Why Does Nobody Flirt with Me? How Do I Deal with Social Anxiety?
Autistic Advice #9
This piece was originally published on March 15, 2023. (I am currently in the process of migrating all my old Medium pieces to Substack.)
Welcome back to Autistic Advice, a semi-regular advice column where I respond to reader questions about neurodiversity, accessibility, disability justice, and self-advocacy from my perspective as an Autistic psychologist. You can submit questions or suggest future entries in the series via my Tumblr ask box, linked here.
This week, I’ll actually be addressing two different questions that I think originate from the very same place: the tendency of many Autistic & otherwise marginalized folks to downplay what we want, and fixate excessively on the impressions of other people.
Our first letter comes from a lesbian in her early twenties, who wonders why nobody has ever flirted with her or kissed her:
Thank you for your question, Anon. Yours is a problem that I have heard many queer people describe having, particularly women who are attracted to women, particularly neurodivergent ones, and among those groups I’ve noticed that there are certain dynamics that recurrently play out. So I’ll happily share some of my thoughts and advice — with the huge caveats that as a gay man and a slut, I have not lived your experience. I hope that readers with more relevant experience can weigh in in the comments.
I notice that in your question, Anon, you describe yourself and your relationship to attraction in terms of things happening to you, or you receiving certain kinds of attention. Or rather, you frame your primary problem as being one of you not drawing in the kinds of contact and interest you want.
You probably feel pretty disempowered, if that is your thinking. You’ve probably been thrusting yourself out into queer spaces and events, making all kinds of lesbian and bi women friends, but no matter how hard you try to take hold of the opportunity and offer yourself up to the sexual marketplace, it seems like nobody’s buying.
Under this point of view (which is a very common one for queer women to have, because they have been denied sexual agency all of their lives!) sexual interest is a gift you receive if you’re a worthy romantic prospect — if you’re hot enough, cool enough, if you say all the right things to the right people and never flub it, if you inhabit a social role that people find desirable, and so on. If you don’t possess all the right qualities, getting what you want seems out of your control. What else can you do?
Well, you can do a whole lot more, actually.
You frame yourself throughout your question as the possible passive recipient of attraction. But what about what you want?
How often have you expressed desire to somebody?
How frequently and in what ways have you initiated contact, told someone you were interested in them, or invited someone on a date?
What do you imagine yourself doing with the people you find attractive? Actually, let’s wind back — who do find attractive? What is compelling or interesting about them? Who do you fantasize about, masturbate about? Have you ever told any of them?
At first glance, Anon, it sounds like you’re doing your damndest to put yourself out there and attract possible mates. You mention using dating sites and talking with people, but those conversations never turning into anything more. That is a very common problem in the lesbian dating world. So much so that even one of the hypnosis fetish conventions that I regularly attend offers a recurring workshop on how to flirt with other women if you are a woman. There’s just that many lesbian and bisexual women in the scene, or in any mixed dating scene really, who deal with this problem enough to need help with it.
Lesbian and bisexual women writers have explored the problem of queer female sexual inhibition (and offered potential solutions to it) time and time again. And with Generation Z being one of the most sexually inactive cohorts in recorded history and social anxiety on the rise, it’s not a problem that’s going away anytime soon.
Hell, even the most popular women & nonbinary BDSM cruising night in town here is frequently dry as a bone, with almost none of the beautiful, decked-out-to-the-nines sapphics there doing so much as spanking one another. And I know for a fact that many of them do want to spank (and kiss and fist) each other, because I am close friends with many of them and I hear them and others grousing about the lack of openly sexual energy in the space all the time.
Many women do not feel comfortable expressing their desires outright, and it seems to lead to a lot of self-doubt, and grinding of gears, and crowds of lesbians standing around gazing into their drinks and assuming that nobody is interested in them. In reality, all parties involved crush on one another and crave a lot, but they feel too shy to use their words and directly ask for a date. It’s kind of a sexual bystander effect, if you will. Everybody interprets everybody else’s freeze response as signal that freezing is what you’re supposed to be doing.
Women don’t want to be the bad guy, which is how they understandably view a man who intrudes in their space and asserts his attraction toward them, often forcefully, with zero interest in who the woman actually is and what she really wants. And so women equate having agency with being manly, and being assertive with being intrusive, and then they can only imagine themselves feeling comfortable with their own sexuality if they are merely an audience to it, rather than a director or an actor upon the stage.
This problem links back to another common issue in queer dating & cruising spaces: the much-bandied about non-crisis known as the “top shortage.” Many queer & kinky people who identify as bottoms (that is, as wanting to be on the receiving end of activities such as sexual penetration, or being bound up or whipped) complain that it is nearly impossible for them to find a good top (a person who wants to dole out the penetration, bondage, punishment, or what-have you).
In kinky spaces there’s this stereotype of bottom-identified people gathering around in a shy little circle and speaking quietly among themselves about all the wonderful, dramatic, sadistic, overpowering things they’d like to have done to them — but then never approaching any potential top to ask that those things get done.
Bottoms only hang out with other bottoms, the common-sense prejudice goes, because all bottoms like frothy, feminine activities such as quaffing mimosas, not driving, and listening to Kim Petras. All the tops they collectively fantasize about being taken by are either not on the apps, too busy out doing masculine things in garages and cornfields to have time for frivolous sexual negotiations, or else they simply do not exist at all.
In reality, of course, there are actually a wide array of top-leaning people out in the world, either having the kinds of sex they want to have with bottoms who can communicate, or gathering in their own inhibited little groups kvetching about the problem of a bottom shortage. I know this, because I have met them.
I’ve never had a problem getting topped, personally, even as a lifelong s-type with a variety of hyper-niche interests. That is because there is no top shortage. Nor have I had any problem finding casual partners to fuck, or romantic prospects to date. People who yearn for intimate connections with other human beings are thick on the ground, it turns out. What’s rarer is finding somebody who can take ownership of what they want, describe it clearly, and move actively toward it.
Unfortunately, because queer people grow up having our identities erased and our sexualities shamed, many of us don’t enter adulthood knowing how to initiate, or even believing that we deserve to. If this sounds like the same overly passive dynamic that I just outlined happening within the lesbian dating scene, that’s because it is the very same thing.
Top or Bottom: How do we desire?
In June 2017, TNI’s Lou Cornum brought together three writers to discuss what’s really going on in queer lamentations…
In a piece for The New Inquiry from back in 2017, George Dust states that when queer people complain about there being a top shortage, what they really mean is “nobody is fucking me the way I want, and I have no agency in that.” Alongside co-authors Billy-Ray Belcourt and Kay Gabriel, Dust suggests that many queer people align themselves with a passive or “bottom” position because they believe that role will absolve them of the guilt of really wanting things. They present themselves as what they believe to be the sexual party with zero power; the receiver, the accepter of action rather than its cause.
This position is drawn in contrast to the bottom-identified person’s idea of a top: the one who approaches, the person with hungers and desires, the person who decides which sexual activities will happen and how intense they will get. The top, from this perspective, is the stronger, more capable, more dangerous person. They’re the only one who can ever be guilty of intruding or harming somebody else. This power is scary, but it’s also compelling.
Dust calls this fantastical version of a top a “brute” — and they are the most cartoonish stereotype of what it means in society to be a man. Because it’s a cartoonish stereotype, no human actually lives up to it — and we’d probably revile a person even if they could.
Though queer people know we are harmed by the gender binary and heteronormativity and all the social scripts those things force upon us, its biases are still embossed on our brains. Without meaning to, we reproduce tired gender stereotypes in our relationships. And so we see expressing a sexual want as masculine, and being masculine as being more capable of violence and coercive control, and thus bad. We see failing to communicate one’s desires openly as desirably feminine, as well as a sign of blamelessness and purity — because on some level we still feel it is wrong to have desires.
But this entire worldview is a complete lie. Desire is not evil. Expressing attraction is not a violation. Failing to express oneself can be just as dangerous as not listening to someone else’s limits. Women can be abusive. Bottoms can sexually assault. No matter our gender, presentation, or sexual role, we are each capable of harm. And the only way to make a safe, mutually pleasurable sexual encounter happen is by going after it, actively, and communicating from a position of inner strength.
I Don’t Feel Safe Around Cis Women.
It’s time we all rethink our perceptions of various groups as inherently “dangerous” and “safe.”
So how do you do that, if society’s been telling you all your life that you’re meant to date by acting like a deer passively snapping twigs in the woods, waiting for some hunter to hear you, and pursue you? (That really is dating advice that Evangelical Christian counselors give to women, if you can believe it).
By not fixating so much on what you’re doing or not doing to draw other people toward you, and instead thinking in terms of what you want and what you observe beyond yourself.
I’ve never had trouble finding dates or hook-ups — even back when I was living as a supposedly straight woman. That’s largely because I have never navigated my wants and fantasies the way that women are taught they have to. When I was on OK Cupid in the early 2010’s, for instance, I listed many of my kinks and my interest in casual sex right on my profile. That really wasn’t considered normal at the time. But I knew what I was there for and I wasn’t going to play games about it.
I loved scrolling through the site, enjoying the buffet of faces and personalities that were laid out before me. The personality test results and lengthy profiles always gave me plenty to enthusiastically comment on. My enthusiasm was genuine, and I was hungry for what I wanted, and the earnestness of my approach really paid off.
If I was attracted to somebody, I messaged them quickly, saying “You’re cute!” or “You look really good in those short-shorts,” or “You seem like you’d be a lot of fun to go to a museum with” as the case might be. I read lots of profiles, and noticed when somebody’s responses interested me. I asked people about their dogs, the books they were reading, what they were into, what they were looking for, whether they were kinky, if they wanted to hook up — pretty much in that order.
If the conversation went well, I escalated things and asked for an in-person meet-up or date. On many of those dates, I had sex. Sometimes it was life-ruiningly fabulous. Sometimes it was dull or the person had a bad taste in their mouth and it sucked. But then I was back to the drawing board, messaging, initiating, and pursuing all the same. I did all this while presenting quite feminine and identifying openly as a submissive. I never saw my identities as incompatible with pursuing what I wanted. I’m thankful I was too Autistically laser-focused on my goals and too literally minded to pretend to be any other way.
This more or less remained my strategy when I moved out of the straight dating world, and into the queer masculine realms of Grindr, Steamworks, Sniffies, and Cell Block. You might be surprised how much the same skillset that worked as a straight woman grabbing beers at a brewpub transfers over to getting railed by a stranger on a leather bar’s dance floor.
So Anon, here is my advice to you: Know what you want. Know that it is not bad. Look outside of yourself, and beyond yourself. Notice the people around you. Observe your internal reactions to them, where your eyes linger, what you feel. Smile, wave, approach. Say to someone, “You’re cute.” Say, “here is what I am into.” Ask the other person about themselves.
Ask, “what turns you on?” Ask, “Are you interested?” If there is interest, begin to close in, to touch, to sway against their body. Tell them that you want to have sex with them. Tell them exactly how. Hear what they want and decide if it’s compatible. Ask them if they have a condom. Have fun. Or don’t. Validate your own feelings. Squeeze their bicep affectionately and thank them for the moment. Go back on your way. Melt back into the crowd.
I’ve had many many interpersonal problems over the course of my life, Anon, but telling somebody directly that I wanted to bang or even to hang out with them has not historically been one of them. I really wish I could just lend some of that hutzpah over to my lesbian siblings because I hear them complaining about the persistent unsexiness of women’s bars and apps like Lex all the time.
All that said, it feels pretty glib and unhelpful for me to tell you, “just act more like a bluntly direct, gay autistic man.” To say only that would be to ignore the fact that your lack of confidence has a longstanding cultural history, and that it’s one that nearly all queer women I know bear the marks of. Beyond that, there might be biases working against you, such as fatphobia, racism, or ableism, all of which might incline fewer people to openly share when they find you hot. That’s real problem that operates outside of you and which no amount of self love can eradicate. I think it’s important to acknowledge when the deck is stacked against people unfairly.
But no matter what, there are lots of people out there who will want to date and fuck you, Anon. Even if you are dealing with those injustices. Even if your confidence is fried right now. Even if your inner life and fantasies are still somewhat inscrutable to you. You mention that you have a lot of good friends, that you put yourself out there, and that things are otherwise going pretty decently for you in life. And it seems very clear to me from your message that nothing you’re doing or saying is “wrong” or off-putting. The only problem is what you’re not saying, or not letting yourself say.
Over the years I have known a great many lesbians and wlw who are very social, outgoing, fun to be around, cute, active in a variety of interesting hobbies, stable, and all-around total prizes who just did not fuck or date until their late 20s or 30s or beyond. It happens because of the social forces I have just described, plus society’s rampant denigration of all women’s desires. Women masturbate at later ages than men. Queer women come out later in life than queer men. Women aren’t given the social tools to go after the things that they need, or else they are harshly punished for using them. You’re not unusual for needing help and time navigating all this.
If you haven’t, Anon, I would suggest showing your dating app profile and some past messages to a few trusted friends (maybe some gay men as well as other queer women?), to get a variety of perspectives and some reassurance. It will help give you peace of mind to know you aren’t doing anything wrong.
Then I would recommend you challenge yourself to start a conversation with at least five women you’re interested in this week. Try the apps, local queer meetups, and gay bars. Tell a girl she’s pretty. Tell a girl you find her fascinating and you’d like to get to know her better. Ask a hot, goth horror movie buff to cuddle up and watch Skinamarink with you. Find an adorable pet player on Fetlife and tell her you want to try walking her around the apartment on a leash. Whatever works for you! Just make sure it’s driven by genuine interest, or at least curiosity — not a drive to people-please.
It sounds like you’re already doing great in life, Anon. All you need is to approach people more, and more directly, while getting better and better at embracing your own needs. Slowly, you will become more comfortable with initiation and with rejection, as well as with seeing yourself as a sexual being who sees things, and wants things, and goes after them with agency — rather than a passive receiver of others’ interest.
…
Our second question today comes from an Autistic person who is also bogged down by inhibition & self doubt — this time in a more general social realm:
Oh, Anon, I know this struggle well. Like many Autistics, I spent many years overcompensating for my tendency to miss social cues and step on conversational toes by becoming an inveterate people-pleaser. I focused all my attention on regulating the appropriateness of my actions, and on tracking other people’s reactions for any sign that I’d failed to impress them.
After spending hours pretending to be somebody that I wasn’t and calling that “socializing,” I would feel exhausted and bitter. Turns out being hypervigilant for hours is tough! And no matter how hard I tried to be exactly what other people wanted me to be, all I could notice were the ways I came up short. I’d repeat awkward exchanges to myself in the shower, invent convoluted scenarios where something I’d said had been taken in the worst possible way.
Many of us spend so much time trying to make other people like us that we never stop to ponder if we really like them. We believe the goal of a social interaction is to “win” approval — rather than to behold the beautiful complexity of another person’s selfhood, and make what we will of it from a secure position within ourselves. Your own reactions, observations, and intuitions have got to come first.
If you are used to people punishing you for not being the person they want you to be, then quieting all that self-doubt and the instinct to people-please is quite tricky. And in situations where the stakes of being disliked are quite high, such as at work or among relatives whom you are financially dependent upon, unmasking in earnest is not possible. But I will assume, Anon, that you are talking about socializing amongst acquaintances and potential friends, and that you want to be able to be a more earnest, more real self around them.
And if that is the case, my advice is to stop focusing on the social performance you are trying to put on, and all the ways in which you think that you’ve failed, and instead focus on observing other people. And as you do so, notice and validate the reactions and wants that emerge within you.
What are people doing? What are they wearing? How are they acting and why? What’s interesting about them? What are they thinking about, worrying about? Who seems uncomfortable in the space, just like you usually do? Who is swanning around like they own the place?
Who do you find annoying? Who gives you bad vibes? Who do you feel glimmers of curiosity or affection toward? Can you show them your genuine interest?
What fascinates other people? What do they have to teach you? Which conversations catch your ear?
Whose conduct do you admire? Can you tell them that you admire them? Who would you like to be around more? Can you ask them to hang out? What do you like? What do you want?
With practice, it’s possible to unhitch your feelings about other people from those people’s feelings about you. You don’t have to like somebody just because they are warm to you — and you don’t have to stop appreciating a person even if they don’t shower you in the obvious warmth your social anxiety craves either. Other people’s feelings are for them. Your feelings are for you. Let your actions be guided by what you really want.
Instead of getting lost inside your own head, try to notice all the beautiful, annoying, infuriating, loveable, boring, rude, awkward, overly practiced, freaky, casual things that other people are constantly putting out into the world. Learn to study other people very closely, but without any agenda to make them like you. Just practice observing. And observe the feelings that stir within you as well.
Notice what you like about other people. Move toward that. Include more and more and more of that in your life. Disregard and dismiss the people that don’t feel so good, especially the ones who aren’t helping you grow.
Keep doing all that, and then eventually, you will have too much delight and interest and frustration and healthy conflict resolution going on in your life to worry all that much about how you seem. You are a full human being with a right to your own desires, and with enough agency to draw your life toward those desires. You don’t have to sit around waiting, passively and anxiously, for somebody else to grant you the relationships that only you can build.
You can submit future questions to Autistic Advice here.
