"Ace week" in girl guiding.

Why not have a 'why not just talk to mum and dad about these sort of things week'?

What on earth are these organisations up to? Who sends their kids to guides/brownies/scouts/cubs etc for sex education? I thought these places were just for kids to have fun with other kids (in a non sexual way of course).

“Beamur

Guides are 10-14
Rangers are 14-18”

So well under 16 then.

it isan absolute factthat there are very real negative health consequences to life without sexual activity

Really? Like what?

@Thefartingsofaofdenmarkstreet

My 10 year old dd says she doesn't want to get married or have kids, she says she wants to grow up and live with lots of cats and hamsters. Do I need to start educating her about asexuality?

Do you object to your child being taught about homosexuality in school?

Do you think lesbians just fancy women because they've had a bad experience with men?

Do you think gay men just fancy men because they've had a bad experience with women?

Whatever you genuinely believe, based on some anecdotal evidence and zero actual lived experience, you don't have any right to tell asexual people that they don't exist and are simply mentally ill people. No matter how 'helpful' you think it might be for people who might have a repressed sexuality due to trauma to make this claim, it's a lot more harmful to the many more people who actually are involuntary, born asexuals for you to peddle such harmful lies.

I would think through why you feel it's so important to you to believe that asexuality doesn't exist. Why can't you believe that people are born without sexual desire? If you're born with it...you can also be born without it. It's pretty logical, actually.

My 10 year old dd says she doesn't want to get married or have kids, she says she wants to grow up and live with lots of cats and hamsters. Do I need to start educating her about asexuality?

[quote vinsurvin]@MrsOvertonsWindow I'm sorry to break it to you, but children do have sexual relationships. Children are increasingly being sexualised from a very young age. Children have 'boyfriends' and 'girlfriends' at primary school. It's an unfortunate truth that children are having sex or experimenting with sexual touching while still at primary school. You might not like it, but it is the reality and will continue to be so - the average age of puberty is getting younger and younger in Western society which means sexual feelings are kicking in younger and younger.

Pretending this isn't happening isn't going to help matters. It is what it is and we have to provide safe frameworks to educate and keep children safe as they learn to navigate their sexual feelings. As such, we have to prepare children and explain to them -in age appropriate terms - what sex is, who has sex and with whom, and what it's ok for them to do and what it's not ok to do, from a fairly young age. Introducing them to the idea that not everyone has sex with someone of the opposite sex is not harmful or damaging in any way. The pearl clutching on here is ridiculous. Girlguiding are not suggesting that they are going to be holding sessions where girls are going to be forced to declare themselves as any particular sexuality. They're simply raising awareness that asexuality exists. I don't see why that would be a problem. Why do you find asexuality as an orientation so threatening? I'm confused.[/quote]
Yikes!!!

Oh shit, that mask slipped almost immediately.

[quote PeterPomegranate]@vinsurvin I’m happy for you if you’re happy. But what difference does it make for the children in your life? They just know you don’t have a partner. If you know them well they might know that you’re not interested in having a partner. Whether or not you are asexual doesn’t really make a difference to them does it?[/quote]
It's not about knowing the sexuality of an adult in a child's life. It's about educating children as to asexuality being an orientation, just like homosexuality, heterosexuality, bisexuality, etc. All it is, is education.

And if girl guides are so interested in sexual orientations, like asexuality, how come they ignored lesbian visibility week?

Why don't they have 'boundaries week'? Or 'how to say no' week?

Problem is, that girl guides doesn't believe in sexual orientation. They don't believe sex exists. Hence their policy on allowing boys into an all girls organisation.

So when they call it a sexual orientation, I'd really like to know how they define sexual orientations?

@MrsOvertonsWindow I'm sorry to break it to you, but children do have sexual relationships. Children are increasingly being sexualised from a very young age. Children have 'boyfriends' and 'girlfriends' at primary school. It's an unfortunate truth that children are having sex or experimenting with sexual touching while still at primary school. You might not like it, but it is the reality and will continue to be so - the average age of puberty is getting younger and younger in Western society which means sexual feelings are kicking in younger and younger.

Pretending this isn't happening isn't going to help matters. It is what it is and we have to provide safe frameworks to educate and keep children safe as they learn to navigate their sexual feelings. As such, we have to prepare children and explain to them -in age appropriate terms - what sex is, who has sex and with whom, and what it's ok for them to do and what it's not ok to do, from a fairly young age. Introducing them to the idea that not everyone has sex with someone of the opposite sex is not harmful or damaging in any way. The pearl clutching on here is ridiculous. Girlguiding are not suggesting that they are going to be holding sessions where girls are going to be forced to declare themselves as any particular sexuality. They're simply raising awareness that asexuality exists. I don't see why that would be a problem. Why do you find asexuality as an orientation so threatening? I'm confused.

As for the asexual lingerie...ha,ha,ha!

How could a 6 year old ever identify as asexual without significant (and inappropriate) coaching from an adult?

I am not traumatised, I am not mentally ill, I don't have a hormone disorder and I am not repressing my homosexuality. @trancepants I am reporting your post because it's downright misinformation and wholly insensitive and offensive.

I am sorry that it upset you. It's really not my intention. But I am afraid that I genuinely believe that there are also people who's lives are being diminished when they are lead to believe that their mental or physical issues are a sexuality. I am not saying that you are one of them. But there absolutely are people who absolutely are being hurt and missing out on an essential part of life. Because, while i don't know if asexuality is genuinely an orientation or not, it is an absolute fact that there are very real negative health consequences to life without sexual activity. As I stated earlier, this doesn't have to be partnered, it can be with yourself.

So think through why you want to report my post. I understand that it hurt your feelings. And I am sorry for that. But because your feelings are hurt you want to suppress information that could help others because you don't like it. I get the impulse. I don't like the fact that babies born by c-section can be more prone to illness and have less developed immune systems. Reading that hurts me and worries me. But hiding facts and suppressing discussion because they hurt us only causes other people to be less aware and creates more hurt.

It's completely normal for children to be asexual. Anything else would be a red flag. And girl guides is not the place to discuss it.

The issue, for me, is that I'm not in the slightest bit surprised that young teenagers are calling themselves asexual. This is a pornified world where if you're not up for it, 24/7 with all the kink, then there's something wrong with you. Calling yourself asexual is a barrier to being targeted.

(I'm not talking about you vinsurvin, you're an adult).

Instead of celebrating asexuality, yay, rainbows, girl guides should be tackling the pressure on young women to have sex.

@vinsurvin I’m happy for you if you’re happy. But what difference does it make for the children in your life? They just know you don’t have a partner. If you know them well they might know that you’re not interested in having a partner. Whether or not you are asexual doesn’t really make a difference to them does it?

vinsurvin
This is about children, not adults.
Children are not meant to have sexual relationships. Until recently society acknowledged this and worked hard to stop over invested adults having age inappropriate discussions with children about sex.
Adults should be free to adopt whatever orientations they want (within the law). But involving children in these discussions is unacceptable.
That's the issue being discussed here.

Maybe 🚩 🚩🚩 🚩🚩 🚩 behaviour?

Asexuality is an orientation.

Asexuality means - in its purest sense - that you feel no sexual attraction to anyone. This doesn't mean you don't have sex, it just means you don't feel sexually attracted, 'turned on', if you like, by anyone else.

It's an orientation just as much as heterosexuality, homosexuality, and bisexuality.

Children should learn about all types of sexual orientation. Not because it's an attempt to 'indoctrinate' them or make them think about their own sexuality, but because it's a way of helping them to understand that not everybody in the world is like them and/or their parents and they need to be understanding and open minded of different ways of living life. As they get older, understanding from a young age that it's normal and acceptable and totally fine to feel sexually attracted to the same sex, to feel attracted to both the opposite and same sex, and not to feel sexually attracted to anyone at all, is also vital to ensuring they feel safe, secure and comfortable in their own identities, whatever they might turn out to be.

The trauma caused to people by having to suppress their sexuality in a society that is heteronormative is well known. Asexual people are no different in this.

I am asexual - in that I feel no sexual attraction to anyone, and feel repulsed at the thought of sex - and have always been this way. It's just part of who I am. I have not experienced any trauma - never been sexually assaulted, grew up in a perfectly happy household. Both my siblings are happily married and had sexual partners from teenage years - I never did. Never got it, never understood it, never wanted it. It is so upsetting and offensive to constantly have people peddle this myth that there is no such thing as asexuality - just traumatised people. We would NEVER say that to homosexual people in this day and age - so why to asexual people?

I have spent my adult life forcing myself to have relationships with people because I thought that was what people did. I had no idea asexuality was an orientation. I had never been taught in any part of my own sexual health lessons at school that it was possible and indeed absolutely fine not to feel any sexual attraction at all. In a world where everyone talks about sex all the time, it's actually really hard and confusing to be someone who doesn't ever think about it, and doesn't know why they don't think about it. Discovering asexuality a couple of years ago has given me so much freedom. I could have been spared so much pain and confusion if someone at some point in my childhood or teenage years had told me that asexuality existed as an orientation. As such, I wholeheartedly agree with the girlguides raising awareness of this. If that could help one girl in the future avoid the pain I've experienced as an adult trying to force myself to fit into a heteronormative world, then it will be doing a great service.

It is very saddening to read such ignorance and bigotry on this thread. I don't support the current trends in gender ideology at all, but asexuality as a sexual orientation is real, it is involuntary and it is disgusting to read the kinds of dismissive, cruel and actually quite nasty comments on here about asexuality. I am not traumatised, I am not mentally ill, I don't have a hormone disorder and I am not repressing my homosexuality. @trancepants I am reporting your post because it's downright misinformation and wholly insensitive and offensive.

I hope this doesn't reach scouts. As a leader I wouldn't know what to do or say.

I really hope the papers picked this up.

And as Katie has pointed out on that Facebook link, where is their training? If a child says they are asexual, it could be due to trauma, not a happy clappy celebration of identity whilst singing Kumbaya.

Honestly. This relentless push to sexualise children from every angle is overwhelming. From bloody John Lewis to girl guiding

I’m horrified that anybody’s sexuality or lack thereof is discussed at or remotely relevant to GG meetings. It’s seriously disturbing. Where are the boundaries? Where’s the safeguarding?