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The Fate of a Male Hetero Asexual in the USA


Georgetown

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Dreamsexual

 

On 21 May 2019 at 5:47 PM, Georgetown said:

I’d rather be alone and unhappy than contribute to it, if that’s what’s needed.

 

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On ‎5‎/‎20‎/‎2019 at 2:37 AM, Georgetown said:

hetero asexual women are often perfectly fine to date heterosexual men, who seem to always outdo asexual men in the peacock pageant with all the motivation that comes from their desire for sex.

To attract heterosexual men as a woman you have to be visually appealing. The romantic asexual women that are with heterosexual men are competing with other women to attract males, so it makes sense that they are going for men who are the most appealing to them. That's what everyone does, sexual or asexual, male or female or otherwise.

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I guess that we are the minority, I'm in the UK, I am unaware of ever meeting another asexual, truthfully, I've been on my own since 1991, I'm in my mid 50's now and I have realised that I'm destined to be on my own, that said, I've heard of asexual couples both hetero and gay who've got together, it's possible so I wouldn't give up looking, I wouldn't suggest dating sites unless they're asexual based sites, there are a few of them, they're worth a look, for me, I didn't realise there were others like me until it was too late, I'm in a single persons job, living in a single persons pad and that's what I've got used to, I don't think I'd be any good in a relationship now, but that's just me, that said, I would say, go to meet ups, go out when you can, you just never know what's around the corner

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Heteromantic ace men should have it easier in one way, they seem to be outnumbered by heteromantic ace women, so the odds would seem to be better. Yeah, aces in general are a small percentage of the total population, so that limits our chances. But it isn't hopeless if one keeps an open mind and doesn't become bitter as bitterness is unbecoming.

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50 minutes ago, daveb said:

Heteromantic ace men should have it easier in one way, they seem to outnumber heteromantic ace women,

Huh.  I keep seeing people here posting the opposite (that ace women greatly outnumber ace men).

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4 minutes ago, ryn2 said:

Huh.  I keep seeing people here posting the opposite (that ace women greatly outnumber ace men).

Oops, that's what I meant. I wrote it the wrong way round. I'll edit my post.

 

That's what I get for posting while migraineing. :P 

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2 minutes ago, daveb said:

That's what I get for posting while migraineing

You too, eh?

 

I wondered if there might be a typo somewhere because “proportionately more men” and “advantageous to men” seem contradictory... but migraine brain!

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RoseGoesToYale

God, it's an awful system we have going in the US... a horrendously low-contact culture to the point where people don't get their basic (non-sexual) touch needs met, which actually makes some people lose their minds and do violent things, and I really can't help but wonder how many shootings could've been prevented if someone had just given them a minute-long hug and said "It's going to be ok. You are enough. You are loved." Compound that with the fact that this society sees touch as black and white... "there is platonic touch, and there is sexy times, and touch is either one or the other, period!" Which is bs, and even psychologists are starting to wonder how many people are forcing themselves into sex they don't really want in order for their touch needs to be met, because it's practically taboo for friends to touch each other. The idea of two people intimately touching in non-sexual ways gets perverted into the next century by onlookers for no rational reason at all.

 

Does it affect women? Oooh yeah. All my life I've wanted a romantic relationship (though it took me until 19 to figure out to call it romantic/sensual, and not the usual), and my female friends around could've cared less about the success of their love lives. And somehow, they got boyfriends by the boatloads, even as far back as middle school. I never said anything to them about this, but I was horribly jealous of them and confused out of my mind because I could not understand how they were doing it. I had hoards more crushes then they ever had and I talked about them incessantly, like I do, and I know they were annoyed at times even if they don't admit it, but I failed with every single one. But in American girl culture, when you're down on your luck in the romance department, they don't play wingwoman, they don't encourage you to get back out there. They pity, and they sympathize, and say "there theres" and "poor things", which works great... unless getting a fulfilling romantic relationship is one of your life goals. But women have it, extremely ironically, pounded into their heads from birth that they should not care. No need to care about relationships, because you're a woman, and women are strong and independent and don't need that sort of thing! (Ah, but if you don't get into one, we'll all give you funny looks) Let men chase after you like poor homeless puppy dogs!

 

I can't play by those rules. I do not understand those rules. I am a painfully direct person. If I like someone, I don't sit around, I take action. I try to talk to the guy, and I ask him out in short order? Does this work? No, because American gender roles are still ridiculously strong, it's still uncouth for a woman to ask a man out, and doing so is considered to be emasculating. Even with this "knowledge", it's still how I roll. Is this the main reason I'm still single? Dunno, could also be the aceness and lack of decent verbal skills. But gender roles still take the moldy freakin' biscuit.

 

It's an awful vicious cycle. You can't get your touch needs met from the platonic realm, and then if you can't get a romantic relationship, those needs don't get met, which eat you alive, compounded with now you start to feel unloveable, like something is morbidly wrong with you. And you try desperately to figure out what it is, to make changes, to become a better person. And when it fails again and again, the failure becomes cemented. You look at the mirror and start to hate yourself. When you're female, you're told you're supposed to love yourself, so then you feel even worse. And then your lack of self confidence bleeds through even your biggest and brightest smile. But you never tell anyone this because you're scared you'll be chastised by other women for being a failure as a woman, or for being oppressed by the patriarchy for putting my self worth into a man's love. Wouldn't make a lick of difference if I were homoromantic, I'd just be chasing after women with probably the same failure rate. Just so happens I'm attracted to dudes. And I'd have to explain that my self worth isn't tied to anyone, but my emotional/physical needs demand special closeness from someone, and my heart really wants, for mystical unknown reasons, for that person to have an appearance different from my own. If I could take a pill that'd cure me of any attraction, I'd take it.

 

Where in hell was I going with this? Gender sucks, I was definitely going there. But that some women out there are in the same boat, and we're more bitter than death wish coffee, and maybe just as strong, but darned if we know how to break the cycle, either. It's not just hetero-ace men. It's like the Toronto Maple Leafs. You know they can do it, you know they could make it, but the voices of all those failures makes you say and do things like throw your jerseys on the ice in disgust, to the disdain of everyone else in the league. (Sorry Toronto, didn't mean to pick on you. Just remember you have cups, way more than my team has, and that's proof you could always do it. I'm having a bad day.)

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Georgetown
2 hours ago, daveb said:

Heteromantic ace men should have it easier in one way, they seem to be outnumbered by heteromantic ace women, so the odds would seem to be better. Yeah, aces in general are a small percentage of the total population, so that limits our chances. But it isn't hopeless if one keeps an open mind and doesn't become bitter as bitterness is unbecoming.

Maybe at the ace conference in NYC coming up what you’re saying will hold ture

 

1 hour ago, RoseGoesToYale said:

God, it's an awful system we have going in the US... a horrendously low-contact culture to the point where people don't get their basic (non-sexual) touch needs met, which actually makes some people lose their minds and do violent things, and I really can't help but wonder how many shootings could've been prevented if someone had just given them a minute-long hug and said "It's going to be ok. You are enough. You are loved." Compound that with the fact that this society sees touch as black and white... "there is platonic touch, and there is sexy times, and touch is either one or the other, period!" Which is bs, and even psychologists are starting to wonder how many people are forcing themselves into sex they don't really want in order for their touch needs to be met, because it's practically taboo for friends to touch each other. The idea of two people intimately touching in non-sexual ways gets perverted into the next century by onlookers for no rational reason at all.

 

Does it affect women? Oooh yeah. All my life I've wanted a romantic relationship (though it took me until 19 to figure out to call it romantic/sensual, and not the usual), and my female friends around could've cared less about the success of their love lives. And somehow, they got boyfriends by the boatloads, even as far back as middle school. I never said anything to them about this, but I was horribly jealous of them and confused out of my mind because I could not understand how they were doing it. I had hoards more crushes then they ever had and I talked about them incessantly, like I do, and I know they were annoyed at times even if they don't admit it, but I failed with every single one. But in American girl culture, when you're down on your luck in the romance department, they don't play wingwoman, they don't encourage you to get back out there. They pity, and they sympathize, and say "there theres" and "poor things", which works great... unless getting a fulfilling romantic relationship is one of your life goals. But women have it, extremely ironically, pounded into their heads from birth that they should not care. No need to care about relationships, because you're a woman, and women are strong and independent and don't need that sort of thing! (Ah, but if you don't get into one, we'll all give you funny looks) Let men chase after you like poor homeless puppy dogs!

 

I can't play by those rules. I do not understand those rules. I am a painfully direct person. If I like someone, I don't sit around, I take action. I try to talk to the guy, and I ask him out in short order? Does this work? No, because American gender roles are still ridiculously strong, it's still uncouth for a woman to ask a man out, and doing so is considered to be emasculating. Even with this "knowledge", it's still how I roll. Is this the main reason I'm still single? Dunno, could also be the aceness and lack of decent verbal skills. But gender roles still take the moldy freakin' biscuit.

 

It's an awful vicious cycle. You can't get your touch needs met from the platonic realm, and then if you can't get a romantic relationship, those needs don't get met, which eat you alive, compounded with now you start to feel unloveable, like something is morbidly wrong with you. And you try desperately to figure out what it is, to make changes, to become a better person. And when it fails again and again, the failure becomes cemented. You look at the mirror and start to hate yourself. When you're female, you're told you're supposed to love yourself, so then you feel even worse. And then your lack of self confidence bleeds through even your biggest and brightest smile. But you never tell anyone this because you're scared you'll be chastised by other women for being a failure as a woman, or for being oppressed by the patriarchy for putting my self worth into a man's love. Wouldn't make a lick of difference if I were homoromantic, I'd just be chasing after women with probably the same failure rate. Just so happens I'm attracted to dudes. And I'd have to explain that my self worth isn't tied to anyone, but my emotional/physical needs demand special closeness from someone, and my heart really wants, for mystical unknown reasons, for that person to have an appearance different from my own. If I could take a pill that'd cure me of any attraction, I'd take it.

 

Where in hell was I going with this? Gender sucks, I was definitely going there. But that some women out there are in the same boat, and we're more bitter than death wish coffee, and maybe just as strong, but darned if we know how to break the cycle, either. It's not just hetero-ace men. It's like the Toronto Maple Leafs. You know they can do it, you know they could make it, but the voices of all those failures makes you say and do things like throw your jerseys on the ice in disgust, to the disdain of everyone else in the league. (Sorry Toronto, didn't mean to pick on you. Just remember you have cups, way more than my team has, and that's proof you could always do it. I'm having a bad day.)

You have accurately described many things. I was once told by someone that the best part of sex is the cuddling immediately following. Many people probably do feel pressured into sex to experience simple human affection that is otherwise completely taboo for Americans.

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13 hours ago, Georgetown said:

I hate that our culture forces it upon us, to be pawns in awful games. 

For millenia, humanoid creatures have had sex with each other, and after many hundreds of thousands of years, became  desirous of having mates whom they loved, not just had sex with.  It isn't "our" culture, and it isn't forced upon us, and what many/most of us experience are not awful games.  I'm sorry you feel that way, but do not claim that your feelings are those of all humans.  

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Dreamsexual

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Dreamsexual
On 22 May 2019 at 9:52 AM, CBC said:

the need to demonise things that one doesn't experience or relate to themselves.

 

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As an American AFAB person what Rose describes has not been my experience.  Some of that is probably generational, but it may also be geography (as I asked a few younger friends and it didn’t resonate with them either).

 

Not in any way implying that it isn’t true for Rose; just pointing out that America is a big, diverse place and there isn’t an overarching “American female experience.”

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AspieAlly613
11 hours ago, RoseGoesToYale said:

God, it's an awful system we have going in the US... a horrendously low-contact culture to the point where people don't get their basic (non-sexual) touch needs met, which actually makes some people lose their minds and do violent things, and I really can't help but wonder how many shootings could've been prevented if someone had just given them a minute-long hug and said "It's going to be ok. You are enough. You are loved." Compound that with the fact that this society sees touch as black and white... "there is platonic touch, and there is sexy times, and touch is either one or the other, period!" Which is bs, and even psychologists are starting to wonder how many people are forcing themselves into sex they don't really want in order for their touch needs to be met, because it's practically taboo for friends to touch each other. The idea of two people intimately touching in non-sexual ways gets perverted into the next century by onlookers for no rational reason at all.

 

Does it affect women? Oooh yeah. All my life I've wanted a romantic relationship (though it took me until 19 to figure out to call it romantic/sensual, and not the usual), and my female friends around could've cared less about the success of their love lives. And somehow, they got boyfriends by the boatloads, even as far back as middle school. I never said anything to them about this, but I was horribly jealous of them and confused out of my mind because I could not understand how they were doing it. I had hoards more crushes then they ever had and I talked about them incessantly, like I do, and I know they were annoyed at times even if they don't admit it, but I failed with every single one. But in American girl culture, when you're down on your luck in the romance department, they don't play wingwoman, they don't encourage you to get back out there. They pity, and they sympathize, and say "there theres" and "poor things", which works great... unless getting a fulfilling romantic relationship is one of your life goals. But women have it, extremely ironically, pounded into their heads from birth that they should not care. No need to care about relationships, because you're a woman, and women are strong and independent and don't need that sort of thing! (Ah, but if you don't get into one, we'll all give you funny looks) Let men chase after you like poor homeless puppy dogs!

 

I can't play by those rules. I do not understand those rules. I am a painfully direct person. If I like someone, I don't sit around, I take action. I try to talk to the guy, and I ask him out in short order? Does this work? No, because American gender roles are still ridiculously strong, it's still uncouth for a woman to ask a man out, and doing so is considered to be emasculating. Even with this "knowledge", it's still how I roll. Is this the main reason I'm still single? Dunno, could also be the aceness and lack of decent verbal skills. But gender roles still take the moldy freakin' biscuit.

 

It's an awful vicious cycle. You can't get your touch needs met from the platonic realm, and then if you can't get a romantic relationship, those needs don't get met, which eat you alive, compounded with now you start to feel unloveable, like something is morbidly wrong with you. And you try desperately to figure out what it is, to make changes, to become a better person. And when it fails again and again, the failure becomes cemented. You look at the mirror and start to hate yourself. When you're female, you're told you're supposed to love yourself, so then you feel even worse. And then your lack of self confidence bleeds through even your biggest and brightest smile. But you never tell anyone this because you're scared you'll be chastised by other women for being a failure as a woman, or for being oppressed by the patriarchy for putting my self worth into a man's love. Wouldn't make a lick of difference if I were homoromantic, I'd just be chasing after women with probably the same failure rate. Just so happens I'm attracted to dudes. And I'd have to explain that my self worth isn't tied to anyone, but my emotional/physical needs demand special closeness from someone, and my heart really wants, for mystical unknown reasons, for that person to have an appearance different from my own. If I could take a pill that'd cure me of any attraction, I'd take it.

 

Where in hell was I going with this? Gender sucks, I was definitely going there. But that some women out there are in the same boat, and we're more bitter than death wish coffee, and maybe just as strong, but darned if we know how to break the cycle, either. It's not just hetero-ace men. It's like the Toronto Maple Leafs. You know they can do it, you know they could make it, but the voices of all those failures makes you say and do things like throw your jerseys on the ice in disgust, to the disdain of everyone else in the league. (Sorry Toronto, didn't mean to pick on you. Just remember you have cups, way more than my team has, and that's proof you could always do it. I'm having a bad day.)

WOW!

 

That's a lot of information to process.  I was hardly aware of any of this or how strong it was, but it's consistent with my observations of reality in the urban areas of the northeast.  Thanks for blowing the whistle about this.

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18 minutes ago, AspieAlly613 said:

it's consistent with my observations of reality in the urban areas of the northeast. 

I’ve heard this from/about men in the US northeast, but not from/about women.  That may just be my friend group or immediate geography, though.

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