Autistic women face a huge amount of misogyny and misogynistic gatekeeping from autistic men, and we as a community should be talking about it more.

There's a scarily large contingent of autistic men who have internalized the fact that it's their autism that makes women not date them, because women are inherently awful and prejudiced, so the concept of autistic women (who STILL won't date them) existing infuriates them.

Yes, these men have been targetted by and been victims of indoctrination by extremist incel culture, but they are also still actively harming women, particularly autistic women, and their autism is often used as a reason not to call them out.

When autistic men are exhibiting behaviours that harm autistic women, often the focus is on protecting the autistic man, not the autistic women. I've been the victim of this sort of thinking - because I was also labelled 'higher functioning', it was never addressed with him.

Just recently, in 'Love on the Spectrum', an autistic man was allowed to vocalise incredibly misogynistic views, with no word from his family or anyone else, and no sidenote that this wasn't acceptable behaviour. It was just 'aww, look at the autistic man talking about women'.

Autistic men are as misogynistic as non-autistic men, but often their autism is used as a free pass away from accountability. The autistic man who made me feel uncomfortable for over a year, my employers were never even willing to explain to him what he did wrong.

I had to carry that burden, and even at times felt like I was in the wrong for being too harsh against him because how could he understand what he was doing was wrong?

It's not acceptable.

Autistic women deserve to be protected, within our community and within wider society.

The same goes for what autistic people of colour face from white autistics in this community.

The same goes for what queer autistics face from straight autistics in this community.

And the same goes for what trans autistics face from cis autistics in this community.