Weird Thoughts: Maud is Kuudere! (She might also have Asperger Syndrome) · 10:39pm Jul 17th, 2016
Maud, love her or hate her, she is kuudere. Kuudere being a Japanese trope for emotionless anime girls, which in case you didn't know is hot as hell. XP
Now here's where it gets a bit weird. Maud is highly intelligent, hyper focused on her fanatic love of rocks, and seems to not convey or understand emotions very well. So a lot of people have the idea that she might have Asperger syndrome... and she probably does. I won't lie, when she was created she was obviously supposed to be the living embodiment of a rock, or maybe the writer was purposefully going for a kuudere character. Either way what we have is somepony with Asperger syndrome. In fact a lot of kuudere characters might have Asperger syndrome, but I won't get into that right now. Instead lets stay on topic here.
Maud is an awesome pony, and she deserves only the best in life. Having Asperger syndrome isn't that bad, one of the smartest people I've ever known has it, and he's a school teacher with the heart of gold. In fact it's because of the way that Maud holds herself, the way she talks, and the way she communicates that makes me love her so darn much.
I've been doing research into psychology all day, and I found some really awesome things. For example, at first I had thought that Maud might have antisocial personality disorder, because she lacks empathy. After looking deeper into that I threw it out right away, it required Maud to be rather malicious when she has only ever been mean once in the show. Next I was suspicious of her having Schizoid personality disorder, but of course even if it matched the emotional parts of Maud it just didn't work when Maud has pretty much built the perfect life for herself, from my research schizoids have a very hard time staying focused and building themselves up. Finally I considered one of the strangest little things I've found, Alexithymia. It was pretty much perfect for her emotional state, this one's all about not understand emotions within oneself or in others. It can even lead to people becoming desensitized to emotions all together and becoming more or less robots. Unfortunately there is a catch; this one required a lack of imagination. Maud might showcase her lack of understanding of emotions, especially when you look at her poetry, but she is far from lacking an imagination. Boulder is an imaginary friend... or at least I hope so. (If that little guy is really alive watching us all, waiting, biding his time... well that's just unnerving.}
So in the end, I can only think of her having Asperger Syndrome. She has a surprising amount of knowledge in a single field, being obsessed with rocks. She has a hard time understanding emotions, and showing how she feels to others. She also can't tell when people are bored of her obsession and so she goes on at length about it in her lovely monotone voice. And there's a few other things to all point to this being the case. Of course she lucked out and missed some of the worse symptoms that Asperger Syndrome can have, so that's good.
That is if one is looking to psycho-analyze her. Otherwise she's pretty much just an awesome kuudere pony. Which is really nice because that's my favorite type of anime girl. Anyway that's really about all I got to say on the subject. If you got anything to add, or argue, or whatever, just let me know in the comments. And as always, thanks for reading. XD
Now here's some pictures of my favorite kuudere girls. XD
"Aspergers isn't that bad", a part of Aspergers is being highly intelligent, another part is having problems acting socially. Me personally? If I didn't have a strict rulebook on what I can talk about and what I can't talk about, I wouldn't know how to talk with people XD if I didn't think about how I should act around people, I'd make mistakes, and in the past I've made mistakes I'm very ashamed of now. I did horrible things because I didn't know any better, because socially I didn't have any common sense, and I still have a few problems I'm working on fixing.
APD doesn't imply malice, and she's not erratic enough for schizoaffective.
Before attempting psychoanalysis, you should probably try to learn what you're talking about.
Her motivations make APD or schizoaffective unlikely: she doesn't like / doesn't eat candy, but she keeps the necklaces because she loves Pinkie Pie. Sociopaths don't have the ability to love, and schizoaffective makes it difficult to think of others as "real".
She's also unlikely to be autistic.
4098167
You gave reasons for the rest, but forgot to for this one?
4098167 I'm actually very glad you pointed out the candy thing and how she keeps it because Pinkie gave it to her. I could make an argument about why she might keep them, like a trophy to signify how she 'owns' Pinkie. But that makes her a lot more crazy than she is. And as for schizoid, I can only speak from the research that I've seen. It's close but no cigar.
Finally for Asperger Syndrome. I've known someone for over four years before I found out he had Aspergers. He is almost entirely normal, and if he hadn't actually explained to me how his brain works and how he had to learn how to see emotions in other people I never would have known. The guy is a genius. Autism doesn't mean that somebody is dumb, they can be hyper intelligent and normal. One might never know they are speaking to some who has it. Their are however different levels of it, and in Maud's case I'd think she has aspergers, but not a severe case of it.
Then again, that's just my analysis. As a writer I like to understand what makes characters tick, and so research like this is always interesting to me, though I am sure to get some things wrong. Thanks again for the point on why she doesn't have APD. XD
4098142 that's interesting to know. Do you think that Maud has a rulebook or a journal she keeps that tells her 'how to talk to ponies'?
4098236 I dunno, I've never seen that many episodes of MLP
4098234
Asperger's also isn't a thing anymore. It's now called "High-functioning autism spectrum disorder".
She's unlikely to be autistic because she doesn't display behaviors of it, and I'm sick of self-diagnosed aspies looking for a normalization of their aberrant psychology be diagnosing all their favorite characters with it, and the attention garnered by being able to say "Well this character has a particular field of study they find meaning in, so it must be an aspie obsession, so they must share the neurosis I tell people I have to excuse my utter lack of social skills."
She's not autistic, she's just quiet. Like a rock. Her parents are likewise stony.
Limestone isn't "tsundere", she's just an asshole.
Pinkie Pie being isn't "yandere", she just finds her self-worth in the approval of her friends.
Marble isn't whatever the fuck that's supposed to mean, she's just shy.
I also hate moonspeak.
4098177
4098142
4098234 Autism is also a form of mental retardation. It doesn't necessarily mean aspies are hyperintelligent. Most of the aspies I've met who were diagnosed by someone with a doctorate in psychology were dim as fuck.
4098373
What's next? "Rainbow Dash isn't Cyan, just Blue." ?
Words have definitions. If a character meets the definition of a word, then it is perfectly alright to point out that word can be used to describe a character. It doesn't matter if you don't like that word, language, or have negative connotations with it due to some ass-hats on tumbler. None of those reasons take away that it's perfectly alright to use a word that fits a character to describe that character.
I'm surprised to hear it's all just "High-functioning autism spectrum disorder" now though. I mean, it always was that, but it used to consist of separate categories and one official "left over" category. When did that stop?
4098415 They don't meet those definitions, and I'm tired of weeaboos and their broken moon-babble.
That's also not a reasonable extension of my point (also she's not cyan. Cyan is a green-blue. Lightning Dust is cyan.)
Couple years ago iirc.
4098379 well okay, I don't and never have claimed to have AS. I just find this kind of research fascinating, and making psychological profiles based on characters from tv shows/ cartoons is interesting to me. And I admitted that the character was designed to be like a rock, the writers clearly did not intend for us to go this deep into them. They even state in their twitter feeds that they don't think too hard when writing. That going too deep kinda ruins the craziness of the show for them. In all honesty I have only met two people with AS who are hyper intelligent and function so well that you would never know. I have met many others in which it is clearly obvious that something is different about them.
yeah, Pinkie Pis is so not Yandere, it's a funny joke but she's not murderous. Never was. As for Limestone, I couldn't guess her. For Maud, she's still Kuudere in my opinion (unless a more knowledgeable otaku can tell me otherwise) Finally, Marble is so Dandere it hurts. Like, it's beautiful and painful at the same time. I love it.
All in all this is mostly for fun, I'm sorry that you don't like it, but you have offered some interesting insight for me to do further research on. And that's always good. Thanks for the reply.
4098430
)
They do meet the definition. Anyone familiar with the terms will have a good understanding of what kind of character these ponies are if you use them. That's effective communication right there. (But hell, I'd be willing to admit Pinkie is not so much Yandere as Genki.
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I'll be darned. It's true. Which now that I think about it, I already knew, but it's so darn prevalent that I wouldn't be surprised if pretty soon Cyan will officially be Light Sky Blue. Much like what happened with the definition of "Literally" to now be "Figuratively".
If that is not your point then you're doing a poor job of expressing it.
4098450 But they're not.
4098538
The Genki Girl is a character...who acts like she's been mainlining Red Bull and crystal meth. She is possessed of an over-abundance of energy, such that she runs everywhere ..., speaks quickly (sometimes unintelligibly so), and always does everything fast, fast, fast! She's filled with confidence and determination, regardless of whether she's competent or not. Although usually played exclusively for comedy, sometimes the Genki Girl slows down for a serious or introspective moment.
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Yeah, this sounds nothing like Pinkie.
4098573 Genki girl is closer, but in real-world speak she's more manic-depressive.
Limestone is more Jerk With A Heart Of Gold than this.
The rest is meaningless moon-babble invented and used by fat neckbeardly fucktards who think they speak Japanese, when they're about as good at it as Heavy Weapons Guy is at English.
Hearing "day-soo" makes me want to punch a baby in the face.
4098635
And we're done.
If you are going to straight up deny the reality that real people use words you don't like then what's the point anymore. I get it. It's a scary, ever-changing world out there. But you can't just sit back and denounce all evolution of language while expecting to be taken seriously because of it.
4098644 Weebs aren't people.
4098651
Neither are gypsies, amirite?
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4098654 ...
That's not funny.
4098379 Well that's strange, as Asperger kids are more naturally intelligent, but they can sometimes be average or less. Trust me though, when it comes to common sense? Yeah, sometimes they have absolutely none. I had no common sense at all as a kid.
4098730 I've never met one that was of even average intelligence.
Conversely, none of the few people I've met approaching my intellect have been autistic.
4098755 Okay, so I guess I'm going to be the adult here and say it simply; you are being very intolerant. You may not like weebu/otaku culture. But bad mouthing them is wrong. There are far too many people that look at bronies and say, "they aren't people." or even worse, "Bronies are pedophiles because they like shows for little girls."
I've unfortunately come across a few of them, even worse, I've had my own friends feel that way about me when they first found out that I was a brony. Intolerance of the level you are showing is just horrible. I'm not very good at being an otaku, heck I didn't even know half these terms until today, but I won't put them down for having their own terms and cute names for things. For crying out loud our porn is call 'clop' that's the sound of a horse's hoof! We have no right to say that desu or waifu sound stupid when we use words like brohoof. None at all.
You don't have to like them, but please, don't insult people just because you don't agree with them. This fandom is supposed to be built on the ideals of Love and tolerance. Not Hate and Prejudice.
That's all I'm really going to say on the mater.
4098755 The only Asperger kids I've met have either been talented or book smart. I'm pretty book smart myself, and I'm also a fast learner. I'd also say I'm quite good at sketching. But I suppose because I have Asperger's Syndrome I must be below average intelligence. You must have a very high intellect to know just how intelligent I am without even getting to know me. Either that, or you must be really foolish to make such judgement without any evidence.