HIV and Autism

[Rawchub73]

On 9/14/2021 at 11:27 PM, Hairypiglet said:

It's correlation. People with autism are less likely to stand their ground in regards to practicing safe sexas well as having tactile aversions and skin/touch sensitivities that might inhibit their use if certain items for safe sex. I don't use social media anymore, so I can't find the links, but there was an autistic guy with HIV in Toronto putting out all kinds of survey studies that showed correlation between autism and HIV risk.

I would totally agree with you there from a sensory side if they like touching (some don't) I think the risk would imcrease

[ErosWired]

I don’t know how I’ve failed to see this thread up til now, but I’m going to tell you up front, as a genuine, card-carrying Autistic person with all the bells and whistles, that all this is Grade-A bullshit.

No, gentlemen, being Autistic does not predispose people to contract HIV. Autism does not make us any more likely to be impulsive or careless than Neurotypicals - in fact, generally we’re more likely to hone in on details and more cautious how we interact with people generally, because “normal” people tend to turn really shitty if we don’t get it just exactly right. If we seem to be impulsive, it’s only because we’re not behaving the way Neurotypicals are expecting us to behave. It’s their perception that creates an illusion of impulsivity. Suggestions like this only suggest to Autistic people that Neurotypicals don’t really understand us at all.

Yes, many Autistic people have touch sensitivity, but as a result, they’re far more likely to avoid intimate physical contact altogether, than to avoid condoms, and depending on the specific sensitivity, may be more likely to use a condom than go bare if the condom provides a sensory buffer to the more intense sensory input of skin-on-skin intercourse.

The impression I get if all this is that some (very clearly Neurotypical) people have looked at a list of potential diagnostic criteria for Autism and thought, I bet somebody like that wouldn’t be careful about sex. Which is classic Neurotypical judging-by-wild-ass-assumption. The history of the identification, classification, and development of strategy toward Autism since time just prior to the second World War has been an absolute horror show of incompetence, arrogance, politics, greed, and scientific ignorance by Neurotypicals - and it’s still going on.

I didn’t see any science in the link provided, just generalized statements about diagnosis (an issue very much subject to debate) and an acknowledgment that you can’t really make broad statements about Autistic people because Autism is so variable. Well no shit, Sherlock - you can’t pin it down because there’s no firm consensus on what even causes it yet, other than that there’s almost certainly no single cause. So any speculation about causality like that being discussed in this thread can’t possibly be anything more than something pulled out of somebody’s ass.

And I’m sorry, guys, but you fellas chiming in because you “might be” Autistic, or you’re “borderline” Autistic, or you think you fit the profile - no. Come back when you’ve been diagnosed on the Spectrum, and we’ll talk. A person isn’t kinda-sorta Autistic, or a tiny bit Autistic. He may be so well-adapted that he can pass for Neurotypical, but you’re either wired that way or you’re not.

Now, I’m Autistic. I was diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome as an adult in 2004, because science hadn’t even come to an agreement about what it was until the mid-80s, and spent the next 20 years trying to figure out how to diagnose it because they still thought it only affected children. I’m also HIV+, and got so sick with it that I nearly died of AIDS. Oh, look - see? An Autistic guy who got AIDS! They must be prone to it. NO. I got HIV for the same reason any Neurotypical gets it - some poz guy fucked me bare. I wasn’t specially vulnerable; I wasn’t squirrelly or not paying attention; I wasn’t too sensitive to use a condom; I was reasonably careful, I got tested regularly, I was educated about the risk, and I went in with my eyes open, not on impulse. I got unlucky. Being Autistic had zero-zip-nada to do with it.

[JamesL100]

I would say no more or less likely than a Sagittarian, tall, blond or left-handed person.

[BootmanLA]

On 11/2/2022 at 2:50 AM, ErosWired said:

I don’t know how I’ve failed to see this thread up til now, but I’m going to tell you up front, as a genuine, card-carrying Autistic person with all the bells and whistles, that all this is Grade-A bullshit.

No, gentlemen, being Autistic does not predispose people to contract HIV. Autism does not make us any more likely to be impulsive or careless than Neurotypicals - in fact, generally we’re more likely to hone in on details and more cautious how we interact with people generally, because “normal” people tend to turn really shitty if we don’t get it just exactly right.

Not to disagree but to ask a question: it is my perception (rightly or wrongly) that at least some people on the spectrum tend to approach things very literally and assume that other people are doing the same. Because they may lack the ability to read the emotional cues on which neurotypical people tend to rely, might they also be more inclined to take whatever people tell them at face value?

I ask because of - as an example - white lies. People sometimes tell "white lies" to avoid hurting the feelings of someone else. I've observed that at least some people on the spectrum (again, in my limited experience) seldom or never do this because they simply don't perceive the possibility of hurting someone's feelings with a comment or reply, so they just plainly state what's on their minds. There's no intent to hurt others; they just lack the ability to predict the reaction that their honest answer will provoke.

If all that's true - and yes, that's a big if, even if only for *some* people on the spectrum - then might such individuals also be less likely to sense when someone is being less than forthcoming about HIV status? In other words, might someone on the spectrum, being focused on the details, miss the "subtext" that someone might be communicating if he's being less than honest about his status?

And that's not to say you're in that boat, or that this is how you got pozzed. But obviously, given that you did, and you say you went in "eyes open", either he told you he was poz (and you let him bareback you anyway), or he told you something else, or he didn't tell you at all (those are, basically, the only options). I guess what I find confusing is that you say you were "reasonably careful" and I'm not sure what that means.

[TaKinGDeePanal]

Autistic people are anything BUT “inattentive”. 
 

@BootmanLA - your response above regarding literalism pretty much hit the nail on the head. 

Edited November 3, 2022 by TaKinGDeePanal

[ErosWired]

6 hours ago, BootmanLA said:

Not to disagree but to ask a question: it is my perception (rightly or wrongly) that at least some people on the spectrum tend to approach things very literally and assume that other people are doing the same. Because they may lack the ability to read the emotional cues on which neurotypical people tend to rely, might they also be more inclined to take whatever people tell them at face value?

Not only do most of us tend to take things literally, and find body language and facial and other emotional cues inscrutable, we also tend to be more trusting and therefore vulnerable to deception. For the same reasons, people with Autism are far les likely to lie about things. And because we don’t, why, we suppose, would someone else? You’re not mistaken about that, and it’s all definitely true of me. God knows I’m far too trusting.

But that doesn’t equate to being any more vulnerable to getting infected with an STD by a person who knowingly lies about his status than a Neurotypical. In the situation, the NT guy asks about status. The other guy says, “I’m neg, don’t worry.” NT guy looks at the guy’s face, thinks, He’s full of shit. What happens then?

NT guy’s got no evidence the guy lied, just his suspicion. So he has to decide: Bail, insist on a condom, keep asking trying to trip the guy up into telling the truth, or take a chance. But here’s the thing - NT guy is really down to fuck. Bail, really not an option. Play detective, it’s probably just going to piss the guy off and he’s still just going to have to decide condom or bare. Other dude says he only fucks bare. So after all that, NT arrives at the only question he was ever really going to have to answer in the first place: Fuck bare or not fuck? All he’s got between him and a hot load is a doubtful hunch.

The vast majority will take the bare fuck.

This isn’t hypothetical. It’s all over this forum. Post after post after post relates that almost nobody is using condoms, or even asking for them, and it’s universally accepted that men lie about their status - both ways, in fact. Some will say they’re neg when they’re poz, and some will claim to be poz when they’re neg. And from a practical standpoint it might not matter at any given moment because what a guy says about his status is only ever accurate between his last test and the next unprotected fuck. The NT spider-sense you seem to think exists might be useless because the dude who claims to be neg may believe he’s being absolutely honest because he has no idea he’s infected.

Autistic guys - just because we don’t read all the winks and smirks doesn’t mean we’re simpletons. We know we don’t get it. (Your behavior is bizarre to us, and we spend a considerable amount of our time trying to figure out why the fuck you do irrational, emotional shit.) We may not be able to intuit when you lie, but we know perfectly well you do it. So instead of trying to ‘read’ you, we can take the knowledge that guys tend to lie about status and will have probably assessed the calculated risk of such an encounter based on an assumption that the guy is lying before we even see the guy.

That’s me. I don’t ask. I don’t need to. Because my health is a matter that concerns me, I think it through, weigh my risk, assume a certain likelihood of exposure, and decide if I’ve mitigated the risk enough to take the cock.

Essentially, Neurotypicals and Autistics actually do the same mental calculus in the situation, but use different methods. The NT mind uses a more organic/emotional approach, while the Autistic mind is wired for a more cognitive/systemizing approach. But the result is much the same, because we all face the same risk for the same reason: None of us can read minds, and we all want the fuck.

When I say I was “reasonably careful”, I mean that I did all of the above plus regular testing. I’m fairly confident I was infected during the gangbang day I took 34 loads - a situation of excess which I could not have anticipated or factored for, and clearly was not within my anticipated margin of risk.

[BootmanLA]

Without quoting and citing lots of specific lines, you make some very broad assumptions in your post that I think are unwarranted.

You assume that NT guys who have a suspicion that a guy is lying about his status - or at least something like the vast majority of NT guys - will go ahead and have the fuck. I respectfully suggest that using this forum as even a semi-representational sampling of men out there is just bullshit. I know a bucketload (technical term) of guys who, prior to PrEP, didn't think twice about foregoing barebacking if they had any inkling someone might be lying about his status. One thing that almost universally led to that conclusion: when the guy insisted that he only barebacked. That was a big red warning flag that he was playing fast and loose with his health. And I can assure you that a significant number of men, until PrEP came out, were using condoms any time they weren't sure about someone's status. 

In fairness to you, based on your exploits you've recounted here, you may be dealing with a much different population than a large chunk of gay America. There's the kind of guy who goes out in the gay community, or what passes for it, in his area (bars, community centers, coffee shops, etc.), meets guys either in passing or through his friends, strikes up a conversation, and ends up eventually (if not right away) having sex with the guy. And there's the kind of guy who sat at home, looking for "taking loads now, hotel room, door ajar" ads on Craigslist or whatever, and responded to those ads.

I respectfully suggest that (a) I suspect there were a lot more of the first group than the second, at least in major urban areas, and (b) they were a different sort with respect to their health than the ones who answer those ads - who, I suspect, stand a higher chance of being closeted gay or bi men who want to get off with a man but who would never, ever admit to anyone, much less a doctor, that they had sex with men.

And that's not to say guys with autism are more likely to be those Craigslister cumdump types. I'm saying that to the extent that's how your sex life evolved (and I don't mean necessarily Craigslist literally, but the kind of anonymous, come-fuck-me sex you seem to revel in), you're going to have a much different perspective of "what men who have sex with men" are like. Sure, lots of them are desperate and going to go for the bare fuck anyway. But extrapolating from them to "the vast majority of men" is specious at best.

Nor do I mean guys on the spectrum are "simpletons". You said it yourself: you're more vulnerable to deception. Why you think that wouldn't play out in real-world consequences, at least some of the time, is beyond me.

[ErosWired]

4 hours ago, BootmanLA said:

And I can assure you that a significant number of men, until PrEP came out, were using condoms any time they weren't sure about someone's status. 

“Until PrEP came out”.

You’re framing your argument in a realty that no longer exists, and extrapolating conclusions on conditions no longer extant. You might as well be talking about how guys would react in the dark times of the mid-80s, or the years pre-HIV - both would be equally irrelevant in describing contemporary lifestyles. PrEP is available now, in increasing use, and the fact that both ART and PrEP have ensured that HIV is no longer a death sentence has caused a sea-change in the way men approach sexual encounters. That’s irrefutable.

Of course this site doesn’t paint a balanced picture of sexual behavior for all gay men - even if the accounts here weren’t heavily riddled with embellishment to start with, the site itself is aimed at a population predisposed to accept risk in pursuit of sex. But it’s this population that’s asking the question, and it’s this population I’m addressing.

But, respectfully, your defense against my characterization of ‘NT guy’ - which was clearly a caricature intended to provide a starting point for analysis and not a socioanthropolological profile - amounts to a kind of whataboutism given that my point was a refutation of mischaracterizations of persons with Autism. Mischaracterizations which, I’m sorry to say, are rife, pervasive, and complicate our lives each and every day.

I appreciate your effort to be sensitive. You don’t quite succeed, but that’s not entirely your fault. I don’t expect to ever understand the Neurotypical mind because to do so I would have to have one. It would be arrogant and presumptive to think otherwise. Through my caricature of ‘NT guy’ and the analysis that followed, you can see an illustration of how an Autistic person might attempt to interpret how a Neurotypical person would reason. Of course I rely on assumptions. I can’t know. If enough NTs tell me my assumptions are incorrect, I will have to refactor. I know that I can tell you that the assumptions I’m reading here about Autistics are quite wrong.

And I’m done beating my head against yet another brick wall.

[BootmanLA]

12 hours ago, ErosWired said:

“Until PrEP came out”.

You’re framing your argument in a realty that no longer exists, and extrapolating conclusions on conditions no longer extant. You might as well be talking about how guys would react in the dark times of the mid-80s, or the years pre-HIV - both would be equally irrelevant in describing contemporary lifestyles. PrEP is available now, in increasing use, and the fact that both ART and PrEP have ensured that HIV is no longer a death sentence has caused a sea-change in the way men approach sexual encounters. That’s irrefutable.

Of course this site doesn’t paint a balanced picture of sexual behavior for all gay men - even if the accounts here weren’t heavily riddled with embellishment to start with, the site itself is aimed at a population predisposed to accept risk in pursuit of sex. But it’s this population that’s asking the question, and it’s this population I’m addressing.

But, respectfully, your defense against my characterization of ‘NT guy’ - which was clearly a caricature intended to provide a starting point for analysis and not a socioanthropolological profile - amounts to a kind of whataboutism given that my point was a refutation of mischaracterizations of persons with Autism. Mischaracterizations which, I’m sorry to say, are rife, pervasive, and complicate our lives each and every day.

I appreciate your effort to be sensitive. You don’t quite succeed, but that’s not entirely your fault. I don’t expect to ever understand the Neurotypical mind because to do so I would have to have one. It would be arrogant and presumptive to think otherwise. Through my caricature of ‘NT guy’ and the analysis that followed, you can see an illustration of how an Autistic person might attempt to interpret how a Neurotypical person would reason. Of course I rely on assumptions. I can’t know. If enough NTs tell me my assumptions are incorrect, I will have to refactor. I know that I can tell you that the assumptions I’m reading here about Autistics are quite wrong.

And I’m done beating my head against yet another brick wall.

Likewise, I appreciate your effort to understand NT people, even as you don't quite succeed, either. The difference, as I see it, is that NT people can observe autistic behavior and see how it deviates from what we experience dealing with a majority-NT world, where we have to navigate in part using the emotional cues that are invisible to many autistic people.

To use a crude analogy: if I see a blind person walking down the street using a white cane and/or an assistance canine, I can see how his walking differs from those who surround him. Without the visual clues to know when to turn slightly, when to pause because the crowd is slowing, etc., he's going to stand out. He's not going to see how his actions are different, because he can't see them. All he knows is that his canine signaled to stop, or his cane tapped the leg of someone who's stopped in front of him, and hopefully he stops before walking into them. And at least he has assistance in the form of a tool or a companion animal to help him navigate the world, even if it's not quite at the same level of ease as a sighted person. Without the cane or dog to assist, his experience would be radically different.

I suspect - and could be wrong - that this is similar to what people on the spectrum experience. They have some sensory input, but not the same full range that NT people do, at least in terms of being able to read emotional responses and understand how NT people may interpret their frankness. It's not just that they respond differently - it's that certain parts of the experience are simply not there. And to think that this can't possibly mean a difference in how a NT vs autistic person might respond to someone lying about HIV status - where one of them can sense there's something off, the other has no clue - is just silly.

It's reasonable to ask whether this presents a statistically significant additional risk - whether the numbers bear out that this is a problem. But to deny it exists at all? I call bullshit.

[PozBearWI]

The words that stand out for me in @ErosWired response are "I appreciate your effort to be sensitive".  I didn't understand any of that from your response, nor was it, I believe; your purpose @BootmanLA.  Emotions are factual for the individual experiencing them but they are not "the facts" for the rest of us.  

Edited November 5, 2022 by JimInWisc

[BootmanLA]

48 minutes ago, JimInWisc said:

The words that stand out for me in @ErosWired response are "I appreciate your effort to be sensitive".  I didn't understand any of that from your response, nor was it, I believe; your purpose @BootmanLA.  Emotions are factual for the individual experiencing them but they are not "the facts" for the rest of us.  

To be clear: I do indeed strive to be sensitive. I use the phrase "people on the spectrum", for instance, which recognizes there's a difference among people in that category, rather than lumping them all together as "autistic". I also don't want to assume that any condition - autism, diabetes, impaired cardiopulmonary functioning - will always produce the same results in people, because people are different, and how something like this affects individuals is, well, an individual thing. So I appreciate Eros' acknowledgment that I'm trying - and not always succeeding, I'm sure - to be sensitive.

[PozBearWI]

18 minutes ago, BootmanLA said:

To be clear: I do indeed strive to be sensitive. I use the phrase "people on the spectrum", for instance, which recognizes there's a difference among people in that category, rather than lumping them all together as "autistic". I also don't want to assume that any condition - autism, diabetes, impaired cardiopulmonary functioning - will always produce the same results in people, because people are different, and how something like this affects individuals is, well, an individual thing. So I appreciate Eros' acknowledgment that I'm trying - and not always succeeding, I'm sure - to be sensitive.

Yes indeed.  I don't think the metric should be "success" in this case.  We're human.  Failure to recognize the effort (whether or not declared) seems to be what is taking dialogue away from solutions these days.  

In WI, there is a lot of focus on use of native american referenaces.  My town, Saukville is an amalgam of "sauk" (NA for river) and "ville" the ubiquitous american town name as evidence in "Smallville" et all.  At the moment there is no hue and cry at our use of that name...

I grew up being referred to by many as "faggot".  Sure it was unpleasant.  But those are simply words.  Absent anything else the word has no power.  When I was being threatened with physical harm by someone calling me "fucking faggot" was way less focused on "faggot" than the threat itself.  

So, I would propose we change "Resdkins" to "Faggots".  I would love to be in a stadium with thousands shouting "Go Faggots!!!!" and "Yeah faggots".  Thousands declaring they want the "faggots" to win the season...  How is that demeaning???

{{and yes I am aware how this changes the topic rather substantially; but my reply is not intended to change the course of the flow, but rather to be an interesting bend in the river of dialogue}}
 

Edited November 5, 2022 by JimInWisc

[ErosWired]

3 hours ago, BootmanLA said:

I suspect - and could be wrong - that this is similar to what people on the spectrum experience. They have some sensory input, but not the same full range that NT people do,

I’m trying to be patient.

Your choice of analogy speaks volumes. To the NT world, an Autistic person is defective, deficient in some way, blind to what is obvious, and therefore to be viewed as someone with a handicap. No, I don’t pick up your limbic cues (thank God - I would rather bash my thumb with a hammer every five minutes than be subject to the emotional chaos that rules the majority of people’s lives). That doesn’t mean I don’t perceive at all, or in an alternate way. As an example: Charisma. There are certain people who are able to charm other people by simple force of personality, the way they smile, their tone of voice, their natural beauty, their skill at manipulation. They’re the kind of people who make successful politicians, megachurch pastors and similar pied pipers because everyone just loves them. It doesn’t work on me. I see them coming a mile off, and I see their false glamour for exactly what it is. I see the trick and I see how they pull it off. Meanwhile, the NTs around me are lapping it up with a spoon. In that situation, I’m not the one with the blind man’s cane.

Autistic people are usually the ones standing off to themselves not engaging in small talk (which we generally loathe). It’s not that we’re dull, dumb or numb - it’s just that we’re skin-crawlingly bored. We’re not paying attention to you because you’re mostly talking about what usually preoccupies NTs - feelings. Instead, we’re busy noticing all the details about the room, deconstructing the architecture, identifying the species in the potted plants, etc. If by some miracle we find someone willing to converse about something of consequence, you’ll find we’re more than happy to be sociable, and will discuss it at length - too much length for what NTs seem to consider appropriate for social gatherings, evidently, as there are lots of references to Autistics being unable to shut up.

Note that this is only a problem because the NTs want us to shut up. In fact, in most cases, the things that NTs identify as  a disability, a delay, or inappropriate or ‘abnormal’ behavior in Autistics, or things that cause Autistics distress, are simply behaviors that don’t conform to what the NTs consider ‘normal’, and therefore react to negatively. It is their reaction that is usually the cause of the problem, not the Autistic behavior.

One of the world’s leading authorities on Autism noted that an Autistic person isn’t Autistic when he’s alone. It’s having to deal with the other people. It’s so true. Any time I venture out among NTs is like walking through a minefield, because you don’t realize how incredibly volatile you are. A wrong word chosen, or said the wrong way, in the wrong tone of voice or no tone at all, even just not looking in the right direction, and—BOOM! Autistics have to constantly think about how to navigate around NTs, but NTs don’t do the same for us - they just put a label on us that reads “Not Normal” and either shun us, try to fix us (we’re not broken, thanks) or tell us how it’s all our fault because we don’t know how to behave like normal people (them).

Your further comparison of Autism to diabetes and impaired cardiopulmonary function is also wide off the mark - Autism is not an illness. Let me repeat, for emphasis: Autism is not a mental illness. We are not unwell. Autism is not something we have; Autistic is what we are.

My mind is as sound as yours, just wired differently. I have two bachelor’s degrees cum laude, a master’s degree magna cum laude, completed all but thesis on a second master’s, completed a year of post-graduate study, have published 13 books, served 30 years as a federal public servant in civilian uniform performing a professional function and 15 years as director of a nonprofit organization. I have dealt with elected officials at the federal, state and local level (I despise all politicians equally). I advanced to a green belt in Tae Kwon Do, studied fencing for three years, and have a concealed carry permit (I am neither helpless nor naïve). I have traveled in 30 states and 9 countries. I have been married and have raised two children into promising citizens-my daughter is going with me to early voting this afternoon, where I will cast my ballot for candidates and ballot measures on which I have made myself well-informed. I live alone, look after myself, provide for others, and pay my taxes.

All of which is to say: This Autistic guy is a perfectly functional and accomplished member of adult society, not some mental case who shouldn’t be fucking because he’s too gullible to take care of his own cunt.

[Wolvi]

Also think about the people who are not autistic or don’t have any specific symptoms but are still neurodivergent in general And have HIV.  And neurodivergent doesn’t mean that someone has a mental diagnosis though one can. That just means they were wired differently in the brain but there’s no connection to any diagnosis that’s considered on the spectrum. Unless diagnosed of course

Edited November 6, 2022 by Wolvi

[Gat]

There's also the reason on how some pozzers sadly see as their god given right to "take out the trash" so they purposefully go infect minorities, "sluts"  or those they deem unfit, only relying on their perception on what may be a very different reality, in some cases even with the intent of creating addicts since poz people tend to be more uninhibited 

So autists, dealing on top with the issue of being social pariahs due to their quirks (which in many cases is the base of their dubious diagnosis) end up in circles where they're easily hunted down and sometimes through the promise of social acceptance or a life doing what previously was unobtainable fall prey to these dangerous circles due to their Innocence 

Forever changing their bodies to suit this new lifestyle that'll consume them till in most cases they go and are left with permanent scars or leave the hard way