a 10 minutes read…
‘‘Next up, in our special days list for next month, we have International Asexuality Day on the 6th of April. I think Asexuality is pretty self-explanatory so we will promote it as a post, what do you think?”. Two years ago I would have reacted the same way if I had to organize a promotion campaign related to Asexuality, and even before that, I wouldn’t have known what Asexuality was in the first place!
But after those two years, I was knowledgeable enough. I couldn’t miss the opportunity of raising awareness for one complex and misunderstood sexual orientation, hidden within the ‘+‘ in the LGBTQ+ community; one that I had spent months browsing about through different forums, wiki-pages and youtubers, obtaining new insight every time, and that, despite being complex, was no more and no less than ‘The sexual orientation characterized by the experience of little to no sexual attraction’.
A theoretical definition can oftentimes be overwhelming, so bear with me. Have you ever seen a cactus and wanted to hug it, kiss it or even have sexual intercourse with it? No? What a pity, me neither. Have you, however, seen an attractive person walking down the street and pictured yourself with them, in your bed, having adult fun time? Oh, you have? Well, not me! That is exactly what sexual attraction looks like, a primal instinct that has stayed with us since ancient times and sexually draws us towards other people, when it guaranteed the survival of our species by reproduction; the same instinct that manifests every time your bestie Jennifer whispers to you someone she just saw was hot, sometimes even multiple times… in a time-span of 5 minutes…
For some Asexuals, people are like cacti, but for others they’re, well… people… but only at times! This may sound confusing again, but think that just like the word ‘Transgender’ encompasses a variety of gender identities different from the one assigned at birth, the word ‘Asexuality‘ acts as an umbrella term for all the possible different asexual experiences, and there’s where the “little to no attraction“ part comes into play.
The Asexual Spectrum
The AVEN (The Asexual Visibility and Education Network)* Triangle represents human sexuality as a diverse spectrum, containing Asexual identities in scales of grey and black. At the top, white represents strict Allosexuality (A complete experience of sexual attraction) and on the opposite side, black represents strict Asexuality (A complete lack of sexual attraction).
From all the sexual orientations within the Asexual Spectrum, two major groups (labels) that are not strict Asexuality can be distinguished.
Demisexuality: ‘The sexual orientation characterized by the experience of no sexual attraction until an emotional bond has been established with the target of the attraction’.
Gray-Asexuality: ‘The sexual orientation characterized by the experience of sexual attraction only under specific conditions, infrequently, at low intensity or in an ambiguous way’.
The cactus analogy is now flawed for obvious reasons as neither A-Spec (people who identify with labels within the Asexual Spectrum) nor Allosexual people (those who experience full sexual attraction) would want to get intimate with a cactus, would you?
You are surely now reflecting on my previous words with too many questions for me to predict. But let me give it a try ;). Before introducing the brand new Donut Analogy let me tell you that no, not everyone is Demisexual just because the majority of people don’t want to have hookups with strangers, Demisexuals won’t experience any kind of sexual attraction whatsoever prior to the emotional bond. And also no, Gray-Asexuals don’t have problems with their sexual drive (libido, desire to obtain sexual pleasure) or with their reproductive system, sexual attraction is an instinctual response, not a physiological response, although they might happen at the same time. Things will start making sense soon, don’t worry.
You are doing your usual Saturday grocery shopping at Albert Heijn and you suddendly sense a sweet smell coming from the bakery section. DONUTS! You start imagining how they look like, shining in sugar glaze, moist and fluffy, you crave donuts and you might even start getting hungry. Let the craving be sexual attraction (kind of self-explanatory) and getting hungry the sex drive (your motivation to get a donut). I just described the experience of an Allosexual person. A strictly Asexual person won’t crave eating a donut, but the pleasant smell might remind them to have food soon, they can indeed get hungry. Some will even eat the donut because they want to satisfy their hunger… and enjoy it! Some might don’t even like donuts in the first place! The first is a sex favorable Asexual whereas the second one is a sex repulsed Asexual, but none of them had the craving in the first place, and not two Asexuals have the same sex drive or hunger in the analogy, yes, there are hypersexual asexuals, because they don’t act out of attraction, but out of pleasure.
Demisexuals grew really attached to Dunkin’ Donuts since their childhood and as a consequence, they do crave those specific donuts, so they won’t get close to our fictional Albert Heijn bakery section, they’re just not as deeply flavored… maybe? Gray-Asexuals would from time to time crave a donut, no matter from where, but just not with the same intensity or frequence as their Allosexual friends.
No two people who identify as Asexual share the same experience. Diversity stems from the intensity in which sexual attraction is felt, the intensity of their sex drive (or libido) and their favorability towards sex.
The Split-Attraction Model
After having explored the Asexual Spectrum, let me confuse you a just a bit more by telling you that there are many A-Spec people in romantic relationships, or even married. Here is where labels start to get crazy and you get to choose between an identity crisis or leaving it as it is. I obviously chose the first option :D, and I’m grateful I did!
When someone comes out as Gay, you immediately understand they are attracted sexually, romantically and aesthetically to members of their same sex or gender. And with this reasoning, you could also argue that when someone comes out as Asexual, they are not attracted sexually, romantically or aesthetically to anyone… Although that’s not how it works, recall that many A-Specs are married or in romantic relationships.
The Split-Attraction Model is a tool that is mainly used to understand one’s attractions and communicate with others with ease (Also for existential relief :D) that consists in splitting the attractions into categories such as Physical Attractions (Sexual, Aesthetic, Sensual) and Emotional Attractions (Romantic, Platonic, Queerplatonic, Alterous), therefore infinite combinations are possible. To communicate your identity, the orientation prefixes Hetero-, Homo-, Bi-, Pan-, A-, Demi- and Gray- follow the respective attractions. For example:
My labels are Demisexual Homoromantic
I identify as a Sex-favorable, Romance-repulsed Asexual Aromantic Panplatonic
Come on Jennifer, you can be both Bisexual and Heteroromantic if you only see yourself in a relationship with men!
The second one is indeed a mouthful, but as I mentioned, these are mainly for people to fulfill their existential needs! I created an attraction chart for myself when I was figuring my attractions out.
You don’t have to understand it, I just wanted to show how complex one’s identity can be, and how long it can take to fully comprehend such thing. In fact, many things have changed since I made this chart, although it’s mainly differences in micro-labels. The journey of getting to understand my sexuality and other attractions started in my late “teens” after I was introduced the term “Asexuality” by a friend.
Having never been attracted in a normative way to other people seemed natural for me, hence I didn’t question my romantic and sexual orientations until the world made it obvious that there was something going on, that others were discovering kinds of love that I never imagined they existed.
After going down the Asexual and Aromantic-Spectrum rabbit hole, I felt comfortable identifying as AroAce, although it turned out to be more nuanced than I imagined... Coming from a relatively conservative country, I was shown by my social surroundings that homosexuality was not valid even if it was superficially respected, therefore I subconsciously denied and blocked every thought that was related to it. However, after revisiting my orientations and knowing that I was going abroad to study in a much more safe country for LGBTQ+ individuals, I noticed I didn’t need to have that barrier anymore, and decided to be spared from the burden me myself had put on my shoulders a long time ago.
My Journey
“If somebody were to ask for my labels, I wouldn’t be completely sure to this day.
However, I would happily tell them I identify as Gay, Demisexual and Demiromantic because I know that these labels won’t summarize the experiences I lived to get to accept them :)”
‘‘No… I could definitely give you a lecture on Asexuality”. I replied. And I’m glad that my passion for giving visibility to Asexuality spoke for me that day.
I hope this blog entry has shed more light on your understandings about the Asexual Spectrum, and that you managed to empathize with this identity a little more today.
Have a nice International Asexuality Day!
~ Curro