Why do so many Aspies like to act in a stertyped manner?

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maxisunnygirl
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16 Aug 2010, 8:41 am

I was just wondering about something that I've often seen about a lot (but not all) of people with AS.

Why is it that we like to stertype about people and often act in a stertyped fastion?

I know that not all of us do this, but most people with AS (myself inculed as I'm very girly even though I do also like some more typally male hobbies and TV programs) act (most often this'll happen when they are kids) like stertype male/female gender roles?

I know that it does not happen that a girl or woman with AS will be 100% fenmaine (but most of the girls that I've known are like that) or that a boy or man with AS will be 100% matcho (but I've know many, many that are so matcho that they think that they are in an action movie!) But it seems that while a girl with AS will be very shy and often passive (most of the time) a man with AS will go round with all guns blasing and be the most goung ho males that you'll ever hope to meet!

My reconing is that as quite often kids with AS stay at home, they spend a lot of time waching TV and/or playing video games (I did anyway) and so they'll start to pick up the often VERY stertyped views and behaveor from those programs and games.

This means that while boys with AS will spend there time 'thinking' that they are superheroes, (and thus lash out at bullies) girls with AS will copy princess's (and get bullied and thus the probems begin)

Happlly this get better for us girls as we have a much better grip on real life when we grow up.

I don't mind it that so many people with AS do this but I was just wondering what you guys and gals think....

Anyway I've got to go now, as I've got to go down the yellow brick road and find the Emreled City. (My fave movie as a kid was MGM's 'The Wizered of Oz')

Ta Now.



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16 Aug 2010, 8:45 am

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just-lou
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16 Aug 2010, 9:02 am

Just to clarify you mean stereotyped, correct?
In regard to your point, I've noticed just the opposite - that many aspie people tend to move beyond the accepted roles of sexuality and gender. As aspie people are obviously cognitively different anyways, they can be more outside the box on these issues as well. For myself, I consider myself genderqueer, and have been told that I tend more toward the male end of the gender spectrum. Gender is essentially a social construct. Theoretically it may once had originated from the female function of childbearing and the common trend for males to have greater physical strength when humans were still hunter-gatherers, but modern gender roles are purely social, an antiquated evolutionary leftover. As AS people demonstrate significant differences in their recognition of social behaviour, it follows that the AS perception of gender may well be different to NTs.



maxisunnygirl
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16 Aug 2010, 9:16 am

Yes that's very true and thanks for the reply (and the troll I used to have over 200 of them as a child if I remember rightly), however I did not mean ALL Aspies, I just ment that quite a few of them can appear that way as I've said I come across as very lady like but sassy at the same time.

This does not mean that I mimic popstars (and the like) all day it's just that (like you) I tend to be a little of both the male and female, although at the end of the day I'm a female at heart.

Don't worry I was not offened by what you have said as you have rased a good point.

Ta Now



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16 Aug 2010, 10:13 am

The ones I've met conform a great deal less to traditional gender roles, actually. Maybe 80% of NTs conform closely... only about 10% of autistics seem to. (This is a guess from the few dozen autistics I've met.) We even have a higher rate of non-heterosexuals (bi, gay, and asexual) as well as a higher rate of transgendered people. When I took the MMPI, I scored right in between the gender stereotypes; the test couldn't tell if I was male or female. I think you're seeing the opposite of what's actually there.


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16 Aug 2010, 11:37 am

Although I'm very male in my physical appearance I feel rather androgynous on the inside.



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16 Aug 2010, 12:12 pm

maxisunnygirl wrote:
Why is it that we like to stertype about people and often act in a stertyped fastion?


If we didn't all have certain traits and behaviors in common, there would be no means of diagnosing anyone with a nameable 'condition'.

What would you call it if we all were completely different and acted independently at will, doing whatever we wanted with no shortcomings or handicaps? Neurotypical, that's what.

Remove the stereotyped behaviors and you've cured the disorder.



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16 Aug 2010, 2:08 pm

My autist daughter adheres very strictly to gender rules mainly I think because she is trying desperately to find reliable rules that she can always count on to make the world less chaotic. She didn't pick them up from TV, I'm pretty sure. Children's TV (which is what she watches) goes out of its way to show its girl and boy characters not adhereing to traditional gender norms. As far as I can tell, she observed gender differences in preschool (when kids tend tyo become aware of them) and clung to them very tightly so the chaotic world would make sense. She is looking mainly for a reliable system of rules that "the world" can be counted on to follow. For the time being, gender stereotypes seem to be her way of systematizing the world.



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16 Aug 2010, 2:45 pm

For a man I'm such a sissy. D; I find I can be really feminine, and it wasn't until a few years ago that I stopped crying. Darn being emotionally sensitive. I also haven't really been successful with traditional manly sports, despite some interest.

In this state I'm heterosexual but I often wonder if I'm a transgender. At the same time, I'm still attracted to females.



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16 Aug 2010, 3:01 pm

maxisunnygirl wrote:
I was just wondering about something that I've often seen about a lot (but not all) of people with AS.

Why is it that we like to stertype about people and often act in a stertyped fastion?

I know that not all of us do this, but most people with AS (myself inculed as I'm very girly even though I do also like some more typally male hobbies and TV programs) act (most often this'll happen when they are kids) like stertype male/female gender roles?

I know that it does not happen that a girl or woman with AS will be 100% fenmaine (but most of the girls that I've known are like that) or that a boy or man with AS will be 100% matcho (but I've know many, many that are so matcho that they think that they are in an action movie!) But it seems that while a girl with AS will be very shy and often passive (most of the time) a man with AS will go round with all guns blasing and be the most goung ho males that you'll ever hope to meet!

My reconing is that as quite often kids with AS stay at home, they spend a lot of time waching TV and/or playing video games (I did anyway) and so they'll start to pick up the often VERY stertyped views and behaveor from those programs and games.

This means that while boys with AS will spend there time 'thinking' that they are superheroes, (and thus lash out at bullies) girls with AS will copy princess's (and get bullied and thus the probems begin)

Happlly this get better for us girls as we have a much better grip on real life when we grow up.

I don't mind it that so many people with AS do this but I was just wondering what you guys and gals think....

Anyway I've got to go now, as I've got to go down the yellow brick road and find the Emreled City. (My fave movie as a kid was MGM's 'The Wizered of Oz')

Ta Now.
:roll:


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16 Aug 2010, 3:04 pm

For me, behaving in rigid and stereotyped ways is probably about a sense of control. If the environment is predictable in some manner, then we will have more control and less anxiety. It is when people or situations do not accord with our stereotypes and behave in unpredictable ways that anxiety occurs. For N/Ts, they find it much easier to adapt to the change than we do because they may not have the same preconceived notions of how things ought to be.



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16 Aug 2010, 3:10 pm

ScottyN wrote:
For me, behaving in rigid and stereotyped ways is probably about a sense of control. If the environment is predictable in some manner, then we will have more control and less anxiety. It is when people or situations do not accord with our stereotypes and behave in unpredictable ways that anxiety occurs. For N/Ts, they find it much easier to adapt to the change than we do because they may not have the same preconceived notions of how things ought to be.


I'm pretty sure this is how it is for my autist daughter. As an Old School Feminist I couldn't understand why she was so insistent that she must wear pink and she couldn't so much as touch a toy truck. I kept trying to get her to see beyond these incredibly rigid gender stereotypes. But eventually I realized that this was her way of bringing some sense to the world---rules and a predictable pattern.



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16 Aug 2010, 3:24 pm

I've noticed the complete opposite. Most aspie guys i know of seem to be very un-macho... And then a lot of aspie girls are a lot like guys in some ways. I definitely don't conform to the female stereotype.



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16 Aug 2010, 3:35 pm

I'm a man trapped in a woman's body, and I look like a man, as well. I'm very proud of that. I even have a man's name, for my rank title. That's how masculine I am, for somebody who's supposed to be female.


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16 Aug 2010, 6:55 pm

I am a male and I am un-macho (if that is a word?) Nevermind not being macho. I don't understand the whole macho thing at all. Why can't people just be who they are and not act that way. The whole macho thing confuses me.



just-lou
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16 Aug 2010, 8:46 pm

Quote:
We even have a higher rate of non-heterosexuals (bi, gay, and asexual) as well as a higher rate of transgendered people.


I have noticed this too. Unfortunately, it does give people an excuse to dismiss or invalidate transgender or asexual people as "mentally ill" which doesn't help.