Advise for female doctors with handling autistic male patients

Some autistic male patients chose never to indulge in females. If they're an asexual virgin - learning difficulties has sod all to do with it. Do not suggest to autistic male patients, that their carers arrange for someone to teach them what sexual consent is - for the sake of female's mental insecurities. Do not treat harmless males like potential rapists.

Parents
  • More to the point it’s insulting to suggest to autistic people who are perfectly mentally capable that they need help understanding what consent is. It’s not a mentally difficult concept.

    The issue is that communicating consent involves well … communication. Consent is often communicated nonverbally and the withdrawal of consent is often communicated nonverbally. And teaching non-verbal communication regarding sex to autistic people goes way beyond a 10 minute lecture by some trumped up educational professional.

    anthropologists could write volumes and do PhDs in the topic of non-verbal sexual communication and would still tell you that they don’t fully understand it. It’s not something that can be condensed into an easy read, picture book, 10 minute lecture.

    fortunately as the law stands at the moment autistic people do not need to have consent in order to be safe from prosecution, they and everybody else merely needs to reasonably believe that there was consent. 

Reply
  • More to the point it’s insulting to suggest to autistic people who are perfectly mentally capable that they need help understanding what consent is. It’s not a mentally difficult concept.

    The issue is that communicating consent involves well … communication. Consent is often communicated nonverbally and the withdrawal of consent is often communicated nonverbally. And teaching non-verbal communication regarding sex to autistic people goes way beyond a 10 minute lecture by some trumped up educational professional.

    anthropologists could write volumes and do PhDs in the topic of non-verbal sexual communication and would still tell you that they don’t fully understand it. It’s not something that can be condensed into an easy read, picture book, 10 minute lecture.

    fortunately as the law stands at the moment autistic people do not need to have consent in order to be safe from prosecution, they and everybody else merely needs to reasonably believe that there was consent. 

Children
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