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Asexual Awareness Week 2018: What's asexuality?

This year, asexual awareness week is October 21-27, 2018.

What is an asexual?

Someone who never experiences sexual attraction and never has the intrinsic desire to have partnered sex.

Rabger's Model
Rabger's Model

Asexuality is not a lack of a sex drive

Many asexuals do masturbate, but they don't think about having sex with others or inherently desire to share sexual activity with others.

Asexuality is not celibacy

Celibates have the inherent desire to have sex with someone, but they choose not to act upon it. Asexuals don't have that inherent, primary desire.

The difference between celibacy and asexuality
The difference between celibacy and asexuality

Asexuality is not repression or a result of medical problems

Asexuality is not the result of sexually abuse, level of attractiveness, never having had good sex, getting out of a bad relationship, hormone deficiency, being a loner, not meeting the right person, depression, or etc. There are plenty of ugly people who are heterosexual. Most asexuals don't have a hormone deficiency from the last time they checked. Asexuals aren't repressing a sexual desire that doesn't exist. They aren't secretly homosexual and in denial. Many asexuals, including me, would've not repressed homosexual desires if we had any. Being a loner is irrelevant to sexual orientation. Sexual people don't "turn asexual" because of bad experiences, they only turn bitter.

Asexuality is not a mental disorder

Asexuality doesn't cause psychological distress to self or others, doesn't cause physical harm to self or others, doesn't break any laws, and isn't strongly frowned upon by society; so it's not a mental disorder according to DSM-5 standards.

Asexuals can have varying romantic orientations

There are romantic and aromantic asexuals. Romantic asexuals inherently desire a romantic relationship with another person but without the sex part. So it's possible for a straight person to not desire sex in a relationship. It's possible for a gay or bi person to not want sex in a relationship. Those people may have sex with their partners only for the secondary benefit of keeping their romantic partner.

Romantic and sexual orientations
Romantic and sexual orientations
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Most Helpful Guy

  • Awesome piece! Very informative piece. GO ASEXUALS! And for those who say it is BS - I feel it is how the brain is 'wired' or 'programmed' at birth. There is a large spectrum of peoples sexual desire - IMHO. The ones to need to have it a lot all the way down to axesuals, and anywhere in between.

    I didn't see it in this piece, but it is probably worth mentioning for other people exploring their sexuality or lack thereof: www.aven.com

    And for those that are loading and prepping their troll rifles for me - I am currently celibate by choice.

    • @OP - thanks for the MHO.

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  • Great mytake. Many have trouble truly understanding asexuality.

  • Simple

    Asexual Awareness Week 2018: What's asexuality?Asexual Awareness Week 2018: What's asexuality?

    • Romantic asexuals can want romantic love. Aromantic asexuals can only feel platonic and familial love. Not everyone desires romantic love. Stop generalizing.

  • This is very enlightening. I do place a high degree of trust in research but I also have my own thoughts. I have a hard time accepting that this isn't something that is broken. The research just hasn't found it. I don't believe it's a normal development for someone to have sexual desire but not with a partner. I don't think a lack of sexual desire would be normal either. We are driven to breed since puberty. We are hard wired since birth to survive and recognize good genes for breeding later. So in my mind, any instinct that prevents that or hinders that instinct is an abnormal development. Just my take on the subject.

    • Do you hold the same view on homosexuality? I don't see how research is necessary for this. There is a utility competent to research which requires research to be useful for a good purpose. It doesn't matter why someone is asexual, bisexual or etc. It's just too personal of an issue to research and put them underneath the microscope.

    • Yes I do feel the same way about strictly homosexual. I believe we are anatomically created to have sex with either sex (man has prostate inside rectum, woman has clitoris on outside) but again, to not want to do that which leads to breeding is not normal development. Either physiologically something went wrong or psychologically something went wrong. Again, that is my thoughts. Research, rather the topic is personal or not, is important. To say it's too personal a topic assumes it's a choice and cannot be studied. I believe true straight homosexuality is not a choice. We are born with it. Why would anyone want to suffer the judgement of they had a choice. But any belief can be based off opinion or evidence or a mix of both. Mine is grounded in a mix of both.

  • Very informative take.
    Absolutely LOVE the information you provided especially the last photo.
    According to the chart I’m POLY-SEXUAL. lol

  • Asexual is like some vegans, before you jump an attack this let me explain,
    for a while I worked in a Hotel, they had many seminars, on most for meals at the start there was only one Vegan, in two weeks there were more than half of those on the seminars were suddenly Vegan,
    I am not getting on to Vegans just using this as an example,
    same went with people drinking tea, at the start one maybe had it black at the end most did

  • Thanks for explaining what asexuality is, but I don't see why it needs a week of recognition. I don't have anything against asexuals, but I think it's their business, not anyone else's.

    • It needs recognition due to how invisible we seem in society. It's our week for our sexuality to be recognized.

  • Its people who don't give a fuck about fucking

  • I've always wondered what asexuals think about when they masturbate and whether they actually enjoy the feeling, especially of orgasm.

    I also find it interesting that while asexuals only make up a tiny percentage of general population, they seem to be disproportionately many on here.

    • The graphic is a little misleading though. Demisexuality is rather a subcategory than a sexual orientation itself.

    • Why do I get downvoted for being curious about how asexuals feel?

  • Im asexual as well. Not something i think about a lot but recently i have.

  • Do you really need a week? Wouldn't a day suffice? I mean things like Autism, World Down Syndrome, Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade... just to name a few, only get days. Wouldn't Asexual Awareness Day be enough given the small percentage of the population that are asexual even when compared to say people with Autism or Down Syndrome?
    Don't take this the wrong way, I'm not against people being asexual or anything like that. I just feel like a week is a bit excessive for what can be summed up in a short MyTake!

    • Any group can get a day or week if they want to. Asexuality suffered many years of exclusion and invisibility. We need a week to be recognized.

  • I appreciate your my Take and as a pansexual, I am accepting of your orientation and I embrace people like you with respect. However, I’m a little confused as to why there’s a need for an awareness thing. Asexuals may be increasing (I don’t know) but it’s probably not going to be significant in numbers because... of science. Also... I don’t think asexuals are majorly discriminated against (i could totally be wrong, feel free to educate me).
    I think it’s great to have a regular celebration for who you are but I don’t think asexuality is something that NEEDS “awareness”.
    Hopefully I’m making sense...

    • Asexuals aren't "increasing." The only thing that increased is acceptance and the population. The percentage of 1% will remain stable in future generations.

    • That’s totally fine with me 🤷🏾‍♀️ But I just don’t see how people wouldn’t accept asexuals.

  • im thinking of starting the ' no one gives a fuck what your sexuality is' movement... never been one for labels though

    • Heteronormativity is all over the place but it suddenly because a problem when someone discusses a sexuality that doesn't conform to heteronormativity?

    • do hetro people have big parades or wear , im straight t shirts? that wasn't my point anyway. it was more about looking forward to a time where it just doesn't matter. incidentally i saw a charity the other day that has a homeless shelter for gay people... im sure all the other shelters dont turn gay people away. seemed kinda stupid to me

  • Asexual is a lack of sexual desire, which happens to be connected to Low T as well. Granted you produce testosterone both in the testes and in the brain. Get a brain tumor in the right place for example and it can literally neuter your testosterone production and kill your sex drive. Even if you have enough testosterone to get an erection.

    If someone doesn't have a sex drive it legitimately can be entirely in their head, even if it's not necessarily a disorder. I would argue on some level in most cases they're dealing with a type of depression (tho I'm no expert). A healthy sex drive is a sign of normal human health. If you don't have one you are lacking a major component of health. Having a low sex drive doesn't necessarily mean you're not healthy, but no sex drive at all is a bad sign. Might be medical or psychological, but that's no bueno.

    Tho I am curious as to how there appears to be a high number of seemingly attention seeking asexuals that make posts about it. So much so to dedicate an awareness month to it... that's some misdirected sexual energy.

    • Asexuality is not the lack of a sex drive. Biology isn't always linear. Testosterone has a correlation with sex drive, but it has nothing to do with sexual attraction. It's not misdirected sexual energy when I'm trying to help others understand what asexuality is and make it less of an invisible orientation. It' already rarely spoken about it, so when I get one week to talk about this, I'm attention seeking? Wow.

    • When I refer to sexual energy I'm referring to the pent up energy guys get after either 1. not having sex for awhile or 2. Just not getting off for a period of time. That pent up sexual energy is misdirected if this is what it leads to. I'm not saying you in particular are just attention seeking. But anyone who has been on this site for more than a month has seen how often asexual topics and posts have been made about it. Nearly all of them claim to be for the purpose of raising awareness. People know about it. The attention seeking appearance of it comes from it constantly being brought up and the people posting about it almost requiring others to fully take on the beliefs they have about asexuals. To be honest tho, this isn't a topic I even care much about and I don't even remember why I commented.

  • You shall throw this list in garbage, because any one who ain't straight is suffering from a mental illness or has a medical hormones condition... the only true sex is between a man and a woman...

    Now you can spill all your anger and rage but guess what! I don't care... that's my opinion, like it or not 😏

  • Worms are asexual. It means they fuck themselves because they each have both sexes.

  • More modern bullshit. Ridiculous.

    • That's your opinion.

    • Right. An opinion based on decades of experience and knowledge. You? Not so much. LOL

    • It's still an opinion with no reliable basis obviously

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  • I understand, Straight, Gay, Bi and Asexual, the rest strike me as mental disorders.

  • The weird thing is how much asexuality people want to spend so much time talking about their lack of sexual desire.

    I don't like hamburgers, but I don't feel compelled to right a big long story about not liking hamburgers, and the angst and woe I feel whenever a McDonald's commercial comes on.

    Damn it, I want the non hamburger eater awareness week, and I want it now!

  • Ha ha... it's one of those things like... hmm, why do I care what your sexuality is? All I need to know is that you don't want to have sex with ME, or as it turns out, with any other person !

  • Does everything get a week now? Are y'all that insecure that y'all need to have your on week -_-

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