Asexual Visibility Week 7: Asexuality in the wider world

OK then, here it is. The end of asexual awareness week. I honestly didn’t think I’d make it through all seven days. For the last day, I’m going to do something different from what I did the last few weeks. No matter how hard I might try, I’m still only one ace. I can’t really claim to be a voice of the asexual community. The best I can do is say that there’s at least one ace who thinks like this. So the quality of writing in today’s article will be significantly higher than normal, because a lot of it won’t be mine. I’m going to give a list of good links to other asexual resources. The fact that its a Saturday and I'm lazy has nothing to do with anything.

These are mainly resources for allies. There are plenty which are really good, but are aimed at asexuals. Like http://youknowyoureasexual.tumblr.com, which I find hilarious, but which most non-asexuals would probably wrinkle their foreheads at in puzzlement. Also, you know how I said I wouldn't change what I'd written? In this case, that's not true. I'll keep this updated with any good links I find.

First off: AVEN. Probably the biggest single site dedicated to asexuality. The site is here, and they have a wiki here, which is fairly good for explaining the basics.

There are also plenty of other asexual blogs, vlogs and podcasts, such as Love from the Asexual Underground, Ace of Hearts (which no longer updates, but is good all the same), Asexual Explorations (the link goes to their blog, since that's what you're probably most likely to be interested in), asexy beast  Hot Pieces of Ace and the A-life podcast. If you have a question, feel free to ask me, but you could also try ask an ace, where your question may already have been answered.  All of them are very good, and they give perspectives on being ace which are different from mine. They have different styles - the Asexual Explorations blog is more academic in its focus, and the Ace of Hearts is more personal. If I had to recommend just one, it would probably be the vlog Hot Pieces of Ace. It's really good, and has the advantage of being pretty flickering pictures, which are easier to pay attention to. On the other hand, if you're still reading my stuff, you're probably immune to boredom. If you finish all that and you want more, don't worry, there's plenty. Put a search into google for 'asexual blog' and you'll get loads of stuff. Or look through AVEN's 'World Watch' Forum, there's generally quite a lot there too.

Other examples of asexual people: There are a few asexual celebreties, including Emilie Autumn. There's some suggestion that one of the New Testament prophets might've been ace (he talks about those who 'burn' for sex, and those who don't), although I can't remember which one. And there are asexual characters. Possibly Sherlock Holmes, definitely the Doctor no matter what anyone says*. A few other books have asexual characters too. Guardian of the Dead is a novel in which one of the main characters is openly asexual, and is a good read if you like fantasy. The main characters of Death Note are either asexual or sociopaths. Probably both.

If you want to help out, with visibility, got to AVEN. We have a shop, and loads of other stuff. The next event type thing I can remember off the top of my head is pride 2012 in London. We have a float (I have no idea what we'll be doing, but I'm hoping the comments about dressing up like cupcakes was sarcasm).

OK. That's all you get today. I'm rather burned out from the whole 'seven days of posts' thing. I might have something for you Tuesday or Wednesday, but I'm not sure.

*Including, should it come to it, Moffat.

Update 1/03/2012: Here's a pamphelt for you that I should probably have posted the first time. This is an article about asexuality which I haven't written an article on. This is the masterpost for the 'Carnival of Aces', and you'd probably be safe to assume that it's always going to remain a pretty good place to go to find people writing about asexuality. This is a blog with bits on asexuality which has another explanation as to why so many aces are in some way trans*, which is pretty much the exact opposite of mine (Or is exactly the same with the opposite emphasis, depending on how you look at it). And this gives a view which is probably pretty similar to mine. Or at least to what I meant to say, which is probably not exactly the same thing. Obviously, the entire site it's on, http://asexualnews.com/, is going to be pretty good as an asexuality link. It does give me really annoying ads, though, so apologies if that's a problem.

Asexuality Visibility Week 6: How to deal with an asexual friend.

Extra long post for the end of asexual visibility week. Of course, a lot of the length is stolen, but still.

What do you do if you’ve got a friend who’s asexual? Or who you think is asexual? Or if you think you’ve found out that your ‘asexual’ friend… isn’t? This should be a topic on which I have at least some expertise.

First, let’s say you’ve found out that your friend is asexual. First of all: don’t. Seriously. There’s not really any good way to find out for definite that someone’s asexual, unless they tell you. There are ways. Hacking their Facebook might work. Going through their browsing history and finding AVEN is a pretty good indication. Finding their posts and reading them can help too. Yeah. Try not to do that. From personal experience, it’s not very nice to have happen to you. OK then, but what if you have found out – you had their phone and saw something by accident, say? I would say it’s probably better not to tell them, actually. I’ve been on the receiving end of having someone who I haven’t actually come out to start a discussion of my asexuality (this was before I’d actually come out at all). Let’s just say that there’s a reason I’m so open about it now.

What if you suspect, but don’t know? Is it OK to ask ‘are you asexual?’?* I’d think yes, at least in my case, but it’s probably going to vary from person to person. I mainly say that it’s OK because there’s a good chance that they themselves don’t know what the word means, or haven’t thought of it. Whatever happens, if they say no, you take that as the truth. It doesn’t matter if you think they’re lying. If they are, it’s their decision whether to come out to you or not, and you should respect that.

What if they have come out? Can you then ask whatever you want Well… First off, read and familiarise yourself with this list (which comes from here, and is by no means exhaustive):

We’d prefer if you avoided most of the stuff on there, in general. Personally, I’m OK with probably more than half of them, as long as I genuinely think that the person I’m talking to is actually just ignorant. Since you’ve read this, you aren’t. So don’t ask them. Aside from that, try rewording the question to be one you might ask a homosexual. Obviously, since they’re different orientations, there are things that don’t fit, but generally speaking, if it’s something that a gay person would find hideously offensive, you might want to think about whether we might find it equally so**. Other than those two tests, different aces are OK with different things. Most people are going to have boundaries. I’m OK with talking about pretty much anything to do with my sexuality, but I get really really aggravated about having to explain the basics repeatedly still, just about the only thing I won't discuss that's in some way related to my sexuality is who I have a crush on (or who I have a squish on, but that's a little less firm). Let people bring things up in their own time. If there’s something you absolutely need to know, use the internet to find out. Don’t try to take them out of their comfort zone. Other than that, it’s their choice what they want to bring up, who they want to tell, and how they want to talk about it – I’m OK with just talking about asexuality, but I much prefer to write things down, since I think I’m more articulate that way. I know it might be slightly annoying, but ‘I’m asexual’ are among two of the hardest words I’ve ever said***. Coming out is hard. It makes you feel vulnerable, and you shouldn’t push someone to make themselves feel more vulnerable.

If they do seem to be OK with questions, try not to ask anything that you couldn’t answer yourself with relation to your own sexuality, or which would seem bloody stupid if they were asked about your own sexuality. Here are a few examples of questions asexuals might get asked, flipped to apply to sexuals (this is stolen from Asexual Underground):

1) What do you think caused your sexuality?

2) When and how did you first decide you were sexual, and why did you make that choice?

3) Is it possible that your sexuality is just a phase that you will grow out of?

4) It is possible that your sexuality stems from a neurotic fear of dealing with people and not just their bodies, or from a neurotic obsession with physical bodies, or worse, an inability to see past a body?

5) Sexuals have histories of failed asexual relationships, not being able to deal with close personal non-sexual relating. Do you think you may have turned sexual out of fear of emotional intimacy?

6) If you’ve never had a really intimate relationship with someone without all the messy things that happen when you mix in sex and bodily fluids, how do you know you wouldn’t prefer that?

7) If sexuality is normal, why is there such huge spectrum of sexual attraction, drive and desire?

8) Sexuality and sexual activity can be indicative of hormonal or psychological problems, and even brain damage. Have you considered getting your hormones checked or having a psychological assessment?

9) Many people who have been sexually abused while children or teenagers act out sexually and become very sexual later in life. Were you abused as a child or teenager? Is that why you are sexual?

10) To whom have you disclosed your sexual tendencies? How did they react?

11) Your sexuality doesn’t offend me as long as you leave me alone, but why do so many sexuals try to seduce others into that orientation, or seduce them all?

12) If you should choose to nurture children, would you want them to be sexual, knowing the problems they would face, all the complicated things they would need to deal with in their relationships and lives?

13) Most child molesters, rapists and abusers are sexual. Do you consider it safe to expose your children to sexuals? Sexual teachers, particularly?

14) Why must sexuals be so blatant, making a public spectacle of your sexuality? Can’t you just be what you are and keep it quiet?

15) Sexuals always assign their relationships such narrowly restricted, categories of “friend” or “partner”. Why do you cling to such unhealthy and limiting relationship categories? Why can’t you just love?

16) How can you have a fully satisfying, deeply emotional experience with another person when you are preoccupied by sex and what your bodies are doing? How can two people actually be intimate if they are constantly seeing and treating each other as sexual objects, or trying to get sexual fulfillment?

17) Sexual relationships have total societal support, yet divorce and messy break ups continue to cause sexuals profound distress. Why are there so few stable sexual relationships?

18) Since sexuality and problems that stem from it are so painful for so many people, techniques have been developed to help sexuals change. Have you considered trying hormone or aversion therapy?

20) How do sexuals ever concentrate when they have to deal with the constant bother of sexual attraction, sex drive, and spending time and energy pursuing people for sexual relationships?

21) A disproportionate number of criminals and other irresponsible types are sexual. And there are so many types of self-destructive, abusive and oppressive behaviours that are sexual in nature. So how can sexuality possibly be normal and healthy?

22) So many sexual people are only willing to be emotionally intimate with someone if they are in a sexual relationship. Why are sexuals so emotionally frigid?

23) Maybe you only think you’re sexual because you haven’t met the right person. Do you think you’re only turning to sexuality because you are desperate and emotionally unfulfilled?

24) There are so many physical risks involved with sexuality, including STI’s and unplanned pregnancy, not to mention the emotional risks and frustration especially in long-term committed sexual relationships. Why would anyone want to be sexual?

25) Why do sexuals need to be validated by having someone else desire them sexually? Why are they so insecure?”

You see? Most of those are either offensive, bloody stupid, really difficult to answer or some combination of the above. So asking an asexual the same kind of questions – especially since a newly out ace is likely to be less sure about their sexuality than you, and have fewer friends of the same orientation to turn to – isn’t really a good thing. Finally, be aware that if you get to ask us questions, we totally get to do the same to you. I have yet to find someone to adequately explain to me what sexual attraction actually feels like. Of course, noone would ask questions about someone else’s sexuality, and then not be willing to answer questions about their own. That would just be hypocritical J.

Finally, what if you think that one of your asexual friends has been lying to you, and isn’t really ace at all? Well, you’re probably wrong. Yes, it’s possible that they were lying to you^†. It’s also possible, and more likely, that they thought that they were asexual, and have found out that actually they’re not. It does happen occasionally, since it’s rather hard to be sure you’re not attracted to anyone (and that’s why ‘demisexual’ tends to be considered so close to ‘asexual). That doesn’t mean that the orientation itself is invalid, just that people make mistakes. I thought that I was heterosexual for some time. But really, how do you tell? ‘Asexual’ was checking out an attractive woman? There are aces who view humans as a work of art, as I mentioned previously, and they can admire them aesthetically without any sexual attraction at all. If I didn’t actively try to avoid it, I’d probably be seen to be checking out women quite often, since I rather like jewellery, and would probably spend significant amounts time looking at her necklace. Which could lead to some people getting the wrong impression, I’m told. ‘Asexual’ is blatantly flirting with your boyfriend? It’s quite possible that they’re just being friendly – I’ve certainly been told that I was flirting with someone, to my complete surprise. There are quite a few asexuals for whom the word ‘flirting’ wouldn’t really cross their mind^††. Aces can have relationships, and can have sex in those relationships. Some asexuals can have sex to satisfy their partners, and some even enjoy it. I can honestly say that I can think of not a single behaviour that actually definitively demonstrates them as not being ace. Even if you seem to find something incontrovertible, remember how hard I said it was to come out? There might be someone whom they haven’t told and don’t want to know.

Basically, sexuality is someone’s own business. If they tell you something, believe them, be glad that they trusted you, and don’t push them for information that they don’t want to share. They’ll probably be more willing to share if you’re supportive than if you’re constantly pushing for them to tell you things, anyway. That way, we can all live happily together.

*And I am really unsure about that punctuation.

**On the above list, only 3, 5, 7, 8, 11, 15, 16, 21, 23 and possibly 14 could pass this test, and those only because they don’t really have obvious homosexual equivalents.

***Just after ‘not guilty’, and just before ‘Cthulhu Fhtagn’****

****Seriously, you try saying that whilst suffering (possibly slightly ironically) from sleep deprivation.

^†Although frankly, I can’t imagine why.

^††A good test here might be to see if you’d still think they were flirting if they were the same sex and gender as the person they’re ‘flirting’ with. You’ll still probably get some false positives, but it might help cut down on them.

Asexual Visibility Week 5: Asexuality and Gender

Blogger tells me that yesterday’s post didn’t actually go up yesterday. Oh well. You get two posts from me today, you lucky people. Since yesterday, I remembered what I actually wanted to talk about in that article. No, I’m not going to change it. The idea of going back and changing the record of what I said disturbs me somewhat (I will do it occasionally, but if it’s anything more than adding a footnote or correcting a grammar error, I’ll mark it). By happy coincidence, gender also happens to be the subject of this month’s carnival of aces. A fact which I found out literally today.

Sexuality and gender. I don’t actually have that much hard evidence for what I’m about to say beyond my own experience, and the impression I get on AVEN, but I’ll do my best. Somewhere around twenty percent of the asexual community identify as transgender. At least ten percent definitely identify as a gender other than that which would normally be associated with their biological sex. Obviously, that’s rather higher than in the general population. Some of this, of course, is due to links between LGBT and asexual communities – transgender people are probably more likely to know what asexual means, and asexual people are probably more clued in about what it means to be transgender.

However, the statistics I’ve found for number of transgender people in the overall population put it at somewhere under one percent. That means that asexuals are out from what we might expect by an order of magnitude. And I’m talking about statistics with numbers of subjects in the thousands or millions. I can’t be bothered doing the maths, but simply from approximate use of a binomial distribution in my head, the odds of that happening purely by chance are so mindboggling that I can’t even think of an appropriate metaphor to explain to you how mindboggling they are. And the skew is way, way too big to think of as just coming from the factors I mentioned above (especially since I don't think you get the same results from the gay community). Something else is needed.

I’m going to make a massive assumption here, and assume that most asexuals think vaguely like me. This probably isn’t true, since I’m reliably informed that noone thinks like me, but I don’t exactly have a lot of other models to work with here. In which case, I’m going to say that it’s probably a lot easier for asexuals to identify as in some way transgender than for most sexuals. Not simply because we’ve already questioned one aspect of our sexual identity, so we’re more likely to be open to questioning others, but because I suspect that sex and gender might matter to us somewhat less. Obviously, since I’m heteroromantic (as far as I know), sex/gender* must matter to me in some subliminal way, but I really couldn’t tell you how. Over time, my current attitude to sex/gender has developed as follows: When in a group with at least one cisgender female, the subject of sex is less likely to come up**, which is good. Furthermore, women tend to have nicer outfits than men, although this is not an absolute rule. Basically, I (and I suspect quite a lot of other aces) don’t care as much about gender as sexuals do. Shorn of the sexual aspects to them, gender and sex are basically purely social things, like the distinction between goths and preps, or footballers and trekkies***. And for someone who genuinely thinks of gender as purely social, it becomes a lot easier to move between man and woman. The divide becomes a lot less important. There are definitely some aces who just genuinely don’t care.

So there’s my conclusion. I think that aces are likely to see gender more in terms of society than in terms of natural biology, so we’re more likely to take a pick’n’mix approach to it. I’d love to see statistics for the bisexual/pansexual community, because if I’m right, the same effect should apply there (definitely for pansexuals, and probably for bisexuals). Unfortunately, I can’t find any. [ADDITION] Another thing I can't find is something I saw once saying that homosexuality was actually allied to transexuality in some way (being homosexual is a minor form of transexuality, I think it said). I can't find it at the moment, but if it were true, it would probably apply to asexuals as well. I'm not making any statements as to the veracity of that claim, and if that were true you'd get the same results from the homosexual community, and, as I've mentioned, I don't think you do, but I thought I should mention the existance of such a view [/ADDITION].

I hope I got through this without accidentally offending anybody with my wildly unjustified assumptions. Tomorrow, for the end of asexual week (it goes on another day, but Saturday’s going to be slightly different from what I normally do) I’ll be talking about how to deal with a friend (or acquaintance) who is, or who you suspect might be, asexual. That I should be able to talk about with some authority.

*Can’t really say which one in all honesty, since I’ve never yet had a romantic crush on anyone who wasn’t cisgender.

**Except when random men who neither of you know start asking for hugs from the girl you’re talking to. That was slightly weird.

***And for those people who’re thinking that there are actual biological differences between the sexes, there are quite possibly biological differences between footballers and trekkies, probably bigger than those between males and females. There are probably a lot of trekkies who couldn’t be footballers if they tried – I’m not exactly a trekkie, but I’m definitely a nerd, and I certainly couldn’t be on the football team. For genetic reasons, no less. Why give extra prominence to the presence or absence of a Y chromosome, compared to all the others?

Asexual Visibility Week 4: Asexuality and the arts.

This is up late, isn’t it? The power cut really didn’t help. Still. It’s technically today (if this goes up literally instantly), at least where I am*.

Asexuality and the arts. I’m going to make a sweeping statement again: the arts are about creating beauty. You might argue that, but I think we can all agree that art which isn’t in some way beautiful isn’t really very good art. And I’m not just including the more traditional arts here, like drawing, sculpting and writing, but everything else under that category, like dance**, architecture and fashion design. I think those are art anyway, for the record, but they aren’t always what people think of when someone says ‘the arts’, so I thought I should make that clear.

The thing about beauty, though, is that there are, as I’ve said before (although possibly noone’s read it, since it was the last post before old acanthus was locked) two kinds: sexual and aesthetic. Sex has become a lot more acceptable in the last few years, and western society is, to put it mildly, rather sexual. It’s slightly annoying when it gets too blatant***, but I’m not going to say that ninety-eight and a half per-cent of the population should be silenced for my comfort.

The thing about the arts is visibility. There don’t tend to be that many asexuals in the arts. That’s partially because of visibility, but it’s a vicious circle – there aren’t many asexuals in the media****, so noone knows about them. Since noone knows about them, the media doesn’t include them. But there’s another thing too. Probably most asexuals don’t know they’re ace - we don’t exactly get a manual. Most of us don’t even know the word ‘asexual’ as anything other than a means of reproduction. And it’s rather hard to be absolutely sure you aren’t attracted to anything. And the arts have a tendency to portray sex as something you absolutely have to want. If you don’t clearly there’s something wrong with you. That’s not really a helpful message guys. Basically, the arts tend to be focused on sex, from TV and books with sex seen as an ultimate goal, a highly desirable prize, to fashion and dance which are often focused on bringing to attention to sexual characteristics of the subject.

The other thing is in how we can relate to things. Art is often seen by asexuals in a rather sexual way – there are asexuals who use art (like architecture, as well as painting and sculpture) to understand sexual attraction – indeed, some asexuals, as I understand it, treat humans as basically works of art (partially natural, but I personally tend to view humans mostly as a frame for clothing, jewellery, etc. So art has a rather odd relationship with aces – the culture of art tends to be a bit too sexual for our tastes – which isn’t bad for aces who know about it, but it’s rather annoying for people who don’t know they’re asexual. On the other hand, one asexual in popular bit of media**** can raise awareness massively, and aesthetic beauty is one of the easiest ways to try to relate to sexual beauty we have.

I’m pretty sure that’s not what I intended to write about when I planned out this week, but it’ll do. Tomorrow is the relationship between asexuality and gender. I do remember what I’m going to write about for this one, but I don’t know how well I’ll manage it.

* If it isn’t today where you are, please seek help from the department of temporal anomalies.

**Yes, that includes things like pole dancing – which is why I felt the need to mention it.

***Personally, I tend not to notice sexual content until it gets to the point where large numbers of people have already set off to storm someone’s office.

****Shut up Doctor. Noone ever notices that you’re asexual, since you never actually mention it, and it’s left slightly ambiguous anyway.

Asexual Visibility Week 3: asexuality and the nature of love

OK, there’s a possibility that a fair few people might have been linked here. Please don’t hurt me. And just to reiterate, I don’t claim to speak for all asexuals. I try to include viewpoints of aces who aren’t me, as far as I understand them, but I’m always going to be limited by the simple fact that I’m me, and I’ve never been anyone else. That said, let me go back to making sweeping and authoritative sounding statements about things.

Love. What is it? Here’s a conversation which I’ve blatantly stolen from Brian Davies:

“I love you,” says Mary. “Do you really mean that?” asks John, “Yes,” Mary replies. And the ensuing conversation goes like this:

John: Then you want to be with me?

Mary: No.

John: But you want to talk to me?

Mary: No.

John: Surely you want to share things with me?

Mary: No.

John: And you don’t want us to make love together?

Mary: That’s right.

Does ‘love’ actually mean any of these things? Random hypothetical: A madman threatens to kill you and the person you love if you go near them or talk to them ever again. I, personally, would want to avoid them as far as possible. Or suppose you know that every so often you go insane, and kill anyone near you. Or suppose you’re very poor and either you feel you’re a burden to them, or that you might love them, but you love yourself more, and can’t afford to share with them. There are hundreds of ways the above conversation might be perfectly justified.

Leaving aside the rather contrived situations of the previous paragraph, can you really say you can’t imagine a situation in which you’ve broken up with someone, but you still have feelings for them. I personally tend to avoid people I have a crush on. You might say that that’s not ‘true’ love, but the fact is that no matter how much you love someone, there’s no guarantee that they’re going to love you back. In which case you might well decide that hanging around them was too painful, and start to avoid them. And if we’re on the subject of True Love, surely the truest love would include valuing someone else’s feelings above your own. So you’d want to do whatever you thought would make them happiest – not necessarily any of the things John mentions. So no. None of the things John mentions are actually necessary for love. In which case love has to be based on feelings, rather than either on the actions you take, or the actions you want to take.

Furthermore, it is perfectly possible to want to have sex with someone who you don’t love – unless I’ve totally misunderstood the concepts of one night stands, celebrity crushes, friends with benefits, pornography and prostitution. So we have to ask: what is it that makes ‘loving someone’ different from simply wanting to have sex with a friend?

Why do I mention all this? Well, most of you have probably figured it out by now. The logical conclusion, I think, is that love must be a feeling that is actually qualitatively different from wanting to have sex with someone. In which case sex in a relationship is important not for what it is, but for what it represents to the parties in the relationship. Thus, if sex means something completely different for one or both of the parties in the relationship – say if they’re asexual, so they hate the idea, or are simply indifferent to it – then what sex represents in that relationship will change, and it might be perfectly possible in such circumstances to have a loving relationship with no sex in it at all. Of course, some aces might have sex with a sexual partner, in order to make that partner happy. Again, it’s not about the sex itself, it’s about what the sex means. I would argue that having sex with someone who you don’t really want to have sex with for the sex itself is a far truer expression of love than having sex with someone because you’re desperately lusting after them.

So yeah. Despite how inseparably linked they might be for a heterosexual heteroromantic (or a homosexual homoromantic, bisexual biromantic, etc.) in our culture, sex and love are very much separable – and there’s much much more to love than ‘close friend you want to have sex with’. It’s hard to imagine being in love with someone you aren’t friends with, but if you accept that crushes are kinda akin to love, then it seems sorta possible. Ish. But regardless of that, love is, at least for me, and I would guess for all romantic asexuals (and probably even all romantics) different from friendship. Maybe not entirely separate, but definitely at least partially so, and in many ways beyond it as well.

So we can love. Tomorrow I plan to talk about the asexuality and the arts. I can’t remember exactly what I was going to say about asexuality and the arts, though, so that title might change a bit between now and then.

Asexual Visibility Week 2: Asexuality, sex, and why we seem to think about it so much

OK then. Let’s talk about sex. And for the curious, yes, I mean the act, not the biological classification. Gender is on Thursday. You might think I won’t have that much to say about sex, or that I don’t really have much right to talk about something of which I have absolutely no knowledge. So let’s talk about sex as it relates to asexuality. Let’s be clear here – the asexual attitudes to sex are pretty much as varied as the asexual attitudes towards football. Some of us detest it with a passion. Some of us don’t mind it. Some of us actually rather enjoy it. We just don’t desire it, in the same way sexuals seem to. Let me put it like this. If you offered an asexual the choice between sex and chocolate cake, about ninety percent of us (including most of those who ‘enjoy’ sex) would choose the cake. The rest don’t like chocolate cake.

Let me go a little off topic for a moment here. A few people think I talk about being asexual too much. And, annoying as it is to have to admit, you might have a point. But I am by no means the worst offender. And at least I don’t think of myself as better than you because I’m above the pathetic, disgusting animal instincts that drive you to make complete fools of yourselves in desperate service to your id*. Why do aces do that? Well, the second one is easy to explain. There is something terribly animalistic about the sex drive, and it has an incredible amount of control over sexuals. I cannot think of a single thing that isn’t actually necessary for survival that could have the same amount of sheer animal desire associated with it as sex does for sexuals. Actually, in my case, even food and sleep don’t really match up. But why do so many aces (and it’s not at all all aces, just a fair few) seem to talk about being ace so much?

Well it’s because we do. We think about sex a lot. I’m actually going to use someone else’s words for this:

[This is kind of about asexuality over all, not just this guy.]

Think about how sexual [western] society is. Especially for a guy (as the poster refers to him as he) in which the kyriarchy has this habit of erasing asexual folk, or just referring to them as “people who just can’t get any.”

It may seem like he’s talking about it a lot, but it’s probably nothing compared to the overtly sexual culture around him, so instead of point it out and engaging in an attempt at silencing the dude, maybe listen to his little spiels about asexuality, perhaps and learn more about his marginalized sexuality?

I mean, how annoying would it be if you were homosexual and several heterosexual persons kept reminding you how much you talk about it? Of course, you talk about it. It’s important to you. How many movies are made around homosexuals compared to heterosexuals? And think about how often any asexual persons are featured?

Sometimes we just need to step back and reexamine certain aspects of our privilege, even if it may not seem as such.¹

That puts it way, way better than I could (or have). As well as being able to talk about how marginalised we are without sounding like a whiny idiot. Think about it: Do I talk about being ace as much as most of you talk about being heterosexual? Not really. Do I shove it in your faces along with all the disgusting details? Hell no. I’ve actually got to the point where I prefer mixed company, because it’s less likely that we’ll get into a conversation about sex. I have to constantly re-examine what I say, as I’ve mentioned before, because sexuals tend to take things a different way. Asexuality is massively important to me because I am almost constantly aware of how I’m different from most of my acquaintances (although statistically, probably not all of them).

And that’s why we think about our sexuality so much, and might seem to talk about a lot.

Asexuals can, as I said, have sex – to keep a relationship healthy, or because they genuinely enjoy it, and there’s no chocolate cake left***. Asexuals can love people, and we’ll make sacrifices for that love, just like sexuals. But if we don’t want sex, what exactly does asexual love even mean? What makes it distinct from asexual friendship? I’ll talk about that tomorrow.

*That sentence in no way reflects my view by the way. I don’t have a link for that one**, but I’ve heard us aces described as ‘the pinnacle of human evolution’ and even you sexuals described as not being fully human because of your sexual attraction.

**Actually, I do. I’m just choosing not to give it to you, for reasons of my own.

***For the record, I would really, really prefer never to have to.

¹From http://debunkingqs.tumblr.com/post/1085284928/this-is-kind-of-about-asexuality-over-all-not

Asexual visibility week 1: Why visibility matters.

Hello again people. You might have noticed that Acanthus was offline recently. Actually, those of you who pay enough attention to your address bar might notice that it still is. Blogger decided I was spam. I’m creating this as a backup blog, so everything that’s on here will go up on Acanthus if it ever goes back up. Annoyingly, the archives on acanthus will probably say that I didn’t post anything in October 2011. Like I said before, this annoys me.

Why did I create a backup blog now? It’s asexual awareness week. So I’m going to try to do a post every day for the next week. Which would be rather hard if I didn’t have a blog. I probably won’t manage it, but I’ll try, and everything will go up eventually.

First of all, why on earth does asexual awareness matter? There isn’t that much discrimination against aces – don’t get me wrong, it exists, with the general assumption that anyone who doesn’t want sex is somehow ‘broken’, but it’s hard to discriminate against a group you don’t know about. We can fit into normal society without discrimination fairly easily. Surely increasing visibility is just going to put us at risk of more discrimination.

Well, it’s actually rather hard to tell if someone’s asexual without them telling you about it, even if you do know that we exist. I wasn’t 100% sure I was ace until... a few week ago, actually. A sex-neutral, romantic asexual is pretty much indistinguishable from a normal sexual, unless they choose to be. Even a sex-negative romantic’s going to have a pretty easy time hiding the fact from anyone who isn’t their significant other. And the significant other is going to have to know about, and understand, the ace thing anyway. So there’s no increase in discrimination there. The only people who it might be a problem for is aromantics. And frankly, no matter how much visibility we do, the assumption is probably going to always be the same as it is now – that they’re closeted gays. Discrimination against aces is definitely a problem, but all an ace has to do to avoid it is just not say anything. We don’t even really have the LGBT problem of having to actively hide who we are. And I don’t think there’s likely to be an increase in institutionalised ‘anti-ace’ attitude if people know about us. We’ll probably just be lumped in with LGBTQ, the same way we are now, no matter how much some aces might object to the idea. Frankly, I don’t think there’s going to be much immediate change to the way people who know what we are perceive aces. That’ll come later.

So that’s why visibility isn’t a bad thing. But why does it matter? Why isn’t it just entirely indifferent? Well, let’s say you’re asexual. Coming out is hard. Even for me, saying those words is difficult, and I’ve been out for quite some time now. That’s why I write about it so often – it’s much, much easier to publish an article or a Facebook status on the subject than to tell someone directly.  Once you’ve gone to all that effort, the last thing you want is someone to tell you aren’t really, to say it’s just a phase you’re going through, or even ask ‘what does that mean?’*.

Then there’s the ‘support network’ thing. Anti ace discrimination exists. Don’t get me wrong. Mostly it’s in the ‘you don’t really exist’ category, but I believe that according to some denominations of the Christian Church, we don’t have souls**. And people who’d get absolutely furious if you said the same kind of thing about homosexuals or transsexuals will let it go if you say it about aces – both because they don’t know about us, and because even if they do, we’re obscure enough that just denying our existence really isn’t that hard to do, or to justify doing. Yeah, it’s rock stupid to do so with absolutely no knowledge whatsoever, not even having looked up any of the research on the subject, but sexuals seem to have such a difficult time understanding the concept of someone who genuinely doesn’t care about sex that it’s probably understandable (although still absolutely unacceptable).

And one last reason why it’s good for people to know about us: for all those aces who don’t know what the word means. People who think there’s something wrong with them because they don’t want to have sex with random strangers. There’s no handbook that gets sent out to all us asexuals***. We have to find out about the orientation, same as anyone else. There are plenty of aces who were having sex for years before they found out about the orientation. There are even ones who only found out in the course of seeking medical treatment for the obvious problems with their sex-drive. Frankly, I think that’s the most important thing of all – that the ace themselves knows about their orientation. That they know that there’s a group they can go to who understands how they feel. Frankly, I don’t care if the United Nations signs a resolution officially reclassifying us as nonhuman****, so long as I know who I am, and how I feel, even if I have to hide it, that’s better than not knowing.

And that’s why asexual visibility matters to me. If you asked another ace, you probably wouldn’t get the same answer. We’re all individuals, and I don’t pretend to speak for the asexual community. Tomorrow, I should be talking about sex. See you then.

*The last is totally understandable, don’t get me wrong. It’s just annoying to repeatedly have to explain your orientation to people, and rather undermines the whole ‘coming out’ thing.

**The Bible, incidentally, does arguably make a brief reference to asexuality. It’s fine. You can even make a case that one of the profits (Paul, I believe, but don’t quote me on that) was asexual.

***Random tangent: it’s really quite annoying that asexuals isn’t recognised as a word by Word, but homosexuals, heterosexuals and bisexuals all are.

****Actually, I totally care, but bear with me, I’m trying to make a point here.