send in the clowns (off topic)

[Joy Lucas]

I think clowns per se, evolved from the european court jester in
medieval times and probably beyond that as well. The emphasis was
always on a mysterious character, dressed up to hide the true
intentions. In the 17th C you had Pierot a mischievous and yet sinister
clown and the 19th C saw the popular but oldest type of clown the
whiteface - this was thought to be the most bizarre type and often
acted as the butt to someone's bad joke about them. This epitomises all
troubled emotions wrapped up in one grotesque costume and character. As
I said before they represent the human condition and no wonder children
with special needs are frightened of them, easily picking up all the
bad vibes at once. Someone with autism or Aspergers cannot tolerate too
much stimulation at once, and a clown would represent just that, an
awful lot of emotion all at the same time.

Take some comfort in the fact that there is a website
http://www.ihateclowns.com

Best wishes, Joy
http://www.homeopathicmateriamedica.com

[Caro Andujar]

Joy,
That was quite an interesting post.
"The emphasis was always on a mysterious character,
dressed up to hide the true intentions". If a child
senses this, and this gives rise to feelings of
mistrust, would the rubric be "suspicious" in your
opinion?
Caro
--- Joy Lucas wrote:

the 17th C you had Pierot a
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[Soroush Ebrahimi]

In the olden days usually the king / ruler had a clown or jester who was
able say the truths that often would cost the head of the others.

Whether these were really fools or just acted the fool, remains to be
debated.

Notably we see these characters in both Middle East and also European
countries.

I remember the 60's song "Ha Ha said the clown, as the king was discrowned
....."
http://www.yardbirds.org/lyrics/haha.html
http://www.leoslyrics.com/listlyrics.ph ... FHOd1Wc%3D

Rgds
Soroush
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[Joy Lucas]

I think in a child who has autism or asperger's (or any other special
need) then the problem is assimilating all the information and then
trying to deduce what it all means (well I guess we can all have that
kind of processing problem in degrees). If one works from the point of
view that a clown's demeanour can be misleading, and it is often meant
to be, then I think that is the main issue. Suspicion could certainly
be the end result of that problem with processing and one would need to
look at a specific case to see if that theme of suspicion follows
through. Often you can't always get that reliable information but you
need to look for it. In my experience it is usually some kind of
aggression that gets expressed rather than suspicion, this is a form
of self protection, as if battling with all that information, but
suspicion can also be very aggressive, you only have to think of
Hyoscyamus, but each case has to be taken on its own merits.

All very interesting.

Best wishes, Joy
http://www.homeopathicmateriamedica.com
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[Shannon Nelson]

Also, don't autistic and asperger's have special problems with change
and unfamiliarity?

[Joy Lucas]

These can be common enough sx with children/people with these
conditions and others, such as Down syndrome and I suppose that is why
carcinosin is so often suggested or indicated.

Best wishes, Joy
http://www.homeopathicmateriamedica.com
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