“Autism doesn’t look like anything”

This is not an accurate statement, and I'm going to explain why. 

Yes, autistic people do often take things literally, but there's more to it than that...

Autistic people take things literally **when context is missing** and they don't have enough information to make logical inferences about what the other person might be trying to communicate beyond their actual words.

Example... when it comes to work conversations, I STRONGLY prefer talking to people on video chat (where their video is actually on and I can see their faces) over phone or text because I have a ton of added nonverbal context to what they're saying.

There's a bit of a misconception that autistic people can't pick up on facial cues... probably because some autistic people actually can't... but this is not even close to a universal experience.

For me, personally, I can absolutely pick up on facial cues. And if I'm having a conversation with someone in person, I can pick up on all sorts of other nonverbal cues as well (posture, hand gestures, etc.)

BUT if I'm missing that nonverbal context and someone is telling me something (e.g. via text)... I'm going to default to taking their words literally.

And I think this nuance about the autistic experience is important for people to understand.