Adult male aspies being bullied by teenage boys?

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This describes me almost perfectly. Sometimes I get the vibe that some guy wants to do something stupid and one look from me shuts them down. I guess it's the positive side of looking like a serial killer...

Yeah, if you look back at them as if they were the prey it tends to activate thier back-up button.

Sometimes.

It usually happens when they perceive me as an effeminate male. I try to avoid "trouble spots" as much as possible, but, once in a while, and I'm not saying these will work for everyone, I'll do one of two things:

1. Hold my cell phone in the air and ask, "Want me to call the cops?" You'd be surprised how often that will deter some people.

2. Reply with, "Hey sh!theads, why don't you come over here and try something? Ya want to? I'm right here! Go ahead and hit me because that way I can sue your mommy and daddy for thousands of dollars. Yeah, that's what I thought. Call me when you hit puberty!! !" This works because most people are cowards. When you actually take a step towards them and invite them to act, they run away.

I tend to give off "submissive vibes" because I'm a "dude in a woman's body." This unfortunate combination can attract rats.

I don't know about most people but bullies are definitely cowards, if they weren't then they wouldn't be bullies in the first place.

Once you learn this, you can deal with them pretty easily by simply calling their bluff.

You have a point there, and I think maybe the Asperger's body language helps to prevent that in a weird way. Maybe the challenge signal isn't there from me, and if the would-be agressor doesn't pick up the signal from me (nor does he get a response from his own), it diffuses it? In any case, I'd be very inclined to act fast to come up with a mental diffuser for any situation like that.

But if I have to put on my "mess with me???" face...

Charles

WOW! I am PASSIVE! I often walk with my head down. My posture often isn't that great. I don't look people in the eyes. I've only been bullied out in the open 4 times, in over 30 years. 2 times were a jerk on the planes. I think, interestingly, that they were BOTH the same guy. One guy that tried to hold up a line, and I tried to take the initiative. And one guy that got upset because I, afer his wife, after fiddling with the payment mechanism for NO reason asked if there was anything she could do for me, said, sarcastically, "NO thanks, you've done enough already.".

She must have really henpecked her husband, or he was insecure, or he thought I was an easy mark. He yelled up at me, JUST outside my comfort zone, and I just stared him down as if I were deaf. It was the ONLY way to handle it, because anything else could have led to a fight, or him yelling longer. BTW he was shorter than I was, and older, but he might have been strong. Being older though, hitting him would be, from a sensibility standpoint, like hitting a girl. That puts a male in a BAD postion!

As for the guy(s) on the plane. I kind of took it. With the other guy, I stood my ground. But I AM getting fed up with it. One guy, just because he was inconsiderate and stupid, tried to push me away, and he suddenly had LESS room to deal with, because I took all the rest.

Just had a thought -- has anyone noticed that if they silently stare at someone (who is trying to start some s***) that they'll tend to get intimidated (or whatever it is) and go away, but if you say more than a few words (and especially if trying to sound tough or intimidating) that it completely nullifies that effect?

(For me, the best way is to stand up straight, stare, and keep my mouth shut as much as possible.)

Yeah, I'm sure it happens - sometimes I've been picked on by teenage boys at work even though I'm a teacher. I was checked by one my first year there. I didn't realize yet that I could have dragged him by his head to the office and made his life miserable for it.

Working closely with them though, I think it's just the nature of teenage boys to have lots and lots of energy and unfortunately sometimes it can come out very negatively. I agree with Moog about martial arts. I studied kung fu and it helped me deal with them in a very positive way. I know I can take any one of them without much effort at all. Also, I tend to genuinely like them which I think they can pick up on, so even if they're difficult at first they usually relax and act human after we engage for a minute.

Tone of voice contains so much information.

Also, calling them sugar pumpkin can change things up. It will always have an amusing effect on them - I suppose even more so if a man says it to them. lol

I like it, I must try that

Maybe not such a good idea. They might pound on you for being "gay".
The fewer words (better yet none) the better.

yes i believe this happens especially for those in their 20s/30s and maybe 40s. but past age 50, i think that just by being older, you wont have too many run-ins with the teenagers. i work with about half a dozen teenage males at work, and there have been issues with their bullying,etc.. i have had the talks from my senior managers about "gaining people's respect" and so forth. and it doesnt help matters that from my years of torment of high school and college that im not overly social with men even because i seem to attract the a**holes or the crazy stupid loser a**holes whenever i seem to be "friends" with any male. i frankly dont have much reason to trust men. as there always seem to be some type of ruthless BS game with them. and i have also worked with older males, and mostly because we are from two different generations, there really isnt much common ground whenever im around them either. it f*****g sucks. and i do wish at times to meet those ideal cool friendly fun guys to hang out with, but it never seems to happen and i dont think it will until im like f*****g middle age and wishing i was young again and people's BS levels are acceptable or something like that.

I got picked on a lot in highschool for being small. Due to problems I had associated with Type I Diabetes I ended up developing very late. In fact, I was 5'3 until I was damn near 18.

In any case I started lifting weights a lot when I entered college. Initially fueled by the anger I had built up from years of people's torturous criticism (I still get furious about it if I don't push it out of my mind as soon as the thought pops) it ended up becoming a special interest level hobby for me. Just like any other special interest I acquire.... I took it way to far.

The funny thing about this is that I was usually left alone at parties previous to my weight lifting endeavor. After I had spent absurd amounts of time in the gym I found that I became a target of rude, angry, drunk guys. Something that has resulted in generating about as much misery as being targetted in highschool

In talking with some family about this they seemed to draw the same conclusion in confidence being a major factor..

This is the answer to most social problems that we face. Its simple either you should be mentally strong(in other words socially intelligent) or physically strong, if you are both it is great, but if you are none of these then there is no reason why a NT would respect some physically weak person who has a social brain of new born, trust me it is true.
Body building and learning martial arts are very necessary. The latter is for self confidence which will actually prevent one from having fight and should be used rarely if needed as it would be difficult for an aspie to gauge the social consequences of a fight and he may make his life even more difficult, . I guess that the reason why specialist in the field are not seen prescribing them is that they sound too nonacademic. They would rather speak about reading faces, understanding intonation which are important but in my opinion secondary to what is mentioned in the beginning of this paragraph.

Last edited by daspie on 20 Mar 2011, 11:55 am, edited 3 times in total.

When I started getting visibly more muscular, I also started feeling a lot more self conscious with it. I noticed people noticing. I never really went to the kind of venues where testosterone-y guys get wasted, so I probably avoided a lot of aggro.

I don't think simply being big and strong is necessarily a solid bully proofing strategy. If there's one thing I'd recommend people do , it's a martial art.