To play the devil's advocate, I wonder if these naysayers really understand all that much about what ASD is to begin with. I find it sort of comical that they should presume to be authorities in such matters. 

I don't think this is true of NTs as a group, more the providence of busybodies, who come from every sort of group out there. They just have to be know-it-alls and lecture other people as if they don't have a lick of sense in their heads. 

Perhaps it comes from low self-esteem. I'm not sure. Some of my family members do this. They are not the happiest individuals.

Interesting about the idea that NTs can't read Aspie emotions. 

My housemate and I are both on the spectrum and can read each other REALLY well, but not necessarily the NTs around us.  We also have other friends on the spectrum who we agree are MUCH easier to read than most NTs. 

I watched the video.  Her intended audience was know-it-all NTs, so I hope it isn't just viewed here and in the Asperger's community.  This was wrenching to watch.

I could have written most of these responses, particularly TabithaKitten's... except that I haven't learnt all that well to imitate NTs.  In controlled settings, I have roles I play (or used to play... I am now totally disabled with CFS): greeter, business person, mediator, facilitator, but they are roles that I embody in my own way.  I'm not imitating as much as I am being a role.  (I can't seem to explain the difference, eh?) I suppose I come off a bit geeky at times.  In settings that are not controlled, I have no idea how to be other than to be myself and that's where I run into trouble.  I am most always real/authentic in social situations.  

Mostly, I am high functioning enough that most people find me to be interesting, self reflective, and personable... until they get to know me and then, I finally hear words like, "weird."  And that's when I find that people originally thought I was also probably judgmental (funny, they almost always assume I'm a vegetarian too) when they first met me, which explains the nervousness that I often see in others.  (I've been told it is a combination of how I look and my voice that gives rise to this.  Apparently, I sound like the college professor you'd love to hate except you respect her teaching ability.) 

I've learned how to do minimal amounts of small talk (perhaps that is imitation), which leaves me feeling as if bamboo shoots are being shoved under my finger nails.  I want to run around screaming at the inanity, though I think I get why NTs do it.  I just don't get the same thing out of it that they do.  If they got the same thing I do, I doubt NTs would engage in it.  So I don't think I'm very good at imitating... the bamboo shoot thing is too uncomfortable.  Playing roles where I have some sort of purpose, however, seems another thing altogether and does not stress me in the same way... however, I couldn't live my whole life like that.

I'm tired of being told I am weird.  But worse, I am tired of NTs assuming that they know my intent simply because they do not understand me or my behaviors.

As a talker, as someone who knew she was a talker since she was a kid, as someone who has not liked this aspect about myself and have tried to develop self control over the years even before getting my Asperger's diagnosis this year at age 54, I find this aspect of who I am to be the most difficult.  

In controlled environments, I can easily follow rules: No more than four comments during a day as a participant.  In church during talk back, I could now not open my mouth to comment but once every month instead of every Sunday (but it took my seeing that others were talking about me to realize I needed to institute that rule).  I can log the comments and stick to the rules I develop most of the time.  

However, in uncontrolled environments, either my excitement (about talking with someone I can relate to) or my social anxiety get the better of me and my talking can get out of control.

Last year, just prior to the diagnosis, as I was unwittingly assigned a role in a "friend's" childhood trauma drama that she was re-enacting, this friend determined that because I talked so much that I was narcissistic (and also nefarious... though, she would projecting her own insecurities onto my weirdness to arrive at that).  I've been tested and my psychologist would say otherwise, as would my mother who seems to know me better than anyone else and can't understand why any one would interpret me in a nefarious way (me neither... I can't see myself... I don't have any idea how others see me except for having too many interests to the point that I could engage in endless in-depth conversations about everything because the whole universe is so fucking interesting).  Indeed, one of the examples the "friend" used to prove that I am a narcissist was that I once talked with her for 20 minutes about grout and then wanted to show her the grout in my sunroom.  Grout.  Sigh.

Frankly, at this point, after the wringer I've been through in dealing with NTs who get me even less than I get them, I don't want to interact with anyone in the real world.