Autism and Gender Identity (GID) – GID has been officially changed to Gender Dysphoria with the release of the DSM-5 in 2013
The Relationship between Autism and Gender Identity
Have you ever wondered about the large overlap between Autism and Gender Identity? Then this article on Autism and Gender Identity is for you!
Before we get started with this article… I would first describe what Gender Identity is and what Gender Dysphoria is (including gender euphoria) along with its relationship with Autism.
Gender Identity is defined as how someone feels about their gender in terms of how they see themselves. There are many variations of how certain cultures view “Gender Identity”, such as:
- There are some individuals who identify with their sex that was designated at birth (hence the term “Cisgender”, and “cis” means “on the same side”).
- However, there are other people whose sense of Gender Identity (meaning how they see themselves) may NOT (keyword: not) be in alignment with their designated sex at birth (hence the term “Transgender”, and “trans” can also mean “on the other side”).
- People who identify as both male and female
- People who identify as more than one Gender Identity (think of one of my social media friends and siblings who I deeply admire and respect more than anything)
- People who identify as a gender that is outside the Eurocentric, Christian,
or Xtian, as I will utilize those terms interchangeably.
According to the Wikipedia page [that defines Christians], they explain the term as follows:
¹ “The abbreviations Xian and Xtian (and similarly-formed other parts of speech) have been used since at least the 17th century: Oxford English Dictionary shows a 1634 use of Xtianity and Xian is seen in a 1634–38 diary. The word Xmas uses a similar contraction.” - People who were of Colonialist gender and sex binaries
- There are even some people who identify as neither female nor male, and that is okay.
Gender Dysphoria and Gender Euphoria
Gender Dysphoria involves a conflict between how a person sees themselves as and the sex that they were designated at birth with (based on a doctor viewing an infant’s genitalia… creepy I know [cue the sarcasm]) whereas Gender Euphoria (which is the opposite) describes a person feeling at peace when one thinks about their true Gender Identity, which is typically accompanied by the joy and/or comfort that they experience.
American Philosopher and Gender Theorist Judith Pamela Butler speaks in her essay “Performative Acts and Gender Constitution”, explains her controversial perspective on Gender Identity:
² “Philosophers rarely think about acting in the theatrical sense, but they do have a discourse of ‘acts’ that maintains associative semantic meanings with theories of performance and acting. For example, John Searle’s ‘speech acts,’ those verbal assurances and promises which seem not only to refer to a speaking relationship, but to constitute a moral bond between speakers, illustrate one of the illocutionary gestures that constitutes the stage of the analytic philosophy of language. Further, ‘action theory,’ a domain of moral philosophy, seeks to understand what it is ‘to do’ prior to any claim of what one ought to do. Finally, the phenomenological theory of ‘acts,’ espoused by Edmund Husserl, Maurice Merleau-Ponty and George Herbert Mead, among others, seeks to explain the mundane way in which social agents constitute social reality through language, gesture, and all manner of symbolic social sign. Though phenomenology sometimes appears to assume the existence of a choosing and constituting agent prior to language (who poses as the sole source of its constituting acts), there is also a more radical use of the doctrine of constitution that takes the social agent as an object rather than the subject of constitutive acts.
When Simone de Beauvoir claims, “one is not born, but, rather, becomes a woman,” she is appropriating and reinterpreting this doctrine of constituting acts from the phenomenological tradition.] ¹ In this sense, gender is in no way a stable identity or locus of agency from which various acts proceede; rather, it is an identity tenuously constituted in time – an identity instituted through a stylized repetition of acts. Further, gender is instituted through the stylization of the body and, hence, must be understood as the mundane way in which bodily gestures, movements, and enactments of various kinds constitute the illusion of an abiding gendered self. This formulation moves the conception of gender off the ground of a substantial model of identity to one that requires a conception of a constituted social temporality. Significantly, if gender is instituted through acts which are internally discontinuous, then the appearance of substance is precisely that, a constructed identity, a performative accomplishment which the mundane social audience, including the actors themselves, come to believeand to perform in the mode of belief. If the ground of gender identity is the stylizedrepetition of acts through time, and not a seemingly seamless identity, then the possibilities of gender transformation are to be found in the arbitrary relation between such acts, in the possibility of a different sort of repeating, in the breaking or subversive repetition of that style.
Through the conception of gender acts sketched above, I will try to show some ways in which reified and naturalized conceptions of gender might be understood as constituted and, hence, capable of being constituted differently. In opposition to theatrical or phenomenological models which take the gendered self to be prior to its acts, I will understand constituting acts not only as constituting the identity of the actor, but as constituting that identity as a compelling illusion, an object of belief.
In the course of making my argument, I will draw from theatrical, anthropological, and philosophical discourses, but mainly phenomenology, to show that what is called gender identity is a performative accomplishment compelled by social sanction and taboo. In its very character as performative resides the possibility of contesting its reified status.” – Judith ButlerFootnotes
¹‘For a further discussion of Beauvoir’s feminist contribution to phenomenological theory, see my “Variations on Sex and Gender: Beauvoir’s The Second Sex,” Yale French Studies 172 (1986).
This essay can possibly be relevant in terms of the relationship that Autistic people have with their Gender Identity in terms of how they relate to it however very few studies have resulted in any finite causation for this phenomena in conclusions of peer-reviewed articles and studies, but also how they have difficulty with navigating a non-intersex-normative (or perisexnormative) and also allocisheteronormative world that categorizes gender into neat, little, Eurocentric boxes, which actually causes a lot of harm towards gender-modal and to intersex individuals, but…
I am NOT an expert on that, because gender-modal and intersex individuals are the experts of themselves and their identities and it’s NOT okay for me to talk over them.
According to an article published by the National Autistic Society titled “Gender Identity and Autism”:
³ “There is some evidence to show a link between gender dysphoria and autism, and that autistic people may be more likely than other people to have gender dysphoria. However there is little evidence about the reason(s) why, and some recent research suggests the link between autism and gender dysphoria is not so clear. More research is needed. More research is also required to develop and test assessment tools, support and treatment for autistic people eperiencing gender dysphoria.”
The National Autistic Society also conducted interviews with Autistic folx as a part of their “Stories from the Spectrum” series, and the interviewees were Dr. Wenn Lawson (an Autistic psychologist) and Madge Woollard (an enby Autistic pianist who goes by she/her). In the words of Woollard, “A lot of us Autistic people don’t really fit in society, and I think that this extends to ideas around gender”. Her words can imply that Autistic folx often have difficulties navigating society in terms of the relationship between themselves and their gender identities.
She also states that there is also a “huge overlap with Autistic people and with transgender people” and that there is also “a lot of non-binary Autistic people around”, which is also true because of the fact that (as I have stated earlier and will state again since I have a tendency to repeat myself a lot) plenty of Autistic folx do not really fit in with the binaristic and neurotypical world in a social manner, and that can also extend to the ideas around Gender Identity.
It is not relevant to the topic I am currently writing about, but I would also want to add something that can also give some knowledge about Gender Identity in terms of culture.
In history, there were a vast variety of Gender-Modal cultures [hell, even Judaism (both a religion and ethnoculture) has more than two narrow categories of Gender Identity, such as Androgynos and Tumtum] way before Eurocentric and Christian colonialism came and destroyed almost every single gender identities from each modal culture, with the exception of a couple that still survive today, such as Japan’s X-gender [another way to say non-binary, which can also be the same term outside of Japan in different countries], the Samoan Fa’afafine, the Indian Hijra, the Latine (and/or Mexican) Muxe, the Indigenous Two-Spirit, the Thai Kathoey (as it translated to “ladyboy” at a website that had interesting information about culturally diverse gender identities, but with improper/outdated terminology), the Jewish Aylonit (depicted in the Jewish Talmud as a woman who was designated female at birth, but cannot have children and/or is percevied as “man”-like), and plenty of more modal gender identities that are still thriving today under Eurocentric and Xtian colonialism.
There is also the acronym known as MOGAI (also another LGBTQ2S+ acronym, but easier to use and much more inclusive than LGBTQ+), which is lengthened to Marginalized Orientations, Gender Alignments, and Intersex.
As also stated in Laura Dattaro’s article of Gender and sexuality in Autism, explained, Gender Identity and sexuality is actually various among Autistic people than in the general population (a majority of whom are non-intersex [or perisex], allosexual [describes someone being sexually attracted to someone] or alloromantic [is described as someone who is being romantically attracted to someone], cisgender and heterosexual, able-bodied and neurotypical). To summarise what Dattaro stated, Autism is more common among people whose sense of Gender Identity is in misalignment with their designated sex at birth, which is “three to six times as common” in accordance with an August study that was conducted by researchers who want to understand how to be able to best accommodate and support people who identify outside of Eurocentric and Christian colonialist genders.
For plenty of centuries, most neurotypical parents and/or caregivers had the false belief that Autistic individuals (especially people of different neurotypes with intellectual disabilities) “shouldn’t” be given information about sexuality and that they are “less” interested in romantic and/or sexual relationships than neurotypical (or as I also like to refer to them as “allistics”) individuals are as Dewinters (the author of this information) states. However, this often false, inaccurate and harmful belief is changing for the betterment of the well-being of Autistic individuals as researchers begin to acknowledge that providing relationship support is vital to ensure the well-being of neurodivergent, neurodiverse and Autistic people (disabled and neurodiverse/neurodivergent and/or Autistic people should also be able to have access to equitable opportunities to have beneficial relationship support), just as it is to ensure the well-being of neurotypical people. A comprehensive and accurate sex education can also be beneficial for both Autistic and neurodivergent/diverse individuals as well because they are typically left out of the sex education discourse (since said discourse is dominated by neurotypical people who shouldn’t have a say in which Autistic person “should” love who).
Dattaro’s article says that “only 19 percent” of American sex education has relevant material that is more inclusive to MOGAI individuals in accordance to what the advocacy group GLSEN (Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network) says about America’s lack of or a seldom amount of a relevant and accurate sex education in its curriculums, which can and will create barriers for Autistic people who are also MOGAI as well.
When it comes to the relationship with Gender Identity and Autism, it is NOT just a Eurocentric/white issue, but rather it can also relate to intersectionality (in terms of when one’s identities intersect with another which can aid comprehension on how both privilege and oppression can intersect with one another). For example, there are Autistic folx who are BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour), Autistic folx of different religious creeds (Jewish, Xtian, Muslim, Pagan (and/or Neo-Pagan), Hindu, Shinto, Wicca, Jain, Sikh, Baha’i, and so forth), Autistic folx of modal ethnicities, intersex Autistic folx (since intersex folx are also part of the MOGAI community, but not every single intersex person wants to be included in the MOGAI community), and many more Autistic folx of all intersectionalities.
So if there is someone you would like to recommend this article to in terms of understanding the relationship between Gender Identity and Autism, then y’all can send them this!
~ From a Russian-Jewish Autistic person!
Citations
¹ Wikipedia contributors. (2020, November 30). Christians. In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 20:39, December 12, 2020, from https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Christians&oldid=991604775
² The Johns Hopkins University Press. Performative Acts and Gender Constitution: An Essay in Phenomenology and Feminist Theory. Judith Butler. Theatre Journal, Vol. 40, №4 (Dec., 1988), pp. 519–531. Accessed: 2009, 06, 08 15:26 by The Johns Hopkins University Press from https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=scholarly+articles+Performative+Acts+and+Gender+Constitution:+An+Essay+in+Phenomenology+and+Feminist+Theory+Judith+Butler&hl=en&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart.
academia.edu [PDF] Retrieved by Medium Publication Owner on December 18 00:32 from https://d1wqtxts1xzle7.cloudfront.net/44167065/butler_performative_acts.pdf?1459173416=&response-content-disposition=inline%3B+filename%3DButler_performative_acts.pdf&Expires=1607850173&Signature=RyiZ300eSTVRGyWAibOoNg3JHI1KDOV7EjYsr8TnQFRz2vPgrJ0~XqHlx5kBf2zYutQ~UgKr3Qh7wkbIh39sW6BQrGiZ6ZgGuTxJw5i1D-b6s~ac8BZk4LraKG3aXVAPNrIN1OSu2o~4rXTR1OnO4PYKh7YdCnvKywsiOLUt5yCf7WcH0jM2Mi03JT8MXsjZTB6IOo2myIxoO0I~Iq9b217njWWKGw4pcK7KZAUagyR9zZgry6J0DGR3rIqT4gdVyVTIr61qMP7TXvSD-~XHz3XtXDWagPHkrXiFMk4buDRshRtDIVnrFrnjdWYrjjjPNXd9dVeVJMXa8rd1-shAbA__&Key-Pair-Id=APKAJLOHF5GGSLRBV4ZA
³ National Autistic Society and Autism UK Ltd. According to the National Autistic Society and Autism UK Ltd, they are registered as a charity in England and Wales (269425) and in Scotland (SC039427). The National Autistic Society is also a company limited by guarantee, registered at Companies House (01205298). VAT registration number: 653370050. © The National Autistic Society 2020. Autism and gender identity. Retrieved by Medium Publication Owner on December 13 04:22 from https://www.autism.org.uk/advice-and-guidance/what-is-autism/autism-and-gender-identity
