I think the reason so many ignorant people think heretoromantic aces and heterosexual aros are “straight” is because they see our asexuality, our aromanticism, as a weird “neutral” rather than an orientation, as a recessive gene that gets overwritten by the attraction we do feel. They are wrong. My asexuality colors so many of my thoughts, and in our romance saturated culture, I’m sure aromanticism does the same for aromantics. It is not an odd quirk for an otherwise straight person. It is a different facet of being queer, and anyone who wishes to identify with that word should not be pushed away.
IM LAUGHING SO HARD I DIDNT THINK SEXUAL DESIRE WAS A REAL THING LIKE I ALWAYS SAW PEOPLE TALKING ABOUT HOW THEY WANTED SEX BUT I THOUGHT THEY WERE JOKING OR EXAGGERATING OR SOMETHING THATS WHY IT WAS SO HARD FOR ME TO REALIZE I WAS ACE BECAUSE I THOUGHT IT WENT WITHOUT SAYING SEX ISNT THAT IMPORTANT IM 19 YEARS OLD I CANT STOP LAUGHING LITERALLY 99% OF THE POPULATION EXPERIENCES SEXUAL DESIRE AND I THOUGHT IT WAS A JOKE
This is pretty much the definition of being an ace person, tbh, and I’m so glad.
this is literally the #that sounds fake but okay meme im dying
#ME#I THOUGHT SEXUAL ATTRACTION WAS RARE#AKA#HOW TO FIND OUT YOU’RE DEMI (via @miseryauthoress)
Honestly, every single cheating plotline never made sense because “but why do you have to have sex with them? just don’t??”
^^^^ Every single cheating plot line ever I was like: What is so hard about keeping your pants on what is your problem??
…do you have any idea how hard it is to do literary criticism that will get published when your reaction to at least 75% of character motivations is this makes no sense whatsoever why do they even care?
When people ask you why you don’t date someone just to try, and when you answer that well you’re not interested in that person, they explain that usually you don’t like the person at first, but you might fall in love after having dated a little while
and you’re just?????? but what?????????? is the point of dating someone if you don’t like them??????????????
what do you mean the point is making out and sex????????? why would i want to do that with someone i don’t already like?????????
I have literally experienced all of these.
my realizations laid out before me. xD;;;
this is adjacent to the Bi Realization of like “oh my god… there are people who… only like… ONE gender??? like, at all? Ever?!?!!?”
Yeah like I know baby boomers who talk like this and you can kind of just tell they don’t have the words and the self acceptance to realize this sorta thing is what’s happening
The extra twist is growing up in evangelical purity culture, so everybody makes a big deal of abstinence and True Love Waits and everything, and you’re just kind of like “okay, sure, that’s easy, why is everyone acting like it’s hard? anyway abstinence, cool, I’m doing what I’m supposed to, no big.” (Kind of like how “just say NO to drugs” campaigns feel baffling when you’ve never been offered drugs and you’re not interested anyway.) And then you get to college and away from the purity culture echo chamber finally and you’re like “wait. wait. are you telling me sex IS a big deal for people?? it’s not just like…exaggeration in the media and kids rebelling for the sake of rebelling??? wtf???”
and that’s how purity culture can both prevent you from realizing asexuality is a thing AND insulate you from feeling broken about it for a long time, which means you get a whole series of super weird revelations as an adult when you’re finally less sheltered
Oh, btw cus I haven’t seen any posts about it yet, the 2018 asexual census survey is up, and people should defiantly go take it so that we can continue to have up to date information on community demographics.
Demographic information, and other information gathered by this survey can help us recognize and address community needs, gain funding for ace community issues, and help us improve research on asexuality.
If I’m trying to fund a group for ace sexual assault survivors, then I want hard numbers to show potential donors that will make them say “yes, this is a problem that I should put money twords”
If I’m doing research on the intersection between trans-antagonism and ace-antagonism then it helps to be able to access data on how many ace people identify as trans/GNC befor I start my research, so I can understand the scale of what I’m looking at.
Demographic information is important for a lot of things and the people who run the ace census very graciously synthesize and provide that information for us for free, so while no one is under any obligation to take the survey, I do highly suggest that you do whether you’re ace or not (they need comparative data as well). They do important work and if you have the time it’s good to participate.
It’s the tail end of Asexual Awareness Week and I sort of forgot this year, so the universe decided to remind me: a couple days ago I found this scarf (which I bought) and these shoes (which I didn’t) at Plato’s Closet, and then I saw a girl wearing a black hoodie and gray yoga pants with purple and white stripes.
Here’s a comic I made about identifying as asexual and aromantic! I made it for an anthology which ended up falling through, so I thought it would be a good idea to post it on Valentine’s Day.
asexuality, like any other sexuality, is not a definite sexuality set in stone. We are human, we each live differently, view the world differently, and interact with the world, ourselves, and others differently.
If the label doesn’t exactly fit you word for word, but you feel comfortable identifying as ace, then identify as ace.
labels do not exist to confine us, they exist to put a word to an experience.
Last saturday there was a whole radio program on one of Italy’s main radio stations about asexuality that ended up just being two women giggling about how “those weirdos are sick, and they want to be proud of it! lol! but at least they don’t reproduce so the disease won’t spread”.
They said asexuals people are gross and need to be kept at distance. That we should become extinct as soon as possible. “keep the children far from this”.
Asexual people got mocked and insulted Nation-wide, and now there will be people that, not previously knowing what asexuality is, will think that we’re just dumb sick weirdos.
So yes, obviously there’s absolutely no stigma at all, no social backlash at all with being asexual, or god forbid aromantic. Yup.
I’m tired.
The good news is, people are reacting to this. I’ve seen this reported and criticised in several quite well-known newspapers, and the Italian lgbtq+ community is taking action against this kind of representation. A lot of people have attacked and/or questioned the two women, the author of the program and the program’s pages, and while I don’t think there’s going to be any kind of official apology (nor do I care: these people are horrible and an apology wouldn’t be sincere), it’s good to know that people are fighting with us and that we’re part of a bigger community, despite what some gatekeepers on here like to claim.
I was bored, so here’s a rough translation of the article.
“Asexuals are weird, they’re sick”, debate on the Radio2 broadcast hosted by Paola Perego
On Radio2, during the radio broadcast “Al posto del cuore”, asexuals have been heavily mocked.
Just few days ago we told you about “asexuals”, trying to explain what asexuality is, and today we have to talk about it again, because of what happened on August 4th on Radio2, during the radio broadcast “Al posto del cuore”.
The hosts Paola Perego and Laura Campiglio have indeed confronted the theme of asexuality, mocking it far and wide (HERE’s the recording of the episode, from minute 10). The two hosts have introduced the topic as “something we have to firmly say no to: asexuals”, then went on with an embarrassing, to say the least, verbal crossfire.
“Are they the ones who don’t get laid?”. “No, worse, they reclaim this thing as a life choice. What’s next?”. “But do they exist? Are there men as well? Men who have no interest in sex?” “Crazy but true”. “According to recent studies, they’re 1% of the population: it’s a very widespread disease”. “They’re sick, this is crazy”. “These weirdos, because they are weird…”. “They reclaim their life choice just like that, with no shame, I can’t fathom”. “Aren’t they living a better life? They have no distractions and women can not shave…”. “Paola, please, stop, you’re talking like an asexual”. “This condition of theirs, this illness of theirs, let’s admit it…” “There’s good news: asexuals for sure don’t reproduce, so they’re an endangered category”.
These words have of course made the asexual associations of Italy flare up, who have been doing informative work, local and national activism for years, with their little means and with the effort and passion of many volunteers, to reduce the many commonplaces about them. Asexual people (for whom the data of 1% is to be considered outdated, there are numbers about 5% when it comes to the asexual “spectrum”) are victims of prejudices.
“A radio broadcast like this one, deeply offensive and disinformative, on air at 11 am of what is practically a holiday”, Gruppo Asessualità –
ArcigayMilano, NovarArcobaleno, Arcigay Rainbow Vercelli Valsesia, Collettivo Asessuale Carro di Buoi and AVEN Italia stress through a public statement, “definitely didn’t bring anything good, especially toward those younger people who, as soon as they have “come out” to their families, will feel mocked like this, and thus invalidated and put to shame in front of their loved ones, and to those who are not “out” yet, but felt offended and treated as circus freaks on a national scale”.
Asexuality, we have to stress, is defined as a sexual orientation characterized by the lack of sexual attraction toward all genders. They started talking about asexuality during the studies of Alfred Kinsey, at the end of the 40s, who noticed a percentage of people (evaluated between 1% and 10%) who didn’t have sexual attraction toward any gender. The first asexual association, only virtual at the time (AVEN – Asexual Visibility and Education Network), was founded almost 20 years ago (in 2001). Asexual groups participate in the Pride on global scale since 2008. In Italy, the first asexual groups have participated to a Pride for the first time in 2014, at the Milano Pride. In 2018, the asexual groups have participated, in an organized way, in five Pride of the Onda Pride, and in at least three of these some activists of the asexual community were present as organizers.
“Visibility is one of the reasons of the existence of asexual associations and groups itself”, they go on. “We can, gladly, do without the visibility given by Radio2 in this way. We won’t ask for an apology from the hosts. We only ask, if media don’t have interest in talking about asexuality with awareness of the facts, to please not talk about it. They are free to talk about the summer adventures of some guy from a reality show. After all, it’s better to be useless than harmful”.
There is another article, actually! It was written yesterday, and it includes the answer from Marco Salvati, who is the author of the radio program. You can read it (in Italian) here.
I’m a little tired now and I don’t have the energy to translate the second article right now, but the summary is this: the two female hosts didn’t say anything about the matter anymore, and Salvati pretty much dismissed the whole thing and all the people who were hurt by this, saying something like “it was a joke, it’s crazy, now you can’t even tell a joke about supplì [supplì is an Italian food, T/N] because there’ll be an association for the defense of supplì that will sue you”, and… he’s probably an exclusionist as well, because he said that “trans and homosexual people are mocked and deprived of fundamental rights, but asexuals are not mocked because they have the same rights as single people, you can’t recognize them on the street so it’s impossible to make fun of them”.
I’m not even surprised. I’m just disheartened.
i hope all of those “we don’t hate ace people” exclusionists can find time between their acey incel jokes to remember how to pretend to look outraged.
me: not all my characters have to be aro/ace just because I am, that’s silly
also me: I thought about this OC for longer than 5 minutes and now she’s a-spec because my brain tried to imagine what sexual/romantic attraction feels like and shorted out
You never have to have sex with anyone. You never have to kiss anyone. You never have to date anyone. Of course you can if you want to, but remember that it’s your choice, and perfectly OK to choose not to.
I'm a defeatist but I don't have to be 