Yesterday @Erdrandbewohner postet a video about pick up artists “specializing” themselves in autistic women and the fact that 88,4 of autistic women report that they experienced SA in the past. The number didn’t surprise me and I am one them.
So, what makes autistic women and people of all genders, that are not cis men so prone to experience SA?
I didn’t watch the video, I don’t want to, but here are my thoughts about this, based on my personal experiences and what I learned from other feminists.
Besides all the bullshit all women have to deal with, primarily the fact that we learn very early that our needs are much less important than the needs of men, that we are constantly criticized for being angry, speaking out or purely existing, there are several other aspects that make us extremely vulnerable.
First there is the obvious aspect that many of us have difficulties reading social cues and we take things very literally, that we think that everyone is as honest as we are. But that is not the main reason in my experience. It’s also not the fact that our natural body language and stimming, like playing with our hair can be perceived as flirting when we are not.
It’s the constant invalidation we have to deal with since childhood. That is true to a certain extent for autistic men and allistic women too, but the intersection of both is extreme and I can’t even imagine how it must be for black autistic women or autistic women of colour.
I learned very early that my needs are not important, that I am too sensitive, too loud, annoying, that I am the problem and was told that I should stop making things up, shut the fuck up and adapt. I learned that life is painful, that love is painful, that interacting with other people, with this world is painful, that was my normality until I started to read feminist books, until I found out that I am autistic at the age of 42 and connected with the autistic online-community. And even now these things are so deeply ingrained into my system, that they influence me on a subconscious level and probably always will.
Autistic women are often undiagnosed and/or misdiagnosed, which makes us end up in burnout, isolated, unsupported or being stuck in relationships, that are not good for us, not understanding what is going on. It happened to me, that I stayed overnight at a men’s apartment, who already made me feel uncomfortable, but I ignored my intuition, because I had nowhere else to go, I was practically homeless, because burnout crashed my life.
But rape culture doesn’t start with non-consensual sex or even touch, it starts with men believing that they can do whatever the fuck they want to a woman and get away with it, because the sad truth is, that they usually do.
So, to all the men, who think that they are the good ones and not part of the problem, please ask yourself the following questions honestly:
When there is a conflict between a man and a woman, do you automatically assume that he is right and she is probably wrong or at least overreacting?
Do you act differently in a group with other men than on your own?
When another man makes a sexist joke, do you call him out or do you say nothing?
What consequences do men who behave sexist have to face from you?
Do you think, that women are complicated and difficult to understand?
Did you ever read a feminist book?
It’s not all men who take advantage of vulnerable women, but all men profit from patriarchy in one way or the other and most of you feel way to comfortable in doing so.
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