Published on 12, July, 2020
Hi fellow men. PS (ladies you can chime in if you wish to add anything too) open to all.
I wanted to get a bit of understanding from the men out there. What do you think about being a man with autism? Is it hard? What support do you get? What do you struggle with? For example aggression, anger management, exclusion, social isolation etc.
What do you wish people understood more about being a man? What is being a man to you? What values create a man?
I personally have certain values I will list here:
- treat women with respect and kindness. I believe women deserve to be treated with respect. I always hold doors open for women and let women go first on the bus etc. Just common decency to me but just little things that make me me.
- doing what I believe to be right. I try and follow my heart and do what I know or feel is the right thing to do in the moment.
- patience. Being patient and taking my time with things. Not rushing into the first thing that comes my way but rather instead taking my time and letting things take they’re natural order.
- no tolerance for drugs. Having the inner strength to say no to drugs and being willing to set those boundaries with those I meet through my everyday travels.
- self control. Having the ability to control my self and not act on the first impulse that I feel. Having the self control to stop myself from making daft decisions (ties into next point below).
- maturity. Having wisdom in years and experience to set an example to younger folks of how to treat others and be in the world.
So yeh this was just some ideas, just a fun topic nothing serious. Feel free to share your own values and experiences of being a man.
Hmm yes you are right, the sex here does not matter. I used to envy boys that they don’t have to have any make up that always made me uncomfortable annoying and drove me crazy. Often caused me tics, so I had a choice to hear stupid questions and remarks about my lack of decorations or questions “what’s wrong with you” when ticking and being generally nervous for no obvious reason. But I guess there are many things that men envy us women. As stated in the thread before. As for my experience of being chatted up - it was only for fun, to make fun of me and I obviously had no support and I was totally confused. It took me some time before I realized that they were making fun of me.
I’ve done drag for a few years on nights out and it’s so liberating - even straight men have done drag and they have found the same thing - shows like Priscilla and RPDR, Paris is Burning have made drag more accessible and visible and drag queens get more attention
I've always slightly envied women the option of wearing make up. If I have to "scrub up" for some kind of event there's not really much I can do, but at work events, weddings etc I see women turning up looking absolutely amazing, including women who normally, to be blunt, don't look amazing. There's nothing I can do as a man to glam myself up like that. I wish there was. If only the 1980s new romantics had managed to make that mainstream!
The other thing that men understand only too well, but I think an awful lot of women don't, is the absolute terror men experience because of the expectation that we have to approach women, we have to be the one that does the chatting up. In my case there was only so many times I could try that before the pain of rejection became overwhelming and disabling.
If only people could see us for the people we are, the way we come across in places like this