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Do you feel oppressed?


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I wonder if people who identify as asexual, experience some acts of discrimination? If we consider the Asexuals social (sexual) minority, we also have to assume that they are discriminated. What form of oppression do you recognize in your situation? Or, perhaps, you don't consider yourself minority at all? I would be very grateful for answer.

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I don't feel oppressed... just uncomfortable, when people make jokes. I also seem to be much more aware of the huge sexualization of society than my sexual friends are, and this makes me somewhat uncomfortable in social situations when the conversation turns to sex.

But oppressed? No way.

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str8fuknpimpin

i just feel cool in general

hehe i'm kidding

um, i don't really care that much, but yeah, if you announce it, most people aren't going to run to you man. but then again, the types of people i want to chill wit, are the types that will sit with me. see? :wink:

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Wolf X Omega

Hmmm, if i felt oppressed i never noticed, but as alix said, i just feel uncomfortable sometimes when people engage sexual subjects, and even sometimes hurt to know some friends don't believe that i'm asexual.

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I don't know what to call the fact that most of us have at one point or another been called (or called ourselves) broken or damaged, and that society pressures us to be sexual. It's not intentional, like gay change ministries.

I think we'll have to wait and see when greater numbers of people actually know we exist.

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There is a difference between "oppression" and "misunderstanding." Often the former is a result of the latter, but I have never experienced it. I've experienced plenty of misunderstanding, all the typical "you're broken, haven't met ther right person" stuff, but never any actual opression.

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Not directly. I don't think enough people know we exist for it to be too common. But there is this: I remember reading a couple essays that really pissed me off last year in an anthology on Christian theology when they claimed that "all humans are sexual beings" and so forth. So wait... I'm not human then? This was that very very bad several weeks before I found AVEN. If it had been the other way around, I probably wouldn't have taken the essays to heart. Which suggests to me that maybe there is something latently oppressive in the fiber of our society that leads us to believe (while we apparently sometimes need liberal theologians to tell us that it's okay to be sexual) that it's NOT okay to NOT be sexual.

I'm not sure where to draw the line between oppression and misunderstanding, but I wonder about cases like this-- where it isn't that you come out and someone tells you you're broken, but you don't even have an adequate framework for figuring yourself out (yet), and a set of cultural beliefs has become ingrained in you that implies that you're broken. Maybe that is misunderstanding, on a very basic internal level, but it just feels so insidious.

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Well, I've never heard of asexuals being oppressed or being victims of hate crimes, or anything like that, but that doesn't mean it doesn't suck sometimes.

We're the strangest of the queers, (and just being queer can suck sometimes) so queer that sometimes even other queers (gays, bisexuals, etc) are the most condemning.

Condemning. That's a good word to describe why it can suck being asexual. The patronization, insults, ostracization, all sort of correlate with that.

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I don't feel oppressed or discriminated against. Actually, I feel very empowered. There's not a soul who has managed to convince me that I need to try it, that I'm nothing without it or that I don't know what I'm talking about. Some have said it but nobody has made me doubt for one minute who I am.

I'm uncomfortable about the sex talk, too, mostly because I think it's very rude and discourteous for their partner who usually isn't there.

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"Opressed" may be the wrong word, but the legal status of asexual marriages in certain areas is questionable. Basically, if a marriage isn't consumated, it isn't legally binding and can be annulled. This may not be a big deal to most people, or even to most asexuals, but I think we can all agree it discriminates against asexuals.

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"Opressed" may be the wrong word, but the legal status of asexual marriages in certain areas is questionable. Basically, if a marriage isn't consumated, it isn't legally binding and can be annulled. This may not be a big deal to most people, or even to most asexuals, but I think we can all agree it discriminates against asexuals.

I think it discriminates more against people who are physically UNABLE to have sex (physically). It doesn't really concern me at all because I'm not interested in marriage.

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I think it discriminates more against people who are physically UNABLE to have sex (physically). It doesn't really concern me at all because I'm not interested in marriage.

I would say it discriminates against both. The fact that a romantic couple is forces to have sex in order to claim certain rights under current law is fairly offensive to me, even though I do plan on consumating my relationship if/when I get married. Just because it doesn't directly concern me doesn't mean I should be apathetic about it.

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Just read the entire post...

You don't have to be opressed to be a minority. A minority is just a less popular group. (by popular, I mean, there are less, not that people are choosing to be asexual)

Asexuals are easily a minority. I'm very open about myself, but I've never met another asexual in person. This is the only asexuality organization that I know of. (besides the scary elitist/extinctionist ones) There are thousands of gay/bi/trans forums.

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I don't feel opressed because of my asexuality, but sometimes do feel opressed when it would come to my romantic/physical attractions that could be considered just "weird", more so because a way society generally portraits them than because I would experience opression on myself, personally, though.

Luckilly I feel like total a/a in the past few months, so that is fine. I never thought being aromantic could be such a freedom, I always considered it a "lack" for myself, but now it feels totally fine option making lots of things easier.

Just thought I should add my two cents.

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The fact that a romantic couple is forces to have sex in order to claim certain rights under current law is fairly offensive to me, even though I do plan on consumating my relationship if/when I get married.

Umm.....I thought we had a lawyer on here saying that it was not a requirement.

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I just feel oppressed in general - not neccesarily because of my sexuality - or lack of it :P

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I just feel oppressed in general - not neccesarily because of my sexuality - or lack of it :P

Uhh... do you mind if I ask you to elaborate? I'm just wondering why you feel oppressed. You don't have to share if you don't want to. o_o

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It's hard to explain - It's like I feel that people don't like me for certain reasons - be it my sexuality or otherwise and it makes me feel as though they want me to change/try to make me change - even though they don't say it and might not think it - but it's just the way I feel sometimes.

Like my mum [i love her with all my heart, don't get me wrong] when I told her I was gay [i haven't told her I'm actually a bi-asexy yet], she was perfectly fine about it but then she was talking to my auntie about it, while I was there and admitted to me that she felt a bit upset because she wouldn't be a grandmother and that made me feel sort of guilty.

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I feel my total and absolute desinterest in soccer to be by far worse in society than asexuality.

A unconsumed marriage seems to be quite a privilege. It offers a fast way out. Italian law for example demands 5 years of separation until a sexual couple can get divorced. Who else than my wife could ever mention the unconsumed thing at court? - There's no culture of delivering public proof of sexual intercourse in the jewish/christian society and tradition. Some islamic folks only seem to proof ending virginity during the night after the wedding, but well there seem to be workarounds.

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I don't feel opressed as an asexual.

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I feel the emphasis of sex and it's overblown importance that our culture is constantly focused on is extremely oppressive - but not just for asexuals - it skews relationships to be all about sex so much that sexuals seem to be even more influenced and effected by it than asexuals - it's just that we are more apt to notice because we don't get what's so special about sex in the first place.

As asexuals we much more easily dismiss the idea that how much sex you have and how great it is measures how great you are and how great your relationships are.... but if you are sexual and you want sex already, it's much easier to believe that falacy.

poor oppressed sexuals :cry:

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well i dont feel opressed , i feel good whit myself . i don care the opinion from others, in special from the over-sexuals . -

i will never change my asexuality for people like that

Oh Mon Dieu .. NeVeR

grettings n_o

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I can't say I've ever been actively discriminated against, but most of the people around me don't even know that we exist. However, some of the people that I have spoken to about my sexuality consider me 'damaged' or 'broken'. And of course I have to deal with annoying relatives always saying things like, "Why don't you have a boyfriend yet?"

I especially love it when I'm filling out polls or surveys that ask:

What is your sexuality?

a. Hetrosexual

b. Homosexual

c. Bisexual

None of the above apply!!!

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I just feel oppressed in general - not neccesarily because of my sexuality - or lack of it :P

Same here-- maybe I'm just paranoid. :?

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I just feel oppressed in general - not neccesarily because of my sexuality - or lack of it :P

Same here-- maybe I'm just paranoid. :?

Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they arn't out to get you...

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I think it discriminates more against people who are physically UNABLE to have sex (physically). It doesn't really concern me at all because I'm not interested in marriage.

I would say it discriminates against both. The fact that a romantic couple is forces to have sex in order to claim certain rights under current law is fairly offensive to me, even though I do plan on consumating my relationship if/when I get married. Just because it doesn't directly concern me doesn't mean I should be apathetic about it.

Yes, but it does take ONE of the partners to even bring it to issue to even use it as grounds for concern. If the couple don't feel that the whole world needs to see/know their business and both partners are okay with it, there's not going to be another person in the world who knows so it won't be an issue. If something happens and one becomes physically unable to please his/her partner sexually, then the other partner will have a problem with it and THAT'S when the lawyer, doctor, church and everyone on the bus route every morning has to know about it. So it's more discriminatory towards those who 'can't have sex than those who 'won't' have sex.

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As lockshockbarrel said. I do consider myself to be in a minority but I don't think I am oppressed or even discrimated. It is oftent the case that minorties have to deal with discrimation, but it isn't nessecary.

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I don't know what to call the fact that most of us have at one point or another been called (or called ourselves) broken or damaged, and that society pressures us to be sexual. It's not intentional, like gay change ministries.

Uh, have you heard most of the medical and psychological professionals brought in whenever some newspaper or TV channel does something on asexuality?

Actually, I think asexuals do suffer a fair amount of social "oppression" (if you want to call it that), and I think sentiments like spinneret's are one part of the problem. Asexuals are called broken, repressed, creepy, unnatural, immature, or worse; medical professionals often call us disordered; there are very few asexual characters out there, and less sexual characters are complained about by some fans. I've personally had it implied -- by someone who no doubt considers himself open minded -- that me and other asexuals interviewed for an article would grow up to be rapists. I see a thousand casual comments based on the ideas that everyone is sexual, and that romantic love requires sexuality. People who wouldn't dream of saying these sorts of things to homosexuals, or about same sex relationships, will say them to us without a care.

And yet, out of the gay community and its supporters -- even out of the ones in the asexual community -- it's always "well, gays have it worse." Or "at least you're not being told you're going to hell" -- in other words, the only social oppression that matters is the kind that's often directed at gay people. Or -- out of people who howl when this sort of thing is said to gays -- "those are just social problems, the real issue is legal oppression." Sometimes this sort of thing is prompted by a discussion of asexuality and how it fits in with the queer community, but often it's just brought up: "yes, that's bad, but by the way, gays have it worse."

It's a double standard, where bad things that happen to us matter less or not at all simply because of our sexual orientation, and it's no better than any other such double standard.

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I feel uncomfortable in big groups when the discussion turns to sex. I also feel very uncomfortable when my friends say to me "we need to get you a man" or "you need to get laid" or other similar phrases. But then so far I've chosen not to 'come out' as asexual to anybody and so they don't know the effects these have on me. If my friends continued to say similar things to me after I had explained my asexuality to them the I would feel oppressed.

I think that the continual suggestions that asexuals should get 'cured' or 'fixed' are offensive but they seem to be mostly stemming from genuine ignorance of the topic rather than any desire to be judgemental or discriminatory.

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I just feel oppressed in general - not neccesarily because of my sexuality - or lack of it :P

Same here-- maybe I'm just paranoid. :?

Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they arn't out to get you...

Always a good point :wink:

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