Does "asexual" mean "not desiring either men or women" or "not experiencing erotic arousal?"

[alohadave]

This is a Fully-General Counterargument that could used to support anything, including things that I won’t mention that everyone finds repulsive and evil. It has no discursive value.

And that would be a logical fallacy that should be called out.

 

[SamBomb]

We are doubting aces now? Come on people.

 

[Bramblethorn]

A second defining feature of a female homo sapiens is that they orgasm. The females of no other species do.

Not so. See e.g. https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.7384791 which documents orgasm in macaques.

 

[SimonDoom]

As is so often, the thread's gotten a bit bogged down in a dispute over labeling, which is never interesting.

It seems like from what I've read here there are several different ways one might be placed along a spectrum from asexual to sexual.

Some people may just not think of other people sexually. I'd be inclined to think of that person as "asexual."

But . . . there might be such people who still have feelings of sexual arousal, just not directed at other people. Maybe those people need to be placed on a different spectrum and considered as "sexual" in other ways.

There's also the matter of the degree of desire. Most of my straight male friends are, as far as I can tell, like me: they think about women all the time. Most of my gay male friends have been, as far as I can tell, just like my straight male friends, except they think about dudes all the time. They think about dick the way straight men think about pussy.

But I've also had male friends (and female friends) who just didn't seem sexually interested in other people much at all. In the case of one male friend, I found out relatively late that he'd been a closeted gay man, and we he came out he said he'd been turned on by TV commercials where men took their shirts off. So, obviously, he was turned on, even though none of us knew it for years.

And then there are people who are attracted to other people, whether of their own or the other sex, but not in a sexual way. I think there are a lot of people like this. They may find sex distasteful, or unclean, or threatening to their sense of personal or bodily integrity. They may be unable to overcome years of shame anti-sex upbringing. Or maybe it's low hormones.

All of these people can be characterized as sexual-asexual in one way or another. It's not really a spectrum. It's more like a three-dimensional universe with multiple galaxies bleeding into each other.

 

[Britva415]

Some people may just not think of other people sexually. I'd be inclined to think of that person as "asexual."

But . . . there might be such people who still have feelings of sexual arousal, just not directed at other people. Maybe those people need to be placed on a different spectrum and considered as "sexual" in other ways.

I mean, that's fine, but those "other ways" aren't what it means to have the asexual orientation. That is defined as being about sexual attraction to other people.

It's not even about arousal. It's about sexual attraction to other people and sexual desire for other people. An ace who masturbates, or even who is willing to have sex with a loving partner for the partner's sake, is still an ace.

 

[AlinaX]

It's largely pointless for us to try and recategorise asexuality. Even ten years ago we would have been late to that party.

The Asexual Agenda - with contributions from a wide range of very smart people with a range of actual experience - were discussing this in detail, and then there was the asexual Tumblr community, again very smart people, analysing models of attraction and discussing labels.

Now, you're perfectly entitled to say, "Meh, I don't experience any of that, and don't believe it's real," but if your goal is to actually understand the ace experience then why try and do it from the outside? Read what the experts have to say...

 

[AlinaX]

After all, we don't fill this forum with post after post discussing whether gay men are really gay if they don't like anal - because we know we'd look either bigotted or stupid if we did that. So why would we think it's okay to discuss asexuality as if we understand it better than people on the spectrum?

 

[AlinaX]

A snippet of research:

Asexual individuals did not exhibit a controlled attention bias for erotic cues whereas women with lifelong and acquired SIAD demonstrated a sex-specific preference. These findings are consistent with research suggesting that controlled visual attention to sexual cues is influenced by the direction of one’s sexual attractions. Given that asexual persons do not experience sexual attraction to others, it is likely that images depicting sexual activity were not as motivationally salient to this group, which may have resulted in asexual individuals allocating less controlled attention to these cues.
...
We did not examine the effect of participants’ romantic orientation on their cognitive processing of sexual cues, given that the majority of our sample identified as romantic, with only n = 10 asexual participants reporting aromanticism.

Cognitive processing of sexual cues in asexual individuals and ...​

 

[TheWritingGroup]

Then there's "responsive desire", in which a person doesn't spontaneously feel desire, but can be very aroused if properly stimulated by another person.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/int...202202/responsive-desire-and-erotic-sexuality

Is someone ace if they can go years without feeling arousal, but when the right person kisses and caresses, them, enthusiastically enjoy sex? That's a real question. I don't claim to understand the definition in current use.

-Annie

 

[AwkwardlySet]

I don't claim to understand the definition in current use.

It would be weird if you did

 

[Britva415]

This is a Fully-General Counterargument that could used to support anything, including things that I won’t mention that everyone finds repulsive and evil. It has no discursive value.

I don’t follow you, here, as far as your intentions. What do you mean, by saying this? Are you simply trying to say I’m unpersuasive because you perceive a fallacy?

Or are you saying you’re not persuaded that asexuality is a thing nor that asexual people are subject to misconceptions and misunderstandings like other sexual-orientation minorities have been?

Like, I’m genuinely not seeing which is your point or where you stand in this conversation. I feel like there’s something you were trying to say without saying it, and that’s why I’m clueless.

 

[Britva415]

Is someone ace if they can go years without feeling arousal, but when the right person kisses and caresses, them, enthusiastically enjoy sex?

This seems close to what’s meant by “demisexual.”

It belongs to the spectrum which has been referred to, but it’s not the same thing as asexual. In fact it’s not far off from what not all, but plenty of, “regular sexual” people experience at various times in their lives.

Asexual people can become sexually aroused. Some of them can while with another person. Some can’t. It isn’t the same as “responsive desire” because it doesn’t lead to desire, just arousal. They may or may not choose to act on that arousal with another person, but they still won’t sexually desire the other person or the sexual acts and stimulation with the other person.

Willingness isn’t the same as desire, to an asexual it’s more of a pragmatic choice for the sake of the partner’s pleasure or for the sake of the relationship. Or for the sake of closeting.

Really not that different, in a way, from back when gays couldn’t be “out” and mostly had to marry someone of the opposite sex and put on an act, even in bed.

 

[alohadave]

I don’t follow you, here, as far as your intentions. What do you mean, by saying this? Are you simply trying to say I’m unpersuasive because you perceive a fallacy?

Or are you saying you’re not persuaded that asexuality is a thing nor that asexual people are subject to misconceptions and misunderstandings like other sexual-orientation minorities have been?

Like, I’m genuinely not seeing which is your point or where you stand in this conversation. I feel like there’s something you were trying to say without saying it, and that’s why I’m clueless.

I'm specifically replying to the Fully-General counter argument.

You weren't the person I replied to, so I don't know why you feel that I'm attacking you personally.

 

[Britva415]

I'm specifically replying to the Fully-General counter argument.

You weren't the person I replied to, so I don't know why you feel that I'm attacking you personally.

You're right, I somehow got the quote all wrong, I was trying to reply to the same person you were. Fixing that now.

And for the record I didn't feel like anyone was attacking me personally or anyone at all. I just didn't follow whatever the rhetorical point @TheLobster was making was supposed to be.

 

[XerXesXu]

Not so. See e.g. https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.7384791 which documents orgasm in macaques.

Trans males are males. Even Macaques can suffer from gender dysphoria.

 

[Portly_Penguin]

Hi, asexual here

I didn't really read most of the comments here - primarily out of fear of what they would say, but whatever.

Asexuality is different for different people. Some are sex-repulsed, some aren't. Some have no sexual feelings towards people. It depends on the person.

Personally, I've never had any sort of sexual feelings towards another person. I've never looked at someone and gone "I would have sex with you." The idea of sex for me just isn't something I've ever thought about or considered. I can read about it, write about it, but I don't want to do it.

If that makes sense. It took me a little while to wrap my head around it, to be fair.

And yeah

 

[Levorotatory]

My opinion is that asexuality is an abnormal condition. It could be any number of things, hormone imbalance or the absence of one or more of those.

They used to say the same thing about gays, but nobody thinks of that as abnormal today.

Asexuality is as valid a sexual orientation as anything else in the alphabet soup.

This is a Fully-General Counterargument that could used to support anything, including things that I won’t mention that everyone finds repulsive and evil. It has no discursive value.

Being abnormal is not the same thing as being pathological. Both homosexuality and asexuality are maladaptive in an evolutionary sense and are minority orientations as a result, but they don't harm affected individuals or others, aside from persecution by those afraid of anyone who is different (aka abnormal). Both can live fulfilling lives, and I suspect that most non-asexuals have, at times, wished they were asexual so they wouldn't be so distracted by sexual desire.

The "things that everyone finds repulsive and evil" are different. A sexual orientation that cannot be fulfilled without harming others is pathological. An individual with that orientation either harms others and is rightfully subject to punishment for it, or they must spend their lives suppressing that desire.

 

[Comshaw]

They used to say the same thing about gays, but nobody thinks of that as abnormal today.

Asexuality is as valid a sexual orientation as anything else in the alphabet soup.

I used the term abnormal in a physical sense. Gays have a sexual attraction so there is no abnormal physical condition that is or ever has been proven to make one gay. Asexuality is the lack or total absence of sexual attraction. That tells me there is something missing, a hormone or other chemical trigger. I opinionated that it was in the physical makeup of an asexual person, not that the abnormality was bad, only that it was. I also never said nor implied that it wasn't a valid sexual orientation.

Comshaw

 

[Comshaw]

Being abnormal is not the same thing as being pathological. Both homosexuality and asexuality are maladaptive in an evolutionary sense and are minority orientations as a result, but they don't harm affected individuals or others, aside from persecution by those afraid of anyone who is different (aka abnormal). Both can live fulfilling lives, and I suspect that most non-asexuals have, at times, wished they were asexual so they wouldn't be so distracted by sexual desire.

The "things that everyone finds repulsive and evil" are different. A sexual orientation that cannot be fulfilled without harming others is pathological. An individual with that orientation either harms others and is rightfully subject to punishment for it, or they must spend their lives suppressing that desire.

I must be in the minority of non-asexuals because I have never, ever wished to have less sexual desire. I do not believe that "most" non-asexuals ever think that either. There may be ( I believe are) some that are so saturated with sexual desire that they do feel that way. Those who are sex addicts (nymphomania and satyriasis) come to mind. But just like those on the asexual extreme, few in number.

Comshaw

 

[XerXesXu]

Both homosexuality and asexuality are maladaptive in an evolutionary sense and are minority orientations as a result,

It's more accurate to say that they've not yet been proved to be critically adaptive for humans. Evolution is a purposeless and random process. The net effect, if one anthropomorphizes the process, is that it selects for genetic diversity between and within species. Only humans ask, 'Why isn't everyone like me?' The simple answer is, because that would be maladaptive, it would reduce resilience of the species to random and unanticipateed events.

 

[TheRedChamber]

Both homosexuality and asexuality are maladaptive in an evolutionary sense and are minority orientations as a result, but they don't harm affected individuals or others, aside from persecution by those afraid of anyone who is different (aka abnormal).

Not necessarily. Even assuming that homosexual people never father/birth children (they do) it's not necessarily maladaptive in terms of passing on genes. The key point is that, while our children have exactly half of our DNA, so do our siblings, and our nephews/nieces share one-quarter. There's a well known result that says that men who have a lot of older brothers are more likely to be gay. Leaving aside exactly why this happens (This New Scientist article has a theory) it's possible that the cause hasn't been bred out because having a gay son who contributes to the extended family/tribe and their survivability is better at passing on genes as a whole rather than having, say, a fourth son investing in energy in chasing women from the same pool of mates (and even if he is successful, the tribe is overburdened with new mouths)

Asexuality probably gets you to a similar place. Women throughout history have been forced to breed whether they wanted to or not (either literally forced or through societal pressure). Having low sex drive frees up people to contribute in other ways.

 

[Portly_Penguin]

Can we not use the word 'abnormal' in this discussion please?

I spent my teenager years convinced there was something wrong with me because I didn't care about sex in the same way people in my class did. There was actually a scene in the show 'Sex Education' that touches on asexuality and is a pretty decent way of explaining it both as a term, but also how it feels to know something is off but to not know what it is. When you don't know that there's a term for something, or that other people feel the same way, you convince yourself that there is something weird or strange about you.

'Abnormal' isn't the word to use whether it's meant maliciously or not.

 

[SimonDoom]

I must be in the minority of non-asexuals because I have never, ever wished to have less sexual desire. I do not believe that "most" non-asexuals ever think that either. There may be ( I believe are) some that are so saturated with sexual desire that they do feel that way. Those who are sex addicts (nymphomania and satyriasis) come to mind. But just like those on the asexual extreme, few in number.

Comshaw

I imagine most sexual men just take it for granted that they are that way and don't think about it. I think about it, and sometimes think, "This sure is distracting," but it's a form of distraction that gives so much pleasure and adds so much spice to daily life that I never think, "I wish I didn't find women in short skirts so desirable." I think, "Thank God for short skirts. And women's legs."

 

[Five_Inch_Heels]

Can we not use the word 'abnormal' in this discussion please?


'Abnormal' isn't the word to use whether it's meant maliciously or not.

It isn't a word that should be used on Lit at all.

I imagine most sexual men just take it for granted that they are that way and don't think about it.

And that's a problem that society doesn't want to confront.

 

[AG31]

Hi, asexual here

I didn't really read most of the comments here - primarily out of fear of what they would say, but whatever.

Asexuality is different for different people. Some are sex-repulsed, some aren't. Some have no sexual feelings towards people. It depends on the person.

Personally, I've never had any sort of sexual feelings towards another person. I've never looked at someone and gone "I would have sex with you." The idea of sex for me just isn't something I've ever thought about or considered. I can read about it, write about it, but I don't want to do it.

If that makes sense. It took me a little while to wrap my head around it, to be fair.

And yeah

Do you experience sexual arousal in other situations than relating to another person? Do you masterubate? Fantasize in a way that arouses you?