It is with great excitement to note that this is the start of Asexual Awareness Week. Since 2010, the last week of October has been relegated to bringing attention to The Ace Community and helping people recognize their validity. As many who have followed me on my journey, I am fairly new in accepting my identity, having officially come out in June but began the process last December. The short journey has been a rewarding one, but also difficult when noticing all of the ways that the world feels geared against you, where allonormativity is ingrained in every last advertisement, where to be single is to be some wicked, ugly spinster deemed useless by society. While I understand that’s an exaggeration, it was a genuine conflict that definitely makes the journey easier.
That is why I’m choosing to start this week by looking at the ways that asexuality is misunderstood, maybe even seen as a negative. This isn’t going to be an attack on the community, but hopefully more understanding of the ways that I feel asexuality is ignored. I hope by noticing the problem that we can hope to start the remedy. Again, this is from my perspective, which has largely been a casual observer who watches YouTube and Tik Tok videos or peruses AVEN every time I have a tangential question, finding that there’s more ace culture out there than initially believed.
I think the easiest place to start is June 2021. As I did housework, I had this ABC special on talking about how to "Thrive with Pride." They had various actors from shows like Pose and Everything’s Gonna Be Okay showing their support for the community. Had I not been intentionally looking for it, I probably wouldn’t have noticed. ABC, ostensibly, was perfect symbolism for a more mainstream view on queer identity. While they wouldn’t have the most nuanced take, they definitely did enough right as far as educating audiences on the themes of tolerance and acceptance. It was a decent special until you get to one detail.
They embraced the common nomenclature: LGBTQ+. That is what they chose to focus on. Nowhere over that hour special was intersex or asexual mentioned. Even when featuring a cameo from Everything’s Gonna Be Okay, they focused on gay actor Adam Faison, ignoring (if accidentally) a chance to show a clip featuring homoromantic asexual character Drea. For what it’s worth, ABC’s subsidiary Freeform has done good representation, but on the main network, there were signs that understanding clearly had some room to grow. It was great to see a whole segment dedicated to trans and queer/questioning identities, but it became disconcerting when in the same hour they chose to call bisexuality the “invisible sexuality.”
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| At least Blue loves me |
Had I seen this in 2020, I wouldn’t have thought twice about it. But, since I was looking for any validation of asexuality, it hurt. On a less important note, I found excitement in anyone willing to type LGBTQIA+, noticing the growth of the acronym, the inclusion of a bigger community. Even then, conflict arises in understanding what the ‘I’ and ‘A’ stand for with many finding the latter as ally. While I haven’t had this conflict in my personal life, I’ve heard enough complaints to bring it up. Allies are important, but a good ally would know what all of the letters stand for. Other acceptable uses of the letter include aromantic or agender, but I’ll leave those communities to talk about that.
Even innocently, it already feels like society invalidates asexuals. This comes from the idea that culture is inherently allosexual, that most situations are in some ways geared towards sex. When I was growing up, it was not uncommon for Paris Hilton to be eating a cheeseburger while washing a car in a bikini. The very idea of being gay was tied too closely to sexual encounters (at worst, a predatory stereotype), where even performative lesbianism in commercials felt designed to exploit “hot women” slowly showing skin. I even discovered in the Miracle of Miracles (2020) documentary that many actors thought thoroughly about the sex lives of the Fiddler on the Roof parents. Given how there’s an Act II song where they ask each other “Do you love me?” I took it to be something more romantic or even platonic. Frankly, I’m not a fan of imagining Tevya getting it on.
That may be the core conflict with how asexuals see the world in relationship to allosexuals. A big conflict for me arrives in how general TV is consumed. Whereas I can watch a show and just imagine an extended world where these characters are friends who hang out on the weekend, I’ve found that shipping culture turns to bad erotica instead. The way that two characters could smile at each other, an awkward laugh or giggle automatically means something more carnal. People spend their lives waiting for characters on TV to have sex, consummate a relationship as if it’s the only way to validate their feelings.
I don’t entirely blame them, especially when I was a teen during the height of the R-Rated raunchy sex comedies including American Pie (1999) whose sole purpose was to lose virginity with everybody else being seen as lesser. Given how TV series like Euphoria openly reflect how the youth have only become more hypersexualized down to more accessible pornography, the struggle to remove yourself from this narrative is difficult. For centuries, it’s been believed that everyone needs to get married and continue the family lineage. If not, something is deeply wrong with you. You need to upkeep the status quo, you need to participate in amatanormativity.
Even by accident, this results in painting asexuals as the enemy to the social norm. After all, a common defense for queerness is “what you do between two consenting adults in your bedroom is your business.” Being gay feels tied almost too exclusively to hormones, as if it’s complicated to paint a three dimensional picture. I understand that The AIDS Crisis informs a lot of that read for my generation, but it shows how difficult it is to paint a picture of someone as compassionate and caring, contributing to society in a meaningful way. Many homophobes focus on sex because that’s easiest. When you’re asexual and remove that entirely, it feels like a slight against nature, not making any sense.
“Asexuality doesn’t exist” becomes the rallying cry. Sublabels like demisexual or greysexual are even more invalidated, claiming that anyone who feels the slightest attraction is “normal,” that “everybody feels that way.” As a result, it becomes difficult to not write asexual characters who aren’t in some ways detached from society. There’s Ozymandias in Watchmen (2009) who wants to destroy the world. There’s On Chesil Beach (2017) where their asexuality is defined almost exclusively by trauma. There’s validity in the latter perspective, but the approach is more caricature, reflective of not accepting that asexuals are normal, that there must be something wrong with them. Given that this is often overlapped with autistic character stereotypes, it’s abundantly clear how these two communities aren’t given their fair shake in media.
And, to make matters more complicated, The DSM classified asexuality as a mental illness until The DSM 5 in 2013. This was thanks to AVEN producing a strong campaign to recognize how a lack of sexual attraction was not a sign that you were crazy. Given that homosexuality was declassified as such in 1973, it only shows how divided things are. Being a valid asexual by society’s eyes is only two years older than gay marriage and 40 younger than when media began to explore the queer identity as something more complicated than tragedy. I’m glad it’s been reduced to “normal.” I just think that our journey is going to be an uphill battle for a long time, especially since it seems like absolutely nobody can get the representation right.
I understand that it’s hard. From my personal perspective, I have to ask myself how I write a character that is defined by an absence of something. Without slapping the title on retroactively, how do you make someone asexual and have it feel valid? I’ve seen some great effort on Everything’s Gonna Be Okay and Selah and the Spades (2020), but mostly we’re stuck in the circle of implying a character’s identity if they don’t have a love interest (because that too suggests that everyone wants one, though that’s more an aromantic issue). To me, having characters be friends is much more interesting than forcing a deeper relationship on them. Even then, there will still be shipping circles thinking that this absence is a cowardly writer wanting to make a character gay but being restricted. I’m not here to regulate how you consume media, but sometimes that feels invalidating.
Even then, it’s difficult to escape the mainstream depiction of asexuals that remained just as prevalent in 2021. While Malcolm & Marie (2021) featured a more progressive reference, suggesting that identity could inform how somebody views cinema. Other takes have been less forgiving, such as the TV series Why Are You Like This?, which briefly finds a character desiring sex only to grow disappointed when somebody puts up stipulations and calls him a “damn demisexual.”
Though I think the take that most perfectly reflects the ongoing struggle with public acceptance was in a recent episode of Scenes from a Marriage. In it, a couple played by Jessica Chastain and Oscar Isaac is having a nasty break-up. This particular episode features them attacking each other’s self-worth, trying to become the top dog in a fight. At a certain point, things turn to the most intimate of intimacies with Chastain calling Isaac asexual, making the very idea of his lack of passion in sex seem emasculating, that she was never happy with as symbolized by his lack of ability to perform to her satisfaction.
I’m not discrediting that this is probably a real concern and in context of character motivation it’s not inappropriate. However, the idea that asexuality makes someone inferior is a common narrative that is disheartening to hear continue. It reinforces the idea that sex is crucial to a relationship, that a lack of sex means you can not have a fulfilling relationship. It’s a black and white way of looking at marriage. While I haven’t gone into detail about the minutiae of the ace identity, there’s clearly so much that is ignored by suggesting that Isaac maybe being asexual is a bad thing. It says so much that seems to isolate, invalidate, and perpetuate the myth that the community is lesser or even “not real.” How can we be normal when our rare time on TV recently was used as a pejorative that most people will not at all question?
Finally, I want to turn to something that may not be directly an issue of community but sometimes made me hesitant about exploring my identity. Because I have found difficulty feeling that sort of allosexual connection, there’s that sense that something is wrong with you. When thinking that way, it’s easy to gain a negative mindset, and being impressionable in my early 20s meant that “the loner” had an appeal. I’m talking about Travis Bickel in Taxi Driver (1976), who failed to connect to those around him. Without more nuance, I just saw somebody who was familiar on an emotional level. You wanted to do good, but when would you have the opportunity.
I recognize in later years why “admiring” people like Bickel is bad, and it’s made it difficult to revisit those types of movies without some personal regret. As fantasies of dark revenge faded into something more human, I no longer became attached to it. I began to understand who I was. It is true that loving certain movies doesn’t mean you are automatically that way. I was never a taxi driver. I never rescued Jodie Foster from Harvey Keitel. But for me, it becomes difficult because at a glance, I worry that I fitted too much of a certain identity who finds themselves stuck in self-destructive behavior that scares me, that I don’t want to be part of. It’s also, strangely, rooted in a negative reputation around the subject of sex.
I’m talking about involuntarily celibate, or incels for short. It’s the idea that one isn’t capable of obtaining a regular relationship and thus has reason to be mad at the world. In more recent years, they have been associated with the movie Joker (2019), harassing people on Twitter, and doing everything to cause chaos. I’m not an expert by any stretch. I don’t know that I want to be. However, in a time where crazy white guys have gone on mass shootings and certain negative rhetoric has altered how many of us use the internet, it’s difficult to not feel like from a distance I could be mistaken for it. After all, being asexual meant that I lacked sexual attraction. In a very crude form, so do these people. What do I do to not fall into this camp that seems hostile and self-destructive?
I think it’s in part because I recognize how they COULD feel isolated. Still, I didn’t want to be asexual if it meant people mistook me for some homicidal loner. I’m not saying that this correlation has really existed in any media I’ve consumed, but enough is there. It could be the idea that asexuality is invalid, that we’re often depicted as detached or robotic. It could be the occasional sense of otherness that makes me feel alone in the world. That is a normal feeling, but it’s what you do with it that makes the difference.
Like all asexual analogies, the best way to describe the difference is with food. Think of an ice cream shop. Allosexuals go in and buy whatever flavor they want because they’re interested. Asexuals will walk by because they are not interested, minding their own business. Meanwhile, incels will go in and complain to management about why they couldn’t have any.
This has been a broad overview of how asexuality in media has impacted my way of thinking about it. I’ve personally grown more excited to be a member of this community the more that I discover. I’ve found some great creators who are making a difference and spreading awareness in a meaningful way. While I still have a lot to learn, this year has been about self-acceptance and it has been a journey unto itself. For as much pride as I have now, there were days of doubt, fearing that I’d die alone, that I was faking it, that I was somehow different in a negative way.
But the horizon looks good. Guillermo Diaz is directing a movie called Dear Luke Love Me that will hopefully be as positive of ace representation as the Kickstarter said it would be. Elsewhere, Alice Oseman is publishing novels like “Loveless” that turn aromantic asexuals (aroace) into lead characters. YouTube and Tik Tok have several great voices that have only helped me to feel more comfortable in my identity, understanding how complicated this identity is (in a good way). I hope that you take this week to read some perspectives, to understand the community in some small way. Maybe one day we’ll even be featured on ABC, even in a montage, where the ‘A’ no longer is mistaken for ally. Though don’t get it twisted, we’re still friendly. Why not get to know us a little better and find out?
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