship and his funeral is held, but it is turned out that
his suicide was actually a fake to deceive other people. At that moment, Ben
and his family see the people who deeply repent their ignorance and
indifference towards him, who feel shame from teasing and harassing him, and
who start to sympathize with his situation. His mother says, "Someone had to
die." Yes, someone had to die to let them understand him, and until then, nobody tried to sympathize
with him.
What does her saying really mean? When treating autism, what we have to do is not only fight for the patients who go through mental, emotional disorder, but also remove the invisible wall that prevents us - normal people - from understanding them, from sympathizing with them. Ironically, just as Ben's classmates said Ben couldn't accept them, they couldn't accept him, and just as Ben couldn't sympathize with them, they couldn't sympathize with him, either. Such wall, perhaps, unconsciously exists in the mind of every one of us, even though we may not be as harsh as Ben's classmates in the film.
This movies gives us an indication on how we should treat autism. Through his lonely struggles, Ben could heal himself, and could free himself from the fights against his pains. His fights portrayed in this film gives me a message that what we have to do for these people like Ben is just to let them be themselves, let them triumph over their struggles, and understand them, reminding me of a true meaning of 'sympathizing' with others.
