Gender critical autistics / aspies

Do you think maybe there is an element of not questioning authorities and experts on this? It's something I've noticed with autistic persons in other settings I've been involved in. Once something is accepted as authoritative it becomes very difficult to shift that perspective.

Hi Nonny, you write beautifully I'm going to answer however i'm not formally diagnosed. I hope that's ok with you. I've been trying to get an NHS assessment for almost three years now so am hopeful that I might get assessed soon. I'm pretty gender conforming as I have longish hair and wear dresses at work. However that's mainly because I hate having my hair cut and find dresses comfier than trousers generally.

I'm a member of quite a few fb groups for autistic women and have noticed a real emphasis on unquestioning support for non gc thinking. Whenever someone has tried to post something that is gc they often get piled on by other members. It tends to get really heated quickly and as I'm not officially 'out' due to being undiagnosed I don't feel that I can really join in so I mainly lurk and watch.

I've always felt like an alien compared to other people around me. Until I came to the realisation that I might be autistic I really struggled with my mental health particularly with self confidence, anxiety and was really lonely. I can completely see why young autistic people might see freedom in the trans movement and it perhaps offers them an answer to why they feel different. I feel extremely lucky to have been born in the early 80's and worry for my non gender conforming daughter if things continue like this.

I'm interested in following this discussion I have a friend who has in the last few years really started pushing gender ideology, and also autism lobbying. The catalyst for the latter was her daughter being diagnosed as autistic and she came to the conclusion (I'd say correctly) that she also is autistic.
It's been a big worry to me for her and her family.
One thing I have noticed is although she sees herself as pro-science and is big into the skeptic community, she seems to have very little ability to look at alternate sources, or especially to evaluate different information or POV. It's all about "refuting" the evidence of the bad people who think the wrong things, usually by finding articles that say they refute them. Recently she has been pushing the virtues of deplatforming.

Nonny, your writing is very clear and insightful and resonates with some of my experiences. I'm currently going through the autism diagnosis pathway on the NHS (had my first appointment, now they need to speak to people who knew me during infancy and as an adult).

I will write more later, I too am very glad that trans issues were not around when I was a teen.

I think one of the things that would be helpful to younger autistic girls is hearing about feminism and hearing the logical arguments against gender stereotyping and so on. Just hearing the other side. We know they hear the gender identity stuff and many are taught it as if it's a fact. They probably don't hear the other side so much. And #nodebate is a large part of why.

Another thing I think would be useful is not just learning about gender roles, and stereotyping and that we don't have to follow them, but also pointing out the ways we (at least some of us but I'd say society in general) subtly look down upon things that have been designated as feminine things. Like how the colour pink is fine for girls, but not for boys, and not for girls who don't want to be like girls.. you even see gender critical people now saying things like "I always hated pink". Well, it's a colour, and there's nothing inherently wrong with it. We'd find it a bit odd of hoardes of people declared their hatred for the colour orange for example. (I'm sure some people do genuinely dislike the colour pink, it's just the example that came to me).

I am autistic though I didn't know it back then. But I think it would be helpful for all children really. Male, female, autistic or not.

I remember when feminism wanted to abolish societally imposed differences between men and women...

@Crake do you think the majority of feminists who are critical of gender ideology do not want to abolish these socially imposed differences? Sorry if I have misunderstood you but they very much do.

The whole point is, wear what you like, play with what you like, do what you like, as long as you're not hurting anyone - including yourself. Your body is your body, and your sex is your sex. All the rest is your personality and has no bearing on whether you're a man or woman. Saying that your interests, feelings and clothing preferences are signs of some kind of inate gender is just sexism.

Marcy, Nonny - I think you’re right about autism groups, particularly on FB. A woman raised a question on one of the bigger groups about finding pronouns especially difficult due to not being able to process the cognitive dissonance between evidence seen/person’s desired reality. There were a lot of ‘me too’ comments before it got deleted by the mods.

There are some groups for GC autistics. We tend to get ignored because our literal inability to comply is inconvenient for the ‘be kind’ brigade.

I’m autistic and would have been trans if I hadn’t been lucky enough to be born in the 70s.
As it is I don’t conform to stereotypes.
Most autistic middle aged women I know are GC.
I’ve noticed that autism groups tend to very aggressively go along with TWAW, and I wonder if that’s because they’ve found their tribe (difficult to do with autism) and will do anything to protect that.
I had to reach middle age before having steady friendships, and I can’t emphasise enough how much that has changed my life.

Thank you so much for this thread I'm going to read and re read the posts later. I have a daughter with autism diagnosed age two who informed me a few months ago that she was trans. I'm lost and scared and any discussion ends with her calling me cis and transphobic.
It came out of the blue when she decided to chop off her hair despite my offering to pay and take her to have it done professionally however she wanted (had to anyway to put right the mess she had made)
It's an elephant ever present in the room although there has been no efforts made for her to advance her status, she dresses like she always has (pretty gender neutral) Her hair has grown back and she continues to enjoy the interests she always has had. She calls herself a trans that likes female pursuits (collects and remodels dolls) and has female personality traits (very sensitive, anxious, quiet and passive)
I'm hoping that we both look back one day and see it as a phase she went through and she is happy as the person she is and the sex she was born.

My story...

I grew up in the 70s and 80s. I have memories of being given a doll at the age of 4 by nursery, and being upset as I wanted a car like the boys were given (doll got chucked in a cupboard and never looked at again). I never had dolls and never wanted them.

I remember at about the age of 7 or 8 asking for a car racing toy for Christmas. I recall my dad briefly querying it as it was 'a boy toy' but I stood firm, he didn't raise it again and I got the toy.

I hated pink (and still dislike it). Fortunately, in those days, toys had not been pinkified and pink was easily avoided.

I recall playing families with my best friend (again, aged about 4) and always wanting to be the dad.

Having said that, I did not like babies and wanted nothing to do with them. I was well into my 30s before I changed from being absolutely sure I never wanted children.

I hated my body during puberty. I hated my breasts. I hated my curves. I hated menstruating. I longed for a boyish body shape. I never liked wearing clothes to show my body shape - and I still don't. Baggy, comfortable stuff all the way.

I remember going to social events as a teen and always feeling like s spare part. I used to hang out with the boys, where we could talk about science or football (although mainly listen in my case, I wasn't much of a talker). I couldn't relate to the conversations the girls were having about make up, fashion and boys.

I spent my whole youth feeling like an outsider. Desperate to be accepted and part of things, but unable to navigate the path to get me there. I was very lonely.

I went into a STEM career and have gradually become comfortable in rejecting most of the trappings of femininity.

I remember in my 20s or 30s doing online quizzes about male Vs female brains. I always came out biased towards the male brain. I accepted that narrative as it made sense to me. It seemed to explain a lot about me. Fortunately, that is as far as things went in those days. Of course, now I see it as the bullshit stereotyping it was. Being logical, good at maths and spacial reasoning, but rubbish at fluffy emotional interpretation is nothing to do with male Vs female brain. But at the time I believed it.

I was in my 40s before it even crossed my mind that I could be autistic. I pursued a diagnosis because I felt it would help me understand myself better. I was diagnosed a few years later.

My heart now cries for all the girls who are now being irreversibly damaged by this ideology.

These experiences also need to be heard by clinicians working in gender clinics.

I think that this sort of thing is an important resource and I'd love to see it available more widely. This alternative viewpoint needs to be heard by autistic youngsters being swept up in this harmful ideology.

he choose
he chose

On Saturday the Today programme on Radio 4 was edited by Charles Moore. He's a committed Conservative and is well-known for writing a massive biography of Margaret Thatcher.

He choose a transgender (FtM) relative as a guest who spoke about the relevance of their autism to their transition.

www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p07z278v starting at 7.50

Yet again, the thing that comes across is fleeing womanhood as being a problematical state in the modern world, and one that's particularly problematical for people on the autistic spectrum.

If you don't feel you are able to discuss complex matters that require in depth thought, that is okay.
But normally people are able to explain to others why they hold an opinion.

"Keep in mind that right now you personally believe not following stereotypes makes you an alternative sex, you have followed this belief without question."

If you're going to tell me I've said things that I've never said, I'm not engaging with this discussion. I never insulted you personally and you're on the attack because I said I'm non-binary.

I'm autistic, will read the OP posts later on when I have more time. I'm in a lot of autistic women's groups on facebook and it amazes me how few of them are openly GC - despite many being GNC. I wonder how many are hiding though because of the risk of social ostracism. I would have thought a strong sense of logic would help prevent this, but the high levels of empathy for other's suffering, and being part of a vulnerable minority themselves doesn't help I guess.

Your writing is superb - is it out there, or is this the first time you've shared your experience? If this is your debut, please please get out there because you have a powerful voice in this field that could help so many young people and parents. Thank you for sharing.

Thank you Nonny. A lot of your post resonated with me. Although not autistic, I too raged against gender stereotypes growing up and could see the unfairness and lack of power from around 14 onwards.

Can I ask if you've actually looked at things in context and tried to understand what was happening at that period in history and choices that were made rocketmen?

Or is it just good guys Vs bad guys to you?

I’m autistic and in my sixties. I thank God that I hit puberty in the late 1960’s and not now.
I identify with large chunks of your experience OP, never fitting in with my female peer group, detesting dollies, dresses, make up, endless whinging about boyfriends, being expected to do all the housework, etc. I was mortified at starting periods and felt they condemned me to be part of a group I did not belong in. I was always happiest in jeans and t shirts and spent my teenage years alone, apart from attending school.
Thankfully, there was no transgender pressure in those days, or I shudder to think where I would be now.
Instead, there was the feminist movement (or Women’s Lib as it was called then!) - and it was my salvation. Far from telling me I was the “wrong gender” or in the “wrong body”, feminism fearlessly addressed the truth- that gender stereotypes were socially imposed nonsense, and I was perfectly justified in rejecting them.
I took science A levels and went to university to study medicine (at a time when many medical schools had a 10% quota for female students). And my first night at uni I met my DH, who was a genuinely non sexist wonderful man, and with whom I finally discovered that my female body was something that could give me mind blowing pleasure (and two wonderful daughters!).
I still struggle with my autism - social anxiety has been a problem all my life - but I have been happy in my female body for decades, knowing that it simply defines my anatomy and biology, and has nothing whatever to do with my cultural expressions, choice of clothing, or anything else.
I fear for the current generation of teenage girls. Their boyfriends’ idea of sex is formed by violent misogynist porn, and who can blame any girl for wanting to “identify out” of that by claiming to be transgender? We need old 70’s feminists to go into schools and talk to these girls urgently, about sexist gender stereotypes, empowerment, and resistance!