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Go to hell, Dan Savage!


Sally

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Dan Savage is the editor of The Stranger, a Seattle paper that's basically become a gay paper since their political columnist just left for another blog. He's syndicated nationally (and probably internationally), so some of you may have read him.

Which I'm not going to do again, because he's a $*%@@. I doubt if he would consider asexuality to be one of the queer orientations, since he doesn't believe it's valid.

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Savage Love Savage Love Letter of the Day

Posted by Dan Savage on Mon, Jun 22, 2009 at 5:22 PM

I would like to express my disapproval of your comments about asexuality and asexuals on your June 2nd podcast (Episode 137). Asexual does not mean "you have no interest in sex or romance, or anything." It means you don't experience sexual attraction. Period. Many asexuals still desire romance—and if you think love and sex are so closely tied, perhaps you think prostitutes are the most loving people in the world? Yes, a relationship with an asexual individual doesn't work for a lot of people, but this certainly doesn't mean that asexuals must "stay at home; be alone."

I am asexual. I have never been interested in sex, with anyone. But I only discovered that asexuality even existed several months into a relationship. Was this my fault? I told my boyfriend, fully expecting to be "dumped" as you recommended to your caller. Instead he told me he was okay with it, and expressed full willingness to find alternative ways of showing our love. Three years later, we're still together.

Thank you for you time. I don't normally send emails of this sort, but your comments feel to me like a personal attack on my orientation, and with the details of asexuality so widely unknown, I don't appreciate this spread of misinformation. In the future when people are looking for an explanation of asexuality, you might refer them to www.asexuality.org.

Stephanie

I appreciate the feedback, Stephanie, and I'm sorry I offended you. But... um... I couldn't help but think, as I read your letter, that your boyfriend is either a fool or a fag. But if it works for you guys—if a romantic relationship devoid of sexual attraction and activity works for you guys—then it works for you guys. Who am I to argue with success?

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Yeah. What mad scientist said.

It's because of the possibility that there are more than just a few people out there who are like this guy that stops me from coming out or from joining a queer group. Already have enough on my plate, don't have the time nor the energy to have to face close-minded bigots (which we all inevitably will run into from time to time).

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Columnists.

Don't trust 'em.

('Cept Charlie Brooker and David Mitchell)

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i know not of this savage, but i now know to avoid him which i suspect is all i really need to know ... y'know?

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Yeah, that's pretty barf-worthy, and a bunch of crap gets trotted out in the comments too... everyone must have sex to be normal, all men are sexually rapacious, you will change your mind someday, nobody can have a romantic relationship sex... barf barf barf. On the other hand, there are also a lot of people sticking up for you, and somebody mentioned the brilliant work of Helen Boyd.

Sadly, Savage seems unable to understand that not all men are rapaciously monosexual.

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I agreed with Dan about the call that offended this person. At least he acknowledges that asexuality exists even if hes not informed about it.

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sinisterporpoise

He's not dismissing asexuality here. He's questioning the sexuality of her boyfriend if I'm reading this correctly, but to call him a fool or a fag really is offensive to that person at least. I'm more willing to bet the boyfriend thinks he can "fix" her or will just wait until she's ready.

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"Sorry I offended you. Now, instead, I will offend your boyfriend for the exact same reason [inability to comprehend that people can live without sex]."

Talk about two steps forward and ten steps back.

At least the person who sent in the letter is helping with positive visibility...

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Never read or listened to Savage myself but I have heard that he has some good advice as long as it doesn't touch on some areas related to people being either homosexual or heterosexual with no other options. This seems to fit with that. Savage is gay so I do not think he meant fag as an insult.

But in the end the guy is a dick which is why I've never bothered reading his column.

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mad_scientist
I actually quite like Dan Savage on the most part. He does seem to be rather misguided on this though.

Lots of people don't understand asexuality, what gets me is his totally jerkass reply. Somebody would either have to be gay or stupid to be in a nonsexual relationship? Dick. (Why does he assume homosexual people can be celibate and not heterosexual people, anyway? Or is he trying to imply that he's cheating on her?)

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please delete this account

urg :/

Not the first person i've come across like that in the media though >:/

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Dan who? Is that that kid from the Wonder years? :lol:

Boy am I gonna lose sleep tonight because Dan thinks asexuality is bogus.

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There's also a call about it at the end of this week's podcast (#140).

I'm not too worried about the whole thing. Even with all the insults thrown around, we're getting the message out. If you want to stop reading because Savage is a dick - well, he always has been, and freely admits it. I can take a few points of disagreement if the rest is good enough.

Note that both this letter and the original call involved people coming out while already in a relationship; he's not exactly nice to closeted gays, since they tend to get into relationships that make both parties miserable. The point I don't think he really gets yet is that a great many asexuals aren't out simply because they've never heard of it.

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you*hear*but*do*you*listen

I actually heard about Dan Savage's mistaken broadcast involving asexuality from a member of my school's Asexuals Club, but I never got around to writing a letter to him--mostly because I never figured out how to listen to the podcast. And I thought somebody else could do it better, as misunderstandings about asexuality tend to make my temper flare. Now I may have to make more of an effort...maybe some of us AVENites could draft a semi-angry letter to send Savage? Although we should listen to the broadcast and figure out exactly what he said wrong about asexuality...reportedly he was getting a lot of his terms wrong.

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Guest EGDingCale'sTeapot

if you click here... (thanks to Flourchild for this)...

it is episode 137, and if you slide the bar in to 11 mins that works out pretty well for the next call (the asexual one) if you want to hear it.

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He's pretty famous. He's even been on NPR. But I think he's a dope. He's not worth listening to, IMO.

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Flour Confessor

Meh, I still think Dan Savage rules. He's always admitted and embraced his good-natured breed of assholery, so it's not like he was being unusually dickish to that writer. That's just how Dan writes and corresponds with people. After all, the old Savage Love greeting used to be, "Sup faggot!"

I mean, yeah, I guess he's a little off base to be questioning/insulting the boyfriend, but he's so down to earth and level-headed in almost all his other advice-givings that I can't justify this one indiscretion regarding a topic that I happen to have personal stake in invalidating all the other extremely positive work that Dan Savage has done for people of basically all minority (and majority) orientations. Plus, he's hilarious.

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Guest EGDingCale'sTeapot

I bet Dan Savage's cartwheels don't compare to yours, flourchild. :wub: *laughs*

edit: omg, I am making a joke off of something I read in your blog! (hopes this makes sense now, at least to you)

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He's pretty famous. He's even been on NPR. But I think he's a dope. He's not worth listening to, IMO.

I agreed with that, even before this business. Because he lives in Seattle, he's continually pretty evident. If you give him the excuse that "he just writes like that", you'd have to give other people the same excuse when they deride somebody's self-defined orientation. Like his, for example. I feel every bit as much an asexual as he does a homosexual; asexuals simply haven't been approved as a minority group yet. Until then, even Dan Savage will make fun of us, but that doesn't mean it's right.

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Flour Confessor

I don't see any making fun, though. The writer didn't say her boyfriend was asexual, she said she was asexual and her sexual boyfriend was okay with being in an asexual relationship with her. Like it or not, that sort of does call into question his orientation. You have to realize that for most sexual people, that would be a total deal-breaker. I know that we're all used to thinking of that outcome as a sort of fairytale happy ending, but I don't think Dan's really at fault for having a different take on it.

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The podcast doesn't say that though.

The podcast says that Asexuals can't be romantic. He tells the woman that her boyfriend purposefully led her into a trap when it's likely the boyfriend didn't know they were asexual (based on what the called said).

Though he admitted Asexuality existed, he clearly didn't believe in Romantic Asexuals.

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Again, here's what he said on-line in the Stranger blog (Slog):

"I appreciate the feedback, Stephanie, and I'm sorry I offended you. But... um... I couldn't help but think, as I read your letter, that your boyfriend is either a fool or a fag. But if it works for you guys—if a romantic relationship devoid of sexual attraction and activity works for you guys—then it works for you guys. Who am I to argue with success?"

It still sounds nasty to me.

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oneofthesun
Dan who? Is that that kid from the Wonder years? :lol:

Boy am I gonna lose sleep tonight because Dan thinks asexuality is bogus.

Great post!

People, people - If you don't want to see slugs don't go looking under rocks.

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Dan who? Is that that kid from the Wonder years? :lol:

Boy am I gonna lose sleep tonight because Dan thinks asexuality is bogus.

Great post!

People, people - If you don't want to see slugs don't go looking under rocks.

Well, it was in one of Seattle's major weekly newspaper blogs. A fairly evident rock.

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