Look at all these purples. No two are the same, even the similar ones are a little different from each other. That’s far more realistic then painting everyone with the same brush. You don’t gotta be the “darkest purple” to be a “”better”” asexual. Just be you, and you’re doing it right. There’s no hierarchy, no exact shade you have to match. All parts of the ace-spectrum are good. I’m happy you are here with all the complex details that make you you. – Rose
hi as pride month draws near for june reminder that cishet aces/aros are not LGBT and don’t belong in our spaces
And like, just a reminder that people like op are the people I don’t want to share my spaces with.
Every time I see an exclusionist on here and I click their profile they’re like 17 or 19 or maybe 21 at best.
And that’s fair- it’s not like people that age can’t have opinions or be right, they’re people.
But when I think about how long it took me to work out my own damn sexuality, gender, and all that crap, and how gently I stepped once I realised I was queer, and how much listening to people I did to see who the hell was out there…how much I am STILL learning about people who have different experiences…
…it feels really odd to see people this young being so secure in their belief of who should be excluded from the community.
Not how to support and include, to help and support, but how to exclude.
Like…being confident in your own sexuality at 19? Fuck yeah, good for you, I’m happy you had a better chance and an earlier start than I did.
But… telling other people they’re not queer enough to be in ‘your’ space?
Your space? Not mine anymore? Huh.
I’m over here at 35 still listening and learning and trying to understand everyone’s perspectives, discovering that sexuality is even more complex and nuanced than I know…and all these people barely out of their teens are talking like they know everything there is to know about being LGBT, ever. Like it’s all been written down, stamped, sealed, confirmed by some Authority.
Mmmm. No. Just… have an ounce of humility. Try gaining some perspective, please.
You haven’t lived long enough to even really listen to real life aces, to really think about what LGBT means. I don’t mean this as an ageist insult, I just really think that this kind of shit deserves TIME- hell I know it deserves time and thought because I am STILL unlearning bad assumptions and behaviours, and STILL meeting people who define themselves outside of the frame that I was once taught meant ‘LGBT’.
And you, a teen raised in a world that’s still pretty fucking homophobic and doesn’t recognise half of what the LGBT community itself has taken years to acknowledge, you think you know it all?
Because you’re online?
While you’re here, read some posts where ace people talk about how they’re treated. Forget semantics for a while: read the experiences.
I’m online too, I have been for some time. Doesn’t make me right, but experience is of some value. Experience in listening to queer people who aren’t quite like me, that is, in trying to understand how I am similar, instead of trying to figure out how they do not belong. In how people rework things, figure out how they can be less harmful, more inclusive, more representative of all those who are marginalised.
See, Q is queer but also often Questioning. It’s still important to let people be Questioning, there is an astounding amount of queerphobia in the world and we are NOT done working out the labels. We may never be.
Not so long ago, the T in lgbt was under question. Bisexuals are still being excluded.
So I’m being told I don’t matter by people who weren’t even born yet when I realised I wasn’t straight. They’re skipping right over all the reflection and going straight to self-affirmation by exclusion.
Which, again- if you are born into a world where you never have to question your identity, oh good grief I hope that’s real for everyone some day.
But we’re not there yet, yanno? And I resent being told that after all these years of soul-searching and careful, very careful questioning of whether I belong and how I can be a good member of the community, people arrive so 100% certain of their claim to being LGBT that the first thing they do is try to kick others out.
tl;dr I was here first and I’m not amused.
This is a great read. So please read, everyone.
^^^^^ This!
I’ve known I was attracted to multiple genders since I was 13. But I didn’t know that there were different types of attraction until I was 25. And it took almost two years of soul searching and feeling really weird about myself until I realized that I had never experienced sexual attraction. That is an extremely strange thing to realize and understand and come to terms with. I spent a while thinking I was broken or that something was wrong with me. It was confusing as hell.
And you know what helped me feel better about it all? Talking to people online and offline who understand the different types of attraction and sexuality. People in the LGBTQIA+ community. Without talking to people with a general knowledge of gender, attraction, and sexuality (not people who think straight is the default and everything else is a disorder or a quirk) I wouldn’t have understood my asexuality.
And you’re telling me that if I were (romantically, or aesthetically) attracted exclusively to the opposite gender I wouldn’t belong in the community? I shouldn’t have been able to have access to the resources that helped me stop feeling broken and depressed?
Well it’s a damn good thing that your opinion carries no weight outside of tumblr because you have no right to tell anyone they don’t belong.
Grow up. Go outside. Try listening and trying to understand people whose perspective and experiences are different than your own.
Asexuality is a difficult thing to understand. Many allosexuals cannot wrap their head around it because sexual attraction is so natural for them and the majority of people they know. But asexuality is real. It is valid. It is not a disorder. And it is its own identity. You cannot be heterosexual if you are asexual. Asexuality falls under the LGBT spectrum, even if the person in question is romantically or aesthetically attracted to the opposite gender. Period. End of story. Die mad about it.
I was very close to nearly 30 when I came to the conclusion that I was a brand of asexual. My mother was in her 60′s before she even knew that such a word existed, and she’s as ace as they come. It’s one of the reasons I never knew I was ace, because my mom validated my own lack of sexual attraction.
I belong here. This is my space just as much as yours.
Because my mother told me that all I needed to do was get drunk and lie back and let my husband have his fun. Because if I was drunk, I’d be more relaxed and it’d be over sooner
Because my sister told me that I was trapping my husband in an abusive marriage, and that one day he was going to leave me
Because both of them looked at me in disgust
Because my asexuality is considered to be as great a crime against my husband as a woman who has affairs and cheats on her husband
Because my cousin didn’t even try to understand, and just kept asking ‘but what about in five years? how will you feel then?’
Because I was so afraid of my body and so afraid of sex that I didn’t seek medical help for a legitimate question for over a year for fear of being labelled a deviant or something broken
Because I still ask myself at least once every day if my husband wouldn’t be better off without me
Because I still ask myself at least once every day if I’m broken
Because I still tell myself at least once every day that I’m pathetic and useless and an abnormality
Because I love my husband with every fiber of my being, but everywhere I turn I’m told I really don’t, because love = sex
I need A to stand for Asexual because nobody ever talked to me about asexuality even when I was an outpatient at the women’s hospital for 18 months, and everyone told me desire would come in time
I need A to stand for Asexual because we are literally invisible, and so unimportant that people assume we don’t even need representation, because everyone assumes our lives must be bland and unimportant and lacking in challenges or bigotry
For every asexual that wants a relationship, for every asexual that does not want a relationship, for every asexual who has not yet come to terms with their identity, for every asexual who was told we were abnormalities, for every asexual who was told we just weren’t doing sex right, that we needed a good fucking, that we needed to be drunk, that we needed to relax, that we needed to be raped
We need representation, and we need visibility
That is why the A needs to stand for Asexual, and never for Ally
Fucking Important Post.
Just so we’re fucking clear, this blog is inclusionist. If that’s a prob, gtfo.
People don’t understand the enormous and insidious pressure aces are under to just give in and pretend you like it already. This at an individual and institutional level- look at the way psychologists treat people who don’t want sex, whether they are ace or not. Conversion therapy for aces is so normalized that people don’t even notice it exists.
[I remember this because that’s where “slash fic” gets its name]
If you’re worried, I’d make it clear in the summary as well. A lot of people don’t know about the difference in the two ship tags. But for the record? There are a lot of people out there who love fic without smut 🙂
I’d like to respectfully disagree with this! Or, sort of.
A relationship that is romantic but not sexual should still be tagged with the / —as anon said ace “pairings” this is what I assume they’re referring to! I would also tag the fic with “asexual character” or something similar to make it clear for readers—this is a tag I often search by because it’s one I often see used. Overall, if it’s romantic, regardless of whether it’s a sexual relationship, it’s still a pairing. (For example, you can still have a fic with a “/“ romantic pairing that’s rated G.)
Honestly, I think that’s clear enough to make it clear to those expecting smut that smut isn’t there, and if not, the lower rating should do the job. Those searching for smut can always search by rating too! And there is so much smut out there and so comparatively few fics with ace relationships, and I know a lot of people (myself included!) are desperate to find them. I would focus more on making fic searchable for the audience who really wants to read what you’re writing and worry less about those who don’t 🙂
As for queerplatonic relationships or other relationships between characters that are both ace and aro, I have no idea, but would love to hear what others think!
Question of Smoke 