This is somewhat inspired by the Chuggaconroy - Lady Emily situation and specifically this possible explanation for it that someone brought up, but its not really about that (but if you want to discuss this specific instance, feel free, im looking for some moral clarity on if anyway). Its a thought ive been having for a literal decade
I think nd advocacy and feminism do not intersect cleanly. I dont want to get into details, but i have been in the position of harassing someone without realizing i was doing that multiple times in my life. I think autistic men do often fuck up socially with women in a way that is recieved as harassment.
And i do think the autistic man is still acountable for that and needs to learn better in the future.
But i also wonder a lot about how to best deal with the intersection.
There are other issues as well. Like making the world more accessible and safe for people with Rejection-Sensative Dysphoria, but also protecting a woman’s (and people in general’s) right to say “no”. And connected to this, de-stigmatizing ND behaviors while protecting women’s right to social autonomy and trust their “creep-dar”. (Because i think sometimes ND behaviors can sometimes ping someones creep-dar even if the ND person means no harm at all, because lf the stigmatization).
Im also aware there is a body of writing by Autistic women feminists criticizing the behavior of many autistic men, but im not totally sure how to incorporate that.
The way I go about it is I always give benefit of the doubt at first, then communicate boundaries clearly, and if the person crosses it again knowingly after I communicated very clearly, that’s how you know for sure they’re a creep. Like for that guy I would have said something like “I get shoes are your special interest and all, and that’s great, but now that I know you have a feet kink, and you want pictures of me wearing shoes… it’s a bit weird, you know? I don’t wanna do that”
And if they say oh I get it and then stop, then it’s fine. But if they keep pushing then you know they’re being a sex pest and you can tell them to fuck off.
Yeah. In one of my cases there was a situation where the person said their boundaries, but when they later said they only drew those boundaries because of a misunderstanding about my past (complicated) I thought the situation changed. I also accidentally singled to her that line drawing would be met with anger from me, so when i picked things back up she “humored me” for six months and her “humoring me” came off as enthusiastic consent. So i had no idea anything was wrong.
Worse thing was that she is autistic too so it was a whole mess.
(Also yeah with the Chugga thing it kinda bothers me that Emily is making a public thing about this when she never made her discomfort clear to him.)
Ah yeah the ND double-bind lol. I once wrote off a male friend because I thought he was being “creepy”, but it turns out he’s ND too and just impulsively says weird shit to be funny. He’s actually quite hilarious. We’re like best friends now that I understand him better.
And i do think the autistic man is still acountable for that
This feels pretty ableist honestly. It’s something caused directly by a disability, would you say someone in a wheelchair should be held accountable for taking up more floor space? Or someone with tourettes should be held accountable for saying slurs? It’s effectively saying an autistic man can never fully unmask around a woman.
If you want a space to be truly inclusive for ND people, it needs to be inclusive of freaks, weirdos, and, yes, “conventionally creepy” people.
At the same time all people should feel safe, and in many ways it feels the underlying problem is that a lot of the time they aren’t safe. If people are genuinely safe then they have less need to rely on knee jerk reactions to “conventionally creepy” people. (how you achieve that I guess is the hard part)
Yeah my point is if you “accidentally harass” someone as an ND person you should still apologize (if they are still comfortable hearing from you). I dont think the “accidentally harassed” person has a responsability to continue with a dynamic that made them uncomfortable.
So what i mean is “accountable for the bad feelings caused”.
I think its possible to harm someone while not being in the wrong in terms of the original interaction. Ultimately, what matters is the ability to have humility and accountability for harm caused. We live in a world where oppressed people and especially women are required to faun or people-please for safety. Autistic people and in particular autistic men are less likely to be aware of this dynamic when it occurs. In this case, there is a harmful dynamic between the two people but causal responsibility falls on patriarchal society that legimates the thought ‘all interactions with men can end in violence against me’. It only becomes your fault if you refuse to acknowledge and make right that dynamic once it is exposed.
