LGBT Community Is Hostile

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Its very satisfying to see this- I agree with all of this but have felt very alone in my opinions. I want LGBT people to be kind and open and accepting and welcoming so badly (I'm gay myself) yet in my personal experience they have been extremely petty, condescending, entitled, and I want nothing to do with any of that. It really sucks. I feel like its a recent development too- from where I'm at the past ten years its gotten really bad. I have a theory as to why this is but I don't have time to get into it now.

Well, at least LGBT community acknowledges your existence... ace people are often totally excluded. Internet is full of bitter comments of aces, like recently Equinox released a video of a LGBT alphabet with no single mention of asexuals. Maybe people put us alongside plants and mushrooms somewhere...
I hope to see some aces at my local Pride soon.

^ That may be so of some groups, but others fully acknowledge that aces are part of the spectrum of alternative orientations. I tend to see that while many sexualities and gender orientations get outright hate - indeed, someone here just made a whole topic about how anything LGBT is "filth," aces seem to get dismissed - you've got a hormonal imbalance, you're really gay and in denial, you must have been abused, you just haven't met the right partner, etc. Basically saying that asexuality isn't real, and there is some other explanation that they can like better.

Wow do I really agree with this post.

I feel like it's gotten extremely bad in the last 5 years or so. I've walked out on a date because the person was jumping all over my "incorrect" wording. I just got sick of it. I'm perfectly capable and willing to learn and be supportive of people, esp queer individuals. But oh how tired I am of being treated like I (a gender-queer lesbian) am now your enemy? Simply because I didn't say one word right? And esp being autistic, I can't STAND ppl cutting me off mid-sentense. After about 5 times, I got up and left.

I can't stand how entitled, self-centered, and controlling the queer community have become. You have EVERY right to fight for what you deserve, you do NOT have the right to shove your crap down other ppl's throats in hatred. Isn't that what was done to you in the first place? Isn't that why this fight began?

And honestly, I think a lot of queer people want to have an issue. I do not at all deny that there is a very real struggle going on for a LOT of people. But I have seen too many individuals who play at being a victim, and I'm sick of it. There are real people suffering, and just acting like you're one of them to get what you want? That's beyond selfish and entitled.

I attended Pride for the first time in 2014. I volunteered for my local pride celebration. All I can say is that was a gigantic mistake that I wish not to make again. The organizers for the festival had this "celebration" for the volunteers about a month after Pride. I honestly wish I walked out. They were some of the rudest, shallow and stuck up people I ever took time out of my day to be around.

They had a buffet table with food and I was looking for a place to sit. After looking around I asked where I could find a chair. Instead of politely pointing to where I could find one, one of the staff picked up the chair and slammed it onto the ground. They gave me this look like "you are not part of our clique, go away."

I refuse to take time out of my day to be around people who treat me like worthless garbage.

I get this too. Especially with gendering and pronouns. Its a crappy un-PC thing to write and I'm probably going to be slammed for it but I do see a lot of this raging coming from people who give NO indication that they are queer in any way. So, someone absolutely stereotypically masculine presenting for example, not in transition at all, who lives a male oriented life, has a cis heterosexual female partner, and then starts screaming about someone misgendering them as male or just assuming they're straight.
I'm not suggesting queer people go around wearing signs or that the above example is any less queer than anyone else or doesn't deserve to be treated in the way they prefer (before anyone jumps on my case about it) just that it seems a bit much to get your proverbial nose all out of joint for someone mistaking you for exactly what you present yourself as. Its as quoted - like they want to have a problem. They won't get the crap queer presenting people often get, but they still get to be all outraged when people dare interpret them as they present.
So yeah. I'm an a***hole.

In the case of "the psychological professions," I think they do this for legal reasons. If I'm not mistaken, here in the U.S.A. at least, there are several categories of things they are legally required to report, including:

1) Suicide attempts.
2) Threats to harm other people.
3) Child abuse or neglect.
4) Elder abuse or neglect.

This is known as "mandatory reporting."

There is good and bad in it.....

At least in larger cities like NYC, there's a lot more to the LGBT community than clubs.

Here in NYC, there are LGBT community centers (a big one in Manhattan and smaller ones in at least some of the outer boroughs) where lots and lots of different kinds of groups meet. I am sure that someone could start an in-person support group for LGBT autistic people that meets at one of the LGBT community centers, if this hasn't been done already.

It has been several years since I last participated in the LGBT community in any way, but my impression has long been that the NYC LGBT community was genuinely very diverse. I'd be surprised if it has changed all that much.

Depends where you live, I guess.

Here in NYC I think it is extremely well-organized, with just the right balance of centralizaton vs. de-centralization. There are lots of different groups for lots of different kinds of people. Yet a great many (well over 100, maybe even a few hundred?) of these varied groups manage to participate together in the annual Pride parade.

I'm very sorry to hear this. Where did this happen? Pittsburgh?

What were the Pride events like generally? How many different groups were involved?

@Mona: That happened to me in WeHo, Lansing and Detroit (Michigan), Orlando, and Rome (Italy). It didn't matter how supportive I was, they treated me like a party-crasher. I may as well have worn a KKK uniform.

How did they behave toward you, specifically? Were they aggressively hostile, or just very cliquish?

Also, what specific kinds of places and events did you attend?

Cliquishness is, alas, a fact of human nature. Just about any group will naturally tend to become very cliquish unless it makes a specific effort not to be.

Additionally, social clubs that exist for the sole purpose of socializing tend naturally to be, on many levels, intrinsically hostile environments for autistic and autistic-like people.

If you were to go to your local LGBT community and inquire about the possibility of starting a support group for autistic and autistic-like GLBT people, I suspect you would get a better reception.

They were openly hostile, contemptuous, and exclusionary when they weren't ignoring me outright. These were just the planning meetings for rallies, parades, and other events. Mutual friends would bring me in and introduce me as a sympathetic consultant (I like to organize things, and had a lot of experience at university and in the Navy).

The "You ain't one of us, so you wouldn't understand" mantra was prevalent at every such event. Each such event ended up being a "Let's get loud, proud, and in their faces" kind of event.

Never again. Groupwise, they're on their own.

Were you giving advice that the events become something radically different from what they had been in the past? That kind of advice, from outsiders, is almost never welcome in any group of any kind.

LGBT Pride parades, for example, are always loud and proud. That's one of the main points.

It rarely got to the point where I had an opportunity to share any ideas at all. The hostility started almost as soon as I walked in the door -- usually right after the introductions. It seemed that just by showing up, I became the embodiment of everything that everyone had ever done to them, and without any of them knowing anything about me except my name and why I was invited.

Never again.

Never, ever again.