Young adults who identify as asexual feel excluded from the wider LGBTQ community

[IwantToRetire]

From a survey of 3,695 young adults aged 18-25 27% said they “rarely or never” feel a part of the LGBTQ community. Aside from those who said they were questioning their sexual or gender identity, asexual people were most likely to say this.

18% said they “rarely” felt included and 9% said they “never” felt included.

30% of asexual young adults said they “always” feel included and 30% said they “sometimes” feel included.

39% of asexual people of colour said they rarely or never felt part of the LGBT+ community, compared to 24% of white asexual young people.

It’s also estimated that between 0.44-1 percent (295,768 to 672,200) of the UK population identifies as asexual.

The data paints a disappointing picture that suggests a significant portion of young adults identifying as asexual don’t always feel like they’re a part of the LGBTQ community.

“I hope that this research makes clear the need for greater awareness of the lived experiences and realities of asexual people, especially as we can see a wider pattern here of LGBT+ people of colour feeling excluded from our community.”

https://www.attitude.co.uk/news/a-quarter-of-asexual-young-adults-feel-excluded-from-lgbtq-community-430087/

It's a huge thing to completely lack an urge/feeling that the vast majority experience. It is isolating. It's upsetting. It's often something that people desperately try to fix about themselves. People feeling that deserve a community and support just like gay/bi people do. It's a shame that there can't be more support. It's a shame that we need to describe something fundamental to someone's identity as nonsensical.

Seems to me that there is a whole load of projected, imagined, immature assertions in this statement, similar to how some people manage to convince themselves that they feel like the opposite sex, despite having absolutely no understanding of how the opposite sex feels.

Great swathes of people of all sexual orientations are not partIcularly interested in sexual activity, the non-asexual-identifying masses aren’t all experiencing ‘urges’ and any ‘feelings’ we do or do not experience are not something we consider a fundamental part of the human existence.

The reason there isn’t ‘more support’ is because we simply do not recognise your self description as outside of the standard range.
Lots of people don’t fancy anyone and avoid sexual activity without it ever being part of their ‘identity’.

The shite that we are all continuously fed about sex and love in films, music and TV is no more relevant to most people’s real lives than a film about bald muscled man blowing up cars is.

Most couple’s Saturday nights are spent sitting on the sofa trying to decide what take away to order, not sitting on the sofa experiencing sexual urges.

Single people are often adversely affected by finances (it’s near impossible to buy a house in the South if you don’t have two incomes for a mortgage and a lone holiday will cost more than two sharers) but whether you feel sexual urges constantly, often, occasionally or never in your life doesn’t actually make much difference to anything except finding a compatible mate.

Besides, asexual people aren’t all single and single-by-choice people aren’t all asexual.

I can see that tick box on a dating app for asexual people would be a useful tool in finding a compatible partner, but beyond that what material difference exists between someone who identifies as asexual and someone who just isn’t into sex and doesn’t want to participate in sexual activity?

Because those people are far more common than anyone with a special identity is likely to imagine.

And why have you seen hundreds of people’s passports if you are a geneticist who teaches maths to children?

Groups like Stonewall & Mermaids are now pushing asexuality because they’ve realised that children who went from puberty blockers onto cross-sex hormones are never going to be able to feel sexual attraction.

This has no bearing on whether asexuality is a thing or not, but it has a hell of a lot to do with why this lot are now talking about it.

this is the issue, really, people who "refuse to recognise|" asexuality

and you are referring to yourself as "we" - but an increasing number of people do, recognise it, but not enough - as your post demonstrates

No I'm wondering why you "lol'd" at the idea these young people were very unhappy?

why are you so interested in me! Because I specialise in supporting refugee and immigrant children, both inside education, and as a volunteer outside of it.

I am also a foster carer and take in lone children, and homeless refugees

would you like to see my CV! 😂😂

I suspect the Queer Theory sex ed orgs also use it to justify sexualising prepubertal children (by inviting them to pick out a sexual identity from a range of rainbow-hued options on a powerpoint), rather than teaching about sexual orientation as something that is relevant to adults (‘some families have two mummies’) and that sexual orientation will only become relevant to their lives when they are older.

'Hours a week' on break duty also sounds unlikely, tbh.

<teacher here, not a geneticist & quite possibly a microchimera (cheers ds!), not much bothered about bonking atm> 😁

depends on your school, doesn't it.

Before school duty, break duty, lunch duty, after school duty, all 20-30 mins, some paid, some unpaid, I do at least one a day, when I am at work

why would you say it is unlikely? How many staff are on duty at any one time in a school? How many duties do staff do in a week? In my last school it was only one break time and one lunch time a week. In this school it is more

what is the issue with this exactly? If you are a teacher, you know there are a lot of duties to cover

Your insistence that a lack of sexual urge is an identity is totally your own business, call yourself whatever you like.

But unless you can explain how it’s materially different to someone who just isn’t interested in sex, or someone that just doesn’t participate in sexual activity you can’t expect societal ‘support’ in the way that LGB people are supported (eg legal protections).

who is talking about legal protection? I am talking about education, and awarness, as this thread demonstrates is badly needed

Perhaps you should start an AMA thread so you can keep your impressive CV to one single thread rather than posting it over several topics?

this is the issue, really, people who "refuse to recognise|" asexuality

and you are referring to yourself as "we" - but an increasing number of people do, recognise it, but not enough - as your post demonstrates

People do recognise that there are asexual people, but what seems to be concerning you is that many don't view it through the genderist/identitarian lense that invariably makes demands of others - with calls to "celebrate" it for example - and berates at the same time those who don't view the world in that way.

Yet you are seemingly unable to educate as to the material differences between someone who doesn’t want sex and someone who identifies as asexual!

You are projecting made up things onto other people (that everyone has sexual urges and these are fundamental to their human existence) in order to define yourself as ‘not that’.

It’s awfully reminiscent of Not Like Other Girls syndrome.

Plus the whole point of the LGB orgs is protection from discrimination in life and law (and representation was part of the process of achieving legal protections) so if you just want more characters on telly that don’t have sex, and more people to understand that not everyone wants sex (which anyone over the age of about 25 already knows) why do you need to be part of the LGB?

The issue is not whether they're unhappy etc, it's why they are allocated a gender.

And that’s part of the problem with the alphabet soup - it mixes up sexual orientations (or lack of such) and ‘genders’.

If the lol was inappropriate, apologies. Tbh, I'm unsure where I used it.

I have zero issue with people being unhappy. My natural empathy goes out to anyone sad with their lot.

I have zero time for this being a gender. Imho, gender has become one of the most destructive concepts ever to take hold in society, and even by its broadest definition, not fancying people and not fancying getting on with it, is not even close to being a gender.

Nymphomania, sex addiction, not a gender either.

Why does there need to be awareness though?
I don’t understand.
Surely there’s only a necessity of awareness if you then need to take into account those along other points along the “how much does this person want sex” spectrum?

It sounds like making up a label and making sure everyone knows about it when, simply, there’s no need.

If we need to make sure everyone feels represented in every facet of their lives will there be time for actual education to take place? (Wonders if this is part of the problem)

Lots of good points on the thread. I'm another who just doesn't get why not wanting sex is a big deal or should afford you a special identity. It comes across as people just desperately shoehorning anything they can into the LGBTQ+++ so they can claim special status - especially as I've seen various people claiming to be "ace" on Twitter, also patronisingly explaining that being asexual doesn't actually mean not ever having sex! (That Kat Bristow person was one IIRC) So how are they different from anyone else and even if they are, how does it cause them any problems?

Not wanting sex is like not wanting to eat olives or play rugby or go on holiday - fine, don't then. It's illegal to make someone have sex, so you're protected there. Loads of people are single and don't have any sex whether they want to or not, so you're not going to stand out a mile are you. There are few jobs where you're going to be discriminated against for it, surely. Maybe porn star but that's about it. And lots of us can't do specific jobs because of our likes and dislikes (eg fear of flying means you can't be a pilot) so that's not unique either.

As for awareness - so what? Does everyone have to be aware that some people don't want sex - why? I mean it's a) obvious and b) doesn't really affect anyone in any negative way does it?

Oh God, same. I'm often bewildered by what others think is mainstream. But no one cares about my problems. We dont all wear a weirdo lanyard for me to recognise other weirdos. We all need to learn to not give any shits what other people think (because, kindly, they are not thinking about you at all) . Whether about our sexual exploits or not, whether the clothes we wear are comfortable but ugly or power suits. It is no ones business and if people do comment, so what. If you are confident and comfortable in yourself, other peoples opinions do not matter to you.
If you are not yet confident and comfortable in yourself, try working on that.

Granted young people mostly dont have that attitude, but they too can work on that.

Generally in current year absolutely no one cares about your sexuality or lack of, and as it has been rammed down our throats for the last decade, most of us have lost patience with it.

It's not overly difficult to find like minded people if you have some other thing to talk about, some hobby maybe. Yes they may not be asexual too, but you always have the other thing to talk about. Possibly if you have more than one hobby, you'll get to meet lots more people and have two things to talk about. With confidence. Being asexual is not the only part of anyone's life. If it is they need a hobby. If it's the only thing you talk about, you will be boring. No one likes boring people.

Isn't there a prominent academic type who has publically revealed being Bi?

However no-one she meets asks her any follow up Qs, indeed she feels this makes people Bi-phobic.

Whereas in reality, people have just had enough, they don't give a flying fig she likes her own sex.

No, she's angry and we're all phobes.

Get...a...life! Or a room, lol.

a significant portion of young adults identifying as asexual don’t always feel like they’re a part of the LGBTQ community.

Because they're isn't any need for them to be, and maybe they get that?

I dont even know what a genderist/identitarian lense is, and am not making any demands from anyone else other than recognition and acceptance

it is not a made up label, it is a sexuality that is innate in 1-2% of the population. it exists, therefore it needs a name, like everything else that exists

I’m well up for fewer depictions of sex in TV shows & Films, but if the only way to achieve fewer sex scenes is to substitute them with dialogue about why a character isn’t having sex and how not wanting sex gives them a special identity label that means they are so very much Not Like The Other Characters?

No Thank You.

Exactly.

If everyone was meant to be included it would be all 26 letters.