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Gaydar and A-dar (Asexual Radar)?


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Hullo guys!

Today I am wondering if we could identify other aces in a crowd like homosexual people through 'A-dar'. From my experience (I don't know if it is because few knows about asexuality or aces are hard to identify), I have been assumed as a straight girl for my whole life. Nobody ever suspected that I am ace; in fact, many actually think that I will probably be very sexually attractive. I guess mainly it is because I have a very feminine gender expression, like I wear fashionable clothes all the time, and have some really feminine hobbies (for example, cooking). 

 

However, my friendships are all purely platonic. I often go out, discuss about life and do activities with my friends; however, we rarely have sleepovers. I find the idea of being intimate with them weird (like caressing each other, wearing the same clothes, and um, wearing little in front of them.). I dress modestly and have no interest in sexual stuff and whatsoever (I don't understand why people are excited when they talk about them). When people talk to me about dating, I just become a fish out of water and find some random pick up lines to pass off the topic. 

 

My gaydar sometimes works, but A-dars can get confusing here in China. Most of my friends have little interest in dating and sex, but it turned out that many of them are sexuals that care more about their education/personal pursuit than relationships. Those friends are usually ambitious, and claim that they are not at the age to discuss sex as they need to focus on academics. Other people (who I supposed to be aces/that are not dating) later turned out that they are dating. Perhaps they have their own friend circles and are not open to revealing their relationship to me. 

 

So guys, do you have A-dars? How do you 'detect' other aces from the crowd? Do you think aces are easy to detect or sometimes difficult?

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Elftober Country

I've got pretty good gaydar, but I don't think I could detect another asexual unless they were also identifying as LGBTQ.

 

I'm gonna start looking out for anyone wearing a black ring on their right-hand middle finger tho :)

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I've got a pretty good gaydar as well, but I'm the only (potential) asexual person I know. So it's either that I haven't personally met any other aces or or I'm really bad at identifying them.

Is the black ring a thing? I'm new so I don't really know what symbols or signs are used (except the triangle ofc).

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SamwiseLovesLife
3 hours ago, October Country said:

I've got pretty good gaydar, but I don't think I could detect another asexual unless they were also identifying as LGBTQ.

 

I'm gonna start looking out for anyone wearing a black ring on their right-hand middle finger tho :)

Saaaame

 

I got to wearing a black ring for this reason. Feels like I'm part of the cake club

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SamwiseLovesLife
36 minutes ago, Amelys said:

I've got a pretty good gaydar as well, but I'm the only (potential) asexual person I know. So it's either that I haven't personally met any other aces or or I'm really bad at identifying them.

Is the black ring a thing? I'm new so I don't really know what symbols or signs are used (except the triangle ofc).

Yeah Black ring on your right middle finger is an Ace thing :) You can get some really nice stone ones for less than £5 on etsy if you're interested

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7 minutes ago, SamwiseLovesLife said:

Yeah Black ring on your right middle finger is an Ace thing :) You can get some really nice stone ones for less than £5 on etsy if you're interested

I'll take a look and thank you for the info :)

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Hahaha my "gaydar" is well and truly broken. I have no luck in trying to find or pick other people's sexualities. Although a few of my close friends have ended up being ace but I think that's more of a happy accident and similar senses of humour.

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Elftober Country
1 hour ago, SamwiseLovesLife said:

Saaaame

 

I got to wearing a black ring for this reason. Feels like I'm part of the cake club

 
 

Just noticed you're in the Midlands! Me too! 

 

Glad to know there is another cake club member around these parts :cake: :D

 

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Unless it's extremely obvious, I'm pretty blind to people's orientation cause, not to sound like an ***, I just don't really care TBH. I don't really think about romance/sex deliberately so it doesn't really cross my mind except when someone blatantly gives away their preferences. It makes sense for me though cause I'm hopeless when it comes to recognizing stuff related to romance. 😕

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My gaydar is weirdly accurate when it comes to gay men. It tends to pick up even people who are deeply inside their particular closet, which occasionally leads to embarrassing situations. 

It's okay with gay women.

I probably wouldn't recognize a bisexual or pansexual person at all, unless they stood in front of me stating "hi, mi name is _ and I am bi/pansexual". 

If there is such a thing as "a-dar" or "ace-dar", I probably don't possess it. I've only met a handful of people who I believe might be ace, and I only reached that conclusion after knowing each of them for quite some time. They all identify as female, strangely enough. Maybe it's because I tend to look more closely at women, because they apparently are my preferred "relationship demographic".

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I've never had a foolproof gaydar. Sometimes I can tell, but overall I'm better at reading people's moods and things like that, and always wondered how gaydar can even work when people of all orientations present in endless ways.

 

I have started looking for ace rings, though. Yet to spot one on anyone I didn't already know, or at an ace gathering. 

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Hermit Advocate

I don't think I have an A-dar. This could be because I've just never crossed paths with another asexual before, but people always assume I'm strait so I don't really think A-dar is a real hing. This is why I wear the black ring. 

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okay-but-martin-freeman

I'd say my gaydar is... functioning. My a-dar, though? Broken to all hell. I don't think anyone would be able to tell I'm aro/ace apart from my black and silver rings; I'm a huge girly girl, I'm loud, outgoing, love makeup, love clothes, love shoes, love shopping, all that jazz. Then again, not even that many aros/aces know about the rings, so maybe that makes it even harder to tell...

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1 hour ago, Smixysmoo said:

I'd say my gaydar is... functioning. My a-dar, though? Broken to all hell. I don't think anyone would be able to tell I'm aro/ace apart from my black and silver rings; I'm a huge girly girl, I'm loud, outgoing, love makeup, love clothes, love shoes, love shopping, all that jazz. Then again, not even that many aros/aces know about the rings, so maybe that makes it even harder to tell...

Haha same! People always assume that I am straight as arrow when they first see me. They say like I will get married and have a good sex life really early. Some even worry about if I will be too involved in relationships after I go to universities!

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SamwiseLovesLife
18 hours ago, October Country said:

Just noticed you're in the Midlands! Me too! 

 

Glad to know there is another cake club member around these parts :cake: :D

 

There's an Oxford meetup happening May 6th if you're interested :D Check it out in the meetup forum

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I have neither... I have Gaydar or straightdar or anything.

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

One of my friends succeeded in guessing that I was Ace before I even considered myself Ace, he just never mentioned it until I came out. :P I'm guessing his 'A-dar' is functioning better than most people's though!

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Is a gaydar really a thing tho? Is that not just thinking of stereotypes of feminine men who could just as well be het or ace (or bi or pan for that matter, tho I guess that might technically make them gay, too, I'm not an expert yet in queer semantics...) ?

 

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11 hours ago, ZeL said:

Is a gaydar really a thing tho? Is that not just thinking of stereotypes of feminine men who could just as well be het or ace (or bi or pan for that matter, tho I guess that might technically make them gay, too, I'm not an expert yet in queer semantics...) ?

 

There have been plenty of occasions where I was with family and they state that a friend is setting off their gaydar. When given the chance, I check facebook and it does confirm the family's guess 9 times out of 10 even when the family doesn't have access to their FB account. With that said, I wouldn't be surprised if there was more to it than stereotypes.

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