I've been watching series with autistic women—The Bridge, The Tunnel, Astrid. What impresses me most is how they completely escape the misogyny.
The random intrusion of lights, sounds, and smells are highest on their list of stressors, followed by the unpredictability of human behavior. Ah, by the neurotypical ones. They never even get to the surreal perversion of downgrading half the species because of...I forget, because of our anatomy? Our presumption of humanity?
Their brain-wiring focuses on details, connections, puzzles, symbols, all the things I escape to when the drama of life is overpowering. Baroque fugues, hieroglyphs, medieval miniatures, numerical patterns—I default to the steady universal metronome when the operatic contingencies accumulate.
Autistic women are oppressed, yes, by the prison of a constrained consciousness and a perception that flows through a reduced number of channels. In compensation, they are rewarded with an enhanced neurology, one that grasps the missing link in a rational sequence tout de suite.
They are also liberated from the knowledge of gender hatred—however much they are persecuted for cognitive deviance—they are free from the instant demotion that accompanies classification of lower caste by virtue of being born female.
4 SEPTEMBER 2022
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