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"Official" Asexual Society... says who?!


Caroline78

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After reading a newspaper article, I became aware of the 'Official Asexual Society' - was very disappointed by the website, with I found misleading, and damaging to the cause.. What do others think? I'd be interested to know.. here's the email I sent them:

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Hi

Firstly, well done on your efforts to promote Asexuality and raise awareness of its existence and validity.. however, I hate to say this, but I found your site to be both insulting and unhelpful.

For a start, the Peter Pan / teddy bear imagery is EXTREMELY misleading, and especially the line "The Adulthood in which the childhood still remains". This suggests that Asexuals are somewhat immature and have yet to grow up. This couldn't be further from the truth. I think you'll find that most Asexuals (apart from yourself perhaps?) lead a 'proper' adult existence.. (despite not wishing to have sex) and yet your site suggests the contrary. Therefore, your homepage alone would make me feel ashamed/embarrassed to call myself Asexual.. and yet the site should be making people feel at ease with declaring that they have no sexual urges. The fact that I don't want sex is such a minor detail to me - it shouldn't reflect on my development as a whole.

Secondly.. your definition of Asexuality seems to have been geared towards your own experiences of Asexuality. The "what asexuality is not" page is extremely misleading. The AVEN site is far more helpful when it says:

"Anyone who thinks that the term "asexual" might be useful in thinking about themselves and explaining themselves to others is welcome to use it."

You said in the Daily Mail that you were relieved to find a term for your sexuality.. and so was I.. but according to your site I don't have the right to call myself Asexual. Are you happy for Asexuals to come to the site and then go away being confused once again? The sexual category that I fit into best is Asexual.. even though there will always be a grey area with people. According to your site, I'd be a 'mono-sexual'. I first had an orgasm at the age of 24, two years ago - I only did it as a 'test' to see if there was anything physically wrong with me. I didn't want to do it, but I made myself do it.. and wow.. it was amazing - I felt more alive than I ever had done in my whole life. BUT this didn't make me want to sleep with anyone, and it still doesn't. Therefore, I see myself as Asexual. I shouldn't have to call myself 'mono-sexual'.. I wouldn't expect a hetero / bi / homo person to reveal whether they masturbate or not.. and as an ASEXUAL person, nor should I! It's private! Plus, not all hetero / bi / homo people masturbate, but they don't have to have a new category invented for them. Personally, I think you're just uneasy with the fact that an Asexual can have orgasms, because you don't want to doubt your own sexuality. As AVEN says:

"Others will occasionally masturbate, but feel no desire for partnered sexuality."

At the end of the day, it doesn't matter whether AVEN is right, or whether you are right... BUT surely the term Asexuality should be free to be used by whoever wants to use it.. and that way the mutual goal of global recognition is more likely to be achieved. The AVEN definition is 100 times more helpful to the people and to the cause.

Finally.. I'd love to know what gives you the right to call yourself "official". I find the term most misleading considering that your site is based on your own experiences.

As for me.. my sexuality is not a big deal anyway.. I don't know why people make such a big thing out of sex and relationships. I lead a happy and busy life, with some fantastic friends, and wouldn't think twice about sex if society and the media didn't keep banging on about it. Asexuality is a (very small and coincidental) part of ME... I'm not a part of IT.

Anyway.. peace, love and happiness... You seem to be a fine person, by writing this, I just want to help you to help others!

Caroline xx

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I pretty much agree with your arguments. I'm quite resentful at the childlike assumption, and last I checked the theme was fairies and unicorns :roll:

And I do wish the webmaster will knock off the "official" title. I don't want the public associating asexuals with childlike, Peter Pan wannabes.

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last I checked the theme was fairies and unicorns :roll:

ack! i went to that site a couple weeks back and had a great deal of trouble taking it seriously. i found the content to be lacking and theme to be too sparkly and no it was not a good thing. sheesh.

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I agree that the description of asexuality on that website is a bit off-putting for many of us, particularly for those of us who have masterbated in the past.

'Thankfully' the discussion forum there doesn't appear to have been too popular. Miss Geri has done a fair amount for visibility over the past few weeks but I would like to know if she still has the same narrow view of what an asexual should be.

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Im not "Asexual" according to that website. Just because i used to be sexual doesnt mean that i can never be asexual. Grr this website makes me very annoyed. :evil:

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Thanks everyone for the replies! It was long-winded, but then it was originally an email, rather than written for a message board.

Anyone want to try and do something about getting that lot to drop the Official tag? Very misleading. How about an online petition? I respect Geri's efforts in the press etc, BUT I'd hate for people to discover her site and be mislead. I'm not doubting Geri's Asexuality, so what gives her the right to doubt everyone else's?!

Cheers!

Caroline xx

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  • 2 months later...
biggreenmonkey

Well, they seem to be the 'Nonlibidoists Society' now, so soomething must have gotten trhough to them. They still have the unicorns though.

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Yeah, Geri and I go back to the Old School days of the Haven For the Human Amoeba back in '01. AVEN existed at that point but only on my wesleyan webspace and didn't have a forum, and so people chilled on a yahoo group (there were about 30 of us or so.) Geri and I were two of the people who were more outreach/organizing inclined, but we split over issues like sexual arousal. The "official" may partially be a result of that battle. A coupla years later and here we are. She got some airtime during the media blitz back in October, though I haven't heard much from her since.

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Live R Perfect

Geri still appears in plenty of articles over here in Britain, that's for sure. I shared the pages of Real magazine with her a couple of weeks back.

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  • 3 weeks later...

ack.

I know I'm late-to-the-party with this but I was trawling around through the old posts on here (trying to absorb the general tone of the place through the previous threads) anyway and I saw this. I checked out that site....

oh god it makes me angry! If I had seen that before AVEN I'd probably have stopped looking and been even more messed up. It's just... self promotional bullsh*t (excuse my language if that's not appropriate). And it's not even very well designed!

All I want to say is THANKYOU THANKYOU THANKYOU THANKYOU to everyone here for being higher in google's rankings and catching me before I saw that atrocity. Seriously!

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Live R Perfect

Incidentally, the reason for the change of the website's name is apparently that...

...a group on the internet that weren't asexual but solosexual - that is, having a sex drive but not connecting it to a person but in personal enjoyment: masturbation - started calling themselves asexual and spreading their message to the media. They soon started tainting the image of the true asexual, confusing people while doing so... So it was decided that a new name should be found. Besides which, we have never truly liked the term 'asexual' to start with, as it includes the word 'sex', and the word has been used to death for many different things.

I do hope she isn't referring to AVEN here. :?

That quote was taken directly from the recent article published in The Big Issue, by the way.

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...I would like to know if she still has the same narrow view of what an asexual should be.

My problem with their definition of asexuality is that not only is it narrow, but its narrowness is based on bad logic.

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hmmm... I checked out the site. I can understand there being those who feel NOTHING ever and can't feel anything and never will be able to... but it's probably good that they have changed their name.

Aven is probably going to be more successful just because it is much more inclusive which is necessary since there is such a huge spectrum of sexual non-feelings.

hawke

ps. If I saw that site first I wouldn't have gotten past the fluffy graphics. :shock:

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Live R Perfect
It's just... self promotional bullsh*t

Yeah, that is the impression I have come away from that site with too. They seem to concentrate far too much on promoting their own work. Well, good luck to them, I guess... but I know which organisation I'd rather continue to ally myself with.

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Incidentally, the reason for the change of the website's name is apparently that...
...a group on the internet that weren't asexual but solosexual - that is, having a sex drive but not connecting it to a person but in personal enjoyment: masturbation - started calling themselves asexual and spreading their message to the media. They soon started tainting the image of the true asexual, confusing people while doing so... So it was decided that a new name should be found. Besides which, we have never truly liked the term 'asexual' to start with, as it includes the word 'sex', and the word has been used to death for many different things.

I do hope she isn't referring to AVEN here. :?

That quote was taken directly from the recent article published in The Big Issue, by the way.

Wow, that sounds like sour grapes! Who do they think they are anyway "tainting the image of the true asexual".

That site is just... creepy.

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I'm "solosexual"? That would make me, what, Princess Leia? :?

And I love that. "AVEN ruined the word, but that's okay, because we never liked the word anyway, we have a MUCH better word now and they can just have thier stinky ol' inferior word and just see if we care. . ." *sticks out tongue* :P

But what I want to know is this: why would she feel the need to give us a new term for ourselves if she is conceding the word to us, anyway? The bad logic is all over the place, over there. . . .

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Say, maybe we can recreate the MyDoom virus, only aimed at Miss Geri's site instead of Microsoft. MUAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

Sorry 'bout that, that site just totally pisses me off. Gives me a completely different view of unicorns... No wonder they're extinct...

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Gives me a completely different view of unicorns... No wonder they're extinct...

OK, I was going to go read that site. But now I won't.

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It's not the fault of the unicorns, it's just an extremely crappy site with shiny unicorns all over the place. "That's right SHINY unicorns!!! Get yours NOW at your local toy store!!!"

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I like Unicorns.

What I don't like are people who believe they have the One True Way with regard to ANYTHING!

Grrrrrrr!!!!!!!! :x

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  • 1 month later...

I dunno if this is a right forum to post on, but.. I read by one my friend on another forum that " In the eight of April was created an official asexual's people society" - of course I know where that thing came from, hehe. I've told that I wouldn't call it as much that, because it isn't as much OFFICIAL, or is it?

Other user on that forum said " I think it's silly. Sex is nothing bad. Or they are unsuccesful in sex, and because of that they're claiming they're a-sex from their own will?" Hehe. I wanted to laugh and cry at the same time. THAT IS intollerance and unacceptance of a fact, that people aren't same-feeling. By-myself-I judge-you- principe, oh, I know.

People are apparently confusing the word "celibate" with the word "asexuality".I am confused by that. :wink:

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I actually found that site before I found AVEN and it did make me feel like some sort of freak of nature, it isn't very supportive at all. :? Who are they to portray themselves as the experts on asexuality?? :evil:

I'm so glad I kept looking and found AVEN. :)

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I've heard of that site before but I never wanted to visit it because of the stories about unicorns and fairies.

However, out of curiosity I wanted to know what you were all talking about.

Firstly, that symbol is quite scary, and it doesn't look like a lot of effort went it to it.

I only had a quick look around, but far too much of her own personality went into that site.

But that questionnaire. You have to fill in a questionnaire so that SHE can tell whether YOU are or not.

Here, you would only need to answer one question - number 8 - and you'd be allowed to decide for yourself what it means.

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Miss Geri contacted me about a book she was writing, and I got the impression she had contacted many other people at AVEN.

Anyone know what happened with it?

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