Asexuality: An Education
If you have never had a celebrity crush in your entire life (fictional characters count as well) raise your hand.
For real, let me see those hands.
Wait, what do you mean I’m the only one?
While everyone’s journey is different, especially when it comes to sexuality, it is often hard to pinpoint an exact “eureka” moment. Especially when it comes to asexuality. The moment I realised I was attracted to men was when I started picturing myself dating men. But it’s harder to figure out a “lack of” something.
Asexual is an umbrella term commonly defined as “A person of any gender or sexual orientation who does not experience sexual attraction”. My identity in the asexual spectrum is demisexual, which means I only experience sexual attraction after developing a strong emotional bond with someone. Whenever I mention it, everyone immediately gets curious about my sex life: does it mean I’m a virgin? Am I single? Am I just a prude? Is it because I’m catholic? It gets real uncomfortable real quick. But when I am allowed space to explain, I gladly do so.
One of the reasons these questions are off-putting is that I have been hearing them for years… because I was wondering those things myself. Growing up, whenever someone brought up the idea I could have a boyfriend or a girlfriend, my reaction was “Ugh, gross”. And of course, that reaction was quite common for a four-year-old boy. Or a five-year-old. Or a six-year-old. But where do you draw the line? When was I expected to grow out of it? When my classmates and friends were fantasizing about their incredibly handsome future husbands, I would blame my age (I was the youngest one) for my lack of attraction. At some point, I even looked up the names of random actors in order to pretend I had a celebrity crush as well. In my mind, it wasn’t necessarily a lie, I was just waiting for an actual crush.
Time-skip to teen years and everyone else’s crushes were starting to get a bit more practical. I had had a very generic sex-ed class at school, and I had an idea of how “all of that worked”, and while I still felt entitled to say “ugh gross” when my friends mentioned porn, I started realising not experiencing sexual attraction, especially during a literal storm of hormones, wasn’t that common. I already believed there was something wrong with me because I liked men, but this only seemed to make things more complicated.
I did have crushes on people at that stage. There were a couple of friends I really liked, they made me laugh, liked my same video games and books, but the idea of even kissing them was incredibly off-putting. It wasn’t “gross” anymore, but the idea made me uncomfortable and I just didn’t want to do that. In addition to that, the only gay person I knew in my hometown was a sex worker, and while I enjoyed his company as friends and had the utmost respect for him, I couldn’t see myself dating him and didn’t feel comfortable opening up about my lack of desire for intimacy.
I had a few relationships, mostly long-distance, and I forced myself to try and come out of my shell, but things really changed after I met my fiancé, when I was 16 years old. We talked extensively about my sexuality, and he helped me look for resources that soon enough led to the discovery I wasn’t “broken”, I was asexual. That gave me the confidence to start telling other people about it, but everyone just accused me of not being compatible with my partner or implied he was cheating on me, or that he was going to get tired of me after a while. At the time I had already been out of the closet for years, but I still felt a deep sense of shame around being asexual. I knew I had trauma from grooming and sitting in the back of my head there was a lingering fear the two things could be related. For a long time, I felt I wasn’t entitled to use the asexual label. Then around one year into the relationship, it was like someone hit an on/off switch. As I became closer to my partner, I started experiencing a strong sex drive for the first time, and this has been the case ever since. No, that doesn’t mean I’m “cured”. I still don’t experience sexual attraction to other people, and that doesn’t have anything to do with being monogamous and faithful. I started looking into identities again, and that’s when I found out about what “demisexual” meant, and I am now more comfortable using that label.
Unfortunately, the stigma around asexual identities hasn’t disappeared since then. And while there are a lot of resources to research these identities, it’s probably not best to ask every question you can think of to someone who just came out (and this applies to all sexualities). But since my day job is answering those, I’m happy to bite the bullet, and hopefully cheer you up.
“Have you ever had sex?”
Some people have, some people don’t. That doesn’t make them more or less asexual. There are people who are in a sexual relationship, there are people who had sex before coming to terms with the fact they don’t experience sexual attractions, there are people who are not interested at all. It is not your place to convince them otherwise, and
“So… you never had sex, but have you ever tried to-”
I’ll stop you right there chief. Rule of thumb is if it’s not something you would feel comfortable asking your grandma, or in front of your boss, chances are you are pushing personal boundaries.
“Then how do you know you’re gay?”
Because I like men. Some asexual people still experience sexual attraction, and that’s how they find out. Some asexual people only have a romantic attraction. Some asexual people are aromantic as well. Some asexual people don’t have preferences. It’s an umbrella term, but chances are they found out who they’re attracted to the same way you did. Which hopefully wasn’t only when you ended up in bed with someone else.
“Have you been sexually assaulted?”
I hope I won’t have to explain why this question is problematic. Talking about traumatic experience is incredibly hard, and trying to use that trauma to discredit someone’s sexual orientation isn’t the best course of action. Even if you don’t think the person you are talking to experienced sexual abuse, please don’t assume, as it can be triggering.
“Don’t you want kids?”
“I do, I’ve always wanted kids, I can’t wait to have them! I have been volunteering in childcare and I’m now looking for a house with a few spare bedrooms. Can’t wait to go through the fostering assessment!”
And if that’s not what you meant and you believe there’s a difference… I’ll fight you.
Yes, it’s 2020 and there are tons of different options. There are also tons of people with tons of different sexual orientations and tons of different reasons for not wanting kids.
“It’s probably just a phase, you’ll grow out of it. You just need to find the right person”
Honestly, I don’t need a wingman. I’m fine. If I need help… I’ll let someone else know.
“Is it because you’re religious?”
No, religion doesn’t have anything to do with sexual orientation. The fact asexuality can be confused with celibacy probably helps closeted asexuals, but they really don’t have anything in common. Celibacy is a choice, asexuality isn’t.
“You’ll change your mind if you have sex”
Repeat after me. Conversion therapy kills people.
“You don’t know what you’re missing”
And I really don’t want you to tell me. I am a fully functioning adult and if I want to find out I know how to do that. Please don’t use this as an excuse to tell me the details of your sex life, no one asked.
“Do you masturbate at least?”
Thanks for the reminder! Off I go!
Written by Ramses Oliva
In addition to working 9-5, Ramses can't seem to stop writing, even if it means scribbling on a notebook overnight. He loves talking about queer identities, diversity and art and when he's not writing - or sleeping - he collects antique books and succulents.
You can find him posting overpriced selfies on Instagram at @queer.discart, venting on twitter at @goldendrella or crocheting on the sofa.