Was the Term Demisexual Coined from a 2004 RP Forum hosted by Proboards?

[Conscientious Ghost]

My friends were talking about this yesterday.

I apologize if I'm beating a dead horse or igniting someone's rage. I am ignorant about the origins of demisexuality, and I want to approach this with a clear conscious. Regardless if the the term was or wasn't coined from there, people may, can, and will identify however they feel that fits them.

[Smmk]

I am not sure what to think of this? If I did not know any better I might say it is a little offensive, or is that just me?

[ThaHoward]

Perhaps it was first coined there, perhaps not. But does it really matter in the end? If some people want to identify as such I think they should be allowed to do so (and without shame) regardless if it was first presented here, on a rp forum or by some academics.

[OttRInvy]

The origin of a word often doesn't detract its value.

Plus, I'm pretty sure it's fair to say this guy is making some assumptions. He claims that one passing joke he made years ago spawned the beginning of "demisexuals reign of tumblr?" Please. Also, does anyone else think it's a little creepy that he stalks 15 year old girls' posts from a decade ago...?

[Guest]

Well the term asexuality was originally, and still is, used in biology to describe a method of non-sexual reproduction used in plants and some animals; that doesn't make Asexuality as a sexual orientation any less valid. Just because some 15 year old was using the term demisexual to describe a "slutty RP character back in early 2000s" (the article uses the term slut, I'm just quoting it) doesn't make the term demisexual as it's used today any less of a valid sexual orientation. She may have used the same word, but she didn't 'invent' demisexuality as it is today. The article also calls asexuality 'nonsense' so it can go suck a left one for all I care haha. No seriously, the person (people?) who wrote that clearly has/have no idea what they are talking about. If they had done any real research into asexuality they would know it is not nonsense at all. So yeah, I don't think they know anything about asexuality or demisexuality to be honest.

[swankivy]

"Demisexuality isn't real because I saw it on a roleplay forum and that invalidates everything people identifying this way are experiencing" is a terrible argument to make.

Most of the time people who want to invalidate demisexuality have to redefine it and exaggerate it to make it look ridiculous before they take aim, too. I don't know why some folks get so invested in making other people stop discussing their experiences, but "LOL IT WAS A ROLEPLAY TERM" is dragged out of the woodwork as an excuse to invalidate demisexuality with far more regularity than is rational.

Here are my thoughts on why people should not mock and attack labels, using demisexuality as an example.

[Conscientious Ghost]

I am not sure what to think of this? If I did not know any better I might say it is a little offensive, or is that just me?

Nah, you're not alone with those sentiments. It felt like the post was trying to invalidate, shame, or mock people who identify as demisexual. I didn't appreciate the disrespectful manners even if that was possibly how the word formed.

"Demisexuality isn't real because I saw it on a roleplay forum and that invalidates everything people identifying this way are experiencing" is a terrible argument to make.

Most of the time people who want to invalidate demisexuality have to redefine it and exaggerate it to make it look ridiculous before they take aim, too. I don't know why some folks get so invested in making other people stop discussing their experiences, but "LOL IT WAS A ROLEPLAY TERM" is dragged out of the woodwork as an excuse to invalidate demisexuality with far more regularity than is rational.

Here are my thoughts on why people should not mock and attack labels, using demisexuality as an example.

Thank you for the rationale. I can bring this up if my friends and I ever talk about demisexuality.

[butterflydreams]

Also, does anyone else think it's a little creepy that he stalks 15 year old girls' posts from a decade ago...?

Not really. This is the internet we're talking about here. In under 30 seconds I can find videos of cats doing just about anything.

Or this:

But yes, I've actually been doing a lot of research on demisexuality lately (intellectual curiosity based on some negative remarks I read in a few places). I think people here are making the right argument. Who cares if some 15 year old girl made it up in an RP forum. I once "made up" an idea about philosophy in high school only to find out years later in college, that thing I created on my own actually already existed and was called existentialism. So who knows. It certainly seems to fit properly into how we talk about things now doesn't it? If she hadn't come up with it, chances are someone would have. There'd be this empty space in the asexual spectrum and we'd be wanting to fill it.

[pipsuxx]

regardless of where the word came from, it has meaning and weight amongst a community now. if someone is trying to claim they invented the word and essentially saying they want to take it away again, that's ridiculous. their bio says they "Created Demisexual and is sorry for it". they didn't create the experience, they just may have coined the term that stuck. that's like saying isaac newton invented gravity.

edit to add: i don't know what this blue background on the text is and i can't make it go away, sorry

[swankivy]

they didn't create the experience, they just may have coined the term that stuck. that's like saying isaac newton invented gravity.

Pretty much. Actually there doesn't seem to be any evidence that anyone who uses that term to describe their orientation was aware that anyone used it as a roleplay term. The arrogance of anyone thinking "demi" combined with "sexual" is so unique that it had to have come from this other use is kind of baffling to me. "Demi" is a well-established prefix that works pretty well to describe the experience demisexual people are describing, just like hundreds of us on this forum report having invented similar words for asexuality or nonsexuality before finding out what the most popular "consensus" word was. "Semi" was also used when the language was attempting to be developed. We're all looking for words for experiences. I seriously don't know why SO MANY anti-SJW-lol-ur-just-a-snowflake people bring up the "invented for ROLEPLAY!!!1111" nonsense as if a not-even-particularly-similar usage of the word in a fictional context means it's absurd to use that term for anything or describe the demisexual experience.

Check out Critique of Popular Reason's thoughts on the term too--really interesting history.