This happens to me. As a gay, autistic child and adolescent, I suffered more than my fair share of taunting and bullying. School was often traumatizing because of that.

Once I started my military career, and then later in life, I became part of close, warm circles of friends, and nobody bullied or genuinely taunted me anymore.

But I remained, and remain to this day in some respects, highly sensitive to the possibility.

People who haven’t gone through those bullying experiences probably don’t understand that teasing can be perceived differently by people who have been subject to taunting.