Jump to content

A message about AVEN's values


ithaca

Recommended Posts

Just now, ℃å℞t☉☧hℹĿẹ• said:

Wait so you're saying a homosexual guy would by definition only desire sex with men? And a heterosexual guy would by definition only desire sex with women? *gasp*

 

Just edited right before you posted. I'm too tired, I think everything is serious:unsure:

Link to post
Share on other sites

Maybe we should get back on track, rather than derailing it with definition debates. That argument could be taken elsewhere now.

Link to post
Share on other sites
2 hours ago, ℃å℞t☉☧hℹĿẹ• said:

 I'll maybe make a separate thread later on in the day to reply to your question so as not to derail this one. :cake: 

:cake: I figured it'd be best to ask here since you're not into PMs. Thank you :) 

Link to post
Share on other sites
2 hours ago, Tal Shi'ar said:

Maybe we should get back on track, rather than derailing it with definition debates. That argument could be taken elsewhere now.

Well this isn't actually a definition debate. We're specifically referring back to the topic of the OP which is "anyone who wants to be asexual is asexual and no one can attempt to correct someone who may be misidentifying themselves based on confusion over defintions as this would go against our values here at AVEN". The discussion is about those certain "values" AVEN has which while people may THINK those values are wonderful because they're all-inclusive, totally accepting, etc etc, certain aspects of those values are only doing harm to the prospect of asexuality eventually being accepted as a legitimate sexual orientation by the rest of the world, and those values are also harming efforts at actual education about asexuality (despite the fact that this site is apparently about asexuality education)..

 

I say again, this site isn't actually called the asexuality visibility and DISCUSSION network, but that's what it is, a discussion and speculation network.. Politically correct discussions have been chosen in place of actual education about asexuality. So yeah, that's what my comments are getting at. This site isn't about education, because saying "a gay man is a man who only desires sex with women" is NOT education.. Yet we are expected to say the exact same thing about asexuality and expect this place to be taken seriously as a site about education (it's in the name of the website after all).

 

Some of the 'values' discussed in the OP are harming asexuality visibility and education.. That's the issue being discussed.

Link to post
Share on other sites
Joe the Stoic
25 minutes ago, ℃å℞t☉☧hℹĿẹ• said:

Well this isn't actually a definition debate. We're specifically referring back to the topic of the OP which is "anyone who wants to be asexual is asexual and no one can attempt to correct someone who may be misidentifying themselves based on confusion over defintions as this would go against our values here at AVEN". The discussion is about those certain "values" AVEN has which while people may THINK those values are wonderful because they're all-inclusive, totally accepting, etc etc, certain aspects of those values are only doing harm to the prospect of asexuality eventually being accepted as a legitimate sexual orientation by the rest of the world, and those values are also harming efforts at actual education about asexuality (despite the fact that this site is apparently about asexuality education)..

 

I say again, this site isn't actually called the asexuality visibility and DISCUSSION network, but that's what it is, a discussion and speculation network.. Politically correct discussions have been chosen in place of actual education about asexuality. So yeah, that's what my comments are getting at. This site isn't about education, because saying "a gay man is a man who only desires sex with women" is NOT education.. Yet we are expected to say the exact same thing about asexuality and expect this place to be taken seriously as a site about education (it's in the name of the website after all).

 

Some of the 'values' discussed in the OP are harming asexuality visibility and education.. That's the issue being discussed.

Bada-bing, bada-bam.

Link to post
Share on other sites
arobydesign

I only use this as a social site but I'm a sucker for internet drama, so if someone could point me in the direction of the original drama that prompted this it'd be much appreciated.

Link to post
Share on other sites

I would rather have an inclusive definition where you can't label people while still being able to challenge them than a dogmatic one which would probably lead to people being run off the site. 

 

 

Link to post
Share on other sites

I'm all for constructive dialogue here, rather than letting misunderstandings go unchallenged and/or lecturing diatribes ad nauseum. And ultimately AVEN should make it clear that regardless of differences, or the end result of someone's exploration of sexual identity, they're welcome here. One-way answers aren't very educational for issues that are centered around our most personal experiences and emotions. There's a lot for a person to explore, and turning every personal inquiry into the same elaborate debate is not constructive. It's a deeply personal issue. We can offer our wisdom and experience when relevant without turning it into the same elaborate argument.

Link to post
Share on other sites
binary suns

I have very similar feelings to Myst. The values are... they do not support themselves. they collapse upon themselves in application. They are values which a fool holds. 

 

not that the idea which inspires the values are bad - liking to be supportive of others is a very strong value. but taking it as far as AVEN has it... 

 

Link to post
Share on other sites
binary suns

Ironically as long as AVEN holds its values and people like me, myst, and pan leave it behind because it's too depressing to see AVEN destroy itself. this will enforce those values huehuehue what a master plan!

Link to post
Share on other sites
Guest And Peggy
Just now, lIIIIIllIIlI said:

Ironically as long as AVEN holds its values and people like me, myst, and pan leave it behind because it's too depressing to see AVEN destroy itself. this will enforce those values huehuehue what a master plan!

if you and cartophile leave then I will seriously consider leaving too

Link to post
Share on other sites
binary suns
4 minutes ago, CakeSpadeAce said:

if you and cartophile leave then I will seriously consider leaving too

yes. this is a problem. this is not healthy. This is one- and note, only one - of the many problems with the statements expressed in the OP. 

 

I would not be a good person to discuss them as I will rant and be triggered and start to yell and make everyone unhappy with me. while making no sense whatsoever. 

Link to post
Share on other sites

"The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few." (Spock)

Link to post
Share on other sites
binary suns
7 minutes ago, timewarp said:

"The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few." (Spock)

hm.. I would advise realizing that - there are times in which there is no "right" response. The needs of the many deserve to be met, and the needs of the few deserve to be met. so there is no "right response" if you can only respond one way. 

Link to post
Share on other sites
NoLongerActive1234

There is a difference in giving people your two cents when they are asking for guidance and to be pushy and give your opinion where it's not wanted about people's personal experience. From what I have seen it has gone beyond just telling people who ask straight out for advice and that is totally uncool to me. 
I also doubt that the OP means discouraging people from giving guidance and advice when desired but to say that it is good to keep in mind that a person does decide on their own and that you can't label someone else.
It's not about being politically correct for some 'just because' reasoning it's about showing respect and to not make people feel like shit and like they are not welcome if they choose not to conform to someone else's view on their identity. It's about them and not about anyone else. So I don't think there needs to be some line drawn where one should intervene when someone says they are asexual. 
Everyone should be able to be in the same space comfortably enough on this site even if there is this discussion and pondering on the definition of asexual. 

Link to post
Share on other sites

Speaking on a personal level (meaning without passing through the Board), people are right when they understand that we can't label other people on AVEN. We can share our experiences, share the knowledge we have, etc (as the OP says), but we can't tell someone what their identity is or isn't. They might later realise they actually identify as something else (it happens to many), but it is their journey at their own pace, not ours to set. In case there is actually someone who would like to tell people "You are X" or "No, you are not Y", I do think they should look elsewhere in order to do that, as AVEN is not the place.

 

I believe from personal experience and years of observation and study, that those saying that the current status quo "harms education" are quite wrong, considering the massive steps forward in scientific research, media coverage, alliances with other organisation (including the life saving Trevor Project) and the discussions already happening around introducing asexuality in the sex ed curricula in several places. And that's just a limited number of examples.

Link to post
Share on other sites
arobydesign

OP, I feel like policing what members can and can't say to other members in such a general fashion isn't helping inclusivity. Surely, as and when actual incidents arise, it's up to the thread/subforum mod(s) to sort that out. The site does welcome all, I mean we have a section for sexual partners/allies after all.

Link to post
Share on other sites
Anthracite_Impreza
1 hour ago, Joe Parrish said:

Bada-bing, bada-bam.

I was under the impression it was bada boom :ph34r:

Link to post
Share on other sites
arobydesign
4 minutes ago, ithaca said:

In case there is actually someone who would like to tell people "You are X" or "No, you are not Y", I do think they should look elsewhere in order to do that, as AVEN is not the place.

 

 

The thing is people do come here asking to be told whether they're asexual or not, so by that logic that's also not a question that members can ask.

Link to post
Share on other sites
Just now, cluebat said:

The thing is people do come here asking to be told whether they're asexual or not, so by that logic that's also not a question that members can ask.

People can ask, and always do, it's up to us more experienced members to welcome them to their journey in the right way, without labelling them left and right. Yes, sometimes new members make mistakes and do label others, and the Admod Team knows how to deal with it, and knows to let new people know how to best approach these questions. Members have usually learned not to do it twice.

 

It is part of our job and volunteers' job to help creating the right environment, eventually, making sure we all learn the ways of this community. My part (and the Board's part) in this was also just to remind everyone (old and new) of what our most important values of inclusion and respect are.

Link to post
Share on other sites

"You're not Asexual." <- Not OK. 

 

"That's an interesting way to experience your (a)sexuality. You can find more information on Asexuality here (link), it also includes information on other sexualities and experiences. Perhaps you could give it a read :) " <- OK. 

 

One invalidates the other persons feelings and experiences. The other is educational.  It is important that everybody figures out their identity at their own pace. What happens when somebody pushes a new member out of the asexual community by telling them they aren't Asexual, then they later fully identify as such? We've just pushed somebody out of a great community where they could have received support. 

 

Its a case of your experience = your experience. Not anybody else's. 

Link to post
Share on other sites

I don't see how it's so difficult to give helpful answers that don't violate the "only you can decide" rule. If someone describes something incompatible with asexuality you can say "a lot of sexual people also experience that" which is in no way telling a person what their orientation is. Suggesting that people look further into helpful resources is, well, trying to be helpful.

Link to post
Share on other sites
Just now, Snow Cone said:

I don't see how it's so difficult to give helpful answers that don't violate the "only you can decide" rule. 

I know right, AVEN's been doing for what, 15 years now?

Link to post
Share on other sites

Gotta love people throwing themselves on the cross and posting these "I'm leaving" diatribes.

 

Seriously, just log out and never come back if you feel like it, posting those always just makes you look stupid when you start posting again - and let's face it, you will.

Link to post
Share on other sites
19 minutes ago, ithaca said:

I know right, AVEN's been doing for what, 15 years now?

I think what people are reacting to is they think this is changing, making it more strict, etc. Rather than just reinforcing what is already there. Perhaps a clarification of what spurred this post would help? 

 

Example of how to question, without breaching the labeling rule:

 

"User X: I think I might be asexual. But I don't know. I kind of like sex with people, enough to go out to bars and find hookups. But, I just don't like it as much as people around me and I never really see people as "hot"."

 

"Well, only you can decide if you are asexual or not. But, personally, if I wanted sex enough to go find hookups at the bars, I would not consider myself asexual. Depending on how often and other factors, I might use grey-a, maybe (link to information on grey). Sexuality is a very varied experience, so there is nothing wrong with not being "as sexual" as people you know, even if you ultimately decide asexual or grey-a don't fit. Give a look around and read some stories, see what you relate to. I would also suggest Swankivy's youtube channel, it has a lot of good information. "


What would be breaching ToS would be "Uh, no, you're not asexual. You're sexual." 

Link to post
Share on other sites
nanogretchen4

I agree with not contradicting specific individuals when they make statements about their own sexual orientation or gender identity. I have no objections to those two sections of the statement of AVEN's values at the beginning of this thread.

 

I disagree strongly with the attraction based definition unless attraction is being used as a synonym for desire for partnered sex, in which case I agree but think the definition could be clearer and more succinct. If someone thinks they are asexual when they obviously aren't, we can't contradict them. Fine. But why are they confused in the first place? It's probably because they have just read the super confusing and endlessly expanding list of definitions on AVEN. AVEN lists about fifty different flavors of "asexuals", most of which are actually very common variations on typical sexuality. So I am not going to argue that we should be able to assign sexual orientation labels to other people. I am, however, going to argue that we fix the definitions section of AVEN so that we are not the ones actively confusing newbies.

Link to post
Share on other sites
3 hours ago, Still said:

Gotta love people throwing themselves on the cross and posting these "I'm leaving" diatribes.

 

Seriously, just log out and never come back if you feel like it, posting those always just makes you look stupid when you start posting again - and let's face it, you will.

Mysticus is someone who always posted interesting, thoughtful, and very valuable contributions to the discussions that happen here, but they've almost completely stopped posting now (compared to how much they used to) as a result of.. well, a lot of the issues with the current state of AVEN. Let's face it, AVEN is now pretty much just a tumblr blog about asexuality with a more official name. There are a lot of people here who very much care whether or not Mysticus stays or goes. You might not care,  but  many of the rest of us would rather know than having Myst just disappear without saying anything.

 

3 hours ago, McFace Owly Owl said:

"User X: I think I might be asexual. But I don't know. I kind of like sex with people, enough to go out to bars and find hookups. But, I just don't like it as much as people around me and I never really see people as "hot"."

 

"Well, only you can decide if you are asexual or not. But, personally, if I wanted sex enough to go find hookups at the bars, I would not consider myself asexual. Depending on how often and other factors, I might use grey-a, maybe (link to information on grey). Sexuality is a very varied experience, so there is nothing wrong with not being "as sexual" as people you know, even if you ultimately decide asexual or grey-a don't fit. Give a look around and read some stories, see what you relate to. I would also suggest Swankivy's youtube channel, it has a lot of good information. "


What would be breaching ToS would be "Uh, no, you're not asexual. You're sexual." 

See there's a really foggy line here.

 

I'd respond that sounds no different than any other sexual who enjoys sex enough to seek it out at bars and who places no real value on the appearance of sex partners.. there are plenty of sexual people like that. However, that's the sort of thing I've been getting nudged for recently; pointing out things that are very common among sexual people (losing interest in sex with age and with familiarity being another) ...So yeah, there's a serious issue here that isn't actually being addressed and everyone's just tip-toeing around it. People in general here get really, really upset when you try to bring up "normal sexuality" in response to someone saying "I desire sex but only when in love..." or "I seek sex out because I enjoy but I don't care if I never have it again..." or "I don't find anyone hot but I'll still have sex with them..." etc, even if you're not actually saying "you're not asexual" in those words, you're just trying to explain how there are plenty of sexual people like that. This site is really against the accurate representation of normal sexuality, because it immediately means that 1) many people here wouldn't actually be "asexual" or 2) there are a LOT of asexuals.. like 40-60% of the population at the very least, which would kind of render the asexual label totally meaningless.

 

Not necessarily breaking TOS, but it's still invalidating "asexual identities" to say there are lots of sexual people exactly like that... so we instead invalidate normal sexuality in the favour of validating the whole "anyone who wants to be asexual is asexual" thing. Meh.

Link to post
Share on other sites
2 hours ago, nanogretchen4 said:

I agree with not contradicting specific individuals when they make statements about their own sexual orientation or gender identity. I have no objections to those two sections of the statement of AVEN's values at the beginning of this thread.

 

I disagree strongly with the attraction based definition unless attraction is being used as a synonym for desire for partnered sex, in which case I agree but think the definition could be clearer and more succinct. If someone thinks they are asexual when they obviously aren't, we can't contradict them. Fine. But why are they confused in the first place? It's probably because they have just read the super confusing and endlessly expanding list of definitions on AVEN. AVEN lists about fifty different flavors of "asexuals", most of which are actually very common variations on typical sexuality. So I am not going to argue that we should be able to assign sexual orientation labels to other people. I am, however, going to argue that we fix the definitions section of AVEN so that we are not the ones actively confusing newbies.

Just quoting for emphasis because yeah, that. That's what I meant by "not being a site about education". We are actively contributing towards confusion as to what asexuality is and is not and spreading misinformation about normal sexuality by trying to say it's almost all variants of asexuality of some type or another, unless you have a high libido and want to bang all the people who you find attractive - then you're definitely sexual: If you don't want to bang all the people you find attractive, or want to bang people despite not finding them attractive, you're totally on the "ace spectrum"...

 

Link to post
Share on other sites
24 minutes ago, ℃å℞t☉☧hℹĿẹ• said:

 

 

See there's a really foggy line here.

 

I'd respond that sounds no different than any other sexual who enjoys sex enough to seek it out at bars and who places no real value on the appearance of sex partners.. there are plenty of sexual people like that. However, that's the sort of thing I've been getting nudged for recently; pointing out things that are very common among sexual people (losing interest in sex with age and with familiarity being another) ...So yeah, there's a serious issue here that isn't actually being addressed and everyone's just tip-toeing around it. People in general here get really, really upset when you try to bring up "normal sexuality" in response to someone saying "I desire sex but only when in love..." or "I seek sex out because I enjoy but I don't care if I never have it again..." or "I don't find anyone hot but I'll still have sex with them..." etc, even if you're not actually saying "you're not asexual" in those words, you're just trying to explain how there are plenty of sexual people like that. This site is really against the accurate representation of normal sexuality, because it immediately means that 1) many people here wouldn't actually be "asexual" or 2) there are a LOT of asexuals.. like 40-60% of the population at the very least, which would kind of render the asexual label totally meaningless.

 

Not necessarily breaking TOS, but it's still invalidating "asexual identities" to say there are lots of sexual people exactly like that... so we instead invalidate normal sexuality in the favour of validating the whole "anyone who wants to be asexual is asexual" thing. Meh.

If you say "I know plenty of sexuals who also feel..." imo should not be receiving any sort of action, if you do, I'd bring it up in site comments? Though, if you say "You just sound like a normal sexual", that can be seen as labeling. But, I have not seen your nudges or the threads behind them, so I can't speculate as to the reason. Have you asked the moderator who sent them to elaborate and provide example rewording for how to say basically the same thing, but without breaching their rules? If so, did they provide it?

 

Though, the debate of "was this labeling or not" might be best in site comments, anyway.

Link to post
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...