#idk what every other ace person is doing but even when i was sex repulsed i still thought about it

[freakcliff]

people are always asking things like "what are ace people spending all their time doing if not thinking about sex" and the answer is that i am in fact thinking about sex just intellectually. its a really fascinating topic tbh

[killshopdeluxe]

purity culture thoughts (some gripes) (light cw for mentions of sexual assault)

Once again prefacing with the “these are just my own personal thoughts I wanted to share on my personal blog; I’m not arguing with anyone or trying to drop a hot take” disclaimer LOL

But purity culture discourse has reached such unhinged levels where I keep seeing people fail to realise that “censorship and punishment of expression, even sexual or transgressive expression, can toe the line into fascism” and “exposing nonconsenting parties to overt sex acts in public is rude” are statements that can and should coexist 😭  Like there should be proper times and places for things, the problem is some people want those times and places to cease to exist…

I saw this post earlier and agree with OP and the QRT like.  Making a joke about feeling personally uncomfortable seeing people heavy petting on a public train is not a ‘slippery slope’ to wanting to criminalise having sex?!  And there was that one batshit post on this site going around where OP was asking why public sex was wrong and genuinely thought “exposing unconsenting parties, who could even be children, to sex, is violating” was a bad argument…  Like guys, willfully exposing children to sexual material can constitute CSA…

IDK I have strong feelings about this cuz of my own experiences growing up—adults/seniors showed me things I shouldn’t have seen and then convinced me it was normal and aspirational and I should ‘explore’ my sexuality more and if I wasn’t I was a prude/enforcing gatekeeping (a mentality that lead me to getting raped + forcing myself to engage with harmful situations + being too open about personal info online as a teen =__=).  

By all means, sex and sexual expression/exploration should be normalised, but I feel like some people have a mindset that this means like…  Making every space a sexual one, insisting that people who are uncomfortable or don’t want to engage with sex are repressed prudes who are part of the problem…  When in reality it just means education should be readily available, people should have spaces where they can explore and be themselves, and sex/sexuality shouldn’t be punished for merely existing.

And that last point I feel like should include everyone’s various relationships with sex and sexuality?  The focus should be on preventing harm, so as long as no one is harming others, they should be able to explore how they’d like—and BOTH policing who people love or what they wear or what they like to create or where they like to spend their time AND exposing unconsenting parties to lewd acts or insisting their discomfort (a feeling, not an action) is wrong are harmful.  These things can coexist!

Sometimes I feel like the prude-shaming mentality can be harmful to people who are on the ace spectrum, sex-repulsed, have sex trauma, or just like.  Have more reserved/modest proclivities (could be inherent or could be cultural, and in the latter case, criticism can be racist).  A disinterest or discomfort with sex and desire to personally steer clear of exposure is not inherently a desire to police anyone.  Actions > Feelings.

I feel like this much be such a terminally online people problem though since I know IRL—at least where I live aha—in the RACK/BDSM community for example, there’s knowledge on kink ≠ sex, but consent and clear boundaries are paramount in both.  It’s pretty understood that doing any sort of play in a public setting where onlookers haven’t consented to be in the scene is not good…  (Though, thinking about it, there is starting to be overlap…  Which I’ve seen firsthand cause problems cuz terminally online people will try and police members of the community, often older and more educated ones OTL)

Anyway this got long and winding and rambly, but just as someone who is actually into kink/BDSM in real life (and exploring transgressive/taboo erotic works in fiction), BUT is also aspec and traumagenic sex-repulsed, the discourse often makes me like

THINGS HAVE NUANCE AND NOT EVERYTHING IS BLACK AND WHITE

(Closing disclaimer I’m just sharing my personal thoughts and not trying to argue with anyone or drop a hot take, but I’d be curious to hear other people’s POVs if they want to share!)

[roguelibrarian]

So about a million years ago (read: in August) I posted something about how I've been taking notes on the books I'm reading and do people want to see my patchwork stream-of-consciousness book reviews and the overall response was positive but then I just...didn't do it but now I am!

So, time for Book Club With Rogue, part 1

The book: Sounds Fake But Okay: An Asexual and Aromantic Perspective on Love, Relationships, Sex, and Pretty Much Everything Else by Sarah Costello and Kayla Kaszyca

EDIT: In addition to everything else I say in this post, the authors have revealed themselves to be raging antisemitic assholes (shocker, I know /sarcasm).

If those names sound familiar, it's because the authors host a podcast also called Sounds Fake But Okay, which I have not listened to.

I got this book from the library as part of my quest to read a bunch of this new slate of aro and ace nonfiction that's been coming out lately (pun intended) and boy was it a bad way to start off this adventure.

(just gonna say off the bat: CW toward the end of the post for racism and transphobia)

So for one thing, the authors state outright that this is not an "Ace 101" book and that's true, but only in the sense that they never go deep enough to even reach 101 level on any topic. Everything is touched on in the shallowest ways possible. Sometimes they'll wander closer to some deeper ideas and then drop them immediately. Throughout the book there are quotes from responses to a survey that the authors did, and these brief quotes from other people provide the deepest content you'll see in this book, but they're never followed up or expanded on. They're just dropped haphazardly into the middle of the page and immediately moved on from.

Idk imo it's just a little...Something that a bunch of random aspec people (their listeners, presumably) wrote the most substantial parts of the entire book for them, for free, but these two are getting all the credit.

This book is also so ace-centric. Aromanticism is discussed in every chapter, which is unfortunately more than I expect, but it's treated like it's inherently an extension of asexuality and not its own identity. Those survey quotes I mentioned above? Yeah, it took until halfway through the book for them to include a quote from an aro person. There's also no acknowledgement of the existence of allosexual aromantics or their perspectives on anything. And of course the only ace and aro experiences that are treated like they're meaningful and worth anyone's time are those of sex and romance favorable aspecs.

There's also this weird, almost proselytizing bit about polyamory and how everyone should do it because it's the best and heavily implying that anyone who says polyamory isn't for them just hasn't found the right way to do it. It was so uncomfortable.

There's this weird thing that's repeated throughout the book where the authors will criticize some some aspect of amatonormative society and then immediately be like "now we're not saying XYZ" when "XYZ" is something you'd have to be reading in extremely bad faith to think they were saying. One of the ones that made me want to hit my head against the wall the most was "One last time, we'd like to emphasize that we are not anti-romantic-sexual relationships - Kayla is literally in one!" (narrator voice: it was not the last time). The other was after a (pretty bad) explanation of the spectrum of sex/romance favorability/neutrality/aversion/repulsion. "The purpose of sharing this spectrum is not to indoctrinate the entire world into our system of labels." To which I say, why on earth would anyone, even the alloest allo to ever allo their way down allo street, think that it was? Literally what purpose does this disclaimer serve?

Like I get that aros and aces online have pretty much been conditioned to expect super bad faith readings of everything we say and try to preempt people yelling at us about shit they made up but...this is a professionally published aro and ace nonfiction book, not a tumblr post. The authors are well past the point of being beholden to whiny aphobes on the internet. It was all just so annoying and so unnecessary and they spent just as much, if not more, time going "we're not saying this" than they spent saying what they were actually trying to say.

There are also so many areas where it's very clear that the authors are either uninformed or under-informed about things that people holding themselves out as authorities on asexual and aromantic experiences really need to be informed about. One example is "There is, in fact, very little dialogue on what [legal standing for platonic partnerships] might look like, much less the impact it would have." There's actually a lot of dialogue on exactly that thing, especially in aro and ace communities, and it is weird that two people who've had a successful podcast about asexuality for years and now published a book about it don't know that. They also do the "gay marriage is assimilation" nonsense and claimed that Obergefell v Hodges "harmed" the "queer cause" with zero acknowledgement of context or why it mattered.

There was a whole chapter about asexuality and aromanticism and gender (well...really it was about asexuality and gender) and I was so brave about powering through it seeing as it was written by two white cis women. It wasn't quite as egregiously bad as I expected it to be but at best it was still like, White Feminist Baby Ace's First Analysis Of The Intersections of Asexuality And Gender.

There is zero engagement with race other than a weird moment of the authors being like "our cis white upper middle class families are super cool and progressive and accepting but look at all these examples of those other cultures being queerphobic."

And finally, there is the H*rry P*tter shit. It's clear from the references made throughout the book that both of the authors are avid HP fans. But that's not what irritates me (though imo that would be enough). No, what irritates me is that at the very end of the book there is this completely random, out of left field little essay about how "many trans people" have gotten "hope and comfort" from the HP books and R*wling's "views on gender" (yes, that is how they choose to refer to her violent transphobia and her leading the charge on attack after attack on trans people's right to exist and her repeated, direct harassment of trans children) don't "take away" from that. Again, the authors are cis women. This is part of a weird, shoehorned-in, completely random bit about how "it's okay to like problematic media uwu" and it's like, even if you for some reason must write something like this into your book that has fuck all to do with this topic, it sure is A Choice for the example you reach for to be one of the most heinously transphobic (and racist and antisemitic and fatphobic and every other terrible thing) authors in the modern world. The whole thing really just came off as cis white girls getting defensive about their continued HP fandom and stomping their feet and pouting about even the hypothetical idea of someone criticizing any media that they like.

tldr - it was bad, 0/10 do not recommend, and definitely do not recommend for anyone who wants to learn more about asexuality or aromanticism

[barbierpt]

i'm reading ur blog like the morning paper and i'm just gonna take a moment to address that anon you got about being ace and sex-repulsed; i am also ace and sex-repulsed, but there is absolutely nothing forcing anyone to read other people's smut on the dash, especially if it's under a read more. you have to make a DELIBERATE choice to read through a reply or click the "read more" button—if you don't want to see it, literally all you have to do is scroll past and move on OR block the nsfw tag, because most people do tag their posts appropriately. it is very much a personal responsibility to not engage with things online that are upsetting to you, and if you choose to do so anyway, that's 100% nobody else's fault but your own. like what are you doing?? meticulously reading every smut thread you come across even though you're repulsed and then getting upset at the people who wrote it???? and if it goes deeper than that and just the mere thought of raunchy text being on your dash makes you uneasy even when it's hidden and you're not reading it, that sounds like a particularly extreme trigger that you cannot realistically expect people to cater to. if a group doesn't have smut banned, you're seriously wasting your time trying to ask them to change their rules and ban it for your specific comfort 😭

reading my blog like the morning paper askjagdak 😂 thank YOU anon for saying exactly what i was thinking on that but didn't quite know how to put into words at the time. all of this is 100% true. most people here are considerate enough to tag and hide smut threads under read mores so if you're taking the time to read it... and then getting upset... that's on you. also as an admin myself, i'm not personally a fan of those members that come into the group and ask me to change the rules for their comfort. you joined knowing what you came into like...? idk what to tell you.

[thoughtfulpaperback]

SOMETIMES I FEEL LIKE THERE'S SOMETHING WRONG WITH ME ....

Excuse the all caps, I'm not meaning to shout or depress anyone, but for me sometimes being ace feels like being a little broken

Why? Not because of the things that others might assume.

I feel like I can do most "normal" things okay.

My friend wants to talk about relationships or sex. "PFFT! No problem!" I am not uncomfortable with it.

I may not understand all the feelings she has in terms of craving sex or even shame associated with sex, but I'm always happy and curious to hear her thoughts.

But sometimes people (friends and family) just say something that makes me feel like I'm wrong or something-at least-is wrong.

Sometimes it's the standards

"You'll change your mind when you meet the right person!"

"You just have to meet the right person."

"You haven't really tried dating or relationships, so you won't really know until you do."

"Are you a lesbian and you just have a lot of shame around that?"

"You probably have a lot of religious shame around sex and your body."

All of which drive me crazy and have me like ....

But sometimes my rational brain takes in their arguably rational suggestions and that's what makes me feel like I am somehow wrong.

In this particularly often occurring and triggering situation. My friend thinks that I need to actually have sex to determine whether or not I'm interested in it.

It's bull crap! I know it is, but where she always gets me is when I start to justify myself and explain that even if I was interested in exploring whether or not the physical act of sex is something that I'd enjoy, I could personally never feel good about using someone or giving false hope.

I don't want to be with someone I don't know or trust just to get off to see I'd like it.

I do not want to date and then try it and end up giving someone false hope that I'd every want to do it ever again or that they somehow are the reason I'm not into it (if I'm not into).

I don't like the idea of having to sleep with multiple different types of people like the Goldilocks of sex to figure out if there is a just right situation or person for me.

The thought of any of those scenarios makes me feel bad. And I'm not talking about bad as in having compassion for the others bad. I mean, it makes that part under-my-sternum- but-not-quite-my-stomach feel like it's tightening and burning at the same time.

I hate that feeling.

But what I hate even more is that in theory her argument makes sense. If I'm not sex repulsed, which I am not. I feel more repulsed by the idea of emotional and physical intimacy and people than by the act of sex.

Then, it would make sense to indulge when I have the passing curiosity with someone who consents and 100% knows the situation than to pass on one (possibly enjoyable) aspect of the human experience.

....but I still don't like the idea and that is where this gets me everytime.

Because rationally I know I'm not wrong. I know that my feelings are valid and I don't have to try something that I am not comfortable with to decide if I'm actually comfortable with it or not.

I know that curiosity ≠ desire actual interest in engaging.

I know that I don't need anyone or anything to validate my sexuality or lack of interest in actually being with someone physically.

But idk...sometimes I end up feeling like I'm the one who is not being rational/reasonable and it would be easier just to do what everyone says because it probably won't do any harm.

And after that I just feel bad. Like down. Not the sternum/stomach bad.

[cornrowsandcornbread]

i’ve suspected i was asexual since last year when i realized that people literally got horny looking at strangers. i was so shocked! i have formally participated in saying comments about celebs like “oouuu they could get it (which i don’t do now)” because i just assumed everyone was using it to exaggerate how fine/beautiful someone was, not cuz they literally wanted to sex them up! when i realized that i actually felt kinda violated bc i was like “what if someone i don’t know has felt that way about me?” lol. and i’m alloromantic so i’ve had a few crushes in my life, and even then i was never sexually attracted to them. but bc i have an interest in having sex, and i watch “adult films,” (once again, i’ve never been attracted to the people in them. matta fact, most of the time i think they’re quite unattractive lmao) and i read explicit stories from time to time, i thought i couldn’t be asexual.

it’s bc i’ve always thought asexuality = sex repulsion, virgin, complete distaste for sex, sexual activities, and sexual conversations. and for many aces, that is what it means, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. tbh, in this very hypersexualized world we live in, i truly love that for y’all. but while that is what asexuality means for some, that’s not what it means for all. learning about the spectrum of asexuality “sex repulsion -> sex neutrality -> sex positivity/favorable” and learning that sexual attraction ≠ sexual action has been a great help. you could truly have sex with 1000 people in your life time, you could genuinely enjoy all 1000 sexual… sessions (idk how else to word it lmao), but if you were sexually attracted to none of your sexual partners, you’re just as asexual as anyone else. and that’s been very validating to learn. the definition of asexuality is little to no sexual attraction. like that’s it, there’s nothing more to it. another thing that kept me from realizing i was asexual is it always seemed like weirdo yt people shit. but black asexuals exist. and it’s not yt people shit, i mean last time i checked i was a nigga! the last thing is that i still like to do “sexual/sensual” things. like, one thing about me? i’m gon twerk! and i wanna be a majorette, a style of african american dance that can be pretty sensual, and ik when i finally get my dream wardrobe it’s gonna be A LOT of shirts that show lots of cleavage, and other things of that nature. like i thought that asexuality kinda meant that you don’t wanna show off your body or that you don’t like feeling sexy yk? or that you’re just an all round shy person but that’s not true at all. asexuality, like every sexual orientation, is not as strict as i convinced myself it was. idk i feel good right now knowing this about myself. and this is my only outlet for the time being. not that i can’t tell my family, i truly think they would support me and/or not really gaf tbh lmao. especially my sister who i suspect may also be on the ace spectrum by our conversations (she may not be full on ace but i think she’s somewhere on there), but i just don’t even know how to start the conversation so i haven’t. seems like something that’s a big deal to me but wouldn’t be a big deal to other people yk idk i’m just talking atp. anyways, NIGGA ACES EXIST! I AM ASEXUAL. I’M A SEX FAVORABLE ASEXUAL. I FEEL GOOD ABOUT THIS 👍🏽. THAT IS ALL

[incorrect-dishonored-quotes]

so i was going through some of the daud posts here and sometimes you ship him with ppl??? idk if you know this but that makes ace ppl really uncomfortable so if you could not do that thanks.

[For context, Daud is canonly asexual.]

Listen I'm ace. And rather a stereotype at that. I'm introverted, like space and cake, and I'm sex-repulsed. But not every asexual are these things.

Back in my day, circa 5 years ago, Asexuality was a spectrum, and news flash, it still is. The thing that I've noticed in the ace community is exactly what you're talking about. You're excluding people in your own damn community. There is one ace blog I still follow because of this. All the others started to slowly gatekeep, and although I'm still allowed in bc by sex drive is at a 0%, I do not count myself as part of their "community" because that's not what it is anymore. It's a bunch of gatekeepers with 0% sex drive, calling their old community members allosexuals (Those who experience the "traditional" type of sexual attraction.)

My advice? Follow other ace tags that are on the other sides of the spectrum. Look at other social media sites. Tumblr can really be a trash bin of unneeded discourse, and isn't always a great place for these things. Like, there are people on this site where I KNOW for a fact, they're gonna have a stroke if they go to a real pride bc they saw a masc person in a lesbian flag shirt. The "Pride" side of tumblr is slowly becoming narrow-minded and fighting with itself. But, what else did you expect when the terfs settle here and try the run the place?

As for the spectrum, here are the big players:

Asexual: An umbrella term, but also refers to those who experience no sexual attraction.

Gray-Asexual: Refers to those who feel very little sexual attraction.

Demisexual: Those who only feel sexual attraction after they've created a close bond to someone. This could vary from a couple of weeks, to months, or over a year.

Other Terms:

Aromantic: An umbrella term separate from Asexuality, but often overlaps in many. Refers to people who experience little to no romantic attraction on a spectrum similar to Asexuality. Common labels are Aromantic, Gray-Aromantic, and Demiromantic.

Alloromantic: Those who feel the "traditional" type of romantic attraction.

Sex Repulsed: Refers to people that are repulsed by the thought of engaging in sex with anyone. Asexuals are not the only ones that can be sex repulsed.

Sex Neutral: Refers to those that do not have a preference of weather or not sex is part of the relationship. This may or may not come with extra boundaries, such as how frequent sex is part of the relationship. Asexuals are not the only ones that can be sex neutral.

Sex Preferable: Refers to people that prefer to have sex as part of the relationship. Fun fact, humans are so dumb, evolution or god had to make sex pleasurable for us to reproduce. There are also many who believe that sex is way symbol of trust, vulnerability, and unity. Like any ideals, it is up to interpretation, so do not press these beliefs onto others.

Queer-Platonic Relationship (QPR): Refers to a deep-rooted, committed, platonic relationship. Though they are common in the aro and ace communities, anyone can be part of a QPR.

So what does this all mean for shipping ace characters? Is this an excuse for fanfiction? No! And even if it is, who the fuck cares? Demisexuals, gray-aces, sex nuetral aces, sex preferable aces, and alloromantic aces exist in real life, and are just a part of the Asexual Spectrum as a 0% sexual attraction, sex-repulsed ace like myself! Ace characters being in relationships do not erase their sexuality, just as it wouldn't in real life. Like I said, one day, you will go to pride and you will either understand or have a stroke. I wouldn't recommend the stroke, my grandfather had one, so I urge you to accept diversity in the LGBT+ community.

As for Daud specifically, it doesn't say in lore where he lands on the spectrum, so hc away. Throw a couple of terms in there. Be creative. Personally, I hc him as sex-repulsed and demiromantic. As a little bonus, I hc Corvo as demisexual, and even hinted to it in that CurnCrow fic I did a while back.

Happy Pride!

[scampfire]

Idk if my answers will contribute to anything, but this questionnaire seems fun so let's go

1. How do you identify?

I identify with the labels aromantic, alloaro, demisexual, greyplatonic/aplspec

2. How do you feel about the following

Romance: repulsed

Touching: I don't like body contact in general, but that's my autism, it has nothing to do with me being aspec

Hugging: that's okay as long as I'm asked first

Kissing: not in the face/ on the lips. Everything else is okay (except my chest. Trans guy struggle)

Sex: great I think. Ask me again when I'm not a virgin anymore

Love: I kinda relate to loveless people. I don't feel love for anyone, not romantic or platonic or queer platonic or anything else. But I love the whole world and nature and my fandoms and everything so much that I don't label myself as loveless.

Queer platonic relationships: awesome concept. But I dislike that (some) aro people now seem to have replaced romantic relationships with queer platonic relationships in an amatonormative way. That they praise qprs so much and think every aro needs one or wants one. Just recycled amatonormativty

A significant other: don't need one. It's fine when other people find joy in it, just not for me

One night stands: valid as heck. Nothing wrong with them. I fight everyone who says otherwise

Porn (video): my demi ass doesn't like naked people I don't know, so not for me. But I'm not against them, consume them if you want, or not when it's not your thing. You can do whatever you want forever

Smut (written): smut is awesome. It's not easy to write good smut, but when you have the required skill you're basically a god

Dates/Dating: I don't date. And I don't understand the difference between dating and just hanging out. Someone explain to me please

3. What is one thing most people misunderstand about your identity?

I don't talk about my identities that often. But you can't look at my labels and know what's going on inside me, so I guess that could confuse people. Like, I'm aplspec but still want a friend with benefits. Technically I'm demi, but I still find people attractive after a few hours of knowing them, so I consider myself also alloaro. I'm aromantic but Love shipping. So I'm more complex than you'd think I guess

4. Have you encountered aphobia in your life?

I'd say no, but I encountered amatonormativity so much. Every person I'm out to supports me, but the amatonormative brain rot is real. So a person can support me, but still say it's valid that another person destroyed our plan to meet because she'll meet her girlfriend and romantic relationships are more important than platonic relationships. Why does relationship hierarchy even exist anymore

5. Anything else you'd like to add on the topic?

No hate against aces, but I'm tired that they overshadow every other aspec identity. It sucks that the aro tag is unusable when you don't want to consume ace content. It sucks that books about the queer community have whole paragraphs or even pages about being ace, but aros just get a few sentences. And it's often explained in detail that aces don't have to be aro, but we aros just get something like "oh and sometimes aros aren't ace" and then nothing's mentioned about alloaros ever again. Aces and aroaces are totally valid, and they deserve their communities and own spaces, but I just want a space for aros to exist without having to think or talk about asexuality. A space that's purely focused about being aromantic, and nothing else. I'm not even angry anymore, just so tired

The Aspec Questionaire

Aspec is such a vast category and one some folks (especially allo folks) tend to treat like a monolith. So I thought it’d be good to do a little questionnaire to demonstrate.

(Skip anything you don’t want to answer.)

1. How do you identify?

2. How do you feel about the following, one word answers are fine if you want:

- - Romance

- - Touching

- - Hugging

- - Kissing

- - Sex

- - Love

- - Queer Platonic Relationships

- - A Significant Other

- - One Night Stands

- - Porn (Video)

- - Smut (Written)

- - Dates/Dating

3. What is the thing you think most people misunderstand about your identity?

4. Have you encountered aphobia in your life?

5. Anything else you’d like to add on the topic?

[virtualcarrot]

@taunomorph

Alright, so, important disclaimer that this is my opinion, based on my experiences, and most of all influenced by my own issues.

For me, it’s a “weird weird” that could be fun but that I live badly. I’m terribly controlling when it comes to my own emotions and reactions. I manage them through repression, evasion and most of all diversion. I have experience with this, I’m comfortable doing it, it requires little second thought and I can usually bounce back in a way that looks easy from the outside. Seeing me, many people do not suspect what might lie behind and that is purposeful.

Sexual and romantic (to a lesser point because I was never Aromantic™) attraction are a pain in the neck to manage imo. Sexual attraction even more so because it’s mostly entirely new to me. I don’t know new. I don’t like new. I haven’t learned to master new by the very definition of its newness.  It’s a pull you gotta resist constantly, every day, and in the case of allosexual horniness, being away from people you’re attracted to doesn’t quite ease the feeling. You’re horny, okay. And you’re horny for OTHER PEOPLE. Doesn’t matter who. You have a mighty need.

That being said, I can absolutely see how a healthier relationship with one’s needs and emotions would make sexual attraction fun. Pleasant. It’s a good thing to have, if you have it. If you don’t... Eh. Not everyone likes coffee or idk, apples, it’s not a tragedy (unless you dislike chocolate that is just tragic)

The only thing I’d add is that: when you’re allosexual, it’s not as easy to go without sex as an ace person might think - as I used to think. We’re so exhausted by allos telling us asexuals are broken and defective that sometimes the discourse in the community veers the opposite way and accuses allosexuals of selfishness or exaggeration as to their own needs.

Sure, unlike water and food and breathing, you don’t need sex to survive, but it can be a very important thing and overwhelming need. Some allosexual people can perfectly manage to skip it when in a relationship with an asexual and/or sex repulsed person. But I’d definitely not demonize an allosexual who decides they can’t be in an asexual relationship. How they go about it is another issue. Otherwise, it’s one of those things that happen in a relationship : two people having opposing needs and wants and being unable to compromise. That’s life.

And on a final note: that is never in any way a good excuse to pressure an asexual and/or sex repulsed person into having sex. Of any way.

[izzyliker]

hey - this is one of the mods of the bi jon project. we don't actually dislike or disagree with pan jon at all, we just want to make a project focused on and celebrating bisexuality. our carrd is a bit rambling, but frankly we were trying our best/overcompensating to try and make sure people didn't misunderstand us and do - well, this. our intentions are good, and it's really kind of disenheartening to see all the hate we've gotten for what was meant to be a positive project. (1)

you're under no obligation to answer these, but i saw some of your posts in the tag and felt like reaching out because you did give us even the tiniest bit of slack in good faith. honestly, if you have any advice about what in our carrd is so overwhelmingly bad, we'd be happy to hear it. we've been trying to respond to the overwhelming amount of criticism we've got in a positive way, and take peoples' suggestions. (2)

as for why 'no anti-antis' was at the bottom of our rules list, it's legitimately bc we were trying so hard to be preventative about this negativity that we forgot to add it when we first posted the blog, and just remembered later. again, you're under no obligation to answer these, i just feel like no one's really actually letting us defend ourselves/are taking things in as bad faith a way as possible. (3)

im not exactly sure how the posts showed up in the tag bc ive been very purposefully not tagging them, also ive blocked all of you back (not sure why you blocked me if you actually want feedback, so it seems more like you just want free positive pr and not actual feedback) so its unlikely youll see whatever it is that i reply to this but whatever. 

the issues have all been repeatedly brought up to you so i dont really see how me repeating all of them once again could help. when i last looked at the cardd the things that stood out immediately included. 

pitting ace & bi identities and people against each other REPEATEDLY,  

starting off with a guilt trippy tone and maintaining it throughout (in my experience this is the #1 best way to receive backlash because people do not want to participate in events where you feel like youre being guilted into it, which going into scrutinizing detail over there not being enough content and passing judgement onto authors or artists over it is something that comes across as guilt trippy.),

repeatedly equating asexuality with sex repulsion (not to get into the misleading information about modteam aspec identity breakdowns, since you claimed that 3/4 of the team are aspec, which is technically correct, but what you didnt say was that only one is acespec. surely you know that [allosexual] aro and [alloromantic] ace are not interchangeable) and calling using biromantic over bisexual a “misunderstanding” of the identity as if how to define romantic vs sexual attraction (how to divide, if or if not to divide, use interchangeably different labels) isnt a deeply personal choice ace people who experience romantic attraction make, 

claiming that bisexual jon is canon (he isn’t. this is why people are suspicious of anti-other mspec identities sentiments. which theyre right, if youll be so kind as to stick around til the last paragraph) and repeatedly implying that the reason there isnt “enough” content centering bi jon because the aces are simply unable to not fixate on his asexuality (again, pitting identities against each other),

making the banned ship list way needlessly confusing and including ships that dont even include jon to it, which simply comes across as some kind of a list of bad ships, idk. a way to bypass this would simply be to say “we are looking for portrayals of healthy relationships!” and that couldve just been it. if you felt that that wouldnt exclude specific ships (eg. jondaisy that a lot of people write as a relationship between trauma survivors who have done very bad things trying to get better and learning to trust each other) it is possible to simply say “the modteam is squicked[/triggered] by ships with daisy/elias/peter and we’d like to read all of the works submitted so we’re asking not to receive submissions with those ships.” hating ships is literally completely normal but making rules hard to parse is going to attract questions, especially when the implication is that ships are excluded on the grounds of morality, and a blatant power difference ship (jonelias) is equated with jondaisy, which is from what ive seen almost exclusively shown to be a relationship between equals. that makes people EXTREMELY confused about where the line is. thats why youre getting so many questions about this.  

in general the carrd was spotty, guilt trippy, and needlessly moralizing where it definitely did not need to be. the key to getting people to engage without getting backlash is to make the event seem fun. when your carrd is filled with stuff about unrelated negative stuff people are not going to think it’s a fun event at all. 

and none of this even gets into the fact that at least one of the mods has a history of open hostility against pan people. i heard through the grapevine that he has since made a fauxpology about it, but frankly it already shone through in the language used in the event descriptions. its extremely hard to take any of this is good faith when it is easy to see that one of the organizers is quite fucking clear about thinking pansexuality is biphobic and the carrd is or at least used to be full of anti-pan (and other mspec identity) dogwhistles, and is notorious in some of the tma fic author circles for being extremely fucking nasty about trans men writing fic he doesn’t like to the point of pretending that we’re all cis people (in case youre not keeping track that is misgendering us by implication) because he doesn’t like it. i think some of you (or maybe all of you? idk) in general could stand to examine whether your engagements and participations in the fandom have been at all about having fun or adding positivity to anything, or simply making posts about what other people are doing wrong. it seems that every post i see from anyone in this group is guilt trippy and authoritative, and sadly this translated directly into the event. 

when youre, say, a trans man whose first touch to one of the mods was a post about how fic where trans men have piv sex with cis men is hurting him personally and making it a moral issue and not a matter of a simple preference to the point where he feels comfortable making claims about the trans men (and transmasc nonbinary people) writing fic about trans characters re: their gender or whether theyre fetishizing trans men, your willingness to engage in good faith with an event hosted by him that features numerous red flags is not going to be unconditional. 

im sorry to hear that it has been bad for your mental health, and idk whats fucking going on with this event anymore, but my good faith interpretations have diminished significantly since i saw the shit tmc specifically has been saying about pansexual people and pansexuality as an identity label. i have no clue where the rest of you stand but tmc has repeatedly, consistently shown himself to be unable to act in good faith towards anyone other than people who agree with him.  

[floxalopex]

Really small and silly thing of mine about Entrapdak sexuality headcanons, don't take it too personally in the slightest. I love every member who is part of this amazing fandom.

So, again I introduce myself: I'm made of autism, ADHD, body dysphoria, trauma and, they say, a bit of human flesh.

Stated that for me...

-Entrapta: demisexual demiromantic bi oriented, mildly in a demigirl spectrum;

-Hordak: demisexual demiromantic bi oriented, in a demiboy spectrum (although this is stronger here, he is very gnc/genderfluid).

I also like omni/pan oriented headcanons for Entrapta and AROACE headcanons for both.

As a demipansexual who thought 100% till 16 to be ace and who is slightely sex repulsed. Just this.

It's okay, to headcanon whoever with whatever.

I just think that Entrapta's being autistic (and Hordak is nd too fight me) has nothing, NOTHING, to do with her sexual orientation.

Idk how this is lived in other countries. I've seen so far that in other countries autistic people are considered inhuman->so aroace (there's no correlation with being human and liking sex at all cost) but in mine I've seen people thinking that "retarded people"->so autistic people too to them, are sex starved animals who, poor things, can't even control their bodily urges.

I don't think me being in the ace is a sign inconsistency, nor something that should be corrected. It's not "caused" by autism, maybe other things, but anyways it's here.

I understand that the majority of world population is allosexual. I mean, that the purpose of evolution isn't it? But aro and ace spectrum are, indeed, a spectrum.

Aros can fall in love. Aces can have sex and masturbate. Aroace people can have a family.

So when I hear:

"Entrapdak f**ck everyday" and "Entrapdak never do that, they don't even kiss much" to me they are BOTH, EQUALLY, VALID. They are headcanons and, according to my ideology of the "it's valid unless it blantly meets canon", they are both acceptable.

The aroace comunity keeps being erased from the LGBTQ+ comunity, sadly even by members of the said comunity AND the aroace comunity. They feel like not worthy of being part of the LGBTQ+ or something I guess. Not to mention how a "hybrid sexuality" such as mine is considered. Like, for some being pan is being desperate but being demi is being picky. So what am I? Desperatly picky? I was picky but now I'm desperate? I am picky only on Fridays or viceversa? *Spoliers: I'm a pancake*

It's hard to understand some sexualities, not to accept, mind you. That's something you should always do. I've questioned myself "what Is love" and thought "am I in the aro too?" but I don't think so. I don't understand much how would It feel to be aro, but at the same time I have things in common with It. See? It's complicated. And we, WE, queers know that.

So I understand if an autistic allo wants to headcanon them as such, but please don't say that it's ALWAYS ableist to headcanon a person in the ASD as aroace. Those people really exist.

And... that's It I guess.

[muselin]

This is strange asks anon

I have gotten a bunch but I delete most so here are two recent ones. I Made a post about intimate piercings (basically a MLT post) and someone ranted about *the germs* even followed it up with another ask that I didn’t publish where they tried to guilt trip me because I said something like “aren’t there more bacterial cells in your body right now than there are you cells?”, saying that I find them weird and made fun of them? Idk it was odd. Like, this was totally hypocritical but they took it why to serious 😔

Then someone send an ask announcing that they will no longer follow me bc I made realize that they are a sex repulsed Ace person and this was on anon so I have no idea why they would tell me?? My blog has like 450+ followers how would I know who unfollowed?? ^^;;;;

To answer some questions. We are not moots but we both share a moot so I see your posts on my dashboard sometimes.

As for audience and content, I write for stray kids and some of my stories did do pretty well (two of them even have like 500 notes with is a insane number for someone like me who used to write for smaller fandoms). I’m at university so I have time and do hang out on here (probably more than I should lol).

Last year I posted something every week but now I have a bit less time but more stress :( the other thing is most of my stories are pretty long (usually over 3k words) so they take a lot of time to edit. I keep track of my wips and I have like 80 k of unpublished, unfinished wips. rip me lol

Haha strange asks anon! I'll tag you as that then.

Tell you what, those people sound like some tumblr trolls. My policy with everything is: 1. Don't kinkshame 2. don't be abusive 3. don't be moral police over people's fantasies because what gives you the right over somebody else and 4. if you don't like something then don't read it and move on. I haven't experienced weird asks like that, just occasional hate ones that make no sense, usually when I've stood up for someone who's written something controversial and is getting kinkshamed or abused.

You have so much content waiting to go!! That's insane! That's a very different writing process to what I have, I post a finished fic maybe once or twice a month and usually only have one or two things in WIPs. I keep saying this, I don't believe I'm that creative as a person really, and if I had that many fics all going at once they would just get crappier.

I'm not being very useful again, I just don't know what the actual secret is to good content. I just do what I know, which is put out fics, do some ask games (like confessional monday) but not too often, read other people's stories and share what I like about them.

I'm curious who you are now, I might have read your stuff! If you feel like it, send me a message and we can talk some more. Or anon asks are also fine if you don't feel comfortable ❤

[watatsumi-island]

Hey so idk too much about the aro and ace spectrum. So can you educate me some more about aro/aceflux? I think it'd be cool to learn about it, especially bc media doesn't teach us shit and there's so many identities under Ace/Aro 💖

Oh, sure! I'd be happy to :)

-------

So first I'm going to start with Ace, since I am Asexual.

Some people just simply say that Asexuality/Being Asexual means that you you lack complete sexual attraction. Because of that definition, some people get confused when they hear about demisexuality, gray-asexuality and such, which is where we start talking about the Asexual spectrum.

For example, I'm Aceflux. Which means that sometimes my attraction fluctuates, but how I feel never leaves the spectrum. My sexuality doesn't change per say, it's just fluid.

So. Flat out Asexuality is never feeling sexual attraction towards anyone of any gender identity. Demisexuality is when you have to form a bond/friendship with someone before you begin to feel sexual attraction.

Lithosexuality is feeling sexual attraction, but not wanting it to be reciprocated. Placiosexuality is similar. But it's wanting to do sexual things with someone, and being okay if it's not reciprocated. (Tldr it's more about the action than a feeling) Aegosexuality is feeling a disconnect towards yourself and your sexual attraction, along with it's target. Etc, etc.

Those are many identities (and there are many more) and even among those, there are sex positive Aces (people who will have sex and are happy to and/or like to read about it), sex neutral Aces (does what it says on the can), and Sex repulsed Aces (They don't want sex at all/probably don't like reading about it either) Keep in mind that these are basic definitions, and different identities can mean different things for everyone. An Ace person might not want to ever have sex, but they like reading about it for whatever reason they have, etc.

Asexuality is again, a spectrum. But many people don't care. You'd think that "Hey I don't want to have sex with anyone" would make you the least controversial sexuality in the room, right? But no. There really are some people out there that would rather accept p*doph*les into the community than even one Asexual or any sort of A-spec. (true story, it happened to me) All the problems we face are ignored and treated lesser-than, heteromantic Asexuals are treated as if they're not even there, and popular media repeatedly bash us. Calling us "sick" and "attention whores" when we're just trying to live our lives peacefully and it hurts, tbh :/

-------

-------

Aromanticism by definition is the lack of romantic attraction. And just like Asexuality, there are a lot of identities under it. Asexual and Aromantic are...you could say umbrella terms, and then you have everyone under it. Something like that. Recently I've been questioning as to whether or not I'm on the Aro spectrum or not, and I'm leaning more towards that I might be. So I may be able to give you some perspective? But if you're not satisifed you can always ask someone who's completely sure that they are Arospec.

Demiromantism is when you need to have a bond with someone to feel romantic attraction. Gray-Aromanticism is when you feel it sometimes (but it tends to be rare), it sort of follows the same pattern as Asexuality in terms of the names of the identities, just replace the sexual with romantic and then you have your definition. (Though that's not always the case)

A lot of people think that Asexual and Aromantic are synonyms for each other, when in a way, they're the complete opposite. You can be Asexual and not Aromantic, you can be Aromantic and not Asexual, and you can also be both!

As an Asexual, I can sadly, but confidently say that Aromantics are potrayed even worse because. Well. They're not even there. Genuinely- I've never heard of an Aro character in a tv show, movie or book. At least one that I can think of now. At least, when Asexuals get represented, even when it's bad, at least people will know that we're there and might do research on it for themselves. But Aromantics? It's like they don't exist. I'm definetly not going to start a dumb oppression olympics with this, since both have it very bad. But in terms of rep, Aros tend to have it a bit worse.

When Aros are discussed, people protray them as these heartless monsters. Especially when a person is Aromantic and not Asexual, people might say that they "Just want sex and don't care about the feelings of others" which is not true at all. All the aromantic people I know are some of the most considerate people I've met, far from heartless monsters. And though I can't speak on behalf of every Ace or Aro person, I can say that we are all humans. And our sexuality has not and will not change that.

-------

The over all point is that Asexuality and Aromanticism, and just- sexuality in general is complicated. And if more people were like you and cared enough to learn more, then Asexuality wouldn't be so terribly represented. So, thanks for asking. And if there was something that I missed, you can always ask again. My askbox is always opened. <33

Also, side note. You can always follow @aro-culture-is and @ace-culture-is if you want to see some of the experiences of A-spec people, and you're welcome to do your own research if there's something I can't/haven't answered. 💖

[rosalesbeausderholle]

Different anon but what I've seen more often re: ace discourse is people stating that asexuals may choose to have sex because they like feeling close to their partner, even though they don't care about the act itself, which I'm kind of torn on-I don't think it's a great idea to suggest to people (esp young women) that sex doesn't need to be physically fulfilling. Otoh, I also think about stone lesbians, and how they enjoy giving to their partner without actually getting off themselves,

and I guess I'm not sure what the difference is there or why one would be inherently fucked up while the other isn't.

Oof so these asks have been sitting on my drafts for a while and I forgot to answer them, I'm very sorry. I've been a bit absent minded these past months.

I'm not stone so I can't answer for them but imo it's a different thing. Stone lesbians aren't repulsed by sex, as a whole, they like giving. That's sex that they enjoy. Them not wanting to be touched in certain areas and/or engage in receiving penetrative sex doesn't mean they are sex-repulsed as a whole. Repulsed/turned off by certain sex acts yes, but there's others they still enjoy, so it's not really a fair comparison because there is sex that they do actively want to have. I don't think stone lesbians (or any person who idk, doesn't like oral, doesn't like penetration, doesn't like their chest touched or any other sexual act) are having sex that they don't enjoy. Rather, they're having sex that they do enjoy on their own terms.

That's different than ace discourse tbh. If someone is sex repulsed as a whole, not by certain sex acts, but by every aspect of sex, it's incredibly fucked up that they feel that they must have it just to please their partners. That's coercive and misogynistic and like or not, an aspect of rape culture. Sure, not all the sex you have is going to be mind blowing, sometimes you won't be able to get off (that happens like when you're too stressed or for other reasons) and even with that sex can still be an enjoyable experience. But honestly, that shouldn't be the norm. If all the sex you have with someone fails to get you off and if you only have sex for someone else's sake... get the fuck out of that relationship right. now. Because you deserve better. Also there's ways to be physically close without sex if one party doesn't one sex. Cuddle, bath together, massage them, idk, but never ever feel you must be obligated to have sex you don't want, that repulses you, that may potentially traumatize you, for someone else's sake.

[afrosarah]

My own personal experience as it relates to that last reblog.. like, I identify very much with being aromantic asexual, but when I actually say that I'm aroace, I'm like, am I tho?? 👀

I feel as if I'm forever going to be second-guessing myself because due to nature of aromanticism itself I'm like ??? I honestly don't know what romantic attraction is even supposed to feel like. I have a terrible time separating my platonic feelings for my close friends from what would usually be considered romantic feelings or a desire for intimacy that goes beyond what is generally accepted as friendship-level, I guess.

Like, I highly doubt I actually want to pursue a romantic relationship with every single one of my good friends lmao. Before I figured myself out better, I had what were supposed to be sexual/romantic relationships and there was.. def an element missing for me that the other people were experiencing. So I'm confident I'm just very good friends with them, and that's just how I feel about friends. But how any individual experiences those feelings is like wildly different, you know?

I talk to some of my friends and I'm like.. do you ever think about your friends and you're just verklempt, you just want to scream or hit something, because you're so overcome with your love for them? And most of them are like "...nah lol" despite considering me one if their closest friends. And that's valid, too!

Idk. Then again I'm the aroace person that's kind of bad rep and thinks "QPR", while a valid label if you choose to use it, can just be.. friendship. I know that's what people say to mock or invalidate us, but I guess I just don't see the need for distinction either. The aro/ace community insists on trying to explain to allosexual and alloromantic people that platonic feelings are just as important and no less as romantic/sexual feelings, and I think assigning a different term to a certain kind of platonic relationship ("QPRs are not JUST friendships!") is completely hypocritical to that statement. Or rather, it can be, if that specific distinction is made. If there isn't a hierarchy to the depth of relationships, then I see no reason to separate them further. All the stuff people say might be part of a QPR is stuff that I, personally, would consider doing with a friend.

I'm rambling and off-topic, tho.

Idk. On various occasions, because I'm aroace, I've had people assume I'm sex-repulsed, I'm a virgin, I don't consume or create any NSFW content, I think intimacy is gross, I can't recognize romance/attraction between other people, that I can't recognize when a person is conventionally attractive, that I'd be unwilling to be in any kind of relationship.. so I guess what I'm trying to say is that it's good practice to only make a few surface-level assumptions about a person's identity based on their label.

[mcrmadness]

I think what the person meant by aroace and bi was a bi-oriented aroace.

Oriented aroace is aroace but the other types of attraction besides sexual and romantic are there and like a sexuality in a way. Like I'm ace but I still say I'm gay bc not only do I have romantic attraction to only men, but I also have aesthetic, sensual, ect attraction towards only men as well

So that persons attractions (besides sexual and romo) are oriented in a bi way

Idk if that made sense but I hope it helped

Ohhhh I see!

I just find it very confusing because personally I am able to divide attraction into 4 or 5 different ones: sexual, romantic, sensual and aesthetic. Of which I myself only experience aesthetic regardless of gender which is why I sometimes might use the word "pan-aesthetic" even. And then there is the fifth one aka platonic attraction which I still don't really understand what it means or feels like. I might be aplatonic too.

So when a term has the word -sexual attached to it, I immediately imagine it also means _sexual attraction which is why I find/found it so confusing because asexuality is the lack (or very small amount) of sexual attraction, so how can one feel and not feel sexual attraction at the same time? Unless their sexuality just is fluid, but I am not sure if there's also a word for that. Actually, I think there's yet another term even in the asexual/aromantic spectrums for this, but I have never heard anyone being both at the exact same time.

I have heard of the -oriented terms before, tho, and have seen people using them, too. They do make somewhat sense but at the same time not (for me, at least), unless it's someone who's maybe demi or greyace, as sometimes people also like to define their gender "preference" (if it's the right word) with these.

More about my personal experiences under the cut ↓↓↓

I guess my own asexuality and aromanticism just are so black&white for me that I find it really confusing when I see posts and terms where these things are basically all over the place. It's so difficult to put them in order in my head when my own order is way different and much "simpler". I cannot even compare sexual and romantic attraction with each other because I don't experience either at all. It's like trying to imagine something that simply does not exist at all.

I also don't experience sensual attraction because I'm touch-repulsed, but I can imagine that it probably feels a bit same as when I see a picture of a tiger and have an urge to pet. Aesthetic is just the urge to "stare", for me. Bit like sometimes I wanna stare at the orange SALE tags because they are so pretty and bright color it almost hurts my eyes. (Ummmm why do I have the sensual and aesthetic urge to do only things that could either kill me or then hurt my eyes??? ::D)

And platonic attraction makes maybe even the less sense for me of these all, especially because I understood that it and "platonic love" are quite far from each other. Or not far, but not linked the same way as e.g. romantic love and romantic attraction are to each other. There are also several different descriptions for platonic attraction, depending on whom you're asking from. But being aplatonic does not mean that one does not want to have friends, that much I know.

This is why I sometimes use the label "loveless aro" but I don't know if there's much or any difference between aplatonic and loveless aro, so I often use them both interchangeably cos I forget which one I like more :DD And whenever I'm confused by platonic attraction, I use 'loveless aro', and whenever I'm confused by loveless aros, then I use aplatonic... simple, but not really... :D

So basically if I was put mine as a list, it would look like this:

Asexual

Aromantic

Asensual

Pan-aesthetic

+ Aplatonic and/or loveless aro.

What I prefer to do is to just stop at that aesthetic/platonic state, and I don't want to start chopping these identities into microlabels inside microlabels as, personally, I don't feel like it serves any purpose for myself. Only exception being that loveless aro one, as it's main idea is that "love is not what makes us human" and it makes me feel better on those days when I start worrying about what if I am a psychopath for not feeling/understanding even platonic emotions.

And then of course I also use the terms sex-repulsed, romance-repulsed and touch-repulsed, but I don't think these have to be tied only to aspec identities. Especially touch-repulsion can simply be just a trauma related. I find it also highly unlikely that every single allosexual is "sex-favorable" even when they experience sexual attraction.

This is actually something I was already so annoyed by even back then when I found out about asexuality for the first time when I was 16 or 17 (it was in 2008), it annoyed me so much that being not-ace automatically meant (or still means) that every allo is sex-favorable.

Back then, asexuality also basically meant only these two: aromanticism + sex-repulsion. At least that's how it was understood in my country back in the day, or at least I understood it that way, as no one talked about romantic orientations yet.

I learnt about romantic orientations a few years later and finally things made even more sense - as for a moment I kept calling myself as "asexual bi". But turns out I was just aroace with ADHD and having people-hyperfixations on online friends! :D