remember that bit the other day where I was complaining that I wanted more numbers?

[sciatrix]

There's a new census going up as an Asexual Awareness project! Granted, the questions are mostly basic demographics, but it'll still be pretty cool to look at when the results are in.

And hey, they're learning--you do not need an AVEN account to fill this one out and it's actually being promoted in non-AVEN spaces! Mind, they've missed two asexual communities I can think of--neither asexual_fandom or the Transyada forum are mentioned--but this actually looks like AVEN-based asexual organizers taking baby steps to acknowledge other communities.

Comments

[kaz]

Greyromantic, noooootttt so much--I need to sit down at some point and write a post about how I actually really hate being identified as greyromantic specifically, because for me the point isn't that I experience romantic attraction rarely or only in very specific circumstances but that whatever I do experience doesn't feel romantic at all even if it shares certain characteristics with traditionally defined romantic relationships.

This is /interesting/, because I still find greyromantic the identity I'm most comfortable with (ETA: out of the aromantic/orientationgoeshereromantic/greyromantic group) but if I defined it that way I wouldn't be and it upsets me to realise some people are defining it that way. My personal definition is along the lines of "if you don't quite id as aromantic but not quite as romantic", so that would count both what you mentioned but also involve things like - you experience attraction that's in between romantic and nonromantic, you want relationships that are not quite romantic but not quite platonic, that kind of thing. My personal definition of grey-a is similar but now that you mention it I've seen the "experience sexual attraction rarely or only in certain situations" going around and may have accidentally used it myself - the ways in which it's not sufficient are only really obvious once it excludes you. ><

(I kind of wanted to go for "not trans but not cis", which is sort of how I identify right now - I feel if I id as trans it's sort of appropriating but at the same time I don't want to get lumped in with the cis folk. >>)

[sciatrix]

Well, I go "hey, it's an analogue to grey-asexual, right?" and the thing about grey-As is that they do experience sexual attraction while still being mostly asexual, enough to primarily ID with the asexual community. (Because if they don't experience sexual attraction they fit under "asexual." Although now I think about it, I have seen people who don't experience sexual attraction ID as grey because they don't feel asexual enough for whatever reason... anyway, digression.)

So if I backform that to greyromantic I get someone who does experience romantic attraction, even if it's rarely or weird, and that sort of makes me go "......no, I don't think I do" and then I get entangled in the confusing morass of definitions. For me specifically, "wtfromantic" does better because it encapsulates the sheer level of confusion I'm dealing with without actually putting a label on the things I do want.

Although I dunno, I would also tend to use grey-asexual similarly to the way you use it, it'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." And my political tendencies are to want to encourage them to ID as fully ace because behavior isn't sexual orientation, which brings me back to the more technical definition of grey-A rather than the identification definition. Agh. I don't know, definitions are complicated.

(I actually need to sit down and work through my feelings on gender and whether I want to add a genderqueer label to my identity, so... yeaaaah, I feel you there. I'm still quite comfortable with cis but rather want to acknowledge my tendencies towards fucking with gender conceptions and my Issues with presentation and the rest of it.

Also, going to my campus queer group has made me rather aware of just how masculine-presenting I am, comparatively, and given that "queer/butch woman" is actually a part of my gender identity that might be why I cling to "queer" so hard...)

[kaz]

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.)

[sciatrix]

Eh, I suppose? The thing for me is that sexual attraction seems so much less complicated than romantic attraction, because it's contrasting a desire for sex--which is relatively easily defined, genital stimulation aiming at somebody's orgasm is the broadest one I can think of, and also sex is a relatively discrete activity--with a desire for a romantic relationship, which is considerably more complicated to define and also is defined in terms of mutual emotions and not a physical action you can see. I mean, it's generally fairly easy to figure out whether you've had sex--did you engage in genital stimulation aiming at orgasm for somebody? there you have it--whereas figuring out whether you're in a romantic relationship can be, uh, difficult.

Admittedly, possibly it could be easier for me say "that's easy to define" because I'm not grey-A but I do exist in the weird squishy confusing area for romantic orientation, so. Food for thought, that.

Agh, yeaaaah. I mean, that's the way I generally approach that issue in practice--not telling people how they should identify, but saying "asexuality encompasses all these very varied experiences, asexuality is not defined by behavior, it's about this specific form of attraction and I know people who engage in XYZ behaviors who are still asexual." And they can make up their own minds from that.

(oh god I know. And there's a big part of myself yelling that "GENDERQUEER IS A WORD FOR NONBINARY PEOPLE ONLY" except I... am not actually entirely sure that's true and oh god it's so confuuuuuusing. Do people ever get to stop questioning? It would be nice to fit into the nice clear areas more often, agh.)