Does being gay alleviate some of the symptoms of aspergers?

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I just read this article: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 151845.htm and i was wondering that if a gay brain is similar to a female brain, would a gay aspie be less impaired socially than a straight aspie? Since females are known to be more empathising than systemising and display better social skills than males in general. I know this may sound stupid but...

Tell me what you guys think

i think the correlation if any would be very weak, thusly not a true correlation and in essence a conditional coincidence in the cases where a 'correlation' is seen. I mean of a human who is homosexual and on the autism spectrum for these two situations to have a significant interaction. The article is interesting enough, though skimpy. Science has pretty well proved there is a reason for homosexuality . . . rather than it being a willful abomination before god.

Being both gay and aspie, I can tell you that, at least in my case, it makes no difference whatsoever. I know some straight aspies who have more problems than me, and others who have less. I don't think being gay alleviates anything...

It might explain, however, why I'm such a good language learner. It's been recognised that effective language learning is associated with a good collaboration between the two brain hemispheres. Together with my aspie single-mindedness, this might explain why I can reach conversational level in a language within 3 months .

Well, I can see a (very unconventional) way in which being gay could lessen the problems an aspie has:

If you're known to be gay, people will have different expectations of how you act. If you do 'weird' things, they might attribute that to your gayness, and because of the gay rights movement, most people will not harass you for those 'weird' things if they think it's caused by your gayness, even when it's actually from your aspieness.

To put it differently: In the current social climate, being intolerant to gays is considered a big no-no, so being gay gets you off the hook more easily.

Just a hypothesis, though.

I don't think any individual can say that being gay has improved the traits of their AS. AS is a spectrum, and it's impossible to know where we'd be on the spectrum if we weren't gay, so we have nothing to compare to. What I do sometimes wonder about is whether those with AS who are gay tend to be higher functioning. The sort of people I see in this section of the forums would incline me to say yes.

I don't think that being gay mitigates an individual's aspie traits.

But I do think that being an Aspie can--in some cases--mitigate the problems of coming to terms with being gay. In many ways, we cope with social alienation from very early on--many of us are disconnected from our peers, and prefer solitary pursuits to social ones. So the alienation that gay NTs experience when they first come to appreciate their difference from their straight peers is something that we have already been coping with.

I don't either, not in the slightest.

I can understand how being gay or bi might mean that society might make extra allowances for your "weirdness" or have different perceptions about you due to your sexual orientation but as for the traits themselves? No.

I'd say no since females can have asperger's too.

I don't really believe in this male brain/female brain stuff, probably because when I do tests it tells me my brain is more male and I don't fit into the female brain stereotypes.

I'm inclined to believe it. Scans of male/female gay/straight brains do show different parts of those brains lighting up, so they definitely think differently in an actual sense. Whether they do in practical output is more open to debate.

Women do get autism, but the majority of cases are male. Whether this is a genetic thing or simply that female brains are better at adapting for social things, or even if the theory about testosterone in the womb is right, that's also unknown. The facts only say what is, not why or how.

Well, if you have AS, being gay is probably a plus. Read the tales of misery and woe from straight aspies elsewhere at WP. At least we can get laid whenever we feel like it, with about as much effort as ordering a pizza online.

Some people might disagree with that assessment. I guess you haven't heard AuntBlabbie talk about such things for example.

Hmmm. I searched through his past few days worth of postings, but didn't see anything blatantly obvious. I guess he'll have to notice this thread and enlighten us directly.

This is pretty accurate. If you're just after some meaningless sex, there are loads of guys after the same thing. It's just a case of knowing where (and when) to look.

A relationship, now, that's a very different thing.

Absolutely 100% right. Actually, you could probably provide lots of insight into what constitutes a successful & happy aspie relationship.

To be honest, every gay couple I know (Aspie, NT, or otherwise) who's been together for more than 5 years pretty much consists of two guys who are best friends, and either:

* have sex lives that are completely independent of each other's. They go out for sex, and come home for intimacy.

* go out hunting together for guys to have threesomes with, couples to have fourgies with, or throw/attend outright sex parties or bathhouses.

* are officially 100% monogamous, and as a practical matter don't have sex. Most of the time, one or both actually ARE having sex with others (or will, eventualy), and how they handle the moment of truth largely determines whether they break up, or have a rational discussion, realize they both want the same thing, and move up to one of the first two categories.

However, I know my observation is biased by the fact that I live in one of the biggest gay communities in America, and that there's a hidden, lesbian-like group of gay couples who never go out, are socially invisible, and have kids, so the only couples I really come into contact with are the ones who fit that description & go out to bars and/or have shared profiles online.

Just to directly address the OP's premise, I question the whole idea that the brains of gay men are in any way, shape, or form more "female", and I struggle to see how anybody who's remotely aware of how gay society works could ever possibly come to the conclusion that gay guys are more empathizing. Gay guys might be more empathizing with straight women or straight guys they know beyond doubt are not even the slightest bit gay, but put two gay guys together who are attacted to one another, and SBC's Theory of Mind is going to get flushed down the toilet in a moment of pure male lust.

I'll believe that "gay" brains are like "female" brains when women start drilling holes through the wall to the adjacent men's bathroom so they can give anonymous blowjobs to happy straight guys.

Heh! Gay male brains are *more* like female brains. They aren't the same. They combine the female social sense with the male sex drive. Straight men are sex-mad, but they have to work to get any because women aren't as interested in sex. They like it, generally speaking, but they don't have the addictive urge that men do.

So gay men are constantly horny, and surrounded by other horny gay men, and... well, it's letting the monkey loose on the banana plantation. And that's a rather more visually apt metaphor than I intended, so sorry for that...



That's me. Well, us. I've been in an "open" relationship before and it didn't work for me. I've been in threesomes, and those can be fun - or utterly terrible. In this relationship I'm with a guy who just isn't that sexually active. Lately it just doesn't happen. But I'm 95% sure he's not playing around and I know I'm not!