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c people who are trans and gender diverse children and teens are particularly well represented in these statistics i think this is wonderful and i am delighted that kids know their gender at younger ages it took me 43 years to realise i was non binary and i would have loved to know my identity at a younger age as my identity is liberating sadly not everyone sees coming out as a liberation for transphobic people gender diversity is a threat something to be attacked and criticised critics of autistic trans people come from a range of quarters i want to unpack some of the bigotry here the first form of bigotry is terfs what is a terf it stands for trans excluding radical feminist and it is nasty jk rowling is a prominent terf which really upsets me because i love harry potter and always thought the harry potter universe was an inclusive one but apparently not terfs are particularly hostile to trans women i can never quite figure out what their issue is but i think it centres around thinking trans women are men trying to infiltrate the world of women and somehow gain rights as women tetfs refer to trans women as men and even want to harm trans women sometimes basically at is a load of bigoted harmful nonsense terfs make me very angry trans women do not have some sinister agenda being trans is an integral part of identity not a conspiracy trans women experience a significant amount of bigotry and discrimination i cannot imagine anyone transitioning in order to gain perceived advantages as a woman to my mind the terf argument is just nasty hostile prejudice the fact that feminists and it is not all feminists i should add participate in discrimination against fellow women who happen to be trans is very disappointing indeed i used to identify as a feminist in the past but now i avoid the term because i don t want to be associated with terfs another issue trans autistic people experience is autism world figures making harmful statements about gender identity and autism this happened recently with a notable clinician saying autistic trans kids don t know their own gender and are being coerced by adults with an agenda seriously wtf autistic people spend a lot of time reflecting and questioning our identity we are known for it if you are singled out for being different then you are probably going to reflect on who you are an autistic young person who is questioning their gender should be supported rather than criticised and invalidated and it is the height of condescension to tell autistic trans people that they don t know their gender instead of making these statements maybe clinicians could listen to their trans autistic clients and understand where they are coming from rater than dismissing their experience i hate when public figures be they fiction authors or autism clinicians use their position of authority to spread transphobic thinking i think these people have a responsibility to promote inclusion not division the other transphobia issue is a nasty one and it involves trolling and bullying when i was in school i was bullied for my autistic differences and also my ambiguous gender as an adult i have been trolled for my non binary identity these things are extremely hurtful and can be dangerous many autistic and gender diverse people in fact i would estimate possibly all of us experience trolling and bullying and it is not ok i think we need to build a sense of pride and respect for trans autistic people this involves challenging bigotry and transphobia wherever we find it genuine allies can help with this by calling people on poor behaviour and prejudiced or ignorant statements trans and gender diverse autistic people have a right to be heard and respected just like anyone else does here are some resources qlife https qlife org au spectrum intersections https www spectrumintersections org a gender agenda https genderrights org au posted on july 17 2020 by yenn 2 comments thoughts on the coronavirus covid19 and the autistic community i saw a post on social media yesterday saying the covid19 coronavirus was a media beat up i could understand where the poster was coming from as there has been some rather sensational reporting about the crisis but the virus is definitely not a beat up covid19 is a real crisis and people are right to be concerned i have been thinking about the impact of the virus on the autistic community and will unpack my thoughts here autistic people tend to be more anxious than the general population and it is understandable that we are anxious about the virus i have been worrying about its impact for a while i think catastrophising is probably a more appropriate word it is hard to know how anxious to be should i be buying supplies in case i am quarantined am i at risk of catching the virus are my friends and family at risk should i still travel interstate for speaking gigs will my speaking gigs be cancelled will the economy fail and will i lose my job as a result i could go on for a while i think the best advice i have for others and myself is to try and just worry about the issues at hand and deal with things on a day to day basis another commentator suggested that covid19 will be beneficial to autistic employees because it will result in lots of working from home which favours us thi is sort of correct but needs to be taken in context many jobs do not have capacity for remote working and autistic people who are not employed are probably less likely to be hired in the current circumstances as economies shrink so too does the hiring of people from diverse backgrounds in a smaller economy it is likely that autistic job seekers will be less likely to find work i have seen humorous memes about autistic people benefiting from self isolating this is amusing and probably true but many quarantine situations will involve being confined with other people this could be a nightmare for autistic people i am currently in a rehabilitation hospital and i have been running the quarantine scenario through my head a lot and i really don t want to be confined to a building with the same people for weeks on end another thing which people have been saying is that i will be ok because i am not old or sick a lot of the media about the virus has also focussed on this i find this highly problematic it is as if older and sick people don t matter and the virus is not a concern because young and healthy people are not victims my parents are in their seventies and i would be devastated if they caught the virus it is not ok that the virus kills people that aren t me talking to children about the virus is a tricky thing i have seen a few resources out there including one through footprint books you don t want to terrify them but you do want them to know things like the importance of hand hygiene and give some context to the media discussion fo covid19 autistic children may become very focussed on the crisis and be highly anxious it is a fine balance somewhere between feeding into their fears or at the other extreme telling them that there is nothing to worry about it may be worth scheduling a time where the can ask parents any questions they have about the virus panic buying is something which many of us find baffling one of the issues with it is that it drives others to panic buy even if they don t want to for example if all the toilet paper is gone from the supermarket someone who otherwise wouldn t panic buy will grab any toilet paper if they see any because they know it will be gone soon i am actually very concerned about the covid 19 crisis and struggling with my anxiety i am worried about the hospital i am in being quarantined or repurposed leading to my early discharge i am worried about the economy and my job being affected especially as i have been on sick leave for the past five months i am worried about people i love and care for contracting the virus i am hoping a vaccine is developed soon but until then i just have to manage my worry this is a very scary thing with the potential to disrupt society across the globe posted on march 14 2020 by yenn 1 comment autism and emergency services trigger warning police shootings most of us will come across emergency services in our lifetime police ambulance officers and firefighters for autistic people these interactions can be very stressful and even dangerous emergency services personnel may not know a lot about autism meaning they misinterpret the actions of autistics at its most extreme this can result in death many autistic people having meltdowns have been shot by police who mistakenly believed they were a danger to others or that they were on drugs if police received better training or any training on working with autistic people these tragedies may well be avoided autistic people may be arrested on suspicion of illegal acts based on misunderstandings of the reasons for their behaviour i know of one autistic man who was arrested and interrogated because he was examining the foundations of a building the man was an engineer and was concerned that there was a fault however as terrorism was a big issue at the time the police wrongly assumed that the man was planning to destroy the building instead of what he was actually doing which was to try and save it i know of another autistic young man who got a criminal record for sexual assault he was on the bus and saw a woman with shiny stockings thinking these a great stim he reached out and touched the stockings which were of course attached to a woman who thought she was being groped by a pervert rather than having an autistic person appreciating her stimmy tights when autistic people are in police custody things can get even worse i remember an encounter with police in my dubious youth and they did the good cop bad cop routine which i instantly fell for they also asked me my name and address and the lawyer i had spoken to had advised me to answer no comment to everything so i answered no comment to my name and address this did not go down well some autistic people are so frightened in police custody that they will admit to a crime they did not commit just to stop the questioning and fear autistic people rarely enjoy making eye contact and this can definitely be the case when we are stressed however many police officers believe that not making eye contact is a sign of guilt or lying an autistic person might be being totally honest but not be believed due to them looking down or away from their interrogator when an autistic person is the victim of a crime they can be misbelieved and gaslighted by police and courts this is not ever ok the judicial system should allow access to justice for everyone i think that if police had better training in autism these issues would be less prevalent us based author dennis debbaudt has written great book called autism advocates and law enforcement which deals with these sorts of issues here is a link https www amazon com au autism advocates law enforcement recognizing dp 1853029807 ref sr_1_5 keywords debbaudt qid 1580359327 sr 8 5 the experience of being transported in an ambulance can also be overwhelming for autistic people as well it is a strange and alien environment and a stranger is doing things to you like taking blood pressure and ecgs the radio night go off unexpectedly and they might use the siren which is noisy and can be overwhelming ambulance officers will ask the patient lots of questions which can be overwhelming and can result in meltdown or shutdown add to all of this that the autistic person is in a bad space physically or mentally to be there in the first place so all these intrusions are happening on top of injury or illness once again autism training for paramedics is essential it would also be good to have a sensory audit of ambulances and see if any changes can be made to make them less unpleasant and frightening for autistic patients this could even involve having a small box of fidgets on board accessing help from emergency services should be a positive and supportive experience but for many of us it isn t there is work needs doing in this space and it needs to be led by autistics i really don t want to ever hear of another autistic person shot by police simply because they are having a hard time posted on january 30 2020 january 30 2020 by yenn 5 comments for anyone following this blog it has moved hi all in keeping with my new name of yenn purkis i have created a new wordpress blog site it is this one https yennpurkis home blog while the content on this site will stay here all new posts will be on the new site if you wish to follow my new blog please feel free to do so thank you for your support over the past five years i am looking forward to sharing blog posts from my new site happy weekend to you yenn posted on february 16 2019 by yenn 2 comments i am yenn affirming gender affirming self on monday i was at work sitting at my desk when what i can only call a flash of inspiration hit me in less than the time it took you to read the last sentence i found my name and i knew my name was yenn i think i d better backtrack a bit last year i publicly affirmed that i am non binary gender this has been an amazing time of self discovery and reflection my old name jeanette is about as gender loaded as you can get i have had conversations with a friend called bernadette and we both concluded our names were quite strongly suggestive of the feminine when i came out i wondered if i should change my name i started thinking about it but nothing worked i concluded that i would know when i knew and i did the only convincing i needed when yenn popped into my brain on monday was to see what it looked like written down i tried it with an e on the end which didn t look right i tried it as yenn and i knew i had found my name i considered where it had come from and realised it has a few parents thoughts wise the main thing i see is poetry to yen in poetry means yearning or as i see it aspiration and personal reflection both things i have a lot of experience of it is also a little nod to my old jeanette name and it is quite individual written it looks strong and complete spoken it sounds confident and passionate it might seem like a very quick decision but it was the culmination of a lot of reflection over the past few months when i knew my name i knew i also needed to tell friends i sent a message to a bunch of close friends and emailed my parents i said i will take this gradually and then realised i do not do gradual so on my way home from work i changed the title of my social media pages to yenn purkis and posted a message about why i had done this i have experienced a lot of transphobia and trolling over the past few months so i was caught between liberation at my new me and terror that people would attack me thankfully i have not had any negative responses and nobody unfriended me on social media that i am aware of out of almost 10 000 people on facebook and 5000 on twitter on monday i s...