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The Asexual-Sexual Q&A Thread


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On 4/10/2019 at 3:28 PM, anisotrophic said:

@Anthracite_Impreza one thing I've wondered about is where limerence ends and a long term steady-state "love" starts. When can one say, "ok, limerence has run its course, what I'm feeling should be called love"? Some people characterize the difference as "time", but I'm not sure about that. Maybe.

For me the limerence ends when its not every thing with them sounds good and my personal preferences come back in. Like... I will say no to watching a silly comedy (not a fan of most comedy) over watching it and disliking but just loving being near them enough to not care. For about 6 months it lasts then i can start focusing on whether it is real long term stuff or not. 

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I have a question for sexual people, maybe kind of weird, I'm sorry.. 

 

I am fourteen years old( soon fifteen). Right now I inentify as ace, though I am of course open to that changing because of my age. I find it strange that many people my age are having sexual feeøings, and some, have sex too. People assume I'm a butch lesbian because of my short hair and very masculine clothing style, does that mean they think I am sexually attracted to females?Or do they think I am romantically/ aesthetically attracted to females? Whem people my age, 14-15, come out as gay or such, does that mean they have discovered sexual attraction towards that gender? 

 

I am so sorry if my questions are rambly and unclear! I am just kind of confused and trying to figure things out (also I am not English, sorry for grammar errors)

 

 

 

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11 minutes ago, El:) said:

does that mean they think I am sexually attracted to females?

Typically, yes.

 

12 minutes ago, El:) said:

Or do they think I am romantically/ aesthetically attracted to females?

For many sexual people this is inextricably linked with sexual attraction.

 

13 minutes ago, El:) said:

Whem people my age, 14-15, come out as gay or such, does that mean they have discovered sexual attraction towards that gender? 

Typically yes.

 

Your English is excellent!

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10 minutes ago, Telecaster68 said:

Unless they're aware of the split attraction model (which I doubt, and tends to confuse the hell out of most straight people anyway as it's just not how we tend to think about it), then yes, they mean sexually as well. Outside LGBTQ+ discourse, assume 'attraction' means intertwined romantic and sexual. 

Honestly, the younger generation is growing up with the split attraction model and social media discourse about all of it. So, it's not as confusing to the teens as it is to adults like you. 

 

A lot of people my age and younger I've talked to know about asexuality and romantic attraction differing from sexual. It's part of the culture nowadays. I work with a lot of 19-20 somethings and a lot of 30-50 somethings and somewhere around mid 30s is where they start getting confused by all the sexuality and label stuff, low 30s and below tend to be eh whatever, it's normal about it. It's an interesting thing, honestly. We've had discussions about the differences in the generations at work several times. 

 

But... knowing of it isn't the same as understanding it. And the norm reference they are using to describe lesbian will mean sexual, romantic and aesthetic appeal to people of the same sex. Because that is how most people experience their orientation. 

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3 minutes ago, Telecaster68 said:

This may be more than age, it may be cultural. I work with UK university students and I think many of them would be pretty hazy, although accepting.

Could be. Though, honestly, the UK has run a lot more mainstream articles and specials about it via the BBC and such than the U.S. has so far. We got a 60 minutes special and The View, but those are mostly older people shows. Plus, the UK people watch a lot more Euro stuff and some of the European soaps and such have put asexual characters in to bring visibility to the split attraction models and all that. America has so far only had Bojack and Sirens, but Sirens got canned after just a few seasons and it was also a cable show, so a lot of people don't have access to it. 

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43 minutes ago, Telecaster68 said:

This may be more than age, it may be cultural. I work with UK university students and I think many of them would be pretty hazy, although accepting.

My daughter is 22 and just accepts everything. I told her about being ace and she said "oh right" and carried on. Unlike the few friends I've told (40-70) who either didn't believe me or wanted to know the far end of a fart and didn't believe me (British for questioning in detail). I'm British.

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1 hour ago, Telecaster68 said:

I think Brits just tend to be a more skeptical in general. I've discussed safe spaces and trigger warnings with them as a group, and most students find the idea that they should be institutionalised risible. Informally, one on one, they're generally kinder and more open than my generation, but in my experience, quite dismissive of anything which comes across as a media trope, which is what a lot of the discourse around LQBTQ+ looks like.

I would agree with that. The young generation doesn't really seem to have to think about being accepting and tolerant, whereas people of my generation find it harder work.....myself included.

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This might have been asked before, but not to my knowledge. Allosexual and Alloromantic people, can you describe sexual and romantic attractions (the physical symptoms) in terms of physical symptoms Aces get? For example I've been told sexual arousal is a bit like really wanting to yawn?

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On 12/21/2005 at 12:01 PM, Hallucigenia said:

(Come on, I know there are more sexuals on AVEN than just two people! Maybe a lot of them just don't check the SPFA forum, or something. Might an Announcement round some more of us up?

Okay, and on to the question...)

I have a feeling that sexual attraction is one of those pesky things that's different for different people, but meh. Personally, I don't get knee weakness and all that from sexual attraction - I get it from infatuation, which is a completely different thing (they do go rather well together, but it's quite usual for me to have one without the other).

Sexual attraction is a little bit like being hungry. I know that's a tricky analogy to use, because sex is not like food. You don't need it to survive and not everybody wants it. However, if you think in terms of what happens to you psychologically when you have worked up a healthy appetite for an upcoming meal, it may be a useful comparison. Hunger involves an odd physical sensation, both in the stomach and (if severe) in other parts of the body (for example, if you are quite hungry you may get light-headed). It also involves recurring, distracting thoughts, or at least the tendency towards such thoughts, of sexual activities and how nice it would be to be doing them. Specifically to sexuality, there is a pleasurable sort of heightened awareness of what's going on around the various erogenous zones of the body.

Er, I've just realized that the above may be more of a description of sexual drive and arousal rather than attraction - but sexual attraction directly affects drive, causing it to flare up when you see or think of a certain person, and causing residual drive to be directed towards that person.

It's really hard to describe more specifically since there is not a very specific tactile vocabulary to use and the medical terms involved only describe physical changes (which is of little use to the question). If people have questions about some particular aspect of it I can try.

I know I'm replying to an ancient post but this is a fantastic analogy. 

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5 hours ago, Telecaster68 said:

roughly the same reasons as it's more fun to play soccer in a team than kick a ball against a wall

Off topic, but important (to me)... 

Spoiler

the-depressing-thing-about-tennis-is-tha

 

 

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6 hours ago, Telecaster68 said:

it's more fun to play soccer in a team than kick a ball against a wall. 

For me it’s not, but that’s because I suck at sports and got bullied and ostracized for it.

 

The wall never picks me last and it doesn’t try to hurt me on purpose to get me out of the game.

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13 minutes ago, Telecaster68 said:

If you take this as an analogy for the kind of vulnerability involved in sex, the analogy still kinda holds.

Maybe?  I didn’t routinely experience a sense of vulnerability during sex.  It wasn’t that which made solo activity more appealing than partnered.

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On 4/15/2019 at 5:22 PM, Abîme said:

This might have been asked before, but not to my knowledge. Allosexual and Alloromantic people, can you describe sexual and romantic attractions (the physical symptoms) in terms of physical symptoms Aces get? For example I've been told sexual arousal is a bit like really wanting to yawn?

Well, for me romantic and sexual attraction have different symptoms. For romantic, I get really awkward and self-conscious, because I want them to like me. I also tend to stare a bit... but that might just be me. My hands shake and my body gets really hot(especially my face) and I have trouble forming coherent sentences. I view it as sort of a version of a platonic attraction with more on the line and therefore a more intense reaction. For sexual, again, I get really hot and sort of self-conscious of my body. I do feel a kind of tingling warmth down there, specifically when I am looking at a person I like. Since I'm a proud owner of a vagina, it gets wet and swells a bit when I'm aroused. It's really sensitive and I feel a strong desire for someone or something to touch it, kinda like how it feels nice to have someone scratch an itch you can't reach. For me, the difference between arousal and attraction is that a person I am sexually attracted to causes my arousal and has my trust on an emotional level. I can get aroused by thinking of sex and such, but to feel the attraction towards a person and a desire to have sexual stimulation with them generally requires some form of emotional attachment. Things I find to be sexually attractive in a person will be very different from another sexual person, kinda like how the things aces find platonically attractive vary from person to person. It's really all about personal taste. For sex specifically, penetration feels like getting filled up and connected to another person, and clitoral or g-spot stimulation feels like waves of warmth and pleasure. Kinda like sliding into a hot bath at the end of a long day.

Edited by Neshama
Forgot to mention the difference between attraction and arousal... whoops
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  • 2 weeks later...
chairdesklamp

@Neshama That was a big thing that tripped me up about figuring out demi was I thought they were describing what you just did, and I'm more like "Emotional bond+knowing possibility of reciprocation+right gender=romantic connection may form->go two spaces and if formed would be okay doing the sex thing with this person, might enjoy it, most times would still probably prefer going to a record shop with them, unlikely to think of it first, but if invited to sex by them, would be okay with it. Would also be fine if sex never happened. If emotional bond lost, so is everything else."

 

As a more general question, I DO want to find a partner. I'm a homoromantic trans man. 

 

As trans, my pickings are slim, though I'd no more fall in love with a bigot than he would me, because a bigot is antithetical to my type anyway. 

 

A. This is probably best answered by homosexual men.  Might also be different by area. I'm in LA. Everything is online based now. I've seen homosexuals make friends off Grinder. I tried Okay, Cupid, completely ignored. Is Grinder actually more friendly towards connections beyond immediately choosing a bedmate based on looks than Okay, Cupid, or am I being lied to? (These people might be embarrassed to say they're talking to multiple people for sex at once) 

 

B. Any sexual here can probably help with this, but how can you spot the difference between flirting and just talking/being friendly/a friend? 

 

 

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10 minutes ago, Telecaster68 said:

And really, how bad is it to say to someone, effectively, 'I think you're cool and sexy as fuck and would be really keen on pursuing these ideas in more depth with you, if you want'**?

I so so so wish we could live in a world where being direct about these intentions could be handled gracefully and respectfully by both people involved without worrying about rejection or ambiguous response or violent backlash. I don't even want sex or a relationship, and it makes me nervous to think about! 

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8 minutes ago, Telecaster68 said:

One of the points of not saying it verbally is that there's still some room for both parties to understand there's been a rejection without anyone having to say so out loud, and make it awkward. It does mean being fairly adept at communicating in such a way that both parties know for certain a given exchange means 'I'm interested, are you?', but is also capable of being taken at face value.

Ugh. Explanations like these make me really glad that I don't date. I'd think that saying things flat out makes everything less awkward...

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35 minutes ago, Telecaster68 said:

It was a lot less fun as a negotiation than flirting in a club though, even though the outcome was a lot more successful.

That's where I stumble. Where's the fun part in that?

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Anthracite_Impreza

I'm far too ace and autistic to understand flirting, not that I get it much. I've been told people have flirted with me and it completely went over my head :x

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Anthracite_Impreza

I am also very intolerant of ambiguity ;)

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1 hour ago, CBC said:

People find that not fun?

I'm not exactly "people", so there's that... to me it seems like a great way to waste a significant amout of time.

 

Say what you mean, people.

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I enjoy a lot of ambiguities and vague casual flirtatious language in good conditions, but I also know what it's like to be unwantedly pursued in ways where telling a person to stop will end in some sort of disaster. Tactful hints are ignored, and anything unequivocal is an overreaction or accusation. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

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22 minutes ago, Telecaster68 said:

It's not a waste though. It's kinda enjoyable, again like any social interaction.

Well then that's just where you lose me :D

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I think a lot of women have experiences with men like that. It's not that most men behave that way, but the ones that do try it on multiple women since they don't have a high success rate and are quite desperate. This isn't a sexual vs asexual thing, though. It's about people skills and cultural norms. 

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Anthracite_Impreza
1 minute ago, CBC said:

Tbh I feel like "salty cunt nugget" should be worn as a badge of honour.

*snorts*

 

I got called a fat sl*t in school often. Now, the fat part was accurate, the sl*t part, not so much ;) It's almost as though they can't think of any better insults 😫

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24 minutes ago, CBC said:

I got "slut" from a stranger on the basis of having had an abortion, so.

 

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

That logic always annoys the heck out of me!  The number of partners has no relation to the risk of an unwanted pregnancy.

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Anthracite_Impreza
28 minutes ago, CBC said:

People love to forget actual meanings of words. I got "slut" from a stranger on the basis of having had an abortion, so.

 

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

That's just nasty. I mean, I would assume the process of going through abortions are pretty traumatic things to go through even if you want them, and then insulting someone for having one? Even if you're anti-abortion there's no need for that.

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Yeah, it’s too bad committed relationships don’t provide the guaranteed ability to get pregnant when - and *only* when - you want a(nother) addition to the family that so many people seem to think they do.

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1 hour ago, CBC said:

(If you're looking for a catch though @Snao Cone, he lives in Saskatchewan... not too far to go for lurrrrrve. :P)

Across the hall is too far of a distance for me, then this has the added fact of being a terrible person from a boring province. 

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Anthracite_Impreza

I was probably the only planned child in my village, given the teenage pregnancy rates. My mother was 28 :o

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