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Are we ALL asexual....at least in the beginning?


James121

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When I was a young child I remember finding girls gross. I had no interest in them whatsoever and sex, well that was disgusting too.

As I grew older I began to find girls attractive but still, I was a child and I had zero, absolutely no desire to actually put my willy inside a girl. I may have talked about it (as did my friends) but doing it for real would have scared the crap out of me and I wouldn’t have even thought to have tried it. At best, watch it on a tv show out of curiosity. As I got older, desire to do it begin to increase until boom....I never looked back. I became sexual and therefore did I start as an asexual?

it seems in some respects that the sex repulsed have never moved beyond what I used to experience as a child and there are other asexuals who did but didn’t move past what I was like as a slightly older child. I hope this makes sense! What do you think?

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Hmm,

 

I have had thoughts like this myself when I think of my own situation.

 

I remember just before Middle School it would activate my contrarian steak when boys in my class went on and on about a particular girl.

 

Later I developed crushes on girls, but found couples kissing oddly disturbing.

 

I hit puberty, and my libido was overwhelming at times, but it was still not focused on anyone in particular.

 

Flash forward to today, I still get crushes on girls at times, but I still haven't gotten the urge to ever want to have sex with anyone.

 

So in my case I can remember having crushes on girls back then, and having crushes now, and it hasn't really changed all that much.

 

I'd have to agree that your idea makes some kind of sense.

 

We do in a way start as asexual as a child.

 

I don't think this means that asexual people are immature or underdeveloped in any way though.

 

 

 

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We do in a way start as asexual as a child.

 

I don't think this means that asexual people are immature or underdeveloped in any way though.

I agree if you mean in any other way. But in a purely technical, nonjudgemental sense, if we all start off effectively asexual, and asexual people don't develop sexual feelings as others do, they just are underdeveloped, just as if somone didn't develop body hair, or start ovulation for some reason.

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Hmm,

 

I can see appreciate what you are saying, but I think your comparison to sexual feeling and the physical development we go through in puberty is erroneous in some respects.

 

There have been cases where for some people this is the cases, but it is not a statement that encompasses all asexual people and their situations.

 

Your statement sounds to me like you are saying, since we haven't developed the feeling to want to murder someone , then we must be underdeveloped just as if someone didn't develop body hair, or start ovulation for some reason.

 

This is just my interpretation though.

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Murdering people isn't a near-universal biologically trackable result of chemical changes to our body. Puberty is. Some people don't have some of the consequences of that - starting ovulation etc. - or in the case of asexuals, wanting to have sex with other people.

 

Environment must play a part too, because it does in everything - either in terms of nutrition, weather etc. or psychologically. But the effect is still the same, and the asexual community seems loathe to consider this because politically, it can imply to some people if there's a cause, there's a 'solution' which implies there's something wrong with them.

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1 hour ago, James121 said:

When I was a young child I remember finding girls gross. I had no interest in them whatsoever and sex, well that was disgusting too.

As I grew older I began to find girls attractive but still, I was a child and I had zero, absolutely no desire to actually put my willy inside a girl. I may have talked about it (as did my friends) but doing it for real would have scared the crap out of me and I wouldn’t have even thought to have tried it. At best, watch it on a tv show out of curiosity. As I got older, desire to do it begin to increase until boom....I never looked back. I became sexual and therefore did I start as an asexual?

No, you didn't. That's a totally average experience.

 

That's also not what "sexuality is fluid" means (I know you didn't say that.) Oh and it's a great example as to why people should wait at least until puberty hits until they slap some "label" across their forehead.

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To be honest, I can't remember ever being asexual. I can think back to, maybe being 5 years old, and having some semblance of finding girls "attractive". Yes, it was different, and it didn't make me desire sex or anything remotely like that at that age.. although sexual desire started developing early for me, too, around age 8, my first sexual fantasies I can remember involved my teacher in 2nd grade.. anyway, to say that the thing that defines my sexuality suddenly appeared out of nowhere at a certain age and I was purely "asexual" before then would be plain wrong. It's more like a very gradual process that probably started sometime after the toddler stage.

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everywhere and nowhere

@Telecaster68, I don't think that environment explains it. I don't think that biology can ever explain thoughtfeeling. It's much more, I personally for example have reasons to believe that personality is non-hereditary (or at most hereditary in a social, non-biological sense). The mental aspects of puberty sometimes just don't go hand in hand with biological aaspects because biology is variable, but thoughtfeeling is infinitely variable.

I kinda like the theory presented here. As long, of course, as it isn't presented as implying that asexuals are people who never fully grow up. However, as I wrote, the spectrum of possible thoughtfeeling is infinite and some people just have different paths of development.

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This is pretty much how I viewed things, yep.

 

Admittedly it's sometimes frustrating to run into people who can't seem to relate at all to an asexual experience, even though I'm sure for many of them they were effectively "asexual" as young children.

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Shadowstepper

I think every bit of this line of thinking is ridiculous.

 

thinking girls are icky as a child is not the same as having an aversion to sex...

 

And thinking girls are "gross" is not a universal experience either. I didn't think girls were gross. My kids don't think the opposite sex is gross. But then, I taught my kids not to judge others based on what they look like or to think bad of others for being different.

 

 

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^ I think you're maybe focusing just a little bit too much on that one statement of the OP without really digesting the rest

 

Obviously you don't have to think the opposite sex is gross to be asexual.  The point was that there were no elements of attraction present, which is apparently what some people think sexual orientation revolves around.

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everywhere and nowhere

For me it's more as if sex was icky to a child. And I think that for many children it would be true. Children don't see the point of doing such weird things...

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2 hours ago, Nowhere Girl said:

@Telecaster68, I don't think that environment explains it. I don't think that biology can ever explain thoughtfeeling. It's much more, I personally for example have reasons to believe that personality is non-hereditary (or at most hereditary in a social, non-biological sense). The mental aspects of puberty sometimes just don't go hand in hand with biological aaspects because biology is variable, but thoughtfeeling is infinitely variable.

I kinda like the theory presented here. As long, of course, as it isn't presented as implying that asexuals are people who never fully grow up. However, as I wrote, the spectrum of possible thoughtfeeling is infinite and some people just have different paths of development.

I completely agree - there's an incredibly complicated feedback system between our environment, our physical systems and our genes, and it's not deterministic in most cases, I was more making the analogy that sometimes for some people, some functions don't develop, and in a completely technical way, that means those functions are underdeveloped.

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knittinghistorian

I don't have a problem with explaining asexuality to people in those terms.  "You know how when you were a kid, your reaction to sex or kissing or whatnot was 'You put what where??  And why??  Gross!'  Well, I never had desire kick in to override those feelings."

 

I'm also okay with the idea of something not developing in me that develops in most people.  I don't think it makes me stunted or undeveloped generally.  I also have a tooth that never developed, so I have one fewer teeth than other people.  It doesn't mean anything at all, it's just kinda cool.

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6 hours ago, Shadowstepper said:

I think every bit of this line of thinking is ridiculous.

 

thinking girls are icky as a child is not the same as having an aversion to sex...

 

And thinking girls are "gross" is not a universal experience either. I didn't think girls were gross. My kids don't think the opposite sex is gross. But then, I taught my kids not to judge others based on what they look like or to think bad of others for being different.

 

 

You’ve missed the point and played on the words used. I thought the idea of girls was gross because as a young child, fancying someone was embarrassing.

The thought of touching their genitals would have been the gross bit because I wasn’t mature enough to want to do so.

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Guest Jetsun Milarepa

Haha! I didn't even know I was a girl till I was about 4 years old! Up till then I was just a person! The rest just kept eluding me all through school. It took a long time for the penny to drop.

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20 hours ago, knittinghistorian said:

I don't have a problem with explaining asexuality to people in those terms.  "You know how when you were a kid, your reaction to sex or kissing or whatnot was 'You put what where??  And why??  Gross!'  Well, I never had desire kick in to override those feelings."

16 hours ago, James121 said:

You’ve missed the point and played on the words used. I thought the idea of girls was gross because as a young child, fancying someone was embarrassing.

The thought of touching their genitals would have been the gross bit because I wasn’t mature enough to want to do so.

I'm not sure what kinds of kids the other people here grew up around, but a lot of kids will actually get sexually aroused if they see sex by accident on TV or in their dad's 'secret' magazines he keeps hidden in the shed.. and they'll want to try kissing and try to copy it if they see it, and (this part is disgusting but true) they often actively want to engage in sex if a pedophile grooms them to it. I don't think it's so much that kids are 'asexual', it's more that we actively attempt to prevent them from being exposed to that sort of thing as long as we possibly can so they're quite unaware of it. That stops being possible once hormones kick in because around that time they're getting introduced to it a lot more in school etc, but before then it's still perfectly possible for a kid to be interested in it, thinking about it, finding girls or boys cute or attractive, wanting to try kissing etc, as long as they've been exposed to the idea of it.

 

...I think a lot of the speculation happening in this thread is coming from people who had very (sexually) sheltered childhoods and/or grew up around other kids with very (sexually) sheltered childhoods.

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I agree a lot of children are sexually curious and able to be aroused, but (for me anyhow) it was different to adult sexuality, far more based on cultural references and general curiosity about the world than sharing a connection with someone. It kind of chimes with how I've heard asexuals talk about sex on AVEN, in fact.

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...I think a lot of the speculation happening in this thread is coming from people who had very (sexually) sheltered childhoods and/or grew up around other kids with very (sexually) sheltered childhoods.

Certainly true in my case, anyway.  I didn't even know what sex was until the age of 14.

 

There was nothing to be curious about before then because back at that point you could have successfully convinced me that babies were delivered by a stork.

 

My first exposure to sex was at the age of 13 when I was traveling abroad with family, to a cheap motely place that apparently had full on porn freely viewable on its TV... but I had no idea what it was, and I was just extremely confused by what it was I was seeing.  Nobody else was in the room to witness the event at the time because they were downstairs getting the luggage.

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1 hour ago, FictoVore. said:

I'm not sure what kinds of kids the other people here grew up around, but a lot of kids will actually get sexually aroused if they see sex by accident on TV or in their dad's 'secret' magazines he keeps hidden in the shed..

Aged 5 I don’t really agree. Children are not anywhere near mature enough to want/desire sex which is why it has become systematic for society to make every effort to avoid exposing them to it.  For example, if my 12 year old boy saw a sex scene on the tv he would probably watch it intently. If he was on his own he would probably rewind it and watch again because he is beginning to mature. In 3 years time he’d probably like to give it a whirl himself. If my 6 year old boy saw it he would think they were wrestling and have no real interest in it.

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1 hour ago, Telecaster68 said:

I agree a lot of children are sexually curious and able to be aroused, but (for me anyhow) it was different to adult sexuality, far more based on cultural references and general curiosity about the world than sharing a connection with someone. It kind of chimes with how I've heard asexuals talk about sex on AVEN, in fact.

I think this was the point I was getting at. A lot of what I read on here reminds me of the way I was as a child. Is asexuality a continued lack of sexual development in the mind? The physical development in their body has taken place but just not the mind! On the flip side of the coin, someone who suffers hypersexuality may have over developed?

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Galactic Turtle

Personally I've always viewed sexual and romantic desire as a developmental thing. To that extent, I also recognize that all people develop differently whether it be for genetic or environmental or whatever reasons. The second we're born I don't think we experience either of these desires, however from then on I think we all diverge at different rates in different directions which is why at any given moment regardless of sexuality some people feel as if they've been left behind, are lagging behind, or even zooming ahead of their peers.

 

Just the other day I was out for drinks with two of my coworkers. We're all women in our mid twenties. Quickly the conversation switched to boys and stayed there for the better part of two hours. They recalled their various crushes, romances, and trysts from childhood to the present day and I sat there with startling clarity that I simply did not experience any of this. It is as if my emotional meter has completely different numbers on it than theirs. At points, if I did not know any better, I would've said that my two coworkers were insane. That's the extent to how what they were saying seemed to be the equivalent of someone detailing how they were kidnapped by aliens. One of my friends also recently recalled to me all of her various infatuations over the years and how she unsuccessfully stalked pursued all of these boys from the shadows. The extent to which she got wrapped up in these boys was unfathomable to me.

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2 hours ago, James121 said:

Aged 5 I don’t really agree. Children are not anywhere near mature enough to want/desire sex which is why it has become systematic for society to make every effort to avoid exposing them to it.  For example, if my 12 year old boy saw a sex scene on the tv he would probably watch it intently. If he was on his own he would probably rewind it and watch again because he is beginning to mature. In 3 years time he’d probably like to give it a whirl himself. If my 6 year old boy saw it he would think they were wrestling and have no real interest in it.

This will be TMI for some people!

 

Totally depends on the kids I suppose. I know I would sneak out my grandmother's anatomy books to look at the genitals and breasts from as early as I can remember, and was also masturbating imagining actual sex from a very young age (though never with myself included, it was always characters from books I listened to on tape, like The Hobbit and the Narnia books etc, and Disney characters and Barbies much earlier than that). And by young I mean.. hmmm.. like 2? Funnily enough I never actually enjoyed partnered sex once I started having it, ended up being very happily celibate (by choice) for 6 years and identifying as asexual until I was 28 :P But yeah, I remember my younger brother used to sneak my art comics to his room when he was maybe 6 or 7? They had comic book women with big breasts etc in them, and plenty of kids would giggle about sex and tell dirty jokes on the schoolbus from a very young age at the school I went to. I remember when I was 14 I was using the loo at school and heard two 5 year old girls talking in the next loo cubicle about TMI    how their boyfriends lick their vaginas..END TMI  I really hope that's just something they saw on TV or something though :/ And it's also a common 'pro-pedophilia' (shudder) argument that very, very young children can be taught to enjoy and even initiate non-penetrative sex, so while that's obviously horrific, disgusting, and all things wrong, and while no child can consent to sex as they don't have the mental or emotional capacity to know what they're consenting to, there's still an argument to be made that plenty of kids are indeed quite sexual from a young age if they're aware it's something that exists, they just won't actively seek to have sex with other people (thank God) until those hormones kick in the early teens.

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I actually kind of agree with @FictoVore. here... it really depends on individual kids, but I do think some children develop sexual curiosity at a young age if they're exposed to certain things. Not all kids will, of course, and it depends very much on the culture they are growing up in / what their peers are like - but there's definitely a variety and it depends heavily on a kid's environment and what they see and how.

 

I moved around a lot as a child and the types of kids I met could be so different from place to place within the same age group in terms of what they knew, whether they found boys/girls interesting or repulsive... I don't really want to elaborate but some kids would say/do things i didn't understand until much later, and then I'd move and suddenly that wasn't something people were talking about any more. There was a lot going on I don't want to think about :/

 

I think a lot of the reason we try to prevent small kids from seeing sexual stuff is pretty much because it can cause them to do some really weird things and we don't want predators to take advantage of this sort of curiosity until they know a bit more about the world and about interpersonal relationships and power differences :/

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 a lot of the reason we try to prevent small kids from seeing sexual stuff is pretty much because it can cause them to do some really weird things and we don't want predators to take advantage


 

There's also the hangover from Victorian times sentimentalising children as innocent and unsullied until they hit puberty (a bit like The Fall in Genesis).

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AnarchistTactician

Sooo... this is awkward. How to put it?

 

I literally cannot for the life of me imagine a sex scene. The best I can come up with: tmi

 

Spoiler

He put his dick inside her. And then he started jiggling or wiggling or something. And then they felt good. Although how would they go with the legs? Oh yes, like forks stuck together.

:lol: As you can see, not very good.

 

I think in some cases it's nonexposure.

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47 minutes ago, AnarchistTactician said:

Sooo... this is awkward. How to put it?

 

I literally cannot for the life of me imagine a sex scene. The best I can come up with: tmi

 

  Hide contents

He put his dick inside her. And then he started jiggling or wiggling or something. And then they felt good. Although how would they go with the legs? Oh yes, like forks stuck together.

:lol: As you can see, not very good.

 

I think in some cases it's nonexposure.

A more appropriate word is 'thrusting' my friend, he started 'thrusting' inside her :P haha!!

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AnarchistTactician
12 minutes ago, FictoVore. said:

A more appropriate word is 'thrusting' my friend, he started 'thrusting' inside her :P haha!!

Doesn't thrusting have to do with throwing something hard?

Ie, thrust into hell? :D Haha, a bit off topic. And people wonder why I don't fantasize.

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