Take part: Autistic Gender Critical Voices

[NeuroPoppins]

Hi everyone, I'm putting together an article for my blog about what autistic ppl would like to say to other autistics about how they've been treated for having GC views.

Like being banned from groups, dog-piled, censored, trolled, branded hateful, shamed etc. About maybe feeling you've had to leave the groups and find a new place. Whatever experiences ppl have had. Maybe even personal guilt for not speaking up sooner, or for seeing others be silenced and not sticking up for them because it would have been too overwhelming for you to do. Help ppl see that you can admit these things and you're not alone.

I'm thinking I'll make an article with different quotes from ppl. Maybe turn some into Slides/Infographics so they're more likely to be shared around to help reach more ppl who might feel the same. Or see it and see the consequences for having been the persecutors damning us.

If anyone has anything they'd like to say or add to it put it here in the comments

Will all be done anonymously so no one will be named etc. No worries if you don't want to add anything, that's fine too.

I can't post a link to my blog as it will get marked as spam but you can just search my name Neuro Poppins and you will find my blog so you can check me out first. I've done Autistic Interviews before where I included questions about gender and published gender critical voices to show that there are autistic ppl who do not agree with gender ideology. I'd like to help raise our voices so I'm thinking up different ways to do so.

(I don't monetise the blog either btw, so I'm not making any money off this. I do it because of passion.)

Feel free to ask me any questions if you need more info

Bumping for you.

I'm so glad you're doing this. I'm not ND but several family members who are and I'm disgusted with the cowardice of the the main autism charities who'd rather play politics than protect their own.

Bumping too.

Yes, it's shocking that Autism organisations and charities are not speaking out. The Autism 'movement' has got so tangled up in gender ideology that we can't untangle ourselves from it, it's taken over so many ppl making autism rights second place

I would like to say that it is normal for autistic girls to feel uncomfortable with their bodies when they start to change...as it's change and brings unwanted attention and we can find it embarrassing. It may take us longer to get used to being grown up and that's ok.

It is normal for us to be slower to want to achieve the life steps of relationships, marriage, children etc. This does not mean that we won't want to at some point so don't prevent yourself having kids in the future just because you don't want them at 16,18 or even we'll into your 20s.You might change your mind and regret it. Yes, I know that we think we definitely won't, because that's how our brains work, but all of a sudden we can change our minds. Don't discount this possibility.

It's ok to wear comfortable clothes over fashion. Does not make you male, just a comfortable autistic girl.

Autistic girls (and women) do not have to conform to NT gender expectations to be a girl. We can have our own style and culture without being thought of as trans.

I run my own autism group on Facebook, exclusively for women bc yes, most autism groups "for women" allow tw.

I would have been sterilised and amputated if I were a girl now. At the time, I was a tom boy and had alot of internalised misogyny, so I would have done it, even against my mother's wishes, to escape the trappings of being female.

I’m recently diagnosed (last week), and have a DC with ASD. I’d be very interested in a group such as yours…

I am Autistic and functional enough to get a day job, but I find myself having to constantly self censor during the day, on LinkedIn etc but also on personal social media, I have lost good, long term friends over legitimate comments

Autistic here, bisexual, think gender stereotypes need dismantling, happy for people to dress and live in the way that makes them happy. I’d love a world where ‘being a man’ or ‘being a woman’ = ‘being 100% yourself and living how the fuck you want in a way that brings you joy’.

But I deal in facts and I don’t have any truck with compelled speech or groupthink. To say people can change sex is a lie, and as most autistic people are very uncomfortable with lying I’m not sure exactly what mental gymnastics autistic TRAs are using to justify their beliefs. Humans can’t change sex.

Yes, I am certain I would have thought I was either non-binary (goes well with my lack of desire in sexual intimacy (I used to describe myself as asexual, but I prefer to say non-sexual now). Or I would have thought 8 was a bit.

I did dress up as a boy between ages 11-13 but in secret. I've never felt like other girls and considered myself a totally different kind of human to them, separating myself. It's only in my 30s that I've realised I'm a female. I was never gender dysphoric though, but it's hard to explain. I'm very relieved to have grown up before these times

I struggle to understand how so many autistics go along with this lie considering how free we usually are from group think. But I think it preys on our feeling 'other' and gives it a name that is more tangible for us. And tribe of misfits

It's awful isn't it. Especially when you consider we are often marginalized and isolated socially anyway and now we have a whole new way to feel unacceptable and have to mask in a whole new way, but this time with autistics!

I'd love to join the group if you're happy to share it? I'm slowly starting to challenge the online groups now that I've found more GC groups to be part of. I'm going to start challenging autistic advocates/publishers/websites etc publicly. They are pushing this ideology onto autistic ppl so I can't just keep ignoring it anymore when they post on their Facebook pages etc

It's great that you're doing this OP. Thank you.

Have you heard this speech before?

https://twitter.com/HeidiBriones/status/1778146112068788505?t=kWGl2Di2AAOv4dpSv98LoQ&s=19

I found it interesting listening to her (Maia's) thoughts on why she had previously believed that she wasn't female.

This is great OP.

I don't have a lot to contribute as I tend to keep myself to myself. But I am part of a local support group for parents of ND children and the first day I walked in, I was greeted by All The Flags hanging up high on the walls. (The mention of it being a Safe Space also triggered my spidery senses. Safe from what? But that's probably just me).

Then someone mentioned that Autistic kids are more likely to be trans. My initial reaction was to say, 'well of course they are, you don't fit in and then someone online on in your school LGBT++++ club offers you an' acceptable explanation ' with fluffy rainbows and what looks like acceptance, finally. Of course you are going to fall for it hook, line and sinker. I'd have done as a young teen, which scares me to think about'.

But I didn't say any of that aloud, and felt like a coward. And I find myself self-censoring, biting my tongue sometimes. And attending less and less.

I did say that it's probably best to watch and wait, and hold off any medical intervention or social transition when one parent said their 16 year old son said he thought he was trans. I was encouraged to see that a couple of people there thought this was a sensible approach. But still, I find myself second guessing myself, unsure how to behave around the group. Which is a load I don't need. So no support for me as a parent of an ND child.

I would like to say that it had made finding support for my 12 year old daughter much more complicated. There are ASD groups locally which she is nearly eligible to join (age wise), but they are completely captured and so not safe to send her to. She is really struggling and there isn't much support out there for young kids here so it's extremely frustrating.

That's a great speech. Clear and compelling. Well done Maia.

I backed out of the parents of ND children support group for exactly the same reason. I had asked some questions very tentatively about the propensity to believe you're not really female because of a combination of cognitive processing and societal pressure to "identify" in some way. But it was clear that my questioning was being received as bordering on "ableism" so I had to drop it.

When I listened to Maia's speech, there were moments where I could hear the analytical voice of my own daughter coming through.. only right now, when we do occasionally stumble on this topic - it's a topic best avoided for the most part (I need to prioritise maintaining our relationship in our conversations) - her analytical thinking skills have been whirled in to action using misinformation. The latest "gem" was to tell me that "you don't know anything, Mum. This is why I can't talk to you about this stuff" when we found ourselves on the topic.

It went like this, driving back from school yesterday....

Her sister: Mum, we've got Miss X again (cover teacher). She's still really sexist and hates the boys. She's keeping them all back at the end of class again because some of the boys are talking. There are girls who talk too, but she doesn't seem to notice or care.

Me: Ah yes, I remember her. She's the one who was telling the boys that wars were all their fault when she covered your history class. She went in to lots of detail and told the girls that she felt sorry for them because of the actions of men. Yes?

Her sister: yes

ND daughter: she's really old mum. She's got old-fashioned views about what boys and girls do. She's not sexist. She's just from a different time.

Me: you could be right <my non-confrontational opener> but I'm with [sister] here. I think she is sexist because there were lots of other examples too that I remember [sister] saying. If I'm being kind, perhaps she was trying (badly) in the war example to talk about aggression. Leaving sexism out of it, boys and men are typically more aggressive than women because of the effects of testosterone. There are lots of examples where men who take additional testosterone, anabolic steroids, get more aggressive. So perhaps she was just really bad at explaining what she meant....

<I got cut off>

ND daughter: testosterone doesn't make people aggressive. It just gives them confidence.

Me <in my head.. WTAF?!.. deep breath... calm voice... despite raging concern about where on earth she has heard this.. she wants confidence.. she lacks it... FFS... will this onslaught of adults (or other misinformed children) telling my daughter utter shit on the internet/IRL never end?>....
"I'm afraid that's incorrect. It's a known fact that testosterone is linked to aggression. And also to libido, to people's sex drive. <Yes, that's right. I tried to swerve the conversation on to sex, just to avoid getting in to an argument about gender identity!!>"

ND daughter: you don't know anything, Mum. That's why I can't talk to you about this stuff.

Hmmmmmm. I talked to my husband yesterday evening and he agrees that her misunderstanding about testosterone is yet another risk and that she still could end up deciding to take testosterone when she is 18. She's desperate for more confidence, like most girls her age. Her autism, in ways articulated brilliantly by Maia in that clip, leads her to seek and analyse information in ways that result in a misunderstanding about what it means to be female.

So, I plough on. My focus is to try and remove as much bias from around her as I can. We're not going to stop her using the internet, it's how she communicates with her IRL friends - they game together and it's lovely to hear her on the mic laughing etc - and it's how she researches tornadoes and other favourite topics of hers. Currently it's volcanoes.

I'm heartened by the idea of an ND resource, run by an ND woman who wants to challenge gender identity belief with some thoughtful questions and blogs. Thank you OP 💐

I remember reading a comment by Hazel Appleyard (also autistic) on X where she said that once enough autistic people understand what's going on here, they'll be fired up to fight it 💪

Ha! Just realised that made an assumption:

Are you a woman OP? I think your user name subliminally took me to the conclusion that you are.

Autistic boys also face a risk in relation to gender identity belief, just a different one. From what I have observed, it's split as follows:

Girls: identifying out of girlhood

Boys: as their sexual feelings wake up due to puberty, the combination of their ND cognitive processing and (most often) heterosexual desires are effectively weaponised against them by adults online: they are encouraged to see female gaming avatars and/or anime characters as an extension of themselves and to find this erotic. They begin to think of themselves as lesbians. Obviously there are homosexual, autistic boys who find themselves believing that they are women but I don't believe that there is the same sexual element to it.

My DD is in uni and she is a gender critical autistic woman. She doesn't feel comfortable accessing any support for autistic students because they are all genderists. It makes me so frustrated for her, she is missing out on so much because of this ideology.

Have a look! The first question asks if you're a natal female because we only admit actual women. You'd be welcome!

Great speech, thank you for sharing. Poor Maia and all of these Autistic detransitioners :(

Yeah, all these "safe spaces" claiming inclusivity are actually excluding anyone who doesn't conform to the belief in gender ideology. I see it as a threat now to keep quiet or you're not welcome. Ppl will be too afraid to give honest advice in a space like that, even when you can see a parent or child in distress. How awful :(

It's sounds like a difficult place for you to be in but I bet your words have helped someone there, even if it just gives a very small ripple.

What's DD pls? I keep seeing this acronym but I don't know what it means.

That's truly awful, Autistic ppl really need a sense of community but if you don't go along with gender ideology you are exiled! It's horrifying! How can fellow autistics not see this marginalisation ?!

I'm so sorry, this is an awful situation. As if young autistic ppl don't have enough to struggle with :(