Asexuality: Queering the Mundane

Rejection of our over-sexualised culture is being sold as a politically useful sexual orientation which disarms activists of their analysis of the effects of pornography and abuse on young people.

Asexual Pride Flag (Wikimedia Commons)

“Asexual”, a word most people knew from explanations in biology classes of how bacteria and fungi reproduce without copulation, but more recently it is being pushed as the hot new “sexual orientation” for those who want to join in the fad of flag-waving gender-trenders. Creating online flocks of netizens and on the street Pride marchers who think that declaring they aren’t into something is somehow interesting to other people. Like a vegan at a carnivorous bbq, the asexuals are demanding a place at the table in the Gay Liberation movement while also loudly proclaiming they despise what is on the menu.

For over a decade now I’ve observed the machinations of the corporate rainbow league sell new identities and their great push to have everyone subscribe to the ideas of genders and labels. A conveyor belt of concepts and “struggles”’ cultivated and lined up to take the place of the fight for gay marriage once that aim was achieved in law. One of the many “umbrellas”¹ I tried to raise awareness about was the “aro/ace” movement which I knew was being set up as the next big thing.

I was, of course, lambasted for this, why on earth would someone object to people not wanting to have sex? To me, this was another identity politics scam - a gateway drug even - into an ideology, selling membership into an LGB scene for those with no inherent qualifications. To test my theories and check that I wasn’t being the cruel and unempathetic person I was painted as, I read and read, followed “asexuality awareness weeks” and sought to talk to paid up asexuals about their experiences.

A couple of years ago I sat through a meeting of asexuals (“ace”) and aromantics (shortened to “aro”, who could be described as people who fuck without feelings) and I asked them what oppressions they are subjected to in society as they kept proclaiming their downtrodden state. One described being “hit on” as a phobic offence and expressed the view that romantic people are disgusting and PDAs (public displays of affection) traumatising to view. Seemingly their orientation was prejudiced repulsion against those who are sexually active. I, as an undercover bisexual and hopeless romantic, wondered if I had just been subject to a verbal hate crime. 

I kid, of course. I had no issue with their honesty amongst peers ( besides, I have serious criticism of the concept of “Hate Crime”²). Across from me as this was stated were two coupled “aro-asexuals”, one sat on the floor between the other’s knees, performatively stroking each other’s hair; I observed in confusion wondering if I was a witness to abuse, overt passive aggression, or if the bonding of the club was just mutual gaslighting and talking nonsense with no adults opposing their illogical ramblings.  

These young and timid people brought together by being sold an idea that they were a social class based on their rejection of an over-sexualised society, huddled in a small room, it reminded me of an AA meeting in a movie, combined with a secret religious meet-up. They were there to confess secrets and be radicalised with fearful whispers about the cruel parents and outside world who just don’t understand. 

They were intent on being seen as persecuted, although they could provide no examples. I asked for some, a response was “people have been fired”, I asked who and when, which garnered no evidential response, just some floundering confusion and “you know, like, I’m sure It's a thing”. I was meant to just accept this as true although no receipts were provided. I am personally unaware of an epidemic of asexuals being fired for not being sexual enough at the checkout or office.

This preordained victim status that young people are sold has been growing in LGBT clubs for years now, a phenomenon I have tried to raise awareness about only to be shot down as some sort of hypersexual who wants teenagers to be shaggers, or that I’m dismissive of oppressions and people’s feelings. This misses the point. Regarding “ace” and “aro” in particular, these identities are being used for recruitment into the Gender Ideology movement by Stonewall and many other organisations to surreptitiously hook young people on Queer Theory. 

Otherness and discussing outsider status and persecution are integral to queer ideology.  Young peoples’ feeling of being abnormal and out of place for not fitting in with social tropes is suggested as inhabiting “queerness”. Alice Olivia Scarlett³ writing for Stonewall says “Asexuality is the Queerest Thing”, the various asexual information websites tell young people that their disinterest in boyfriends or girlfriends is a “queer” “orientation” with a “community” as opposed to a totally typical state of being for any person at any stage of life.

Most people are comfortable being single and it is totally normal for children to not want to participate in partnering. To suggest not wanting sex before the age of consent is an “orientation” is an insidious attempt to make a “sexuality” out of something that is in law, what you are meant to be doing anyway, i.e not having illegal sex (statutory rape). Avoidance of sex as a child is not a sexual orientation and it should not be promoted to children as an “orientation” but many are seizing this as an opportunity to explain or justify how they feel.

In an interview by the BBC⁴, (“Feeling Isolated as an Asexual in a Sexualised society”, 2017) a young woman called Tabitha says: “I've known that I wasn't like everybody else since I was 13. I tried to pretend and even went out with a few mates just to see I was just being a bit slow on the uptake. It wasn't until I was 15 that I came across the term asexual and knew then that was what I am”.

Pre-sexuality for children should not be linked to active sexual liberation movements. One must not have to “identify” as “asexual” to justify not wanting sex as a child or young adult (or adult for that matter). I see it as adults declaring to have an “orientation” similar to a child’s and you can probably extrapolate from that the inherent risks of that line of thinking.
There is an insidious attempt to use young people's fear of sexual coercion and experiences of grooming as a way to make them subscribe to a novel social movement and enter them into the LGBT/ “Queer” scene.

Alice Olivia Scarlett’s Stonewall piece³ evidences this; she writes,

“My first relationship was with an older man who constantly used sex as a weapon against me and refused to believe that asexuality could be real. ‘Sex is natural, sex is normal, you’re too young and too inexperienced to know that you don’t want sex, why are you so frigid, our relationship would be so much stronger if you weren’t such a prude’. It went on and on, building and building until the gaslighting and emotional abuse turned into sexual abuse.”

She acknowledges this was abuse but frames it as an orientation that he was not respecting as opposed to her right to say “No”. Apparently, it was a man allegedly grooming and sexually abusing her from the outset.

She goes on to write about her abusive relationship being an example of her orientation for those who quiz her, “I constantly find I have to trot it out and use it as justification for my queer existence. But when did trauma become the mark of queerness?”

Queerness, an umbrella term already stretched to cover homosexuals, heterosexuals and anyone who has a fun haircut, now is a term to describe sexual orientations, kinks, sexual dysfunction and maladaptive behaviours etc. based on trauma responses. Trauma has become a meme badge of honour on social media websites, phrases like “the trauma adds a little spice” are popular enough to have many iterations in youth culture and the slogans can be bought on themed Covid masks from Redbubble⁵.

Bonding over tales of traumatic experiences and the rejection of over-sexualised culture is a recurrent theme on social media platforms, however, under the jovial and pseudo ironic bonding hides genuine distress for many of the participants. 

One website “Meg John and Justin”⁶, in a section headed “Trauma is so common”, they state:

“we could argue that all of our sexualities – or asexualities – have something to do with trauma because (1) sadly high numbers of us experience sexual forms of abuse, assault, and bullying as children and/or adults and (2) the restrictive messages we receive about sexuality are a form of intergenerational trauma. Over the generations sex ed, sex advice, parents, porn, Hollywood movies, magazines, etc. all pass on limited ideas about what counts as sex, and how we should have sex, which leave many people having sex which is painful, unwanted, mediocre, even non-consensual.”

The potential for this orientation to be formed by “nurture” or be considered an acute trauma response is evidenced by a study by Mike C Parent and Kevin P Ferriter in “The Co-Occurrence of Asexuality and Self-Reported Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Diagnosis and Sexual Trauma Within the Past 12 Months Among U.S. College Students”⁷ In the study respondents that described themselves as asexual were more likely to self-report PTSD and a recent history of sexual assault than their peers, “Among non-asexual participants, 1.9% self-reported a diagnosis of PTSD and 2.4% reported a history of sexual trauma in the past 12 months. Among the group identified as asexual, 6.6% self-reported a diagnosis of PTSD and 3.5% reported a history of sexual assault in the past 12 months.” The study concludes that “Asexual identity was associated with greater likelihood of reported PTSD diagnosis and reported sexual trauma within the past 12 months.”

Instead of fighting an over-sexualised culture outright, the asexuality movement has become a twisted muddling of “active sexualities” and kink based subcultures with a mental health epidemic of overwhelmed people. LGBT organisations seem to be increasing their clout by adding more categories to their catch-all movement. Part of their strategy is capitalising on the in-group/out-group tendencies of our society and by promulgating mental health struggles (and lack of therapeutic support) as orientations.

In 2017, as aforementioned, the BBC⁴ interviewed many asexuals who struggled with loneliness and lack of community. Michael Doré of The Asexual Visibility and Education Network (AVEN) stated “People who think they identify as asexual who are feeling isolated or lonely should join an asexual community - whether online or offline... Having a label really helps and finding a community definitely helps.”

A community can be hard to come by in an increasingly online social world that is often firmly segregated by how much you conform to different opinions and activities in our society. Youth culture is currently notorious, particularly in universities,  for promoting conformity via cancellation, especially if you reject pornographic content and prostitution⁸; It isn’t cool to be “whore-phobic⁹”. Remember the much-debatedٰ¹⁰ mantra, “Sex Work is Workٰٰ ”. Filmed prostitution - pornography - is something that children are now increasingly exposed to. A survey of 1000 children by the  NSPCC¹² called  “"I wasn’t sure it was normal to watch it"”  found that, “48% of 11-16 year olds surveyed had seen pornography online”.

Children are bombarded with pornographic images from a young age and the defence of pornography and promotion of “sex-positive” attitudes is imbued in youth culture and schools, with Sexual Orientation and Gender identity (SOGI) discussions being at the forefront of the majority of ad campaigns blazoned with omnipresent rainbows.  

To be uninterested in sex, homosexuality, or transition, is seen as a bit dull these days; avoidance of BDSM or sexual violence is “vanilla”; there is an attractiveness about being able to join in with the militant social media culture of declaring everyone phobic or uneducated about your orientation. In the continued perpetual struggle through the ages, kids don’t want to be left out and isolated. They want to join the revolution.

Parents will probably be quite relieved that their kid strides in to declare herself a fully paid-up member of the Twitter Aros. A sigh of relief that their child will pointedly not sleep around, ask for hormones, get addicted to pornography or start an Only Fans.

They’d be mistaken, unfortunately, from my observations, the asexual movement seems to indulge in more sex or at least as much sex and pornographic content as any other “allosexual” (non-aro spectrum) people. For instance, the Ace/Aro spokesperson Stonewall “teamed up” with, Yasmin Benoit, discusses¹³ viewing pornography in “Here Is What Asexual People Think About Porn” she “would experience an aesthetic appreciation for what was happening and enjoy it a lot”. Meanwhile,  Healthline¹⁴ declares “some asexual people do have sex, because sexual desire is different to sexual attraction.” The asexual proclivity for having regular sex and masturbation is repeated on all aro/ace forums I have visited. You’ll be forgiven for being confused because it is inherently a mess of contradictions.

I may be written off as having “Aromisia / Arophobia” according to AUREA¹⁵ an aro/ace organisation, but my observations are backed up by reading their very own websites and testimonials. I might be accused of “Amatonormativity” (Coined by philosopher and professor Elizabeth Brake) AUREA defines this as “The widespread assumption that everyone is better off in an exclusive, romantic, long-term coupled relationship, and that everyone is seeking such a relationship.” This accusation would be patently false, as I am a bit of a hermit and a staunch advocate of singledom and rejecting codependency. As with many religions and movements, quoting their own texts is oftentimes framed as attacks or phobia.

This is a whole new ideological lexicon from queer theorists to label and define the minutiae of human experience; intense friendships have now been given the new nomenclature “Queerplatonic”,  the act of overthinking your friendships and relationships described as “Split Attraction Model (SAM)”. Their glossary of terms for the ever subdivided scales of levels of attraction continually increases, the asexual movement has its own development of semiotics and philosophy.

Evangelists for the Aro Ace movement make it clear they are Queer Theorists at every opportunity through pronouns and newly coined terms, last year on the AUREA website, volunteer pronouns included Ze/Zem/zer, She/they/it, Ey/Em/Eir, They/Them/Their, and the volunteers labelled themselves such things as Aroflux, Grey-asexual, Arospec, Genderqueer and so on. It would be a mistake for anyone to assume this is about not having sex or promoting singledom as a happy normal to not be mocked. It is an ideological creep overlapping with transhumanism, transgender subcultures and online cult, with very aggressive policing of presentation and language, often promoting having sex with people you feel nothing emotional for. 

I believe it is about breaking boundaries and making people exposed to manipulative peers all whilst disconnected from parents and outsiders who are baffled by the novel terminologies. 

Shame and embarrassment are a way to keep people under control and will occur when children and young adults are forced to disavow their asexuality when they fall in love or pass puberty and have sexual feelings. 

Stonewall et al are encouraging young people to declare themselves as spokespersons for an orientation they declare are absolute. The campaigners say it is phobic myth to suggest it is a “ phase” ¹⁶ and therefore traps themselves in their own cage of public humiliation when they potentially or “come out” as “allosexual” (“Describes a person who experiences romantic attraction or is not on the aromantic spectrum”-AUREA). 

I fear they might even consciously try and suppress romantic feelings or not experiment with people in case they are seen as liars. However, alternatively, since social kudos is gained in some circles from “coming out”, some may just capitalise on this cycle of jumping out of closets for an easy dose of praise. 

As a bisexual feminist who is acutely aware of the maltreatment of homosexuals historically and contemporaneously, this whole performance is quite obscene. Bar the expectation of sex within a marriage, no culture persecutes people for “coming out” as not wanting to have sex right now; in fact, chastity, virginity and abstinence were seen as Godly and pure and most definitely something one should aspire to practice. It is a grotesque inversion of the gay rights struggle to position practising heterosexual chastity and friendship as akin to the persecution of gays who have been brutalised, raped, lobotomised, castrated, jailed and crucified around the world since time immemorial.

To apparently “make up” for the lack of persecution based on their sexuality the asexuality lobby has twisted the concept of “Gay Conversion therapy “ to include themselves, now discussed as a vaguer (and more contentious conceptually)  “Conversion Therapy” and thereby also overinflates the figures cited to call for “Conversion Therapy” bans. 

Extremely muddled questionnaires and evidence are being debated¹⁷ in parliament in the UK, one regularly cited document of evidence is The National LGBT Survey 2018¹⁸ which had 108,100 valid responses. Of that number, 2% of respondents were asexual (‘cis’, and ‘trans’) and that,
“Amongst cisgender respondents, there was not much variation in who had undergone or been offered conversion therapy by sexual orientation. Bisexual respondents were the least likely to have undergone or been offered it (5%), and asexual respondents the most likely (10%)”.(Please note that 2.3% of ‘cisgender’ asexuals surveyed say they had conversion therapy, 7.9% were offered, a back-of-the-envelope calculation that suggests around twenty-six¹⁹ people surveyed in the UK who described themselves as ‘cisgender’ asexuals claimed to have had conversion therapy). 

What this conversion therapy entails isn’t described, it is just alluded to as hypotheticals;
“These techniques can take many forms and commonly range from pseudo-psychological treatments to spiritual counselling. In extreme cases, they may also include surgical and hormonal interventions, or so-called ‘corrective’ rape.” These violations are terrible, but in this document there isn’t evidence that this was applied to asexuals. 

From my reading and firsthand experience, there is a low bar for attempted conversion from self-reporting asexuals. Many things could be classed as attempted therapies or chastizement; casually quizzing them about their orientation, suggesting a sex therapist, commenting on their wish to be left alone, their rejection of the expectation to marry, have sex, or have partners, could potentially be considered attempts to convert them. People of all orientations do not want to have sexual contact from people they are not attracted to or be pushed to be in a couple. I have no doubt many people genuinely feel no sexual attraction or romantic feelings, but being encouraged to join in with a sex-obsessed culture is not, in my opinion, equivalent to having your sexual orientation criminalised or to be subjected to torture for homosexuality.

Since the founding of Asexual Awareness Week in 2010, LGBT+ organisations continued to dilute the meaning of Gay Pride with ever-extending acronyms. When everyone is included in a category, from heterosexual aromantics to homosexuals the movement means nothing.

Gay Pride became a neutered Pride and we are all forced to be called “Queer”. A march for sexual liberation and promotion of the rights of homosexuals and bisexuals is now an egotistical party for the heterosexuals who think sex is a bit distasteful and that the focus needs to be on them and their oftentimes duplicitous insinuated lack of sexual activity.

People should be aware that under the guise of promoting singledom, or a lifestyle not orientated around sex, is an ideology that is promoting narcissism, social media blackmailing and normalisation of terminologies that have little to do with the LGB and the fight for our rights. The movement disarms activists of their ability to discuss the negative effects on children and adults of an over-sexualised culture, instead, they put the onus on individuals, portraying dislike of social pressures as an orientation rather than a justified form of distress that would necessitate a wider social change to remedy. Increasing numbers of awareness days and “aro/ace” LinkedIn bios herald a wave of new protections for oftentimes disingenuous adults, utilising the trauma of the youth, to garner themselves membership into Queerdom via an incoherent identity that carries minimal risk but wields increasing political power.


by Bryndís Blackadder


Published on Substack on 09/05/2021

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Citations in an accessible format to copy and paste into browsers.

¹
Use of the  term ‘Umbrella’
“Umbrella term”
Accessed March 2021
https://nonbinary.wiki/wiki/Umbrella_term
(https://archive.fo/wip/LiTDD)

“The asexual umbrella

What is asexuality?”
Accessed March 2021
https://acesandaros.org/learn/the-asexual-umbrella
(https://archive.fo/wip/dC0c5)


²
“The Scottish Hate Crime Bill: A Human Rights Disaster

August 14, 2020 Bryndís Blackadder”
Self-reference opinion regarding Hate Crime.
https://uncommongroundmedia.com/the-scottish-hate-crime-bill-a-human-rights-disaster/
(https://archive.fo/wip/CKwqS)

³
“Asexuality is the Queerest Thing

By Alice Olivia Scarlett”
Published 27 October 2020
Accessed March 2021
https://www.stonewall.org.uk/about-us/news/asexuality-queerest-thing
(https://archive.fo/72mLG)

⁴

BBC

“Feeling isolated as an asexual in a sexualised society”

Published 23 October 2017

Accessed March 2021

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-41569900

(https://archive.fo/wip/LmL7G)


⁵
Redbubble Covid mask reference.

“the trauma adds a little spice Mask

Designed and sold by salliesimp”

Accessed March 2021

https://www.redbubble.com/i/mask/the-trauma-adds-a-little-spice-by-salliesimp/53241118.9G0D8

(https://archive.fo/9kUld)


⁶
“MJandJustin

Asexuality and Trauma”
Published 15th November 2019
Accessed March 2021
https://megjohnandjustin.com/you/asexuality-and-trauma/
(https://archive.fo/us6al)


⁷
“The Co-Occurrence of Asexuality and Self-Reported Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Diagnosis and Sexual Trauma Within the Past 12 Months Among U.S. College Students

Mike C Parent 1, Kevin P Ferriter 2

2018 May;47(4):1277-1282. doi: 10.1007/s10508-018-1171-1. Epub 2018 Feb 20.”

Accessed March 2021
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29464451/

(https://archive.fo/wip/AV90K)


⁸
Motion to support sex workers

Passed by Student Council on the 6th February 2014
Edinburgh University
Accessed March 2021
https://www.eusa.ed.ac.uk/eusapolicy/liberation/sex_workers/
(https://archive.fo/wip/wI3pa)


⁹
“Whorephobia affects all women”

By Thierry Schaffauser
23 Jun 2010
Accessed March 2021
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/jun/23/sex-workers-whorephobia
(https://archive.fo/JfAHK)

¹⁰

“Prostitution is not a job and never will be. Here’s why.”
By Dana Levy
Published March 12 2020”
Accessed March 2021
https://nordicmodelnow.org/2020/03/12/prostitution-is-not-a-job-and-never-will-be-heres-why/
(https://archive.fo/n6NIm)


¹¹ 

“Why Sex Work Is Real Work”

By Dr Tlaleng Mofokeng

Published April 26, 2019

Accessed March 2021

https://www.teenvogue.com/story/why-sex-work-is-real-work

(https://archive.fo/pMvJq)

¹²

NSPCC “"I wasn’t sure it was normal to watch it"

Accessed March 2021

https://learning.nspcc.org.uk/research-resources/2016/i-wasn-t-sure-it-was-normal-to-watch-it

(https://archive.fo/wip/FOCYU)

PDF: 

https://learning.nspcc.org.uk/media/1187/mdx-nspcc-occ-pornography-report.pdf

“Impact of online pornography on children

Published 15 June 2016

Over half of 11-16 year olds exposed to online pornography.”

Accessed March 2021

https://www.childnet.com/blog/impact-of-online-pornography-on-children

(https://archive.fo/xvMM8)

¹³
“Here's What Asexual People Think About Porn

Yasmin Benoit | October 21, 2019”
(Accessed March 2021):
https://erikalust.com/lustzine/voices/asexuality
(https://archive.fo/ioq3D)

“@stonewalluk

This #AromanticSpectrumAwarenessWeek, we've teamed up with 

@theyasminbenoit

 to give you some tips on how to support and be an ally to the #aromantic community
Feb 22, 2021”
Accessed March 2021
(https://archive.ph/WQqwZ)

¹⁴
Healthline Asexuality information.
“What Does It Mean to Be Asexual?”
Medically reviewed by Janet Brito, Ph.D., LCSW, CST — Written by Sian Ferguson on September 18, 2019
(Accessed March 2021)
https://www.healthline.com/health/what-is-asexual#sex
(https://archive.fo/wip/i6cuq)


¹⁵
“AUREA
Basic Terms

EVERYDAY TERMS USED IN THE AROMANTIC COMMUNITY”
Accessed March 2021:
https://www.aromanticism.org/en/basic-terms
(https://archive.fo/wip/IqNPq)


¹⁶
Phobic myth “it’s a phase”
“Six ways to be an ally to asexual people”
By Leni Morris
Published 06 2021

Accessed April 2021
https://www.stonewall.org.uk/about-us/news/six-ways-be-ally-asexual-people
(https://archive.fo/wip/teOmx)


¹⁷
”Jo Bartosch reports on last night’s debate on conversion therapy in the House of Commons and leaves Disappointed”
Published March 10 2021
By Josephine Bartosch
Accessed March 2021
https://lesbianandgaynews.com/2021/03/jo-bartosch-reports-on-last-nights-debate-on-conversion-therapy-in-the-house-of-commons-and-is-left-angry-and-disappointed/
(https://archive.fo/hBcRo)

¹⁸

Conversion therapy citation.

“National LGBT Survey Research Report 2018

Accessed March 2021”

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/721704/LGBT-survey-research-report.pdf

“These techniques can take many forms and commonly

range from pseudo-psychological treatments to spiritual counselling. In extreme

cases, they may also include surgical and hormonal interventions, or so-called

‘corrective’ rape.” P83  

¹⁹
Conversion therapy Numbers on graph on page 85
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/721704/LGBT-survey-research-report.pdf

Questions found on Annex 5 Question 143-143 at: 

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/721616/Annex-5-Safety.ods

My calculation working:
Total respondents who were cisgender and asexual = 1140

Had it= 2.3%

Offered it= 7.9%

2.3% of 1140 =26.22 therefore I conclude 26 “cisgender” “asexual” people surveyed claimed to have had conversion therapy. (This is my best efforts at interpreting the information in the document, if incorrect I will correct.)


Thank you for reading.