KL_Pereira Posted June 2, 2007 Share Posted June 2, 2007 Hi there everyone! Thanks for having such an open and welcoming community! My name is KL and I'm writing an article on the asexual movement for Bitch Magazine. In my article I'm focusing on various topics, such as recent media coverage, scientific studies on human asexuality, and representations of asexuality in pop culture. I'm also concerned with what is happening now in the asexual community. What revolutions are happening that the mainstream ( and even the indysphere) doesn't know about? How are they important to you? This is where the community aspect comes in. I would be delighted with any insights, brief or not. I welcome any and all perspectives and opinions and would be grateful for any responses you may have. Thank you so much! In solidarity, KL Pereira Link to post Share on other sites
Zealous Posted June 2, 2007 Share Posted June 2, 2007 Out of sheer curiosity, are you asexual yourself? If not, I would recommend getting an asexual person to work closely with you on the article. The clearest cut representation of asexuality in the media that I can think of is HBO's series "Dexter" (one of the only watchable TV shows in the past few years). There's only been one season so far, but the basic outline of it is a serial killer who takes out the trash of society. In the first episode, he describes his thoughts on sex in a way that make him appear to be a Repulsed Asexual, Aromantic (later on, it is suggested that he may be Indifferent, rather than Repulsed). He maintains a relationship for appearances sake, to him it is only a close friendship. When his lack of understanding about how a sexual person works makes the relationship (through a concatenation of events) sexual, his asexuality, quite simply, stops. He is no longer asexual. Some of his first words one the subject are "Thank god for showers. Quiet time to think. Something that will be hard to come by now that I'm in a real relationship." That stood out to me. A "real" relationship? I understand that HBO is pitching to the 99% of the audience, not our 1%, but that seems downright degrading. Why is a close friendship so much less real? On the other hand, that's asexuality hitting the mainstream. And Dexter was a huge success in my area. The idea is being leaked, albeit slowly, and that's something for us to celebrate. It's basically the inverse of your question about under-the-radar revolutions, but I thought it worth noting. Here, as far as I can tell, the big change is asexuality hitting the fan. Now it just needs to get blown all over the place. Within AVEN, at least, I haven't seen a lot of exciting things in terms of changes, beyond the media coverage. However, a number of us here (at least two, to my knowledge) are going through medical networks to do personal studies on asexuality. So there is, beyond publicized research, individual experimentation with hormone shots, etc. If I think of anything more of importance to say, I'll return to this thread with it. Link to post Share on other sites
FISH' Posted June 2, 2007 Share Posted June 2, 2007 I believe it was sonofzeal that said all we need to do to make people understand asexuality is to highlight the differences between romantic attraction and sexual attraction (or something like that). EDIT: Also, are we sure that asexuals are just 1%? It seems like far less to me. Link to post Share on other sites
thylacine Posted June 3, 2007 Share Posted June 3, 2007 "The clearest cut representation of asexuality in the media that I can think of is HBO's series "Dexter" (one of the only watchable TV shows in the past few years). There's only been one season so far, but the basic outline of it is a serial killer who takes out the trash of society." I don't think it's very good to portray asexual people as serial killers. I mean, I'm asexual and I don't want the rest of the 99% of people thinking I'm an evil person and / or serial killer just for that reason. I've never seen the show, however, so I don't know much about Dexter. Link to post Share on other sites
Zealous Posted June 3, 2007 Share Posted June 3, 2007 I've never seen the show, however, so I don't know much about Dexter. It's made very clear that he's a good person. It's just also very clear that he is seriously screwed up. One up, one down. Link to post Share on other sites
thylacine Posted June 3, 2007 Share Posted June 3, 2007 Yeah, but it still portrays an asexual as screwed up. This is a form of bigotry, If I may say so. Link to post Share on other sites
Glitter Spock Posted June 3, 2007 Share Posted June 3, 2007 Yeah, but it still portrays an asexual as screwed up. This is a form of bigotry, If I may say so. I agree with that. I'd suggest you refer to the video interviews with AVENites that you can find on YouTube by searching "asexual" or "asexuality." representations of asexuality in pop culture I've never seen anything on television portraying asexuals that wasn't a news clip or an interview. I think we're almost invisible in pop culture—I think it's because we define ourselves in terms of a negative, unlike other sexual orientations. We do NOT experience sexual attraction, whereas people of other orientations carry a description of who they ARE sexually attracted to (rather than who they're NOT attracted to). Link to post Share on other sites
KAGU143 Posted June 3, 2007 Share Posted June 3, 2007 I think it is too easy to focus on the negative. The majority of asexuals would like to be in relationships of some sort - just not sexual ones. Why not say that our attractions to other people are different from the norm, and are based on things other than sex, rather than saying that they don't exist at all? -GB Link to post Share on other sites
Zealous Posted June 3, 2007 Share Posted June 3, 2007 Why not say that our attractions to other people are different from the norm, and are based on things other than sex, rather than saying that they don't exist at all? I think it's the fear of getting a response that goes "You'll see, you just need to get used to it/try it." We know that that isn't true, but other people don't. Wikipedia actually has a list of asexuality's appearances in pop culture. If he weren't quite so insane, I think we could take pleasure in having Sherlock Holmes among our ranks. Link to post Share on other sites
Hallucigenia Posted June 3, 2007 Share Posted June 3, 2007 Wikipedia actually has a list of asexuality's appearances in pop culture. If he weren't quite so insane, I think we could take pleasure in having Sherlock Holmes among our ranks. Um... you'd rather be represented by a serial killer than by Sherlock Holmes? :shock: Link to post Share on other sites
KL_Pereira Posted June 3, 2007 Author Share Posted June 3, 2007 Yes, thanks for the Wikipedia tip. I knew about their list but I was more interested in film or television representations specifically stating that a certain character is asexual. It seems to me that the books on the Wiki list have characters that are thought to be asexual but no one knows for sure. All these responses are enormously helpful. The Dexter tip is particularly interesting; my editor mentioned it to me when I pitched this article and my first thought was " oh, how horrible!" and it seems to have inspired a bit of a debate here. I'd like to talk about the Dexter debate in my article. If anyone has anything specific they want to add and please feel free to respond here to to me directly. Link to post Share on other sites
ghosts Posted June 3, 2007 Share Posted June 3, 2007 Oooh, Bitch magazine! I read that! I'll come up with some sort of response later on... I'm glad you guys are interested. :) Link to post Share on other sites
ily Posted June 3, 2007 Share Posted June 3, 2007 I don't think it's very good to portray asexual people as serial killers. I mean, I'm asexual and I don't want the rest of the 99% of people thinking I'm an evil person and / or serial killer just for that reason. Agreed. Not everyone is as open-minded as a lot of the folks here, and people tend to make sweeping generalizations. If that's our first foray into pop culture, I have to say that it isn't a great one...if you're not heterosexual, a lot of folks think that's "freaky" to begin with-- without adding anything additionally freaky on top of that. :shock: KL, I'm glad you're writing a piece about us. When is it coming out? I think our biggest challenge is to get our community offline and into RL as an actual presence, like the gay and lesbian communities have done in a lot of places. (Or at least, that would be my vision ) Since we're such a small percentage of the population, this is hard to do, though... Link to post Share on other sites
Eta Carinae Posted June 3, 2007 Share Posted June 3, 2007 Yeah, I'm generally negative about the Dexter thing, too, for a couple reasons: 1. Plenty of people already regard asexuals as possibly hiding or repressing something really unsavory. I'm sure a lot of the long time members of this board have seen this. I once did an interview with Nerve, for instance, and one of the comments after the article was from someone wondering how many of us were going to grow up to be serial rapists. There seems to be a sense that asexuality is so unnatural that it must be related to something really badly off in someone's psyche. (I'd bet money, in fact, that this is the whole reason Dexter is "asexual" in the first place: it's just an extension of his psychological problems.) 2. I don't think he's actually asexual. I'm not saying this because he has sex with his girlfriend, but because later in the season, he seems to genuinely want to. (That episode with the psychologist.) I'm not denying that it's really, really nice to -- for once -- see a character whose sexuality I can relate to, even in part. I still don't think it's much of a positive development. Link to post Share on other sites
FISH' Posted June 4, 2007 Share Posted June 4, 2007 Apparently, Morrissey is asexual. That's about all I can offer at this point... EDIT: Oh, and so was Hitler! You can use him if you think Dexter would be too negative. Link to post Share on other sites
Eta Carinae Posted June 4, 2007 Share Posted June 4, 2007 Apparently, Morrissey is asexual. That's about all I can offer at this point... He's also strongly rumored to be gay. Given that asexuals all being secretly gay is another common stereotype, he's no better than Dexter. Link to post Share on other sites
KL_Pereira Posted June 4, 2007 Author Share Posted June 4, 2007 yes, after watching some episodes of Dexter I agree that he doesn't seem to 1) be asexual or 2) be a very positive character to "represent" asexuality in pop culture. this means that you should all write screenplays and tv episodes (are any of you in the business?)of your own and create and disperse some really great asexual characters for the masses to see! Link to post Share on other sites
spinneret Posted June 4, 2007 Share Posted June 4, 2007 I assume you've also run across Craig Kilborn's "Sebastian the Asexual Icon"? Link to post Share on other sites
thylacine Posted June 4, 2007 Share Posted June 4, 2007 And Sherlock Holmes did drugs, by the way... Link to post Share on other sites
Hallucigenia Posted June 4, 2007 Share Posted June 4, 2007 this means that you should all write screenplays and tv episodes (are any of you in the business?)of your own and create and disperse some really great asexual characters for the masses to see! I don't know about screenwriters, but we definitely have some aspiring (and a few already published) novel writers in this crowd. Meanwhile, have you considered Clara in Isabelle Allende's "The House of Spirits", Kerewin Holmes in "The Bone People", the title character in "V For Vendetta", Tarma in Mercedes Lackey's "Vows and Honor" series, or Jughead from the "Archie" comics? There's also some pretty asexy characters in certain anime series, such as Rei Ayanami (Neon Genesis Evangelion) and Haruhi Fukioka (Ouran High School Host Club) although anime may or may not be even remotely mainstream enough for your purposes. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asexuality#As...lity_in_fiction and http://www.asexuality.org/wiki/index.php?title=Reading_list for more. Link to post Share on other sites
FISH' Posted June 4, 2007 Share Posted June 4, 2007 V was gay. It can't be 100% proven, but it was strongly suggested that he was put inside for being homosexual. Link to post Share on other sites
kbrd143 Posted June 4, 2007 Share Posted June 4, 2007 Morrissey has never stated that he is asexual. Initially, he claimed to be gay ... but celibate. His quotes on the subjext are rather odd, indeed: That was the problem with the 'celibate' word because they don't consider for a moment that you'd rather not be, but you just are. I was never a sexual person. In a 2006 interview in NME Magazine, he did say that he was "no longer celebate" (I think that was the way he phrased it, or perhaps that his celebacy had ended. . . .) -- it was a typically odd turn of phrase, in any case, which didn't really reveal much information. Somewhat prior to that, he did admit to having been in a relationship for two years. He confirmed that the relationship had ended, but he never revealed the gender of the person in question. Most people in the media rather assumed that this meant he was having sex with this person -- but Morrissey never actually said that. Lyrically, many critics assume that Morrissey longs for sex, as he is always singing about wanting someone to love him, or longing to be close to another person, wanting someone to kiss him, or wanting to kiss someone else. The assumption is, I suppose, that if you want to be near to someone else, you must, of necessity, want to do them. But, frankly, I do not find that the lyrics of his songs which deal specifically with sex (and there aren't many of them) help this argument much. Especially on the new album, Ringleader of the Tormenters. Yes, the celibacy might have ended, but the lyrics there imply that the experience was far from positive. (And they continue to be very gender-inspecific. . . . I am thinking, especially, of "You Have Killed Me", and "Dear God Please Help Me" when I say this. If you are interested, I can continue; however, I will stop going on and on, for now. . . .) *shrugs* Essentially, we know enough to know that we don't know enough. The only pop culture reference that I can think of off hand comes from the 1985 Booker Prize winning novel by Keri Hulme, The Bone People. The main character of that book, a woman by the name of Kerewin, definitively states that she considers herself to be sexually neuter and that she has no interest in sex whatsoever -- and that she never has, and never will. The character is asexual, even though that exact term is never used. (And, yes, some of the people on this board are in the entertainment industry, and I might have heard of a person or two working on projects which do include asexual characters -- but that is all I really feel comfortable saying. It isn't my place to reveal the real identities or ambitions of the AVEN populace. . . .) Link to post Share on other sites
ghosts Posted June 4, 2007 Share Posted June 4, 2007 Ok, let's see... I'm trying to dig up some threads for you to look at, maybe some of them will help you with the article? -Apparently there's an asexual reference about a character in Caricature: Nine Stories by Dan Clowes- http://asexuality.org/discussion/viewtopic.php?t=10494 -SpongeBob is asexual, according to creator -The character Utahraptor of Ryan North's Dinosaur Comics is asexual- here's a link to that section of the AVENwiki, which has a bunch of threads you can read, as well as a couple of links to comics with references to asexuality. http://www.asexuality.org/wiki/index.php?t...Dinosaur_Comics That's all I can think of for now, I hope that helps a little. Utahraptor is a favorite among some people here. :P You might want to check out the Media section on the wiki which has links to articles in print, as well as radio & tv interviews with asexuals. Here's the link: http://www.asexuality.org/wiki/index.php?t...ty_in_the_Media I'm not sure if that's quite what you're looking for, however. I'm also concerned with what is happening now in the asexual community. What revolutions are happening that the mainstream ( and even the indysphere) doesn't know about? How are they important to you? A lot of what's happening are just lots of efforts from various people in the community to make asexuality more visible. People are doing this in a variety of ways- some have been interviewed by mainstream outlets (you can check that out in the Media section I mentioned) such as MTV, ABC, Fox News, etc. And then there's some stuff going on in the underground- I read an article in the zine Punk Planet, which is what got me here. :) A lot of efforts also revolve around college/university campuses- many people have joined GLBT groups at their schools, and/or have given talks/presentations at campuses. Some groups have subsequently added an "A" to their GLBT names (meaning- "GLBTA" or whatever combination of letters), and I know a few college classes have incorporated asexuality into their curriculum (I was in one of them). I personally think this kind of visibility work on campuses is really important because it reaches people in an educational setting, if that makes sense- and it can reach a lot of GLBT groups, and lead to awareness and acceptance about asexuality. It's also a great way for people to get involved in visibility efforts. Of course, not everyone goes to college! So there are other things going on, like the interviews & articles in various media outlets, whether mainstream or indy. Some people are working on books, some are working on zines, I think some (or at least one person) are working on plays, stuff like that. We're working on pamphlets to distribute, and some people are trying to become more active in other organizations- the World Sexology Conference is the most recent that comes to my mind right now- you can read about it here: http://asexuality.org/discussion/viewtopic.php?t=22742 Ok! I think I'm done for now. I hope some of this helps! :) Link to post Share on other sites
KL_Pereira Posted June 5, 2007 Author Share Posted June 5, 2007 I assume you've also run across Craig Kilborn's "Sebastian the Asexual Icon"? OK. I must admit I never watched Kilborn. Can someone explain Sebastian the Asexual Icon to me? I'm unable to locate a description or video on the net (the late late archives are down)... Thanks for the tips on the media section too...I think I've tracked down all news/media articles/segments on asexuality. And thanks for all the pop culture refs as well! Link to post Share on other sites
littlelisa Posted June 5, 2007 Share Posted June 5, 2007 You know, something I would focus on, rather than the very few, mostly undesirable representations of asexuals in the mainstream media (mostly from what I can see, fictional characters probably invented by sexuals, or speculation about well-known people that is, I think, unconfirmed), maybe just say that because of very low visibility of asexuality as an orientation there isn't really much of anything in the popular culture to reflect it. What's being reflected in popular culture is a general ignorance about it. It's just not there. Maybe this is just coming from the fact that I barely ever watch TV, movies, or listen to mainstream radio, but I really don't understand the preoccupation of having to find popular culture references (I understand that it could help people understand it if there were such references, but I think that all/most are speculation or a bit of a stretch, or things that could create false and undesirable stereotypes). I'd probably focus more on recent media coverage, scientific studies, lack of representation/ignored by popular culture, etc. I don't know of any particular revolutions in the asexual community that the mainstream doesn't know about. I think it's that the mainstream doesn't know about us period. What's more (on the popular culture side), I don't think this "debate" about this Dexter thing (I will be upfront and say that I have never seen it/heard of it) is rocking the asexual world. Personally, I think it doesn't seem very likely that such a character would exist in real life. Just from what I see here, he seems to bounce back and forth from sexual to asexual according to the writer's whims/whatever they think would get better ratings, probably. I do think it's cool that you're writing this article, though. Good luck with it! Link to post Share on other sites
KAGU143 Posted June 5, 2007 Share Posted June 5, 2007 I can't explain Sebastian the Asexual Icon since I've never seen it and dialup internet makes it impractical to download large files. However, I was able to find a link to a video of it. http://www.cbs.com/latenight/latelate/5questions/big5/ I strongly recommend The Bone People, by Keri Hulme as an accurate portrayal of the asexual experience. I remain highly skeptical of Craig Kilborn's interpretation until I see it. -GB Link to post Share on other sites
Nico-Nico Friendo Posted June 5, 2007 Share Posted June 5, 2007 Ok, let's see... I'm trying to dig up some threads for you to look at, maybe some of them will help you with the article?-Apparently there's an asexual reference about a character in Caricature: Nine Stories by Dan Clowes- http://asexuality.org/discussion/viewtopic.php?t=10494 -SpongeBob is asexual, according to creator -The character Utahraptor of Ryan North's Dinosaur Comics is asexual- here's a link to that section of the AVENwiki, which has a bunch of threads you can read, as well as a couple of links to comics with references to asexuality. http://www.asexuality.org/wiki/index.php?t...Dinosaur_Comics I just read some of those dinosaur comics and they were pretty funny! I hope Utahraptor is asexual. That would be so cool! (Maybe someone should e-mail the creator and ask him if it's true? Oh, and tell him it would be totally cool if he really is. :D ) Link to post Share on other sites
ily Posted June 5, 2007 Share Posted June 5, 2007 I just read some of those dinosaur comics and they were pretty funny! I hope Utahraptor is asexual. That would be so cool! (Maybe someone should e-mail the creator and ask him if it's true? Oh, and tell him it would be totally cool if he really is. :D ) I was reading somewhere (too lazy to look for the thread, sorry ) that Hu actually did ask the Dinosaur Comics writer if Utahraptor was asexual, and he said that he was! Link to post Share on other sites
spinneret Posted June 5, 2007 Share Posted June 5, 2007 Thanks for Sebastian the Asexual Icon link, GB. Here are some threads where AVENITES have discussed the character: one two three some Sebastian quotes via auttie_gurlie: You know, something I would focus on, rather than the very few, mostly undesirable representations of asexuals in the mainstream media (mostly from what I can see, fictional characters probably invented by sexuals, or speculation about well-known people that is, I think, unconfirmed), maybe just say that because of very low visibility of asexuality as an orientation there isn't really much of anything in the popular culture to reflect it. What's being reflected in popular culture is a general ignorance about it. It's just not there. agreed 800%. KL, the main thing is that so few people even know what asexuality is. Asexuals don't just have to come out, we often have to define what we're coming out as precisely because there's so little out there. That's why AVEN's so big on the Visibility and Education. Link to post Share on other sites
Zealous Posted June 5, 2007 Share Posted June 5, 2007 I realized that I presented the idea of using Dexter badly. I had hoped that the shower line made that clear. I think the best way of showing asexuality in the media is showing how it is so often misunderstood. Don't show Dexter or Mr. Holmes in a positive light by any means. Instead, I implore you to show asexuality how it is, then show the mentally ill characters used to portray it. When is there a clean asexual character? A single asexual character who isn't somehow messed up? The closest I can think of is Peter Rasputin (Colossus, X-Men). Yeah, that's the best I have. A comic book character. Can you trump it? You've only got a handful of options. I think our grand total will end under twenty five. Our grand total of human ones will be under fifteen. I think that's an important aspect of asexuality in the media. Link to post Share on other sites
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