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Article about love and sex, and lack of sex in romantic relationships, in Finnish media


swirl_of_blue

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I'm making this thread because I feel it is very rare to see anything about asexuality in Finnish media, and even in this article asexuality is never explicitly mentioned. However, the article does touch upon "love and romance without sex", but at least I feel many of the concepts are not exactly what I would call correct, and some of them are even backwards. The article is in Finnish, so I will summarize what I think are the main points. The article can be found at https://yle.fi/uutiset/3-9845088

Yle is the Finnish national broadcasting company, which is regarded as mostly neutral media and the most trusted newssite in Finland.

 

It is not stated who wrote the article itself, but a psychotherapist-sexual therapist was interviewed. The article is titled as "Sex is not obligatory in a relationship, there can be many ways to love". The beginning of the article lists some of the stereotypical advice people might be given when they have problems with a relationship where sex is disappearing, for example getting sexy underwear, having a romantic dinner or just "doing it" to make desire awaken again. The therapist calls these things very shallow, and that lists of hints are more about sex than sexuality. She thinks many people are just made more anxious when this sort of advice doesn't help them.

 

In the second paragraph the therapist tells that even if the average Finn has sex twice a week, not everyone has to strive to achieve that "normality" and that sexuality can change during the person's life. Every relationship should have its own "blueprint" and many people don't even as adults really know themselves that well. She also quotes how someone might very well say "I've never really cared for sex, but since everyone says it should be the #1 thing I've been doing it too".

 

The third paragraph introduces romance and sex - or lack of sex. This part is a bit difficult to translate, but the way it reads makes it sound like "romantic love" is the same as "feelings + sexual desire", "at least in the beginning". The therapist thinks the passionate love at the beginning of a relationship can turn into fear very quickly, because the other person is let so close so quickly. And fear can then lead to wanting safety and security, and too much of that "kills passion, because passion needs freedom". After this there is some talk of how in times past marriage was mostly for economic and social reasons, and desire didn't really come into it, and that the way relationships are nowadays there is more pressure because a partner should be both "safe" and "sexually interesting and desirable" year after year.

 

The fourth paragraph is what I think if the most interesting, as it goes into different kinds of love. In this article the love where there is deep, intimate, emotional bond but no interest of sex is called "aesthetic love". The therapist is quoted as saying: "to these people the important thing is the feeling of love. There is talk of good, beautiful "energy of truth" of values, and that binds people together. It forms a tight bond in which physical sex may not be a part of". The therapist is asked whether a relationship without sex can work, and she answers "who could really say that you can't love like that?"

 

The fifth paragraph continues with the themes if "different kinds of love", this time with "sensual love". Here sensual is pretty clearly connected to "carnal, physical kind of enjoyment" and that the bond between the people is formed heavily through physicality. There is also raised the question of being "in between", and this is described as someone who has "erotic interests, but very rarely". These people are also described as feeling very passionate towards their hobbies and other interests but still going to their partner for intimacy though they do need a lot of their own alone time. In the last sentence of the paragraph demisexuality is mentioned as "erotic desire only appearing after there is a strong bond of friendship or love, meaning the mental bond must be there before the physical one".

 

The final paragraph is about the importance of communication in a relationship, and that the quality of love life should not be measured by how often or what kind of sex there is. It is also stated that if the partners have very different expectations of relationships and sex, there can be problems.

 

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So what do I think of the article? It is interesting, but I can't help thinking that many of the things said are misleading. What the article calls "aesthetic love" would in my book actually be nonsexual (and possibly also nonsensual) romantic or platonic love, and what the article calls sensuality is heavily hinted to be sexual, which sensuality doesn't need to be. These definitions of "aesthetic" and "sensual" are said to be opposite of each other. Asexuality is not mentioned at all. However, I think the definition of demisexuality is in my book good enough to not be too misleading. I was very excited when I noticed the article and its title, but after reading the whole thing I was pretty disappointed.

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everywhere and nowhere

From what you wrote it sounds like a very good text!

Really, don't care that much about inaccuracies and even no specific mention of asexuality. Any article which says that people are not obliged to have sex is important.

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  • 2 weeks later...
scarletlatitude

Thanks so much for the translation! :)

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