t's just that I also tend to be the sort going "well if you don't experience sexual attraction you're asexual, I don't care whether you're repulsed and nonlibidoist or whether you actually quite enjoy sex and have a ton of it for fun" and it's the latter sort I see sometimes going "well I don't feel quite asexual so I will ID as grey even though I don't experience sexual attraction."
This makes sense, but if I reverse-engineer that to "if you don't experience romantic attraction you're aromantic" it's clear to me how it's more complicated than that - that people can probably experience *something* that's borderline or where they're not sure whether it's sexual attraction or not, you know?
I agree with you about the people who say "I don't feel quite asexual", but then again it's their identity and... mm... I'd be more keen on showing them that there's room for all sorts of identities under "asexual". Like, if they're not identifying as asexual because they think you don't count if you do X or that asexual people who don't do X will kick them out, that sucks and we ought to do our best to show them it's not true. However, if they're not identifying as asexual because they just don't think they have that much in common with asexual experiences and know they *could* id that way if they felt it right... then it's their business, you know? I also think that for some people this is an intermittent thing and they later id as totally asexual-
man, the annoying thing about using "ace" as an umbrella term is that now "asexual" sounds so clinical but we don't have an alternative when we're talking about only-asexual not-grey-a. >>
(lol, and I've been once /again/ going "but am I really really nonbinary?" gah, the neverending questioning of self, and it sucks because so much of it is bullshit "you're not oppressed enough" that I /know/ is bullshit but that I can't quite get rid of.)
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2011-09-14 12:20 pm (UTC)This makes sense, but if I reverse-engineer that to "if you don't experience romantic attraction you're aromantic" it's clear to me how it's more complicated than that - that people can probably experience *something* that's borderline or where they're not sure whether it's sexual attraction or not, you know?
I agree with you about the people who say "I don't feel quite asexual", but then again it's their identity and... mm... I'd be more keen on showing them that there's room for all sorts of identities under "asexual". Like, if they're not identifying as asexual because they think you don't count if you do X or that asexual people who don't do X will kick them out, that sucks and we ought to do our best to show them it's not true. However, if they're not identifying as asexual because they just don't think they have that much in common with asexual experiences and know they *could* id that way if they felt it right... then it's their business, you know? I also think that for some people this is an intermittent thing and they later id as totally asexual-
man, the annoying thing about using "ace" as an umbrella term is that now "asexual" sounds so clinical but we don't have an alternative when we're talking about only-asexual not-grey-a. >>
(lol, and I've been once /again/ going "but am I really really nonbinary?" gah, the neverending questioning of self, and it sucks because so much of it is bullshit "you're not oppressed enough" that I /know/ is bullshit but that I can't quite get rid of.)