Why Asexuality is Hot...

Asexuality is hot. Compulsory sexuality is not. Here’s why.

Yesterday, the San Francisco Chronicle ran a front-page article on asexuality titled “Asexuals leave closet, find community”. In complete shock, I nearly choked on my Cheerios when I saw this—As I immediately began reading, my women’s studies days came echoing back into my head…the voice of Adrienne Rich’s classic article “Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence” in particular. …Could it really be that (the desire for) sexuality itself has become so compulsory now that an asexual existence is largely denied as a possible variance within our sexual spectrum…even (or especially?) in our own field of sexuality education, policy and research?

All of this got me wondering….with the many conferences I attend and journals I subscribe to….when was the last time I saw sex research or education being inclusive of asexuality rather than downplaying/denying it altogether or writing it off as a sexual dysfunction according to DSM standards. And the first answer was last fall in New York at the AARP sponsored SAGE (Services and Advocacy for Gay and Lesbian Elders) Conference where an entire workshop on asexuality within older adults (an emerging identity being added to LGBT elder’s identities) was presented. In over ten years of work in this field, that was one of the only moments I have seen asexuality given any sort of serious and scholarly attention. And so I thought….there had to be more….just had to be…right? Well, back in 2005, NSRC also published an article written by David Jay, founder of the nation’s leading asexuality advocacy organization, AVEN Asexual Visibility and Education Network (he is also included with the Chronicle article). And I know that one of our Department of Sexuality Studies’ most popular classes, Variations in Human Sexuality now addresses asexuality as a variation of sexuality as well….but other than that…not really so much evidence out there of asexual inclusion from those professionals charged with educating this nation about all sexualities….not so much at all. 

It kind of makes you wonder what it is we do not yet know as sexuality educators and researchers because of this largely historical and current denial of asexual existence. Are we really so threatened by people who say they do not have sexual feelings that we would erase them completely from our work, assuming they would not in some way contribute to it? Shouldn’t that in and of itself be a red flag? Or is it that we are too busy focusing on what we seem to love to call “the real issues” (and they very much are obviously but does that have to always mean the exclusion of other important issues?) like HIV/AIDS, fighting abstinence only education and LGBT and reproductive health and rights? I can’t help but wonder what kind of an impact a more clear understanding of asexuality would have on all of these real issues, individually and intersectionally speaking….

Here at NSRC, we are involved in a movement to specifically include those elements of humanity usually left out of supposedly “comprehensive” comprehensive sexuality education such as people of color, people with disabilities, immigrants, LGBT people, people of faith, older adults, people from diverse cultures, people from history and the list goes on… And so if our goal here is to be an all inclusive movement for educating all people about all people’s sexualities then we’d better get up to speed on the asexuality part because we are not doing a very good job of it. There I said it. And I mean it. And I’m just as guilty as anyone but this article has really inspired me to change that. I hope it will inspire you too….

Real people are suffering out there (God only knows how many)…just imagine not having any sexual feeling at all, being too ashamed to admit it and then feeling that in order to be loved or feel connected you have to have sex with your partner (sounds an awful lot like what happens with young girls seeking male attention in this country doesn’t it?)…. What kind of an emotional/psychological impact is that having on people out there? I wonder how many people have had to live and die this way—never knowing what it could have been like to feel liberated and free of sex for life...safe and valued and not erased by society…

Why don’t we help put an end to it by being better-informed allies and educators?

Asexuals are hot. And completely revolutionary too as they push the limits of what is considered acceptable by society’s compulsory standards of everything from proper gender roles to marriage etc….Asexuals are courageous and self-loving and respecting—they have enormous integrity for being able to ongoingly declare their lack of sexual desire in a culture where sexual desire itself seemingly defines every part of us—….often in compulsory ways….. The asexual community’s emergence is one of the sexiest developments I have seen come along in many years… (and I see a lot!)

I think all of us as “ally-sexuals” have much to learn about sexuality, (emotional) intimacy and creative relational possibilities from those that declare themselves sex-less for life....

…It’s almost like the use of an extended silence in the middle of a beautiful song—it often ends up being the most powerful part of the music itself…