"Ace week" in girl guiding.

I haven't rtft but I'm increasingly concerned about the promotion of asexuality, because I think it potentially allows for damaged sexual function to be reframed as an identity choice, which is perhaps convenient when lots of young people are consenting to life changing medical treatments with very little knowledge available about their consequences for sexual function and enjoyment.

Most of us in our teens and 20s had little idea of what part sex would play over the course of our lifespans, even that we might still be enjoying sex in middle and older age. So it's hard to see what informed consent means when a procedure might have a long term impact on that, or what kind of support and counselling young people need in making those decisions.

I am not suggesting that asexuality shouldn't be accepted as perfectly valid if that's the way someone feels or chooses to be, and it's certainly good if we can get rid of all the slurs associated with not wanting sex ('frigid' was a popular one in my younger days). But I think we should also be asking what other reasons there might be for giving it a special week and targeting this at pubescent girls.

They find their personal validation so important that they cannot see how inappropriate it is for random adults to talk to children about sex.

This.

There is nothing in my posts where I have said I think it is appropriate to ‘promote asexuality through a service aimed at children’. Apart from anything else, it is not something you can catch, is it? Or change to, if it is not how you are. It’s like clause 28 isn’t it? People were concerned children would catch being gay and discussion of homosexuality in sex education was seen as promoting it.

My posts are about acknowledging the existence of asexuality without being offensive to asexual people, which seems to be quite difficult for many people, going by this thread and the Times one. What if the civil service, say, had highlighted asexuality week? Is it the asexuality or the fact it was GG (in a tweet aimed at adults)?

It’s like I just wrote a post highlighting the language being used to describe zebras in a thread and you reply, well, are you aware it is because giraffes were not mentioned? Okay, not a perfect analogy, but my posts have been about the language and attitudes towards asexual people in these threads.

It makes me furious

I mean, I thought I was a boring old hetero middle aged woman. Nope, turns out identity politics would label me as a nonbinary genderfree demisexual.

Come now third fiddle, you know those identities are not for the likes of you and me they are only for those who are woke and whose special identities must be centred at all times by everyone else who must educate themselves on the correct way of viewing the world and bend the knee accordingly.

[quote TedImgoingmad]@Datun, as you well know, lesbians aren't cool, and talking about them might result in a conversation about why they are actually increasingly invisible, having been ousted from Pride, their own spaces, and their own sex class. ACE is well cool, and who knows, might come with cool wonga from one of the funders GGUK is chasing.[/quote]
It's so glaringly obvious, I don't understand why they aren't better prepared to cover themselves.

Seeing the ideological capture in action is really quite gutting.

All those young girls who may have a lesbian orientation being specifically excluded from an allegedly girls only group, during an explicit inclusion campaign.

It's a total joke. I felt like I was being trolled trying to understand it. Incoherent tosh at best. At worst worst deliberate piss take. Why do we have to 'educate ourselves' about this bollocks.

I have absolutely no idea anymore.

I thought it was a label or people who didn’t want to have sex. Apparently it could be a label for people who fall in love, who want to have lots of sex but just aren’t attracted to whomever they chose to sleep with.

I was trying really hard to actually understand it. I have given up. One ACE person says that they felt so alone because they weren’t in a relationship and never would be. Another is in relationships and are “horny”, another can fall in love and have sex, just…not attracted.

But at the end of the day, the people on the threads here seem to be most concerned about validation. They want everyone to know about this label which nobody seems to agree on. They find their personal validation so important that they cannot see how inappropriate it is for random adults to talk to children about sex. And they shout about heteronormative society blah, blah, blah.

If I had children over at a play date (8 years old or 10 years old) and I started to tell them that I had regular sex with my husband and that we enjoyed it, I hope the parents would call the police. It is the discussion itself that is inappropriate, not the intricacies of some label nobody can agree on.

I've known people who seem happy to live alone and I've never felt the need to question whether they had or wanted sex. Do they feel that they are being discriminated against?

And it's not just people who live alone. Apparently asexual people may be in romantic relationships, may have sex, may enjoy sex even. Which does really leave me wondering what information being asexual adds that anyone other than a potential partner needs to know. Certainly how on earth you'd explain it to a 10 yr old.

People who only feel sexual attraction once they have an established romantic relationship are apparently on the ace spectrum now.

I mean, I thought I was a boring old hetero middle aged woman. Nope, turns out identity politics would label me as a nonbinary genderfree demisexual.

@Datun, as you well know, lesbians aren't cool, and talking about them might result in a conversation about why they are actually increasingly invisible, having been ousted from Pride, their own spaces, and their own sex class. ACE is well cool, and who knows, might come with cool wonga from one of the funders GGUK is chasing.

I have also learned that you can be asexual and still “be horny” and agree to have lots of sex with people.

Fine. What about the people the asexuals want to have sex with? Do they get a choice to say no? That they want a sexual partner where mutual attraction, love, the chance of a relationship developing is their boundary? Or, like lesbians being told that rejecting penis is transphobia and hate, or like anyone not attracted to a person of colour being told to consider their deep seated racism (by the likes of Ash Sarkar), will having to accept an ACE person because they choose you be next in the line of coercive relationships under the banner of "inclusivity"?

Interesting TedImgoingmad

They talk about all sorts of discrimination, but I couldn't see any mention of asexuality.

We heard from girls, volunteers and staff who've experienced exclusion and discrimination. There are instances of racism, Islamophobia, homophobia, biphobia, transphobia, discrimination because of class (classism) and discrimination because of disability (ableism) happening in Girlguiding.

So how come they didn't recognise the lesbian visibility week? Is that because they don't know what a lesbian is? Or because they don't think their members are ready to hear what they think one is.

If they're going to tell everybody that they've been working on inclusion, they're going to have to be held accountable about what that means.

Do they not realise that people are scrutinising them now?

Thanks for the link. Revealing as ever.

Is there nowhere now, where girls can go, and not have to think about who they are or not attracted to, who other people are or not attracted to, the vast spectrums of genders, orientations, being validated or validating others? A safe space, single sex, away from the male gaze where they can not have to think about their position in the world in terms of attraction or sex, but just be girls and have fun??

Seems not

I'm obviously very sheltered because, before I read this thread, I had never heard of "ACE" and I'm old! I've known people who seem happy to live alone and I've never felt the need to question whether they had or wanted sex. Do they feel that they are being discriminated against?
What business is this of anyone but themselves, and why do they have to declare it, especially to children?!
Sick to the back teeth of seeing the Rainbow in all it's variations shoved down everyone's throats, especially kids'.......

I have been reading the thread about ACE and girl guiding on AIBU.

It appears that some mums are really happy because GG discussed asexuality, lack of sexual feelings and also teaches the girls how to use tampax. The girl in question was 10.

I have also learned that you can be asexual and still “be horny” and agree to have lots of sex with people.

And finally I have learned that the identity of being asexual (and maybe others) is so important to some people that it is essential that society is saturated with it. They need to feel seen and validated. This includes children.

I also understand that many people don’t have a problem with adults talking about sexual identity and implications with children.

I cannot express how horrified I am.

Angela’s background doesn’t scream lots of expertise on safeguarding…

www.girlguiding.org.uk/what-we-do/our-stories-and-news/news/welcome-our-new-ceo-angela-salt-obe/

www.girlguiding.org.uk/about-us/diversity-and-inclusion/our-diversity-and-inclusion-journey/

And an extract:

In 2020 we did a lot of research into your experiences in guiding through our diversity and inclusion audit. We worked with experts to make sure we followed best practice. And we talked to people from all areas of guiding, across the UK, to hear their experiences of feeling included and excluded or discriminated against in guiding. This included girls, volunteers, parents and carers, staff and trustees.

Between June and September, we heard from over 200 people through 46 interviews, 17 focus groups and a survey. And we looked at all the research, data and processes we already had. It was a priority for us to hear from those who have been underrepresented in our work. That means we really wanted to hear the experiences of LGBT+ people, people of colour, people at economic disadvantage, disabled people and people with a faith that isn’t well represented in the guiding community, such as Islam, Judaism, Hinduism and Sikhism.

A year ago, they were making redundancies, in a £4m deficit and looking to secure more funding. I've no doubt their current "inclusivity" drive is financially as well as ideologically motivated.

www.thirdsector.co.uk/girlguiding-opens-redundancy-consultations-charity-faces-4m-deficit/management/article/1690898

Aromantic, not aromatic, LOL...

MumofaceDD, I'm sure you're right that there's a lot of cultural baggage around asexuality and whether people find it "acceptable" (as if it should be anyone's business!).

I disagree that's it's appropriate or even useful to promote it in this way through a service aimed at children. As others have pointed out, homosexuality/bisexuality can be discussed in terms of relatiinships--"some women fall in love with/get married to women" etc.

But being asexual doesn't necessarily mean aromatic, so it's inaccurate and confusing to tell children "asexual people won't fall in love with or marry anyone".....if you want to define asexuality accurately, it still requires a lot more reference to sexual feelings and/or activities than explaining the diff between hetero and homosexuality.

I'm definitely down with telling kids that not everyone has to get in a relationship, fall in love, get married, have kids, etc in order to have a fulfilling life. And when it's both age-appropriate and is carried out by people with appropriate training, then by all means include asexuality as part of sex education so young people are aware it exists and is perfectly ok