A popular technique for collecting the common criticisms of any movement, identity, or experience is the “bingo card.” Misunderstood groups use them to show how often they hear the same arguments, with every item on the card representing a misunderstanding or an inappropriate comment. Here’s one example of an Asexuality Bingo Card:
Aren’t They Using the Word Asexual Incorrectly?
“But that means you can reproduce by yourself!”
People who understand asexuality are often surprised to hear that asexual people actually get this comment. Yes, people make jokes about asexual people being “amoebas” or “plants” and turn it into an excuse to mock asexual people about how absurd asexuality is. What a silly group asexual people must be, using a term that means they can reproduce by budding!
Asexual people are not describing their reproduction with the term asexual. They’re describing their orientation. And yet, detractors frequently pipe up with “I’m sorry, but I can’t even consider your point of view because you’re ruining a word that already has a meaning in science. That word is reserved for asexual reproduction and you’re confusing people by expecting us to accept it!”
But language is always dependent on context. Scientific disciplines use context-dependent terms all the time. For instance, in a scientific context, theory has a totally different meaning from theory as used in a murder mystery or to describe a hunch. It would make no sense to say no one except scientists describing scientific theories can use the word theory. Similarly, asexuality can apply to someone’s orientation. This word is not likely to confuse anyone. People claiming to be asexual are not actually making anyone legitimately wonder whether they are going to spontaneously clone themselves.
“But why don’t they just say abstinent or celibate?” some people ask. It’s true that many asexual people do practice abstinence because many of them aren’t interested in having sex, but abstaining from sex is a practice, while asexuality is an orientation. Just like a gay man can have sex with a woman and still be gay, an asexual person can have sex and still not be sexually attracted to anyone, even the person with whom they share it. A percentage of asexual people are sexually active or have been in the past.
Anyone, regardless of sexual orientation, can choose to be abstinent. Nevertheless, despite the clear distinction between orientation and behavior, some people who don’t want to acknowledge asexuality will still invoke “you’re using the word wrong!” to avoid the issue. If people are confused by asexuality, it’s unlikely that it’s because of the word.
Survey of self-identified asexual-spectrum people collected on the Internet September–October 2011[1]
Note: Because the survey was conducted on the Internet, the participating population skewed young. Older asexual people typically have more sexual experience.
Context has always been essential for determining meaning. For instance, red can apply to a color, a type of meat, a type of wine, a color of hair that’s not actually the same as the crayon, an algal bloom causing discoloration in water, or the political alignment of a US state. But nobody tells redheads to stop calling themselves redheads because that word is reserved for conversations about alcoholic beverages, and no one tells the political commentators not to use red state because of possible confusion about red tides or steak. Nobody flails and protests these uses as “confusing,” because the context makes it 100 percent clear.
You don’t assume someone described as “hot” must need a cold drink. You don’t assume someone is sitting on punctuation if they say they’re on their period. You don’t actually think an asexual person is going to reproduce through asexual reproduction, so the argument that it is confusing is absolutely ridiculous.
Asexual is also sometimes accused of being a made-up sexuality, a “new” and therefore unofficial/inappropriate term, or a placeholder people use until they find their “real” sexuality. Invalidation takes many forms, but the shallowest of them all manifests in denying asexual people access to language that describes them. Mocking the word itself as a means of calling asexuality fake, pointless, or absurd is a fairly superficial method, but it does have the effect of silencing these conversations by making them seem ridiculous or petty. Asexual people should be the authorities on what terms they use to describe themselves, and allies of asexual people should learn their language instead of expecting to control it.
Is Asexuality Based on Fear of or Anger Toward Other Genders?
Sometimes asexual people are accused of avoiding sexual relationships because of negative feelings toward other genders. (LGBTQ people deal with this accusation too.) As they fail to understand that asexual people are describing their attraction experiences—not their feelings toward or opinions of any gender—these critics sometimes insist the cause of a person’s asexuality is a gender-based hatred or a previous bad experience that causes anxiety based on gender.
Just like a lesbian’s attraction to women is not by definition a statement against men, asexual people are not expressing hatred toward any gender through their lack of sexual attraction. And just like gay men are not attracted to men as a fear reaction toward women, asexual people aren’t defined by fear and avoidance of intimacy to the point that attraction can’t develop. If a person who is asexual does happen to express negative feelings toward any gender and has a pattern of doing so, there may be something psychological or pathological going on, but this should never be assumed, especially in the absence of any evidence, and any hate being expressed is not automatically the cause of a person’s lack of attraction.
Some asexual people do get upset with those who routinely proposition them for sex, try to talk them out of being asexual, tell them they’re going to waste by not having sex, or make sexually charged statements to provoke them. Because asexual people who receive this treatment do not always respond calmly to these comments, their anger with particular members of whatever gender pursues them can sometimes be misinterpreted as hatred for the entire gender, and in rare cases, if the harassment is egregious enough, it may actually cause misdirected hate or distrust. It can happen, even though it usually doesn’t, but when it does, it shouldn’t be assumed to be the cause of asexuality. It’s much more likely to be a side effect of unwanted attention.
I’m not saying that I stayed in bad relationships because I didn’t know I was asexual and aromantic. But I am saying that if I had realized, had known what those things were, had realized that asexuality and not sexism explained my experiences—I might have made different decisions.”
—AYDAN SELBY, THE ASEXUAL AGENDA
There is also the related suggestion that asexual people—especially asexual women—are actually demonstrating hatred of whatever gender is propositioning them through the very act of refusing to sleep with them. This is patently ridiculous and sexist. Not being attracted to someone—and therefore not engaging in sexual activity with that person—doesn’t constitute hateful treatment. It also doesn’t demonstrate fear. Sometimes asexual people are told they should be indifferent to sex, and therefore should just shrug and go through with it if someone wants them to. It’s very wrong to tell any person, asexual or not, what sexual experiences they are obligated to consent to.
Asexual people aren’t automatically demonstrating fear of the potential sex partner—or of sex itself—if they say they’re not willing to engage in it. Some people may fear sexual experiences or specific people who desire them sexually, but even when that’s the case, it cannot be successfully addressed through harassment, repeated propositions, or cajoling the person into sex expecting to change their orientation. It is frankly no one’s business if any person’s attitude toward sex includes fear; avoiding experiences perceived as unpleasant or scary is not unreasonable, and those who repeatedly try to pressure asexual people into “getting over” what they perceive as fear are not providing the eye-opening tough love they think they are. No one should decide—supposedly for the asexual person’s own good—that sexual experiences need to be imposed on another person.
There’s a popular perception that people who aren’t sexually active need help to become so (and that they will thank their “coaches” afterward), but these kinds of experiences need to be controlled by the individual. People who are reluctant to engage in sexual relationships for any reason are unlikely to be grateful to someone who keeps trying to change them and refuses to listen. It’s more likely a person who is persistent about imposing sexual experiences on another will only be treated with mistrust and estrangement.
Do People Become Asexual Because They Fail at Dating?
Predictably, the answer is no. Asexual people are actually very likely to have dated in the past, to be actively dating, or to be in relationships (if they’re so inclined). Most asexual people get the same amount of romantic attention that anyone else with similar characteristics would get, unless they feel compelled to avoid contact with others out of fear that unwanted propositions will come up (Most asexual people do not avoid having social lives, incidentally.). Sometimes they’re very perplexed by the romantic/sexual attention they do get because they may not feel comfortable responding to it or don’t quite understand why sexual attention always seems to be an expected part of romance, but none of this means they must be dating failures.
“Here was a friendly, attractive woman who obviously wanted me. No one had ever expressed an interest in me like this before. She wanted to do this for months. I wanted nothing. And I just sat there. This isn’t right. Why didn’t I want her? Why didn’t I feel anything? Why couldn’t I feel anything? What is wrong with me?”
—TOM, ASEXUALITY ARCHIVE
“You just can’t get anyone” is a very common suggestion by people who want to dismiss asexuality. This is inspired by failure to empathize. Most people want sexual relationships; therefore, if they think about how they would feel without sexual attraction or sexual relationships, some imagine the asexual person must feel desperation and despair. These types of people may not understand the concept of “single” without considering it synonymous with “looking” or may not understand being happy without sexual experiences. They may not understand what it means to not yearn to be part of a couple or partnership. That’s why they can’t look at an asexual person (especially a person who does not want to date) and process the idea of that person being happy. Asexuality becomes, in their minds, much more understandable as a convenient explanation chosen by a person who’s embarrassed about finding no suitable partners.
Asexuality is not a synonym for “people who have experienced resounding rejection their whole lives.” Furthermore, people don’t “become asexual.” Bad experiences do not make people stop being sexually attracted to others, nor does “giving up” on finding a partner. There are plenty of people who do indeed get frustrated over dating-related difficulties, and asexual people who date are not exempt from this, but someone who has given up on dating is not the same as someone who is asexual.
Being an introvert, being shy, being socially awkward, being undesirable in some way, having low self-esteem, and being angry at the world are all descriptions frequently thrown at asexual people to invalidate them, too, and all of these fail to “explain” asexuality for the same reasons as those discussed above. An asexual person—like any other person—might have some of these qualities, but when someone is heterosexual and has these qualities, we don’t say they are definitive of heterosexuality. The same is true of asexuality. Allies of asexual people will not point to aspects of their personality that might complicate all sorts of social relationships and blame these traits for their orientation.
Do People Become Asexual Because They’re Physically Unattractive?
Again, no. People don’t stop having sexual attraction to others because they themselves are not conventionally attractive. Asexual people’s sexual orientation is not dependent on availability of partners; it is dependent on their own inclinations.
Other people’s opinions of someone’s looks don’t dictate their ability to feel attracted to others. “Being ugly” doesn’t make sex drive or sexual attraction go away. Unfortunately, people who want to dismiss asexuality will often say “I wouldn’t sleep with you anyway” to individual asexual people—a suggestion that their own aesthetic choice of who’s suitable to sleep with is the ultimate test of whether someone is “too ugly.” Attractiveness is extremely subjective, though, and people who drop judgments about who’s too ugly to get sex tend to present these assessments as objective.
This kind of comment also targets fat people who identify as asexual. Even though plenty of heavy people find partners, fat is often weaponized as a synonym for undesirable and/or ugly. People who are overweight are frequently desexualized no matter what their orientation and are subjected to damaging comments and attitudes regarding their eligibility as dating and sex partners. Asexual people who are also fat are often assumed to be identifying as such due to lack of willing partners or as a natural physical consequence of being unhealthy and are expected to start desiring or pursuing sex only if they lose weight. Of course, being fat is not synonymous with being unhealthy, and it is also not synonymous with having no available partners or with having no sex drive or inclination. The assumption that fat asexual people are identifying as asexual because they’re fat is disappointingly common.
That said, there is no known correlation between being asexual and being physically unattractive. Asexual people may be less inclined to conform to aesthetic expectations in some cases, but they are not, as a general rule, less aesthetically attractive people. Like most populations, asexual people run the gamut of attractiveness; there will surely be a few very unattractive people in the pool, as well as a few gorgeous people. Most people are somewhere in between. If the attractiveness spectrum didn’t include at least some people who are less normatively attractive, it wouldn’t be a normal distribution.
Non-asexual people who possess below-average attractiveness aren’t excluded as a group from all opportunities for sex and relationships. It’s not as if all “ugly” non-asexual people never find mates or get married. The standards of who is eligible for mating are not entirely dependent on physical appearance. Anyone of any orientation can become frustrated with lack of willing partners, but asexual people haven’t become asexual because of their appearance (regardless of what it is). Many asexual people describe feeling annoyed or harassed or bewildered by romantic and sexual attention; it isn’t as though getting offers changes their orientation.
Desire for positive sexual attention is not the only reason a person might want to be attractive. Sometimes asexual people hear “why would you dress like that/do your hair that way/wear makeup if you aren’t trying to attract a partner?” This is, of course, a misleading question because grooming oneself isn’t a universally deliberate signal for sex or romantic attention no matter who it comes from. Partnered people do not (usually) completely stop wearing attractive clothing or doing their beauty/grooming routines once they get a partner, and the continued attempts to look good are not exclusively for the benefit of the partner(s). Many people report that looking good makes them feel good, which doesn’t necessarily imply any relationship with wanting to appear attractive in a sexual context. It should never be assumed that a person who is attractive or is perceived to have done something to be more aesthetically pleasing is therefore trying to get a partner (or is a tease).
Asexual people can often care about their looks just as much as anyone else and can sometimes suffer from body image issues and dysmorphia, eating disorders, low self-esteem related to their looks, and mental illnesses tied in with their physical presentation. They are not living in a bubble away from the judgment of society just because most of them are not deliberately hoping their bodies will be attractive enough to help them get sexual partners.
In short, asexual people’s physical appearance—regardless of whether it attracts partners—is not an attribute anyone should use to invalidate their orientation.
Do Asexual People Have a Physical or Hormonal Problem?
Asexuality is not thought to be linked to any biological disease or disorder (no matter what they said on House, M.D.). Most asexual people have typical bodies, bodily functions,[2] and hormone production. Asexual people are just as likely as non-asexual people to become aroused if stimulated.[3] Some describe a lower-than-average sex drive or lack of arousal experiences, but the strength of someone’s sex drive is not the key determining factor of their orientation.
Monitoring one’s health is certainly a good idea. If an asexual person or a family member/friend of an asexual person is concerned that the asexual person may have an illness, they can be checked for a few disorders that cause a decline in sexual interest (though, again, sexual interest is not sexual attraction).
There are hormone disorders[4] and sexual arousal/genital-related disorders that interact with ability to have or enjoy or want sex,[5] and psychological conditions exist. A person can suffer from erotophobia (irrational fear of sex or something related to it), genophobia (fear of sexual intercourse), sexual anorexia (pathological loss of sexual appetite and/or fear of romance and intimacy), or anhedonia (the inability to experience pleasure, including sexual pleasure). They can experience sexual interest/arousal disorder (lack of interest or reduced interest) or hypoactive sexual desire disorder. However, lack of sexual interest or attraction is not the only symptom in any of these disorders.
Biology isn’t always irrelevant to sexual orientation; for instance, some intersex individuals identify as asexual. Many intersex variations exist and some of them involve hormone production or sensitivity/immunity issues.[6] Some intersex people may not experience some aspects of puberty due to hormone irregularities, and because hormone disorders have other biological consequences, these folks may choose to have some form of hormone regimen or alternate therapy (if available). A person with an intersex variation can still be asexual without it being “an illness”; it’s not helpful to blame the intersex person’s biology to dismiss the orientation, even though everyone’s biology interacts with their orientation and psychology.
People with disabilities also sometimes identify as asexual. As a group that faces desexualization fairly often, asexual people with disabilities are frequently told their attitude toward sex is just a result of internalized oppression, but yes, people can be asexual and have a disability.[7] An asexual person is not less asexual even if some aspects of their sex life, sexual attitude, or sexual interest might interact with some aspects of the rest of their lives, including their disabilities.
Some people who are on medication for physical or mental illnesses may experience a lower or absent sex drive because of the medication.[8] Especially when the condition requiring these medicines is chronic, these people sometimes develop no sexual interest in others and are sometimes comfortable identifying as asexual. When a medical condition or its treatment interferes with or interacts with a person’s appetite for sex, it’s fine to acknowledge that it may be partially “responsible,” or at least influential, without trying to tell these people they’re “not really asexual.” Orientation is complicated, and a person does not have to be free of all possible complicating factors to be asexual.
Before suggesting that the asexuality might be caused by physical or mental disorders, curious parties should ask themselves a) whether the asexual person’s medical history is any of their business, and b) in cases where it is any of their business, whether any other physical symptoms or significant changes in the asexual person’s attitude toward sexual attraction, sexual interest, or sexual experiences have cropped up. If the answer is no, it’s more appropriate to acknowledge the possibility that this person is asexual rather than trying to find some medical problem that could be causing it. Assuming a disorder must be responsible is an ineffective and possibly offensive way to approach discussion about asexuality.
All this said, wanting to encourage another person’s “optimal health” is often a misguided quest. Unless one is directly responsible for the health and safety of a person who cannot make their own decisions, other people’s medical and lifestyle choices should be respectfully left to the individual. Pressuring them to change their habits, pursue possibly unnecessary tests and procedures (that may or may not be stressful, expensive, ineffective, or painful), or adopt alternate ideas about health is inappropriate.
Asexual is what people call themselves if they aren’t sexually attracted to other people. It doesn’t matter whether a little, some, most, or all of the reason that someone isn’t sexually attracted to anyone has to do with some other aspect of their lives. There are many ways to be asexual. It’s a label asexual people put on themselves to describe what they’re experiencing, not why they’re experiencing it.
Are Asexual People Too Distracted by Their Busy Lives to Be Sexual?
Sometimes detractors have a misconception regarding asexual people being too preoccupied with other aspects of their lives to “properly” pursue sexual relationships. There’s a popular conception of asexual people “throwing themselves into” some other passion to distract themselves from failures that would inevitably result if they tried to pursue romantic/sexual interests. Again, this is just a result of people projecting their own coping strategies onto others. It’s not an explanation for asexuality.
People chase their passions. If a partner-desiring asexual person has an interest in someone, they dedicate the necessary time to cultivating that relationship in whatever way they wish. As for non-partner-desiring asexual people, sure some may spend more time alone and may fill that time with solitary pursuits, but many of them have active social lives and close non-romantic/non-partner relationships that require time and energy. It’s not a case of being unable to dig out room in a packed schedule for this one type of relationship that’s supposed to trump all others.
“We shouldn’t feel pressured to provide reasons in a quest to convince others that our choices are valid. It can be hard to own a status that some people may consider embarrassing, but then again, it will always be embarrassing unless people own up. Whether we were ‘too busy’ or ‘career focused’ or ‘waiting for the one,’ we just did not feel like having sex.”
—ILY, ASEXY BEAST
When something matters to a person, they invest time and energy into pursuing it. It makes no sense to suggest that, in the case of asexual people, they must have just put a cap on what their lives can contain and left out the part that involves sex or relationships. If someone feels a desire for it, that person can, of course, choose to ignore it if a career or a project is determined to be more important, but ignoring urges or crushes is not what asexuality is. If people are asexual, it’s not because they ran out of time to have sexual relationships.
Funnily enough, asexual people are also sometimes “accused” of having too much free time—and asked why they haven’t won a Nobel Prize or cured cancer since they surely must be doing something immensely constructive with all that time not spent on pursuing sex. The “but what do you do all day??” response is not uncommon, but this is more insulting to non-asexual people than to asexual people, considering it implies that non-asexual orientations prevent one from being productive or dominate one’s attention entirely. Most of the vastly productive people in the world are not asexual. And being asexual does not guarantee that one will have abundant free time.
Since most people do perceive sexual and/or romantic relationships as central to life, it’s not surprising that they see those who don’t desire those relationships as having “extra” free time. Yes, someone may have more free time if they’re not engaging in a time-consuming activity that nearly everyone else feels compelled to pursue. But that’s like suggesting a person who pursued basketball as a career did so “instead of” pursuing a career in baseball. Most non-partner-seeking people don’t feel their activities are “instead of” partner seeking.
Viewing partnered and/or sexually active life as the default, and all other arrangements as deviations, is not an accurate, useful, or supportive perspective for an asexual ally to maintain.
Did Asexual People Have a Bad Sexual Experience and Swear Off Sex?
This question demonstrates a “can’t win” situation. If an asexual person is a virgin, they’re taunted with “you can’t know until you try it,” but if the asexual person has had sex, some detractors are convinced that it must have been unpleasant, carried out improperly, or experienced “with the wrong person,” forever soiling their opinion of sex. Blaming the sex an asexual person has had is very common, and it’s unfortunate because bad sex doesn’t cause people to stop experiencing sexual attraction (Of course, if someone never has anything but bad sex experiences, that person might get soured on sex eventually, but it doesn’t mean the person stops being attracted to others.).
Some asexual people who have decided they want to try sex despite not feeling sexually attracted to anyone do, in fact, have bad sex experiences, or at least go through with it and really find it difficult to see what the fuss is about (One doesn’t have to be asexual to have this reaction, of course.). Being sexually attracted to one’s partner(s)—including the lead-up of wanting it and having that urge satisfied—often greatly enhances the experience of sex, and if an asexual person doesn’t have that dimension, the actual sex part may be anywhere from physically enjoyable to actively gross and/or unpleasant. Scratching usually feels a lot better if you’ve already got an itch.
Reported in one survey of self-identified asexual-spectrum people collected on the Internet September–October 2011.[9] The surveyed population skews young because it was administered through Internet communities, and of the 3,436 respondents, less than 20 percent were older than age 25, with 76 percent being between ages 16 and 24. Older asexual people typically have had more sexual experience.
Some asexual people do feel like they “need” to go through with a sexual act just to see if they can jump-start themselves; there are asexual people out there who worry that something is wrong with them and wonder whether everyone’s right—that having sex may actually “cure” them. This is pretty common in asexual people who haven’t heard of asexuality; they may search fruitlessly for a sexual situation they feel motivated toward, can enjoy, or can at least tolerate, and they can get frustrated and desperate when they don’t feel what people say they’re supposed to feel (while, of course, probably frustrating or confusing their partners who don’t understand what they might be doing wrong and may blame themselves).
Sexual attraction and interest isn’t like vampirism. It isn’t passed on once a person is “bitten.” Most non-asexual virgins are well aware that they want to have sex; they need no help. Feeling left out of what everyone else seems to desire can be very isolating, so it’s common for asexual people to push their comfort zones in an attempt to be like everyone else.
“I’ve had sex. It wasn’t a compromise. It wasn’t solely for her pleasure. It wasn’t to save the relationship. It wasn’t a violation. I did it for me. I did it because I wanted to experience it. On the whole, it was positive. It felt good. I liked it. But . . . it wasn’t the mindblowing experience I was led to believe. It didn’t sexually awaken me. I didn’t start craving sex with every waking hour of my life. I didn’t suddenly start to feel sexually attracted to her or anyone else. I felt like I was acting. That was nine years ago. I haven’t had sex since. I don’t miss it.”
—TOM, ASEXUALITY ARCHIVE
It’s not terribly uncommon for an asexual person to try sex and think it’s pretty good or not bad. Some who aren’t too put off by sex with a person they’re not attracted to may enjoy the physical sensations and maybe the emotional intimacy, but the experience of sex does not change how they experience attraction. However, most asexual people who try sex say they didn’t enjoy it (and found it alienating that they didn’t enjoy it) and certainly aren’t encouraged by the experience to try to find a different partner or a different style of sex they can then try to like. After society tells asexual people for years that they’ll love this and then they don’t, they’re often less likely to blithely continue experimenting while hoping the world will be right about the next one.
Many people who say bad sex is to blame for asexuality simply can’t imagine not enjoying the experience. These people might gain some semblance of understanding if they tried to imagine having sex with a person who was in no way physically attractive to them—someone who was the wrong gender for their preference, or the wrong body type, or in the wrong age range. If a person who has trouble believing sex could be unenjoyable can imagine a person they are not attracted to at all, and then try to imagine whether they could enjoy sex with that person, they might have some understanding of how an asexual person might be feeling about sex. Many asexual people feel that way about all potential partners. Just like most straight guys can’t imagine liking sex with another man, many asexual people would not enjoy the act—not because they’re doing it wrong, but because people just aren’t sexually attractive to them.
So, for asexual people, regardless of whether they’ve had bad sex, asexuality is likely to be the cause of their attitude toward those experiences, not the result. If a straight guy had sex with a man and told people he’d hated it because he didn’t think he was gay, most people wouldn’t say “no, you must’ve just had bad gay sex, keep trying” or “no, you must’ve just had gay sex with the wrong partner, try someone else.” They’d usually believe him. Asexual people should be treated no differently.
Could Asexual People Be Suffering From Trauma Brought on by Sexual Abuse?
Unfortunately, sexual abuse and other types of abuse are a reality in this world. Some people who experience sexual abuse or sexual harassment become sex-averse, at least for a time.[10] And since experiencing sexual attraction is considered normal, some folks dream up a cause for asexual people’s disinterest instead of processing what asexual people say. Assign trauma to the people they don’t understand, and presto!—they don’t have to reexamine their assumptions about how “everyone” actually wants sex.
You must have been abused is a phrase asexual people hear all the time. First, a message to anyone who might consider saying this: do not bring up abuse without warning in any conversation. Some people who unthinkingly toss out this comment as a dismissal don’t realize that, if it is actually true, it’s an incredibly insensitive thing to say. If someone thinks an asexual person was so emotionally scarred by an assault or abuse experience that it changed their sexual orientation, it definitely should not be brought up unexpectedly. A person’s possible trigger reactions shouldn’t be considered less important than a skeptic’s desire to squash the so-called asexual person’s identity by writing it off as psychological trauma. This is not something to joke about or invoke dismissively.
But what if the critic doesn’t mean it that way and doesn’t actually think the asexual person was abused?
. . . Well, then why is it suggested in the first place? And how could anyone be sure of what the person they’re speaking to has experienced?
Some people make this comment because they want to use very strong words to silence another person. The argument often follows this pattern: “You’re not asexual; you were obviously abused. If you don’t remember it, it must have happened before your memory kicks in.” This is obviously a no-win situation—and a bad argument, since the person who makes it has already decided asexuality makes sense only if the person was traumatized by abuse; therefore, it must have happened. This is a very weak technique to undermine asexuality, at the expense of another person, argued by someone who either does not realize or does not care about the damage it might cause. No one should suggest abuse is at the root of someone else’s sexual orientation.
It does make sense that people wonder about abuse or trauma. If you are a non-asexual person who wants to ask this question of an asexual person you’re talking to, the best thing to do is avoid the topic unless you are explicitly invited down that road. If the asexual person opens up about abuse—either to say it happened or that it didn’t—you might try asking if you can ask a personal question about their experience. There are some asexual people who are open about this, but if they don’t bring it up, you shouldn’t push the conversation in that direction. This information is best discussed between the (possibly) affected person, that person’s loved ones/family/trusted friends, and if applicable, that person’s therapist/mental health professional(s). But since people are curious about how asexual people may be affected by abuse, it will be discussed here.
Not being attracted to anyone or being disinclined to pursue sex is not a sign of something deeply scarring in a person’s past. Just like some people still spread the message that men turn gay because they were molested as boys, or that gay women are only lesbians because a man hurt them or disappointed them, there are those who believe everyone is sexually attracted to others as a default and anything that leads to a different orientation should be fixed. These folks believe mental trauma could be blocking a person’s ability to feel attraction.
Let’s first acknowledge that abuse does happen (unfortunately). A subset of the asexual population has been abused (sexually or otherwise). That’s because a subset of any population experiences abuse. In cases of asexual people who were abused before maturity, it will of course be difficult to tease out how much the abuse influenced the lens through which they see the world. In cases of asexual people who were maturing or mature before the traumatic event(s) or abusive living situation(s), they will have often been aware of their asexual tendencies before the abuse.
“I hate this question because it falls into a tendency to search for causation that belies a need to pathologize. No one ever asks heterosexual individuals what caused their sexual orientation. When we ask individuals what ‘causes’ some part of them, we are saying, ‘Do you know why this thing is wrong with you?’ We are also saying, ‘If you do know, do you think we could change it so this doesn’t happen to anyone else?’”
—M. LECLERC, HYPOMNEMATA
And, unfortunately, there have been cases of asexual people experiencing “corrective” rape. This is when a person gets assaulted for being asexual; the attacker believes the asexual person will learn that sex is fun and “reconsider” being asexual if forced to engage in it. This, sadly, is perpetrated in a “corrective” fashion by people who know the victim and may even be in a relationship with them. Because of society’s common sex-compulsory narrative, asexual victims can sometimes be made to feel as though their attackers and abusers had the right to demand sex, or may at least feel unworthy of relationships if they do not have sex. Using abuse and sexual assault in an attempt to make an asexual person accept sex is a violent act, not a wake-up call.
No matter how an abuse experience has affected an asexual person’s willingness to have sex, their view of sexual subjects, or their attraction experiences in general, it is not appropriate to say that their asexuality is inauthentic because of it. Nobody else gets to decide that what another person has been through negates their self-concept.
Keep in mind that most people who have had an unpleasant, unwanted sexual experience still continue to experience sexual attraction.[11] Sexual abuse can be a horrible, scarring experience, but it generally does not forever remove the victim’s ability to see others as sexually attractive. It is good to seek counseling if sexual abuse has caused lasting trauma, but it should never be with the intent of declaring asexuality a symptom. Aversion to sex as a trauma reaction manifests as fear and disgust, not lack of attraction.
There are also asexual people who were (and are) affected by neglect, violence, or emotional abuse, and they are sometimes condescendingly told their asexuality is not a valid orientation, but is rather a natural function of having bad models or lacking models for healthy relationships. Asexual people who have these experiences may have trouble with intimacy—as anyone in that situation might—but it’s still inaccurate to say a person who feels no sexual attraction or doesn’t pursue sex is only oriented that way because they were never properly taught how to love, are modeling the distant behavior of their abusers, or are afraid of other people because of past violence.
It is always possible that a person could be hiding shame surrounding trauma behind the label of asexuality. People do sometimes misuse labels, whether intentionally, accidentally, or through ignorance. The point is that asexuality should never be suggested to probably or definitely be a symptom following from abuse. There are few contexts in which it is appropriate to discuss someone’s personal abuse history and bringing it up to deny that their sexual identity is not one of those contexts.
Sometimes asexual people who have experienced abuse of some kind will want to seek counseling, and especially if that abuse was sexual, the counselor or mental health professional will often be predisposed to assuming lack of sexual attraction or interest is a trauma reaction. Asexual clients can have a much better therapy experience if they inquire about the therapist’s friendliness toward asexuality first. A good starting point might be a therapist with a background in LGBT issues; they tend to be trained better in respecting non-heteronormative identities. They should be able to work with an asexual client who wants to address trauma without focusing on the client’s ability to have or desire sexual relationships as a sign of success.
Therapy-seeking asexual people may consider a pre-session interview with their mental health professionals during which they can ascertain whether the therapist acknowledges asexuality as an orientation. They can point to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders—the DSM-5—as a trusted resource that accepts asexuality as an exception to some diagnosable sex-related disorders, and they may choose to bring recently published scientific studies on the asexual population to show the mental health professional that others in the field are taking it seriously—and therefore, so should they.
Could Asexual People Be Secretly Gay?
Many asexual people ask themselves this question before they realize they’re asexual (And they may even continue to wonder whether they’re just repressing homosexuality after identifying tentatively as asexual for some time.).
“So, having realized that I wasn’t becoming interested in guys in the way that was expected, the next logical conclusion was that maybe I was interested in girls instead? That was quickly disproved though—I tried looking at girls, and thinking about girls, etc. but it didn’t do anything for me either.”
—MARY KAME GINOZA, NEXT STEP: CAKE
People are taught that they’re expected to like cross-sex partners. When asexual people find themselves not feeling heterosexual attraction, they look at the orientations available to them and sometimes think being gay is the only other option. They may also think they are bisexual, polysexual, or pansexual. Observing that their interest in one gender is the same as any other, they may pick up one of the terms that seems to describe that, without realizing asexuality is a possibility.
When people ask whether asexual-identified people are actually gay and deliberately hiding it, they’re suggesting that they must be so ashamed of being gay that they publicly claim an orientation in which chastity is expected.
One problem with “you’re probably gay” is that asexuality is also a misunderstood, marginalized orientation. If someone is gay and wanting to hide it, pretending to be asexual instead is not a good way to make life easier. Asexual people have a different experience from gay people, but they are still badgered and questioned and disbelieved and disrespected and attacked and denied and tossed into obscurity. There might be a perception that asexual people do not have to deal with the same persecution that gay people do, and while that is often true (unless the asexual person in question is also LGB+), they get a different negative experience. Asexuality isn’t a shortcut out of getting picked on for one’s sexual orientation, and it is not necessarily “easier.”
It is worth noting that prejudice against homosexuality in religious or very conservative families or environments might lead some closeted gay folks to believe coming out as asexual would be less frowned upon. And in some situations, they’d be right. However, most closeted gay people who worry about repercussions will pose as heterosexual, not asexual. Presenting asexuality as an orientation to an unsympathetic audience will result in a different reaction—though it’s more likely to inspire confusion than the violent reaction one might expect when coming out as gay—but since asexuality isn’t “I’m waiting until marriage to have sex,” it will still be criticized and dismissed and considered unnatural by the same people if they actually understand what it is. It’s being non-heterosexual, not being gay, that inspires unpleasant reactions.[12]
Some members of LGBTQ communities protest that asexuality awareness might be dangerous to their community because LGBTQ people have been historically shamed into not having sex. They may believe asexuality awareness will help reinforce this persecution and oppression, since more awareness about the orientation may lead homophobes to “sell” asexuality as a choice. However, this is misleading, because homophobes are really trying to sell LGBTQ people a choice between heterosexuality or a life of abstinence, and no one who understands what asexuality is will claim it is a synonym for chastity. This issue is discussed in more detail in Part Two of this book.
“You’re probably gay and too ashamed to admit it” is what people assume when they have not grown past seeing the world in tight dichotomies—so to them, a person claiming to be asexual should be put in the not-straight box, which is labeled “gay” in their minds.
Most asexual people who come out to disbelieving others are subjecting themselves to a humbling experience that has them feeling vulnerable; and not only that, but they’re also committing to explaining what asexuality is. People know what homosexuality is, and while some gay people face violent or disapproving reactions if they come out, they do not get told that no one feels the way they feel, and they probably aren’t going to have to explain what homosexuality is to nearly everyone they come out to.
“It is not okay within mainstream society for a woman to never express sexual desire. It is certainly not okay to be openly, loudly asexual, and it is damn well not the ideal for women to be asexual. Where do you think the term frigid comes from? Did you think it was a compliment?”
—SCIATRIX, WRITING FROM FACTOR X
Some claim that asexuality is an escape for those who want to avoid admitting their non-straight, queer, or kinky desires. That it’s some kind of criticism-free, virtuous island that is respected and revered because of its popular association with chastity. That it’s the only way some closeted gay people can avoid the gay stigma without being expected to have straight sex. The truth is that asexual people are expected to have straight sex too. They aren’t respected or left alone. Their personal lives are pried into as well. Their life choices are brought into the open and spread out by people demanding justification and proof. People are expected to be sexually active. Asexuality is not a way out. It doesn’t work as an escape.
And, of course, when it comes to gay asexual people (as well as those in non-heteronormative relationships, or with said inclinations), this suggestion is even sillier. LGBTQ asexual people can get all the fun of being harassed for their LGBTQ identity or orientation, and then they can be harassed for their asexuality on top of that.
The bottom line is that people who say they are sexually attracted to no one mean exactly that. It’s absurd how often asexual people say “I’m not attracted to anyone” and hear “so . . . you’re gay then?” in response. Sexual orientation is not an either/or situation. You can’t have a multiple-choice question regarding “Who are you attracted to?” and only offer “A. the same gender,” “B. other genders,” and “C. both” without acknowledging that there should be an option for “D. none.” This also oversimplifies gender, of course. But the main point is that “asexual” is indeed “not heterosexual” while not being homosexual either.
This question is often motivated by the belief that everyone is attracted to something. This misconception usually manifests as “you’re gay if you’re not straight,” but some detractors will take this even further and assign the asexual person a secret attraction to animals or inanimate objects. No, asexuality is not a cover for zoophilia or objectum sexuality. It is absurd to interpret a lack of heterosexuality as a blank that can be filled with any hypothetical attraction experience.
Have Asexual People Just Not Met the Right Person?
It’s possible. Asexual people may have not met the right person to be sexually attracted to. It’s possible in the same way that heterosexual people may not have met the right person of the same gender to make them realize they’re not straight. It’s possible in the same way that men who don’t wear traditionally feminine clothes may not have found the right dress to make them comfortable with cross-dressing. It is possible in the same way that people who hate ground beef may have just not had the right hamburger.
In a very distantly possible, scientific sense, yes, of course it’s possible that an asexual person who has never been sexually attracted to anyone could encounter someone in the world who inspires sexual attraction for them. If an experience is possible for most people, it makes sense to suggest that maybe a person who hasn’t experienced it still might. But responding to a non-straight orientation with “well, you never know, you might change” isn’t a practical or useful response; it suggests the responding person is processing asexuality as if it must be a passing phase. Sexual orientations are nothing but descriptions of patterns that have, so far in a person’s life, been predictable. Sexuality can be fluid, but there’s no reason to point this out as a way to suggest someone can, will, or should change.
Heterosexual people don’t have to add qualifiers to their orientation to be believed that they’re heterosexual. Most people will not tell heterosexual people that they just need to meet the right gay person and their orientation will change. But LGBTQ folks and asexual folks do hear this—and, interestingly, sometimes asexual people hear this from LGBTQ folks as well as from heterosexual folks.
Orientation is a practical way to predict who one might be attracted to. It is based on past and present, and when the past and present have been consistent, there is no reason to believe that the future will be different—nor is it practical to stake one’s future relationships and lifestyles on that possibility.
“I guess everyone’s sexuality could change one day, but when people tell us ‘maybe you haven’t met the right person yet,’ it seems painfully irrelevant—what about how we are right now? I’m A right now, and I always have been. [. . .] But even if I realize, in two days or two decades, that I’m secretly heterosexual, I will always support the A-Team.”
—ILY, ASEXY BEAST
Asexual people aren’t claiming they know, without a doubt, that they can’t experience sexual attraction. But they’re as qualified as anyone else to say they don’t—that they haven’t experienced it and aren’t currently experiencing it—and have every reason to believe they won’t experience it in the future because of this. Most asexual people aren’t interested in dedicating their lives to searching for a partner to change them. No one can assume asexual people are (or should be) hoping or trying to change themselves. And they do not have an obligation to keep looking for a partner who can “wake up” their supposedly sleeping interest in sex.
Sometimes the comments like “you haven’t met the right person yet” sound like “Oh yeah? What about [insert hot celebrity]?”—as if the asexual person would have to admit that if it was Brad Pitt, they’d make an exception. [Author’s note: For some reason, for my generation, it always seems to be Brad Pitt.] No, the asexual person doesn’t find the movie star flavor of the month sexually attractive.
Sometimes people who say this believe asexual people aren’t meeting enough sexy people in real life, but that a truly stunning specimen would flip even an asexual person’s switch. Well, no. [Author’s note: I’ve told multiple people that I’m not attracted to manliness at all, only to have them respond with “Yeah right, you would melt if [flavor of the month] walked in with his abs hanging out and demanded to ravish you.” Why yes, I can say I wouldn’t melt. I’d find that extremely creepy, actually, if a stranger walked into my house shirtless and expected me to respond positively. That may spoil the worldview of the hypothetical unbeliever, but I actually mean it when I say I’m not attracted to anyone. That includes Brad Pitt.]
“I do not want anyone mistaking me for someone they can convert, coerce, or persuade. I don’t want to be considered shy, inexperienced (and in need of a guiding hand), or sexually embryonic.”
—M. LECLERC, HYPOMNEMATA
Anyone hoping to understand an asexual friend or loved one should not go this route in encouraging asexual people to keep trying. Acknowledging one’s asexuality doesn’t constitute giving up on finding a partner or making a decision about one’s future. It’s just a description—a label the asexual person will wear until or unless it stops fitting, and there’s a very good chance it will continue to fit. It shouldn’t be understood or processed as a placeholder.
Is Asexuality a Religious Statement?
This question is caught up in how strongly virginity and abstinence are associated with purity and moral goodness. The easy answer is no—asexuality has nothing to do with religion. And considering that avoiding sex and supposedly triumphing over earthly desire implies that a person possesses the desire for sex in the first place, it wouldn’t make any sense for a non-sex-desiring asexual person to claim abstention as a show of religious sacrifice.
In fact, some asexual people who have been raised in a religious or socially conservative atmosphere feel confused and alienated by the emphasis on “resisting” and “temptation.” They may or may not feel lucky to have no trouble abstaining from sex, and they may or may not feel conflicted about why everyone presents avoiding sex as such a struggle. It’s even happened that some religious authorities who praise chastity as a symbol of purity turn around and deny fellowship, turn down clergy status, or simply look down on a person who hasn’t had to sacrifice to achieve it.
Also, since some of these circles stress waiting for marriage before having sex, some asexual people who desire marriage but not sex may fear what they’ll be expected to do to satisfy the requirements of their religion. Even though sex before marriage is taught as a sin in some belief systems, refusing to have sex inside of a marriage can also be considered a failure to satisfy religious expectations. Asexual people from religious backgrounds may feel they have no option but to avoid all romantic relationships if they want to avoid being forced to submit to the marriage bed.
Some Christian scriptures mention lifelong celibacy being acceptable for those who do not desire sex,[13] while marriage is recommended for those who do desire sex.[14] With marriage being offered as the solution to the (supposed) problem of lust, those who may want to be chaste in a marriage may not be accepted. In Islam, though marriage is emphasized as expected, there is still room for celibacy, but similarly, it’s recommended only for those who don’t marry.[15] In traditional Judaism, propagation of the people is of primary importance;[16] some doctrines even say celibacy breaks religious law, since it constitutes failure to fulfill the divine command to have children.[17]
In philosophies that emphasize erasure of desire as a route to purity, such as Buddhism, innate lack of sexual “distraction” may be mistaken for a sign of enlightenment—or, conversely, may be regarded as cheating or too easy. And in Pagan philosophies that celebrate nature—especially those with fertility rites that symbolically and literally unite the masculine and the feminine—sex may be glorified and asexual people who refuse sex or don’t feel comfortable with expressing themselves through sexual symbolism could be regarded as unable to fully participate. Even in mainstream, conservative, or strict religions, depending on the leader or the denomination of the belief system, sex is sometimes glorified (provided it’s between married people) as being a gift from their deity and a holy expression.
It’s commonly believed that conservative religious organizations would applaud abstinence (at least for unmarried folks), but some mainstream views about sex can be destructive to asexual people who receive them in a religious context. For instance, the same folks who call homosexuality unnatural because of religious beliefs also have a tendency to automatically frame heterosexuality as natural—as the only natural sexuality. Living a life without heterosexual attraction may be regarded as unnatural from a religious point of view, and some religious leaders may even offend or alienate asexual believers by saying their orientation constitutes denial of a gift from their deity. They may pressure or shame asexual people for perceived or actual unwillingness to subscribe to traditional family arrangements because of their orientation; asexuality is certainly not the widely celebrated or preferred orientation that many outside these belief systems think it is.
There are, however, some belief systems and denominations of religions that are supportive of asexuality without misunderstanding it as a show of spiritual strength. Asexual people who want to practice their religion without receiving damaging messages about their orientation might consider looking at organizations that support tolerance, diversity, and individual choice in these matters. A congregation, religious leader, or denomination that vocally supports LGBTQ issues or emphasizes the importance of modern scientific or open-minded world views might be safe and healthy for a religious asexual person. There are interpretations of most faiths that will not condemn the orientation.
Unfortunately, some people have an immediate negative reaction to hearing about asexuality because they imagine asexual people believe themselves superior—that they must see themselves as having risen above supposedly animalistic urges for sex. So some may get defensive if they believe asexual people are making religious or moral statements by declaring their orientation. But most asexual people do not perceive sexual activity as an experience that sullies a person’s goodness, and the orientation is not about abstaining so they can claim they are better than anyone else.
“If asexuals are chaste, it’s not usually because they hold it up as a virtue. It’s because they would rather be chaste, regardless of whether or not they happen to think it is a virtue. I certainly do not regard chastity as a virtue; furthermore, like many other asexuals, I am not chaste. I find it really offensive to stuff these ‘values’ into my mouth and pretend that’s what I asked for.”
—TRISTAN MILLER, SKEPTIC’S PLAY
Even outside of a religious context, saving oneself for marriage is a common show of devotion and honor—an abstention that garners respect from some people. Virginity is more commonly respected for women (until they get “too old,” at which point they’re pitied and mocked for not having sex), but people of all genders do sometimes hear “I admire that you’re saving yourself!” from well-meaning folks. Asexuality isn’t a means of saving oneself. Yet many will immediately assume that anyone who’s not having sex has to be saving it for a particular type of relationship. Some asexual people may do this, just like some people of any orientation do this, but it is not “part of being asexual” as a rule.
Asexuality is not a behavior—it’s a perspective on or experience of other people’s attractiveness—so a person who comes out as asexual shouldn’t be interpreted as though they are announcing a chastity vow.
Are Asexual People Going Through a Phase or Seeking Attention by Being Different?
“It’s just a stage you’re going through.”
No one likes being dismissed as “following a fad” when they’re expressing how they feel. It’s true that sometimes people take a while to figure themselves out, of course. Some people do go through phases, and it shouldn’t reflect poorly on anyone’s opinion of asexuality if they’ve heard of or met a person who was initially mistaken in choosing that label (or discovered their orientation was fluid later in life).
The trouble with asexuality is that no one can prove a negative, so if it turns out a person is a late-blooming non-asexual person, that may externally look like asexuality before the blooming starts. That’s not asexuality’s fault, and it’s also very frustrating (especially for young asexual people) if their friends and family react to their coming out by dismissing their feelings as nothing but a phase. Asexual teens also usually take longer than other people their age to identify their sexual orientation because they’re encouraged to consider themselves late bloomers.
Asexual people shouldn’t be told they’ll “grow out of it.” The prevailing asexual community narratives encourage people of all ages to stay very in touch with themselves while understanding their sexuality and to not deliberately squash or avoid sexual feelings if they do become part of their experiences later on. For the most part, continued identity exploration is respected, though here and there elitists will suggest that the questioning members of asexual communities might make asexuality look bad. Teens shouldn’t be automatically subjected to doubt because of their age, especially since if they really are asexual, they’re figuring that out about the same time other people are figuring out that they find others sexually attractive, and they’re probably wondering what’s wrong with them.
There is nothing to be gained from dismissing a young asexual person as necessarily facing a future “maturation” into a more common sexual orientation. There’s no purpose in telling a young person who feels they are asexual that they will grow out of it, nor is it helpful to “reassure” them that they will find a partner and stop being asexual. It’s important for them to know that asexuality is a valid conclusion—that they don’t have to grow up thinking something is wrong with them because they aren’t interested in what their friends are interested in. Those who would like to avoid making asexual young people feel inferior should not say any of these things.
Occasional critics say they used to be asexual but outgrew it or that they knew someone who used to be asexual but stopped being asexual. This isn’t relevant, because one person’s experience doesn’t invalidate another’s. Some perspectives from people who thought they were asexual and realized it wasn’t true are interesting, though—for instance, sometimes transgender people who identified as asexual before transition find sexual attraction developing in their post-transition lives. And sometimes people explore their attraction experiences and intimacy preferences only to find they no longer fit under the asexual umbrella.
Other critics sometimes say asexual people need to try sex before they can determine whether they like it. This is levied at younger asexual people more often because it’s commonly assumed they have not had sex and couldn’t have the perspective to understand whether they’d like it. Society’s norms more or less expect everyone to have had sex by a certain age, and asexual teens are often spoken to as if their eventual sexual experiences are inevitable. Asexual people shouldn’t be told they’ll grow up, have sex, and change their minds, no matter what age they are.
“You’re not asexual; you’re just socially awkward.”
It’s true that most people go through an “awkward” stage sometime in their lives, and that for most people, that awkward stage comes somewhere during puberty. But for most teens, their first sexual attractions are compelling enough to inspire them to pursue partners anyway—especially since many young people are all socially awkward at the same time and can find comfort in bumbling through it together in their first experiences.
And yes, while being socially awkward can inhibit someone’s chances to socialize (including with potential partners), it’s unlikely someone would use asexuality as an excuse to avoid these relationships. There are plenty of reasons teens might not be ready to pursue partners, but responding to their identity with “no, it’s not that you don’t want anyone; it’s that you can’t get anyone” certainly isn’t going to help their awkwardness. Confidence in one’s approach does have something to do with successful relationships and making connections, but asexuality is a description of how someone feels, not what they do.
“But seriously. Stop trying to seem special!”
Asexual people are often accused of identifying as asexual for attention. However, the kind of attention they get for it is often negative, so those who are only looking to have their specialness praised are unlikely to use the label for long. For most asexual people, “you just want to be special” is a particularly disappointing reaction. Most of them aren’t yearning for any kind of special status; they just want to be listened to, judged to be reasonable, and allowed to go on with their lives without facing pity or harassment. Sharing something personal about themselves only to be labeled an attention-seeking faker may lead them to avoid sharing personal information in the future.
Some people do have inauthentic reasons for identifying as asexual, and it’s always possible someone might be using a sexual orientation (any sexual orientation) to get attention or run with a cause. But it isn’t helpful at all to suggest that this is the case for any particular person. Those who claim an asexual-identified person is only looking for attention will be likely to lose the asexual person’s trust.
Sometimes asexuality awareness efforts are criticized due to fear of “recruiting.” Some people—particularly abusive authority figures, sex therapists who have not done proper research, and people who lack empathy—believe awareness about asexuality is dangerous. Some have said they oppose awareness because it might catch on like a fad and encourage people to ignore their sexual feelings or embrace abstinence rather than work through kinks or non-heteronormative sexual issues that might be disturbing them.[18]
These folks believe that if we pass on knowledge about this orientation existing, some people might label themselves prematurely and stop looking for their “real” sexuality. They seem to ignore that asexual people can be (and usually are) damaged by lack of awareness about their orientation. When these people advocate silencing this dialogue on behalf of people who might otherwise mislabel themselves and experience pain and confusion, it’s clear they only care about this kind of pain if non-asexual people are being hurt. No sympathy comes for asexual people who are forced through lack of language and knowledge to choose some other ill-fitting label and miserably attempt to embody it.
People don’t decide they’re asexual on a whim once they hear it’s an option. They usually find a word for what they feel and something clicks for them, resulting in profound gratefulness and relief. People who are asexual typically struggle for years trying to find some indication of what’s wrong with them or whether anyone else feels the way they do. And if they enter an asexual community and begin having nuanced discourse about intimacy and connection, they aren’t encouraged to put a lid on further self-growth. They’re encouraged to explore and explain their identity for better personal and interpersonal understanding.
“I have definitely thought about my own sexuality (or lack thereof, depending on your perspective) since getting involved in the ace community more than I did in the preceding two decades of my life combined.”
—QUEENIE, THE ASEXUAL AGENDA
These communities discuss romance, sex, relationships, and different forms of attraction in such detail that it certainly wouldn’t be practical to run falsely to asexuality in the hopes that it would make one’s life simpler. When asexual-identified people are dismissed with phrases like “I bet you got this idea from the Internet” or “so is this what the cool kids are doing now?” it’s even more isolating and harmful. Especially once they’ve found a community on the Internet and finally figured out they weren’t alone. To finally have this kind of revelation only to be invalidated is hurtful and disappointing.
Most asexual people were struggling for understanding before finding a community, and their rarity makes finding each other offline very unlikely. The Internet is the only option for many if they want to connect with others like themselves. But that doesn’t mean they got the idea from the Internet; this would be like asking if people got the idea to try sex from watching porn online.
Asexual people feel asexual regardless of whether they have a word for it, and though increased awareness about asexuality might lead to some incorrect or premature labeling, awareness efforts are still very important. [Author’s note: As a young asexual person, I wrote essays about being “nonsexual” and posted them online long before the main asexual network based around AVEN was created, and many other asexual people were independently inventing words to describe themselves before they found others.]
There’s also the reversal of this: people think asexual people have suddenly become gung-ho about wanting everyone to know about their asexuality, while they think it really doesn’t need awareness efforts. A common reaction sounds like “Well what’s the point? It’s not like people are getting asexual-bashed.” And beyond some cases of “corrective” rape, overall no, asexual people usually aren’t attacked physically over their orientation (And they’re grateful for that.). But anyone who thinks the only reason to raise awareness is to prevent physical violence is wrong.
“Even if we feel positive about our asexuality, the onus is always on the asexual to prove ourselves. [. . .] People tell us our orientation is too confusing or unusual to bother with understanding. It’s not hard to start believing that they may be right, and that there is some inherent problem with the ‘difficulty’ of asexuality and, therefore, with us.”
—ILY, ASEXY BEAST
Mostly, asexual people would like to foster an experience of coming out that doesn’t require a subsequent thirty- to forty-minute education session during which they must defend and explain the existence of their orientation. Asexual people would like to stop hearing that people like them need to be “fixed.” Awareness is needed for many reasons, and a non-asexual person viewing the issue as unimportant and personally irrelevant does not invalidate asexual people’s need to educate on the subject.
Wouldn’t Asexual People Be Lonely All the Time?
This is another example of projection. “If I’m lonely without a partner, everyone else without a partner must be lonely too! Even if they say otherwise!”
Very few people believe the only meaningful relationships have to be sexual. It’s true that the institution of the couple is upheld nearly everywhere as a building block of family and society. And it’s true that most people consider their significant others to be the most important people in their lives or their best friends. There’s nothing wrong with that. But it makes no sense to say asexual people—even those who don’t date—must therefore have no one important, no one significant, no best friend in their lives.
Most people want to connect with others in some way, but everyone has different ways of doing so. Some people believe those who reach out in different ways, with different effects, must be hollow inside, missing something essential in life, secretly wishing for this connection that they supposedly lack. “They don’t have sex! How depressing is that? They must have terrible, empty lives.” Happily, that perception of how asexual people feel is a myth.
“I’m not great at the whole dating thing, but I’m still a human being and I crave emotional intimacy. If I don’t date, I have to figure out how to get those connections through an alternate way, and if I do date, I have to figure out how to either connect to other asexual people (difficult) or negotiate expectations that romantic relationships be sexual relationships, too.”
—SCIATRIX, THE ASEXUAL AGENDA
Most asexual people have no particular problems forging and holding onto the relationships that matter most to them. Most of their partnered relationships work a little differently, and those who don’t form partnered relationships value different interaction experiences with their peers. Most people feel lonely sometimes, but asexual people don’t automatically carry around a pit that can never be filled. Many have active social lives and can forge satisfying, intimate relationships of all types.
Some, especially those who are introverts, may seem “lonely” if they spend most of their time alone, but preferring solitude isn’t the same as being lonely. Some have different emotional needs and really don’t crave intimate or particularly emotional connection with others as much as they’re expected to. Being aromantic, asexual, and alone most of the time is not a sign of pathology; plenty of well-adjusted people are most satisfied with their own company and may not crave social attention or go out of their way to spend time with others. It’s just one more perfectly valid way to be.
“So you’re just going to be a cat lady, I get it.”
No, you don’t.
The “cat lady” comment is often dropped on people (mostly women) who don’t want partners. Putting aside the fact that many asexual people do want partners—even if some don’t want sex with said partners—calling people who want to remain single “cat ladies” is usually intended to pigeonhole them as pathetic singletons who hoard cats to assuage their loneliness (Though there’s nothing wrong with loving your cats!). No one likes when others assume they’re going to spend their lives mourning their horrible, lonely fate—not to mention that if a person was lonely, that loneliness would be nothing to mock.
However, no one should suggest someone’s choices based on orientation are going to lead to an unenviable, desperate life. Asexual people will often react to these assumptions by mistrusting and withdrawing from the people who voice them, and it’s possible that repeatedly subjecting them to comments about their supposedly terrible lives will push them toward becoming despondent and self-conscious.
Similarly, sometimes asexual people are assumed to be depressed if they don’t make sexual and/or romantic connections. Depression, or medication associated with treatment, does sometimes decrease sexual interest and sexual arousal ability.[19] That doesn’t mean it’s the other way around. People don’t automatically have a mood disorder if they don’t pursue or enjoy sex. People who are both asexual and depressed do exist, but treating the depression doesn’t make them attracted to people if they are asexual.
Are Asexual People Repressed, Boring, or Dispassionate?
“But . . . then what do you do all day?”
Folks who say this clearly consider sexual attraction—and the relationships that often grow out of it—to be central to their lives and allow these relationships to take up a great deal of their time and attention. Without this focus, many people can’t imagine what their lives would be like and imagine asexual people to simply have a void there. The truth is that most people have passions . . . which they pursue, well, passionately. If a person is interested in sex and sexual relationships, they pursue them and give them a lot of attention. Asking what an asexual person could be doing all day is condescending and misleading.
Chasing or enjoying sexual passion is not the only way to express a lust for life. Some think asexual people are deliberately sacrificing or avoiding “the good things in life,” or must be hiding the desire for these activities deep inside, where even they might not acknowledge them. Those who misunderstand asexuality as abstention for the purpose of self-denial (possibly for some higher purpose) often believe asexual people just don’t know how to have fun. For people who—again—cannot empathize or refuse to, it’s impossible to imagine sex as unappealing. Sex is appealing to them; therefore, they insist sex is objectively appealing, and those who are not chasing it must feel unsatisfied. If they were asked to give up sex—or any other passion—they’d definitely feel like it was a sacrifice and feel a loss in their lives. It’s much easier for them to label an asexual person a boring straight-edger or a repressed killjoy than it is to imagine that not having sex is one natural lifestyle for a person who isn’t attracted to other people that way.
“[W]hen we asexuals are expressing this lack of contentment, it’s not actually because we wish we were sexual people who could have a sexual relationship. We simply want a relationship where we are loved and respected for who we are, and that is sadly difficult to find. One is a discontent with identity; the other is a discontent with the practical negotiation of that identity in the world.”
—M. LECLERC, HYPOMNEMATA
And then some people believe that without sexual interest, a person would just be lifeless. They compare lack of interest in sex to a lack of interest in eating or breathing. Asked to imagine or comprehend asexual people, their response is to call up a zombie being with no juice, and the idea is horrifying and alienating to them. It’s hard for them to relate to asexual people if they believe sexual attraction is a driving, central, essential force in a person’s life and asexual people have none.
But it isn’t as if lack of sexual desire or sexual attraction is the same as lack of desires of any kind. Asexual people don’t automatically lack motivation and energy or any vital “juice.” People who look at asexual people as though they must be zombies or robots are probably looking at them as a concept rather than as people.
An interesting reversal of this question comes when some suggest asexual people must get so much done in their lives only because they “have so much time on their hands.” As discussed earlier, people tend to spend their time pursuing what they love, and asexual people aren’t different in that respect. It isn’t as though everyone in the world is assigned a time-management pie chart with a wedge meant to be dedicated to “relationships and sex” and therefore asexual and/or aromantic people get an advantage in all the other categories. They don’t have a blank space they have to try desperately to fill with activities. They don’t lack a necessary motivating factor in personal passion. And they don’t, as a group, have less lust for life than anyone else.
Aren’t Asexual People Being Awfully Selfish? Isn’t an Asexual Person a Tease?
“What a waste.”
Yes, asexual people hear this if they’re not open to sexual relationships. Some will state an asexual person is “a waste” if a potential sexual partner doesn’t get to experience them in the bedroom. They’re an attractive body with the potential for lovemaking and they’re just wasting it. How bothersome it is that their personal inclinations and desires get in the way of their bodies being enjoyed by someone who wants them!
The phrasing of the sentiments above are absurd exaggerations, but their essence is frequently communicated to asexual people. It may sound ridiculous—because it is—but it is nevertheless a common reaction, usually unthinkingly blurted without regard for how dehumanizing statements like these are. A person who abstains from sex isn’t “a waste” just because sex is possible but avoided. Many people’s bodies also have the capacity to become Olympic gymnasts with lots of hard work and practice. Are people who don’t pursue the Olympics a waste? Plenty of attractive people aren’t models. Is that a waste?
It’s not selfish whatsoever for asexual people to live lifestyles that correspond to their wishes. Calling an asexual person selfish for not engaging in sex suggests they are denying other people something they deserve. It’s saying asexual people owe other people sex just by virtue of having a body that could execute it. It’s much more “selfish” to claim asexual people are obligated to offer sex against their own wishes.
“Asexuality is a free pass out of exactly zero of the thousands of ways the patriarchy polices female sexuality. [. . .] That I enjoy being attractive, without wanting to attract anyone and without being attracted to anyone, puts me squarely in that illogical category known as ‘being a tease,’ just like millions of other women who dare to do something for themselves rather than for a male audience.”
—AYDAN SELBY, THE ASEXUAL AGENDA
When someone is attracted to an asexual person and the asexual person cannot or does not reciprocate the interest, the asexual person sometimes gets called “a tease” or gets accused of “leading people on.” This, of course, is not unique to asexual people; many people have this experience of being on the receiving end of unwanted romantic or sexual attention, and they may respond to it by declaring disinterest. This rejection is often met with a suggestion that the recipient did something wrong by not reciprocating the interest. This accusation suggests asexual people’s sexual orientation is about others, and it’s not.
“Well that’s awfully frigid of you.”
This statement and others like it are often thrown at people—usually women—if they dare to make themselves sexually unavailable for any reason, so asexual people hear it pretty often. Asexual people are not frigid, cold, unfeeling, or (again) failing to deliver something they owe someone. It’s invoked especially often to shame people in relationships who do not want to engage in sex or do not want to engage in sex often enough to please their partner(s).
“I bet you just get off on playing hard-to-get.”
It’s inevitable that some people will interpret “I’m asexual” as a game. Equating asexual people’s lack of sexual attraction to others with “playing” (expecting the end result to involve being “gotten”) strongly suggests that yes means “yes” and no means “keep trying.” No should be taken seriously and respected.
And, of course, romantic asexual people especially get to hear “you’re so selfish!” because if they happen to be in a sexless relationship, they’re perceived as cruelly withholding sex from a partner who deserves it. “Don’t you think you should let them get a real partner?” is a common statement thrown at romantic asexual people by those who think sex is part of any meaningful romantic partnership, usually coming from people who misunderstand a sexless romance as indistinguishable from a friendship.
Ultimately, everyone who wants a relationship has deal-breakers. Some would say it’s a deal-breaker if a partner expects them to have sex. Some would say it’s a deal-breaker if a partner won’t have sex (or won’t have a minimum amount of sex). Lack of sex is not, however, a deal-breaker for all people who experience sexual attraction, especially since there are ways to have a satisfactory sex life without the asexual partner(s) participating in sex. Implying that the asexual person is cruel for withholding sex makes no more sense than referring to the asexual person’s partner(s) as cruel for wanting sex. If either situation truly is a deal-breaker, the partners will just have to break the deal. Otherwise, they should be trusted to negotiate their own relationship without anyone accusing the asexual partner(s) of spoiling it.
What about asexual people who are very sexually appealing but unavailable? Are they really “teases?” Say, if they don’t want sex, why the false advertising? Why try to look attractive? Why wear nice clothes or care about aesthetic standards if anyone who propositions them is going to get shut down? What a cruel thing to do!
First off, people who are married or in serious relationships and are monogamous—in other words, off the market—aren’t obligated to immediately do everything in their power to look disgusting. There is so much more that goes into looking aesthetically pleasing in our society besides that which has to do with sex. Many people feel more confident when they feel they look good, and even those who are not particularly interested in physical appearance will still usually care about hygiene. It’s inaccurate to claim that looking good only functions to attract mates or that those who don’t want mates are sending out misleading signals.
People do not present themselves according to socially acceptable aesthetic guidelines solely to attract mates or keep existing mates happy. Most people do not make a conscious decision to avoid hygiene or flattering clothes based on a belief that they will not see potential mates or existing mates that day. Appearance is used to judge people for many other reasons besides sexual interest.
This also is aimed at women and those perceived as women much more often than any other gender and is sometimes framed in a way that sounds like shaming: namely, if a woman doesn’t go out of her way to avoid someone being attracted to her (or she does wear flattering clothes or makeup), she owes people who are attracted to her some kind of follow-through. If she replies that she’s not interested, she is perceived as reneging on an understood contract. No one should tell anyone that they’re doing something unfair or inconsistent if they look nice but they refuse to consent to sex.
Don’t Asexual People Need to Procreate?
“Then what’s your purpose in life?”
Some people have a hard time imagining how a person could want anything out of life or have any passion for anything if they aren’t interested in getting a partner, enjoying a partnered life, or having children. Suggesting a person has no purpose if they aren’t interested in procreation is very dismissive and offensive.
“But if everyone was like you, you know there’d be no more babies, right?”
Reproduction is completely irrelevant to a conversation about asexuality. Some asexual people still want to reproduce (and can do so), but beyond that, asexual people are not advocating “conversion” to asexuality for everyone else. Clearly procreative sex is the most popular way children are brought into the world. It does not mean that every single person on the planet must have children.
Many societies generally accept birth control usage without attacking users as unnatural. People beyond the reproductive age who want to have sex aren’t unnatural. People who are congenitally infertile or became so through surgery aren’t unnatural for continuing to have sex, though some might treat them as if they have a debilitating condition or may disapprove of those who choose sterilization without having children first. But asexual people hear “that’s unnatural!” constantly. And even though babies clearly aren’t at the root of this accusation, “But what about the babies?!” has become a rallying cry for those who want to tell asexual people there’s something intrinsically wrong with them. Even if we intellectually decided not to have kids, our bodies should still want to, right? Why, it’s part of being alive!
The species isn’t about to die out due to low birth rate. There is no reason to harass asexual people if they fail to reproduce just because reproduction is important to the continuation of the species. Variants have always existed in every species, and if they do not contribute to the destruction of the population, the variants keep popping up. From an extremely narrow biological perspective, an individual organism is not successful if it cannot grow to adulthood and reproduce. But since the species does not define its overall “success” simply through reproduction—and since nurturing and protecting other members of the species is also necessary for the species’ survival regardless of whether an individual reproduces—there is no need to chastise asexual people for failure to reproduce as though they are traitors to the species.
“Motherhood isn’t natural, ‘amazing,’ or inevitable for all women. It’s viable for men to have other outlets of creation—novels, music, scientific discoveries, and it shouldn’t be any different for women. I don’t think having biological kids is out of the question for me—maybe a physical struggle will be preferable to a bureaucratic struggle if and when I do decide I want kids. I can guess why ‘your own kids’ are so important to people . . . sort of . . . but I don’t feel it viscerally. Maybe I never will, and that’s just fine.”
—ILY, ASEXY BEAST
Many asexual people still want children. Many opt for the same types of procedures that are available to partners who can’t procreate with each other and people who can’t or don’t want to create or carry children. And some asexual people are willing to have sex for procreative purposes, just like one doesn’t have to enjoy the process of IVF implantation to be willing to undergo it for purposes of getting a child. Sexual attraction isn’t necessary to go through with sex. Sometimes the desire for a child is stronger than the disinterest or possible revulsion that some asexual people feel toward sex.
To sum up, a) “but sex makes babies!” is neither a compelling reason to have sex nor a revelation for asexual people; b) asexual people aren’t a threat to others’ sex or baby-making; c) the world population does not need a boost; and d) asexual people can have babies if they decide they want them.
Do Asexual People Hate Sex or People Who Have Sex?
Asexual people don’t automatically think everyone else is an animalistic lower life-form. Asexual people don’t all think non-asexual people or their activities are disgusting. Identifying as asexual doesn’t include a moral judgment against sexual activities. Asexual people aren’t identifying as asexual as a way of saying they’re better than others.
Most asexual people support everyone’s freedom to pursue sex responsibly however they like—as long as not pursuing sex is also considered acceptable. Normally their only negative feelings on the subject are directed toward those who won’t stop harassing them to pursue and value sex the same as most of the rest of the world. Some asexual people might recognize that critics think they’re helping, but sometimes asexual people’s annoyance toward or criticism of people who try to “help” them this way can be misinterpreted as disgust for or hate toward people who experience sexual attraction or sex itself. That’s not the case.
The asexual population does contain occasional elitists who will look down on others for what they believe and practice about sex, but that is just as likely to come from people who do experience sexual attraction or do have sex but make different choices about it than whoever they’re judging. It’s not inherent to the asexual “lifestyle” that they want to shame people for having sex, or for liking it, or for being sexually attracted to others. And while many asexual people can’t understand that drive everyone else talks about, it doesn’t mean they’re judging everyone else negatively for it.
Actually, some asexual people celebrate sex—up to and including engaging in it themselves despite lack of sexual attraction. Some asexual people write stories or produce art depicting sexual situations and/or nudity. Some asexual people have no problem with consuming media that contains sexual content. They do not have to be attracted to other people to appreciate or create positive portrayals of these relationships.
This can be especially difficult to explain if an asexual artist does create sexually explicit material, because people want to know whether they’re creating this because they secretly desire it. Or they might reverse the issue and suggest asexual people have no business creating this media—or that they can’t be good at it—if they don’t have personal experience. What artists choose to make art about has absolutely no bearing on what they’re attracted to or what they might want to experience themselves. Art can be used to express personal desires, but no one should assume someone must be doing so if that person depicts experiences or images contrary to personally expressed desires, and no one should use a person’s artwork or subject matter to invalidate claims.
Asexual artists cannot be restricted to creating media that is devoid of sex. Asexual artists know and accept that most people are attracted sexually to others, so if they want to write realistic books or movies, they generally have to create at least some of their subjects with that dimension attached to them.
Some asexual people make sexually explicit statements, have “dirty” minds, or laugh at sexual humor. This can cause some bewildered observers to protest, “Wait, I thought you were asexual. You’re supposed to think sex is gross or dirty. If you’re laughing at that joke or want to see that movie, how can you be asexual?” Appreciation of jokes, language, and sexual content does not indicate a brain primed for sexual attraction. Asexual people are just as varied on this point as the general population; some appreciate sexual humor or make sex jokes or can pick up on sexual undertones, and doing so does not undermine their claim to being asexual.
Similarly, no one should assume it’s necessary to censor themselves in front of asexual people. If anyone—asexual or not—asks to avoid certain topics, it’s best to respect them. But it’s unlikely that casual mentions of sex will disgust someone’s asexual friends and family, and explicit discussions of sex are probably something most people should get the okay for when having them with anyone. Asexual people are not disgusted by the fact that others have sex (at least, not as a rule), and they don’t need language filters to protect their supposedly virgin ears. If a person wants to know how a particular asexual person feels about this subject, they should ask instead of assume. Taking it for granted that asexual people would be horrified has a “let’s not talk about this in front of the children” feeling and may seem condescending to asexual people.
Please note that while some asexual people proudly associate with the sex-positive movement, there are also plenty of asexual people who may not hate sex, but do not identify as sex positive. Some feel that sex is something they just don’t want to be involved in or be exposed to, and quite a lot of people—including people who aren’t asexual—have plenty to say that’s critical of sexualized culture. These perspectives are also valued, and it’s not elitist or shaming to suggest taking a good look at the damaging messages frequently hammered home by pervasive and compulsory sexuality in society. Some folks just want nothing to do with it, and some others would resent being told that sex positivity is required.
There are sex-neutral, sex-nonjudgmental, and sex-averse people in the world who are alienated by (or at least not automatically supportive of) the overtly sexual nature of some sex-positive rhetoric and outreach, and this attitude does not make them anti-sexual or elitist. It just means they don’t personally relate and don’t want to be forced into celebrations of sex as if to prove they’re not against it either.
Occasionally, asexual people (especially those just coming to terms with their identity) celebrate their asexuality in misguided ways, and so unfortunately there is sex shaming, sexuality shaming, sex drive shaming, promiscuity shaming, and sex-worker shaming in the community sometimes. Some asexual people engage in this behavior as a way of striking back at a culture they feel has hurt them, rejecting the shame they’ve been subjected to for failing to conform to compulsory sexuality and “reclaiming” their pride through moralistic claims. Most asexual people who go through this phase eventually realize they don’t have to attack sex for their own asexuality to be acceptable.
However, sometimes this anger and elitism is interpreted as the reason behind their asexuality. They’re just angry at sex, some say, or angry at being left out. The asexuality itself is interpreted as a pretense to cover an asexual person’s frustration or hatred, and it’s assumed that they’d start feeling sexual attraction in a more normative fashion if they’d just stop being so angry. This is yet another way asexuality can be invalidated: if it can be recategorized as a lack of interest that grows out of a maladaptive attitude toward sex, asexuality doesn’t have to be considered as an orientation.
Angry, elitist, and sex-shaming asexual people do exist, but their attitudes are not representative of the community, nor are these attitudes part of what defines them as asexual. Asexual communities often challenge their members’ expressions of elitism and shaming toward non-asexual people where they occur.
Should Asexual People Get Therapy to Be Fixed?
“But orgasms are wonderful!” “But I have such a connection with my wife when we make love!” “But you’re missing out on so much!” “How could you not be curious about this and want it for yourself?” “If you have no interest in the best thing in the world, you should really get help. . . .”
Some asexual people like orgasms and pursue them in various ways available to them, and they still identify as asexual because arousal and satisfaction are not sexual attraction. Also, asexual people tend to hear a lot of “I’m sorry I’m having so much trouble with this, but you see, it’s just that I’m a very sexual person!” Followed by stories about how satisfying sex is. The problem is that telling asexual people how great sex is smacks of talking down to them—like they are missing something vital and are deserving of pity.
Most asexual people don’t react to others talking about sex with stories about how great asexuality is. Abstinent asexual people could theoretically go on for hours about how great their lives are without having to worry about sexual escapades, and non-partner-desiring asexual people can brag all day about how they don’t have to worry about all the ins and outs of the dating game. It still wouldn’t be right for them to say “Shouldn’t you get therapy to help you see how blissful this existence is?”
“But I just want you to be happy.”
Most people understand that imposing their own desires on other people against those people’s will is not about making those people happy. People who say this, or do this, are communicating that asexual people don’t understand happiness and can’t actually be content. Everyone should trust them to describe their own feelings, not attempt to impose their own. One thing that tends to make asexual people unhappy is that other people feel the need to try to fix them, and it does cause stress.
If someone has trouble understanding how it could be wrong to encourage an abstinent asexual person to “open” to sexual experiences, that person should think about how they feel when they’re offered unsolicited advice to an end they aren’t interested in. Like if the waiter doesn’t believe someone will like the meal they ordered and repeatedly insists that they should try his favorite dish (ultimately bringing it and charging them for it). No one should badger an asexual person to change and say it’s for the sake of their happiness. Those who won’t stop trying to change content asexual people are usually much more upset about the situation than the asexual people are.
As for whether asexual people need a counselor for anything sex-related that should be “fixed” . . . first off, strangers and acquaintances shouldn’t bring up another person’s mental health in a casual conversation. Secondly, this suggests asexual people should be trying to figure out what’s “wrong” with them and working through trying to “fix” themselves so that they will either want sex or tolerate it. So they can be “normal.” People who aren’t straight have sometimes had to deal with this as well, though nowadays it’s less likely that a gay, bisexual, polysexual, or pansexual person’s decision to go to a mental health professional will lead immediately to “let’s figure out what stopped you from being straight and try to reverse it.”
Unfortunately, the outward “symptoms” of asexuality could still be considered a mental disorder in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders,[20] and sometimes mental health professionals do believe the asexuality is a symptom even if the asexual person in question is getting help for something unrelated to that. If a physical or mental health practitioner is not informed about asexuality, they could easily misdiagnose an asexual patient and fail to help at best or actively damage the person at worst (all at the expense of the asexual person’s time, money, and well-being).
“But I’m just trying to help you.”
It doesn’t feel like “help” if someone is pushing their own philosophy on someone else. Chances are, if someone has declared that they’re asexual, they like themselves that way and they aren’t going to be enticed to “change” because someone keeps expressing how concerned they are. This is especially suspicious for those who are not particularly nosy about any other aspect of the asexual person’s health. If someone develops a fixation with whether an asexual person’s sex life looks enough like their own out of pure concern for their health and happiness, it seems odd they’re not concerned with other aspects of the person’s health. Perhaps if someone’s really concerned about health, they should also be asking for updates on their bowel movements or monitoring their water intake (Anybody who’s asking these questions and is not a medical professional doing it in a medical context, please stop being creepy.).
“Well, are you sure you’re actually asexual? Have you been diagnosed?”
Some people think asexual people can’t actually be asexual unless a doctor has certified it. This is the only way some people can accept that something unusual is real, but doctors can’t diagnose a sexual orientation. No one is diagnosed as straight by a doctor. It won’t show up on a blood test or be confirmed by a brain scan. It is supposed to be subjective.
And on the subject of doctors, be advised that there isn’t a pill to fix asexuality either. There is a pill for erectile dysfunction and/or medical interventions to result in increased libido, but as mentioned before, sex drive is not sexual attraction and nobody who’s being supportive should suggest asexual people need to be medicated for asexuality.
The diagnosable disorder hypoactive sexual desire disorder sounds a little like asexuality on the outside; it’s defined as “persistently or recurrently deficient (or absent) sexual/erotic thoughts or fantasies and desire for sexual activity.”[21] For a diagnosis to be made, the current Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders stipulates that the sufferer must be troubled by the symptoms. However, a previous version of the DSM allowed patients to be diagnosed with HSDD if it caused “interpersonal difficulty,” and some have said if this causes friction between an asexual person and a partner, it also counts as “marked distress.” Because of this (and a few other criticisms), this definition of HSDD has been criticized, and arguments were made in favor of recognizing asexuality as a sexual orientation in the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.[22] An exception for asexuality is now specifically mentioned, which should function as a heads-up for not only mental health professionals, but also for those who try to mimic them in “diagnosing” others.
Those who want to be supportive of asexual people should avoid telling them to look for a different way to approach their sexuality and their relationships. If someone is unhappy with themselves, it’s their responsibility to change it, and unsolicited advice in this area is unwelcome.
However, if they do want to pursue therapy or psychological counseling, asexual people can sometimes benefit. If an asexual person wants to see a counselor or mental health professional for a reason that might involve disclosing their sexual orientation, they should do some homework on their therapists and possibly come prepared to educate them. Sometimes professionals who have a background in LGBTQ and/or gender subjects can be more open to respecting asexual clients’ orientation, but in this field, ignorance and invalidation are disturbingly common. If interviewing them first is possible, it is recommended.
An asexual person can be most comfortable in therapy if they know their sexual identity is accepted and will be fostered, not suspected as a symptom or treated as an illness to cure. Asexual people can ask their therapists to consult the current version of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (the DSM-5) and point out that asexuality is considered an exception to sexual arousal and desire disorders, and they may benefit from bringing in recent scientific research papers for their therapists to read (Some research links are provided in Part Six of this book.). This helps signal that other medical professionals are taking asexuality seriously and they might want to do some independent research on the topic themselves if they want to be in the best position to treat an asexual client.
That said, pursuing therapy or counseling should be consensual; no one should pressure or make demands of an asexual person to go to a professional and “get fixed.”
Aren’t Asexual People So Lucky to Have Simple, Uncomplicated Lives Without Sex?
As is probably clear by now, asexual people’s lives are far from uncomplicated. It’s true that sexual relationships and partnered relationships add complications and stress to life, and sometimes when these stressors feel overwhelming, some might idealize those they perceive as free from these pressures. Mustn’t their lives be so idyllic and carefree? They probably have as few problems as little children without the adult worries of sexual relationships and pressures hanging over their heads, right? Well, not exactly.
Asexual people who want partners have their own hoops to jump through, trying to negotiate atypical relationships that are anything but simple. They face the rarity of asexual partners versus the difficulty of compromising with non-asexual partners.
Non-partner-desiring asexual people, conversely, have to face a world that tells them their happiness as a singleton is erratic, unnatural, and alien, which often leads to those in their lives pressuring them (sometimes violently) to accept romantic and sexual attention. Aromantic and non-partner-desiring asexual people are often treated as though there’s something deeply wrong with them, and people who present themselves as potential partners sometimes refuse to process these folks as unavailable since they’re not “taken” or partnered. When their friendships are their most precious relationships, they are often dropped or demoted in importance if their partner-desiring friends get significant others, and they sometimes struggle with feeling like they can never be important enough to anyone.
Asexual people live in a world that defines the way they pursue intimacy as aberrant and often treats them poorly because of it. Finessing relationships of any kind is difficult for those whose situation is considered inconceivable, worthy of interrogation, pathological, or in need of rehabilitation.
“For a long time I thought I was aromantic. I was looking at the translation of romance the world was showing me and I thought, ‘I don’t want that.’ It took me a while to realize that just because I didn’t want that—dinner dates and kissing in movie theaters—didn’t mean I didn’t want something. I had to reprogram myself, so to speak, and re-create what romance and relationships meant to me, not what they were supposed to mean.”
—AUDACIOUS ACE, ASEXUALITY UNABASHED
Furthermore, asexual people’s feelings are as nuanced and their lives as full as anyone else’s. Romance, partnership, and sex are not the only adult experiences that make maturity a more complicated place than childhood. Still, some people feel that these definitive relationships require a huge amount of time and attention, and often the pursuit or the negotiation of relationships is so time-consuming, exhausting, and frustrating—sometimes with little payoff. Since some asexual people don’t have to deal with it at all and many asexual people don’t have to deal with it in the same way, the situation sometimes inspires people who have these problems to naively say, “I sure wish I was asexual. My life would be so much easier.” Well, hypothetical person, you know not what you wish.
Many asexual people feel they are part of a misunderstood group. If someone says they wish they were asexual, they don’t know what they’re asking for, just like asexual people wouldn’t know what they’d be asking for if they said they wished they could stop being asexual. An asexual person becoming sexually attracted to others would bring on many new problems, surely; the asexual person would be exposed to all sorts of unforeseen and difficult-to-process aspects of relationships. The reverse is also true.
Asexual people have to navigate relationships differently, and they have to interact with the world despite living inside a sex-focused culture they often can’t relate to. It’s condescending if a non-asexual person tells an asexual person that they wish they were asexual because one of their problems would go away, without seeming to understand that it would also create problems. In a frank, friendly conversation, the pros and cons of asexuality can certainly be discussed, but some asexual people might feel infantilized if they’re perceived as innocent and carefree due to their orientation.
Some non-asexual people have even asked asexual people how to “become asexual,” often misunderstanding asexuality as a lack of sex drive. They may perceive their sexual urges as distracting or annoying or as leading them to experience heartache or make bad decisions. But asexual people can’t guide anyone on stopping their attraction experiences or changing their sexual desires, and even if they could, it wouldn’t necessarily make life easier. The “converted” person would have a different set of problems. Like living with all these misconceptions!
Interestingly, asexual people are often told their lives are so simple, but when they start discussing the intricacies of romantic orientations and types of attraction, they often hear the opposite reaction: “Stop overanalyzing everything! You don’t need to make this so complicated!” It’s only simple if it’s reduced to a sentence. Like any other experience, being asexual has many layers—and it’s complex when examined, like any other sexual orientation.
Shouldn’t Asexual People Let an Experienced Sexual Partner Change Their Minds?
One of the most frustrating misconceptions about asexuality is the widespread belief that asexual people must not have tried sex—or, similarly, must have tried sex with the wrong partner(s)—and that they can be “converted” through a good sexual encounter. Amazingly, a very high percentage of the people who come up with this one believe themselves to be just the one to carry out the experiment! What do asexual people have to lose by “just trying it,” right? Can’t those stubborn people just open their minds and let someone show them a good time?
Some asexual people have tried it. Some asexual people don’t want to for the same reason that many heterosexual people don’t feel obligated (or even able) to have sex with a member of their own gender to find out if they’re really straight. Asexual people don’t have to try sex to make sure they wouldn’t like it; whether they’re attracted to others is the basis of whether they’re asexual, and attraction tends to play a big part in most people’s choices of who to sleep with. People usually want sex long before they get it. It’s not common for a person to suddenly start finding other people attractive because someone gave them good sex.
“Even when it’s true that the individual in question might like sex if they tried it (in the right circumstances), telling them that they can’t know if they’re asexual or not if they haven’t had sex simply isn’t helpful, especially as a response to someone revealing their asexual identity. People should never be made to feel that they need to have sex to feel normal. Ever. If they don’t want to have sex, they don’t have to have sex. Also, asexuality isn’t about not liking sex; it’s about not experiencing sexual attraction. People may not be able to know if they like sex or not without trying it, but they can know if they experience sexual attraction or not.”
—ANDREW HINDERLITER, ASEXUAL EXPLORATIONS
No, sex with a talented partner is not going to flip a switch for asexual people’s ability to become attracted to others. And no, it’s not close-minded of asexual people to refuse to “try” a self-proclaimed master of the art. If, for instance, there’s a straight guy and his feelings about getting oral sex from a man can’t be described as “indifferent,” he may understand why he can’t expect an asexual person to “just try.” Some asexual people aren’t only expressing that they aren’t excited about or interested in sex; some are actually repulsed by it (as many heterosexual people would be if the only sex available was with their own gender). No one should offer to try it with an asexual person as if it’s a favor to them for the benefit of their self-exploration, and no one should act like their unwillingness to have sex is an attitude problem.
Unfortunately, many asexual people feel pressured to go through with it even if they really, really don’t want to . . . because they’re told over and over again that something worthwhile and fulfilling and beautiful is waiting in coitus, and they’re told they “just can’t know” until they do it. What if they do try it, still don’t experience sexual attraction to others, and realize they were right about themselves in the first place? Do critics nod and finally agree that they did everything reasonable to make sure they were really asexual, and finally start accepting the orientation?
Of course not. Asexual people then hear “If you tried it once and didn’t like it, try again! You did it wrong, or with the wrong person! You didn’t give it a chance!”
“I didn’t enjoy it because I don’t enjoy sex with people I’m not attracted to” does not exist to these folks. That just doesn’t compute.
Some people who say this are assuming asexual people tried and had a bad experience, which led them to conclude once and for all that sex was not worth it. The first problem with this is that sexual attraction is something people usually experience before ever having sex for the first time, and they don’t have to prove that they’re feeling it or get “switched on” to the idea despite having no inkling that it would feel good. They’re compelled by sexual attraction. Asexual people are not. Trying it anyway isn’t going to change whether they’re attracted to others, though it may help them understand what they’re willing to do sexually.
And the second problem with this is that trying “again” still isn’t going to satisfy anyone who says this. If an asexual person tries a second time, a third time, a fourth time to like sex and they fail, they will continue to be bombarded with suggestions that they try a different partner, a different gender, a different position, a different time of the month, whatever—as long as they keep trying until they like it. This is absurd because, again, a negative can’t be proven.
Lots of people enjoy the idea of making an indifferent or even a gay person realize how great heteronormative sex is, after which, of course, the “converted” will thank the “converter” profusely for the eye-opening, transformative experience. People love thinking that they’re so good at sex they could even make an uninterested person crave it. And this, yet again, is a symptom of ego—this “experiment” would not be for the benefit of the asexual person, but for the purpose of fueling the other person’s self-esteem and feelings of accomplishment, as well as confirming their preconceived ideas and narrow perspectives. Again, it’s about them, not about the asexual people.
Asexual people would really rather their experiences be about themselves.
1Community Census. (Asexual Awareness Week, 2011).
2When both asexual and non-asexual people had their functions measured while watching a film: “There were no significant group differences in the increased VPA and self-reported sexual arousal response to the erotic film between the groups” (Brotto & Yule, “Physiological and Subjective Sexual Arousal in Self-Identified Asexual Women,” 2011).
3“[T]he findings suggest normal subjective and physiological sexual arousal capacity in asexual women and challenge the view that asexuality should be characterized as a sexual dysfunction” (Brotto & Yule, “Physiological and Subjective Sexual Arousal in Self-Identified Asexual Women,” 2011).
4An imbalance, absence, or sensitivity/immunity to various hormones—androgens (testosterone, androstenedione, dehydroepiandrosterone), estrogens (estradiol, estrone, estriol), progesterone, and prolactin—can affect sexual desire (Regan, 1999).
5“Sexual pain disorders include dyspareunia and vaginismus” (Phillips, 2000).
6Various chromosomal, hormonal, and anatomy-related conditions exist under the intersex umbrella. isna.org includes a list (Intersex Society of North America, 2008).
7“While asexuality has been persistently criticized as a damaging myth imposed on disabled people, individuals with disabilities who do not identify as sexual highlight the inseparable intersection between normality and sexuality” (Kim, 2011).
8“Many commonly used drugs can interfere with sexual function in both men and women, causing loss of libido, interfering with erection or ejaculation in men, and delaying or preventing orgasm in women” (Medical Letter on Drugs and Therapeutics, 1992).
9Community Census (Asexual Awareness Week, 2011).
10“[S]exual aversion disorder has many, often interrelated, causes. Incest, molestation, rape and psychological abuse are often factors resulting in a woman developing complete avoidance of physical intimacy and revulsion at the thought of sexual touch” (Banner, Whipple & Graziottin, 2006).
11“Social and sexual functioning are substantially disrupted immediately following the rape and tend to return to pre-rape levels after a few months, although sexual satisfaction remains low up to 18 months later” (Steketee & Foa, 1987).
12“[T]hose liking (or disliking) homosexuals or bisexuals likewise like (or dislike) asexuals” (MacInnis & Hodson, 2012).
13“Now to the unmarried and the widows I say: It is good for them to stay unmarried, as I do. But if they cannot control themselves, they should marry, for it is better to marry than to burn with passion” (NIV: 1 Corinthians 7:8-9).
14On why Paul, who remained celibate, recommends marriage for those who desire sex: “I say this as a concession, not as a command. I wish that all of you were as I am. But each of you has your own gift from God; one has this gift, another has that” (NIV: 1 Corinthians 7:6-7).
15“[I]f one’s healthful condition, integrity of heart, and peace of soul reside in celibacy then that is better for him, since these are things that are desired of marriage. If one can reach these without marriage then celibacy causes no harm” (The Sustenance of the Hearts (Qut al-qulub) —Abu Talib al-Makki).
16“Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth” (Bereshit 1:28).
17“Every man is obligated to marry a woman in order to reproduce. Anyone who is not having children is as if they were killers” (Shulhan Arukh, Even Ha’Ezer 1:1).
18“It looks like such a dodge from outside. I know from experience, and I know from giving people advice about their sex lives for thirteen years, a lot of people are deeply conflicted about their desires, and a lot of people are really conflicted about their sexual orientations, and for a lot of these people it’d be easier just to not have a sexual orientation. It’d be a great escape to say ‘oh, I’m not gay, I’m not a lesbian, I’m not bi, or my heterosexuality’s so disturbing to me because my kinks are this and this and this, that I’m just asexual, I’m NOTHING.’” —Dan Savage, as quoted in the documentary (A)sexual (Tucker, 2011).
19“Studies have demonstrated an association between depression and diminished libido in addition to sexual dysfunction that can occur as a side effect of many antidepressants” (Miller & Hunt, 2003).
20Hypoactive Sexual Desire Disorder: “Persistently or recurrently deficient (or absent) sexual/erotic thoughts or fantasies and desire for sexual activity” (American Psychiatric Association, 2013).
21Diagnostic Code 302.71 (American Psychiatric Association, 2013).
22“Asexuality raises questions concerning the role of ‘personal distress’ in defining sexual desire problems” (Prause & Graham, 2007).