Asexuality

[NettleTea]

So I know asexuality is a thing. Low sex drive diminishing to nowt. Or a low libido that often doesnt get airtime because the media would have it that its the normal state of affairs for everyone to be gagging for it 24/7

Or hand in hand with things like ASD

Or developes because you are in a sexually unfulfilling relationship and if you dont use it, etc.

It can come and go, or can be a constant

However Ive seen a fair bit of it being included now in teaching materials for schools, and I wondered if this was due to trying to normalise the absence of sexual feeling so that children who undergo hormone replacement and puberty blockers, and as a result have no developement of normal sexual feelings wont know that its not very unusual in teens/young 20s. Its only fairly recently that this loss/absence of sexual function/drive has been coming to light, and its only recently that teaching about asexuality has been included in the curriculum.

I do wish people wouldn't make comments questioning whether asexuality is a result of childhood trauma, sexual abuse etc... it feeds the narrative that sexual attraction is 'normal' and not experiencing it must make you broken. This is exactly what people said, and in some circles continue to say, about homosexuality and the justification used by many people for conversion therapy.

It's just a normally occurring difference, it's not super common, but it's not vanishingly rare either, it doesn't hurt anyone and is not a problem that needs to be solved.

Out of interest loopsdefruit in what situations do you need to deploy your asexual identity?

Apart from in intimate relationships I have never in my life felt the need to label my libido level in a way that it is publicly accessible.

Although perhaps that's an example of my "non-ace privilege".

The idea of sexuality as identity in general is something of a historical anomaly. Maybe it was always destined to end up describing a thousand discrete personal preferences.

But no, I don't think there is any utility in making not being very interested in sex, or romance, a identity. It's pretty much covered by saying Some people don't have much interest in that." Which is true of lots of people for periods of their lives.

nauticant once again, it isn't about libido...I personally don't have much of a sex-drive but I know plenty of ace people who do. However in answer to your question, it is mostly about 2 things:

• Being able to meet people who are like you, about accepting you are not broken and don't need to be 'fixed'. Much like other communities that have formed, it's not about identifying yourself to people outside the community but about identifying yourself to others in the community so that you can find community.

• Being able to explain your preferences to others who you may wish to date or have a relationship with. I could just say I'm a lesbian, but that may lead to some expectations on the part of a partner that I would want a sexual component to our relationship...or that I am sexually attracted to her.

Asexual people have often spent a large part of their lives confused, concerned, or upset that they have a problem and are not normal like everyone else. Even within the LGB community, asexuality is misunderstood and there's still an idea that people who are ace 'haven't met the right person yet' or can be 'fixed' by sex...which is deeply damaging.

The asexual community didn't come about to try and 'be special' but naturally happened when people started talking about their experiences and other people responded that they shared this experience. The asexual Pride flag happened again because it was helpful to be able to express this shared experience so that other people who also felt that way could find this group, and to raise awareness of this identity so that hopefully the views of it being a problem to be fixed would change.

Ideally I'd like to just have sexuality not matter at all, and for people to not make any assumptions about other people's relationships, and for all the variations of human sexuality (that aren't harmful) to just be accepted and nobody would need to come out...but we're not there yet.

Side note that I am a christian and have experienced a lot of discrimination because I am attracted to women, ironically for some christians I am the perfect gay christian as I don't actually have sex...but everyone just assumes everyone else has sex if they are in a relationship so that hasn't really been protective.

I only really say I'm asexual if someone asks about my identity...I don't just wear a t-shirt proclaiming I don't have sex.

@nauticant

Out of interest loopsdefruit in what situations do you need to deploy your asexual identity?

Apart from in intimate relationships I have never in my life felt the need to label my libido level in a way that it is publicly accessible.

I'm curious about this too.

This won't be taken well, but I can't see this drive to claim every facet of the human experience as a "marginalised identity" as anything other than a power play/ claim to some form of "oppression" by those who believe in genderism.

Back in the day, asexual was taken to mean having no sexual desire and not wanting or having sex . Now there are loads of students at my uni asexual society who are coupled up and have sexual relationships. I just fail to see how that is asexual in any real sense. I don’t see how you can separate “lack of sexual attraction” from “wanting to have sex and enjoying it.”having enjoyable wanted sex with someone surely means there is sexual desire right?

@youshouldleave is that really so scary for you?
Weird. I read the whole thread and no one is saying it is scary. People are saying it is used in ambiguous ways and so it is unclear what it is supposed to mean at the moment. Is talking about the definitions of words scary for you?

After the clarifications, and seeing that an asexual identity is about finding a tribe one can feel comfortable in, I'm even less convinced about this being a useful thing to teach to children.

The consent aspects, yes, they're essential, but better to teach young people how to address this head-on rather than needing an identity-based justification to say no.

I think far from promoting inclusion, labeling facets of personality as an identity is problematic as many people will experience periods in their lives when they are not interested in sex. Maybe that will change, maybe not but it is hard to go against what has been labelled as your "true self".

better to teach young people how to address this head-on rather than needing an identity-based justification to say no.
Agreed. At school I remember that girls who wouldn't have sex because of religious reasons were respected more than those who just didn't want to have sex. We should be teaching children that they don't need a label in order to set their own boundaries.

terry I think it's mostly about normalising it as a naturally occurring difference in sexuality. Although I can understand that many people wouldn't view a 'lack' of sexuality as a sexuality...but again it's mostly about it being understood as normal/natural the same way that homosexuality is now viewed as just a normal thing (or getting there for the most part in most places).

The hope being that if it becomes accepted to that extent then people will stop saying things about fixing asexual people or telling young ace people that they'll find the right person in the future, or that they're too young to know how they really feel.

I suppose there probably ARE ace people who are more rabid about claiming oppression, but they aren't really representative of most of the ace people I have met/come into contact with.

I assume the answer is that we're all ace-fluid in the same way we're all non-binary. Not sure whether these concepts are useful to be honest beyond in a self-regarding internal sense of self way.

Bisom I suppose the question is how do you know these people in relationships are having sex? Are they telling you, or is there an assumption that if you are in a couple you must be having sex.

Like I said, my girlfriend and I don't have sex, but we are intimate in other ways and our relationship is just like any other but without sex. I can guarantee that most people assume we are having sex, as for most people they can't imagine a romantic relationship without sex in it.

I've had people ask how you differentiate a relationship from a friendship if you don't have sex, which does make me wonder how deep of a connection people have with their romantic partners if they view it as the same as any other friendship just with sex...but that might not be universal to everyone.

nauticant perhaps you feel you are asexual, or that your sexuality is fluid (most sexuality is fairly fluid for most people) although I view that you can't be ace and not at the same time as one suggests no sexual attraction and the other some level of sexual attraction.

I personally have a gender identity of female, and have never experienced any sort of questioning of that, so I wouldn't view myself as non-binary.

As to whether you find it 'useful' it's probably about as useful as any sexuality label, it's mostly about understanding yourself and about finding a partner if you want one.

What has this got to do with feminism, whether someone's asexual or not, or who they are (or aren't in this case!) sexually attracted to?

Again loopsdefruit I'm getting the impression that you've got a conceptual framework about what asexuality can mean but it's something personal to you. Other people's frameworks will be different. Nothing wrong with that of course but once we understand that asexuality can mean whatever one wants it to mean, then it ceases to be a useful concept except for individuals to use to think about themselves.

nauticant That's fair I suppose, although the definition I am using is the one that in my experience is the one that is mostly agreed upon within the asexual community that I have been a part of.

Obviously I haven't been part of all groups of all aces everywhere, but in my experience it is the most widely accepted definition.

It's not about behaviour it's about your experience of attraction. Going back to my previous post about someone who is bisexual not ceasing to be bisexual if they are in a monogamous relationship.

Arguably that does raise the question about whether other people can define what your identity is. I don't really think you can say whether someone's declared identity is true or not, as you aren't living their life.
Obviously that is going to be different if it's someone claiming a gender identity and wanting access to sex-based rights or services, but someone claiming an asexual identity (or any other sexuality) doesn't really impact on anyone else at all.

After years of thinking about this I've come round to the view that one's identity is sovereign, no one should be able to tell someone what it ought to be, but that has to be completely separate from how someone can apply their identity in the real world and that's where the objective trumps the subjective. For example a self-declared 5 year old who is an adult is not permitted to start infant school.

Schools could just be teaching that we should respect individual differences but instead everything has to be given a label.

Exactly this. Everyone is on a spectrum in terms of the degree to which they experience sexual attraction, and everyone also hasa range of other dimensions to their sexuality, many of which are also on a spectrum.
In general we don't need a label for each of these; we don't need to reify them, or to essentialise people by defining them in terms of one precise aspect of their sexuality. We just need the simple, single message: respect one another, respect difference.
The promotion of these labels is a self-interested activity on the part of certain organisations. They are like retailers growing their product line to preserve demand.

nauticant I would absolutely agree with you there!

I'm glad to read that loopsdefruit, I didn't want to give the impression that I was having a go. This is a fascinating area and deserves careful consideration with a good amount of critical thinking.

While I appreciate you taking the trouble to explain the concepts loops, I don't look at the world through the lense of genderism so I'm afraid much of it still doesn't really make useful sense to me (I understand other opinions are available...)

The hope being that if it becomes accepted to that extent then people will stop saying things about fixing asexual people or telling young ace people that they'll find the right person in the future, or that they're too young to know how they really feel.

You could swap the words "asexual/ace" in that statement with the word "single" and it could apply to hundreds of thousands of people without them having to make an identity claim based on it, and I'd also agree with lonel when they said:

I think far from promoting inclusion, labeling facets of personality as an identity is problematic as many people will experience periods in their lives when they are not interested in sex. Maybe that will change, maybe not but it is hard to go against what has been labelled as your "true self".

I’m or going to make it worse, hopefully, by saying that for the longest time we have all made assumptions about sexuality (not having a go(!) but pp above saying gay men are unlikely to have sex with women from a desiring sexual position, is for instance, one of these assumptions- a quick google of George Michael’s own words would tell you how it goes).
I’m always interested in what people have to say about sexuality, to a degree, but it gets tedious if it’s just a lecture to tell us why we are wrong (because we probably all are, a lot of the time)