(Untitled)

[anivad]

Doing a survey here on the link between AS and sexual orientation/identity, mostly to make a point to someone else on an online forum.

(Sexual orientation refers to that using biological gender as referrence point.)

Poll

Comments

[cheyinka]

Out of curiosity, what point were you hoping to make?

[anivad]

Someone was going on about how homosexuals and transexuals were teh evil, and so I asked what about autistics, seeing as how they have a greater tendency to be not-straight and/or genderqueer. He didn't believe that there was a correlation, so I'm trying to show that there is.

[cheyinka]

Huh. I don't believe there's a correlation either. The poll looks pretty much like any other poll conducted of people on the Internet, with the exception that asexuality has a significant representation.

Moreover, if homosexuals or transexuals are evil (again something I don't accept), it wouldn't exonerate them to say that autistics have a greater tendency to describe themselves with one of those two terms - at best it would make autistic homosexuals less culpable for being evil.

[christinaathena]

I think there might be. Particularly in terms of gender. We attribute less importance to group identities, so it would make sense to me that we'd have a greater tendency to question the relation between our biological gender and our identity. I personally identify as an Aspie who happens to have a male body. Gender to me is just a secondary issue, no more important than the color of my hair. I'd be the same person if I'd been born in a female body.

[anivad]

Yeah, but there are also those who identify as neither gender, so I thought biological gender was the most convenient to use as reference point. I don't think there are many intersex people here.

At one point I had over twenty options on the poll, but I cut down; there has to be a limit. Too many variations out there. This is already more than the traditional straight/gay/bi options that most such surveys have.

[anivad]

That would make trans-women dating men gay, because their biological sex is male.

In the case of this survey, yeah, I thought about that too. I had been going to put 'androphiliac FtM' and 'gynaeophiliac MtF' as options, along with 'androphiliac MtF' and 'gynaeophiliac FtM', but then I wondered about transpeople or other-gendered people who identified as bi or asexual, like me, and it was basically getting messy.

Then I decided it didn't really matter, because the point of this was more to do with proving that autistics were less likely to conform to the regular orientation/identity of their biological sex.

[sparrowrose]

I don't know how valid or permanent my orientation would be. I'm not sure where I fit into the poll. I'm mostly straight because I'm married with no intention or desire to have sex outside the marriage. I'm bisexual because I've been in relationships with more than one gender/sex in the past and have no theoretical objectin to them in the future (with the above limiter of monogamy.)

So I'm theoretically/emotionally/historically bisexual and actually/emotionally/currently mostly straight and then layered over the top of all that is the added bonus that my sex drive pretty much got up and walked away somewhere between seven and ten years ago so I'm mainly asexual but that isn't enough of the full picture to choose, either.

And that's just orientation. as for identity? genderless? I don't know. The whole notion of gender is such a mystery to me. I've never been able to sense possessing a gender. I only know I have one because other people tell me I do.

[zoenox]

I consider myself bisexual based not on my current relationship status, but on my preference. I consider myself bisexual and not pansexual or polysexual or whatever because I prefer men who are mostly masculine (physically and personality-wise) and women who mostly feminine (same deal). I think people who are emotionally more balanced between stereotypic gender qualities are not necessarily any more or less masculine or feminine. I think gender is more in how a person presents oneself; thus a sensitive man is not "feminine" in my book, nor an aggressive female "masculine

[concrete_stare]

I would not dream of answering such personal questions on a poll where answers are "visible to all" on a post that is not friends-locked. This would mean that anyone (including, say, family members, prospective employers, or stalkers) could conceivably Google someone's username and find this incredibly personal information easily.

I doubt I'm the only one who feels this way- so you aren't going to get anything even close to an accurate result.

I also take issue with your earlier comment saying "I doubt there are many intersex people here". On the contrary: in my experience, autism is extremely common among the intersexed, and I know of several that follow this community.

[stormdog]

I think the first point you make is a good one. I'm not concerned myself, but it would be a good idea, I think, to make this a friends locked post.

On the second point, I think it depends on what is meant by 'many'. The question at hand is, I think, whether there are enough intersexed people reading posts in this community to skew data to a statisticaly significant degree if the option is not available in the polls. For my part, I think the point may be moot. There is a large enough percentage (myself included) who have defined themselves as 'something else' that I think the point that the author is trying to make (that autistics have a tendancy toward being "genderqueer") is very well illustrated. (This is assuming that you're welling to lump into the hazy category of 'genderqueer' everyone who does not identify as their physical, biological gender, be that male, female, or intersexed. That is an assumption that I would make.)

[concrete_stare]

A pedant after my own heart.

I tend not to lump people into categories; rather, I let them lump themselves if they wish to be lumped.

Want to be friends?

[stormdog]

Sure; we seem to have at least a few interests in common. I don't think I have any friends in Ireland yet, though my mother's family is from there a few generations back (they're Woodses).

I hope my personal blatherings are as interesting as you seem to think they'll be. *smiles*

[teamnoir]

You need categories for "other".

I believe orientation labels are simply political affiliations and as such, I'm largely unaligned.