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Lust detection heuristics?


AspieAlly613

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AspieAlly613

A question for romantic aces:

 

When an allo asks you out, what measures (if any) do you use to determine whether xyr attraction is primarily lust-caused and therefore not worthy of consideration?

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For me that was easy. I’m not hot enough XD

 

seriously though, the easiest way to know is if you and that person were already friends beforehand.

 

When I was in middle school, I had a mental list of like 3 guys who I thought were sensible and kind that I would agree to date if they ever asked. (This was before I learned about asexuality and thought this was how crushes worked lol) All of them were people I was already friends with. To my surprise, one of those boys ended up liking me and after a lot of hesitation (he was extremely shy) we eventually started dating. Neither of us are particularly stellar in terms of physical appearance, but we fell in love with each other’s personality. 

 

Friendship is technically first base, so start with that if you’re unsure! 

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13 hours ago, AspieAlly613 said:

When an allo asks you out

I'll report back when that ever happens.  Hurray for being male.

 

But uhh, if it's someone I don't even know that's doing it, I would assume it's more physically/sexually fueled, because... how could it not be?

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AspieAlly613
9 hours ago, CBC said:

But even if it's not purely lust-based, sexual people will want sex at some point, so what's the difference really?

For me personally, it's because I'm heterosexual, though I realize that I'm asking a different group of people.

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Custard Cream

Hmm... not likely to happen. My days of inspiring lust are long behind me!

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RoseGoesToYale

I was asked out once, and the guy was desperate as hell. I'm terrible at discerning that kind of stuff.

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AspieAlly613
4 hours ago, CBC said:

I honestly have no idea what you mean by this.

Sure, I'll elaborate.  I'm heterosexual, so I'd be fine having sex with my wife.  It would not be fine if my girlfriend/wife's main motivation in starting a romance were sexual interest.  I perceive that a majority of adult allosexuals consider lust the defining distinction between romance and platonic friendship, with many even believing the term "platonic" to be an antonym of "sexual", not of "romantic".  As such, I'd want to identify the cases where this misunderstanding were in play and make sure that, before we committed to a romantic partnership, we'd be in agreement about what it was that we were agreeing to.

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4 hours ago, AspieAlly613 said:

I perceive that a majority of adult allosexuals consider lust the defining distinction between romance and platonic friendship, with many even believing the term "platonic" to be an antonym of "sexual", not of "romantic”.

I can’t speak for others, but this isn’t nearly correct for me.  I am a sexual woman both graced and cursed with a high libido. 

 

Chemistry and attraction are pieces of the puzzle, but compatibility and trust are equally important for longevity.  When I searched for a lover, the cerebral connection was paramount.  I required mental, emotional and then physical connection.  

 

My lover and I never swapped photos, Skyped or even revealed ourselves for a couple of weeks. We even spoke on the phone first.  I would have never picked him out of a crowd, but I know other women find him highly attractive. In fact, they openly flirt with him at times.  Nowadays, I think he’s the most handsome man created. Race wasn’t a consideration, I was solely focused on connection of the mind and heart to begin with.

 

Sex was the ultimate goal, but mind blowing sex was the unexpected cherry.

 

Edit: The key was not the lusting, but the loving.  He puts it this way, “Sometimes it's not the wanting over the needing. It's more about the meal than the feeding.”  - Source Unknown

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11 hours ago, AspieAlly613 said:

It would not be fine if my girlfriend/wife's main motivation in starting a romance were sexual interest.  I perceive that a majority of adult allosexuals consider lust the defining distinction between romance and platonic friendship, with many even believing the term "platonic" to be an antonym of "sexual", not of "romantic". 

This has stayed with me, and I couldn’t put my finger on exactly why.  I suppose it’s the idea that you’re trying to separate the two: Romance and Lust.  For a sexual, these two are inextricably entwined. 

 

No one knows where a relationship might end up. However initially, if romance is even an outside chance, sex is assumed (at some point) by the sexual.  It’s a foundational element of non-platonic relationships.

 

Therefore, you simply can’t create a criteria that identifies which folks might want romance and then sex in that order.

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I think what OP is saying is how to tell when its lust one night stand hookup inspired hitting on (like I saw you, I want sex, something more may develop but thats the motivator now) or I want to try for something real. As in... sex is the goal, not a relationship. 

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That would be simple then, do not hook up right away.  If an interested party isn’t willing to wait for that hook-up, or put sincere  effort into getting to know you, then it would be clear.

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Galactic Turtle

Ha! While I'm not romantic either, I think it's safe to assume that if anyone asks you out there is at some least sexual interest there OR the feeling that sexual interest is likely to develop. It might not be like.... the first thing on their to-do list but it's definitely on there somewhere before "death" whether that be that very same day or after marriage which is why I truncate these things quickly. Unfortunately I didn't know it was common for people to have sex until I had my first proper adult man coming after me. The things people typically do while dating never occurred to me then I felt pretty dumb. :P 

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AspieAlly613
12 hours ago, Traveler40 said:

This has stayed with me, and I couldn’t put my finger on exactly why.  I suppose it’s the idea that you’re trying to separate the two: Romance and Lust.  For a sexual, these two are inextricably entwined. 

 

No one knows where a relationship might end up. However initially, if romance is even an outside chance, sex is assumed (at some point) by the sexual.  It’s a foundational element of non-platonic relationships.

 

Therefore, you simply can’t create a criteria that identifies which folks might want romance and then sex in that order.

Is it an impossible goal then, or a near-impossible one?  I only want to have to do this once, so that's a relevant distinction.

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AspieAlly613
11 hours ago, CBC said:

So I'm not sure your assumptions are particularly correct, @AspieAlly613.

I'm not sure which assumptions you're referring to.  

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AspieAlly613
11 hours ago, Serran said:

I think what OP is saying is how to tell when its lust one night stand hookup inspired hitting on (like I saw you, I want sex, something more may develop but thats the motivator now) or I want to try for something real. As in... sex is the goal, not a relationship. 

Yeah, that, or a belief that the sex makes the relationship, so both are the same goal because, under that belief, both are the same thing.

 

It's a stupid belief, I know that.  However, some people claim that asexual romance doesn't exist, indicating that they hold the belief.

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AspieAlly613
11 hours ago, Traveler40 said:

That would be simple then, do not hook up right away.  If an interested party isn’t willing to wait for that hook-up, or put sincere  effort into getting to know you, then it would be clear.

Good plan.  I like it.  

 

I would need to modify it a little bit because it's customary for religious Jews to form sexually-motivated romances, then to hardly have physical contact beyond holding hands (and sometimes not even that) until marriage.  Some people may mistakenly think I wanted a sexually-motivated romance that delayed sensual activity until after marriage, so I'd still need to clarify the matter.

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AspieAlly613
11 hours ago, CBC said:

Right, isn't that obvious? If someone asks for my number in a bar 15 minutes after they hit on me, what are the chances we just made a deep emotional connection? If I hang out with someone for the second time after meeting them once and the first thing they want to do is fuck, again... obvious.

Yeah, the general consensus I'm getting is "as long as you're close friends first, it should all be fine, otherwise it's obviously not fine."

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AspieAlly613
8 hours ago, Galactic Turtle said:

Ha! While I'm not romantic either, I think it's safe to assume that if anyone asks you out there is at some least sexual interest there OR the feeling that sexual interest is likely to develop. It might not be like.... the first thing on their to-do list but it's definitely on there somewhere before "death" whether that be that very same day or after marriage which is why I truncate these things quickly. Unfortunately I didn't know it was common for people to have sex until I had my first proper adult man coming after me. The things people typically do while dating never occurred to me then I felt pretty dumb. :P 

Right.  What I'm worried about specifically is someone who either hadn't given proper thought into the question "would AspieAlly613 and I be better as platonic friends or romantic partners?" before suggesting romance or gave it thought and said "I'd prefer to be in a romance with AspieAlly613 than to be platonic friends because I find him sexually attractive."

 

Also, did you manage to escape your family's version of "the sex talk part 2?" Part 1 is the IKEA model 

Spoiler

Insert tab A into slot B.

Part 2 is "Here's what to expect from the sexual side of our culture."

4 minutes ago, CBC said:

"...that a majority of adult allosexuals consider lust the defining distinction between romance and platonic friendship..."

Thank you.  I'll try to reevaluate my estimate of the fraction of adult allosexuals who consider lust to be the defining distinction between romance an platonic friendship.

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Not sure as I've only been asked out like 4 times in my life: once was in middle school and didn't last long (do 7th graders feel that kind of lust?), once was a joke (no idea what was supposed to be gained there), another time was in high school and we were friends and had been talking for a while so I knew it wasn't only lust, and the last time was in college and again we were talking for a while beforehand and he expressed interest in what I liked before I agreed to it.

So never been asked out in a way I could interpret as solely lust-motivated.

 

I imagine the difference would be the situation. If you're asked out in a bar after knowing the person maybe 5 minutes, it's probably lust-driven. If they're you're friend or classmate or otherwise would be able to know more about you than your face/body, it's potentially driven by more than that. 

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