Leave us our words

Last spring I took a creative writing course where we had to write a short play. We read one where all the characters insisted the main character, who I’ll call Guy, was gay. To the point where one of them showed him her Playgirls, porn, etc., to bring him out of the closet.

In the last scene, Guy said that he was asexual. He loved his girlfriend, but he wasn’t sexually attracted to her. The class fell silent, probably because they were confused, and me because I was going “Holy shit holy shit” in my head. A play about asexuality, with a good definition of asexuality! I went with the old “I have asexual friends, this is great” thing, because I didn’t want to come out to my class — and because I knew someone in the class was queerphobic.

Then my professor said, “I like it, but I don’t think you should use the word asexual.”

Part of me was crushed. My professor had never heard of asexuality before, and he was saying that the word shouldn’t be used. Guy would be more interesting without claiming that for himself.

I’d pretty much forgotten all this, but I was reminded of it when Sciatrix said:

When I say asexuals are oppressed by invisibility, I don’t only mean that the usual state of things is, right now, for asexual people to grow up without even the simplest words to describe what they are, even to themselves.

I came up with the word “asexual” on my own. Seeing people exposed to the word and the concept in a positive way gets me excited, because maybe it means one day people who can’t come up with it on their own will have a better chance of finding it.

When I think about what my professor said, it hurts a lot more than it did at the time. I had the e-mail address of the author of the play, and I should’ve contacted him and told him how important it was that asexual people, fictional or not, be able to use their words, and how I supported his use of it. But I was afraid it would get out to the rest of the class, and I didn’t feel safe there.

It hurts me to think about it, because if I didn’t have that word, I might be going to doctors and trying to find medicines to “fix” myself, I might be trying to date people and forcing myself to have sex because maybe if I had a good experience, I’d like it, I might be self-harming when none of that worked, and I might end up feeling so isolated that I wouldn’t want to go on anymore. I don’t think that’s too bleak a picture to paint.

We’re not well-known enough, even to ourselves, to let our words be erased. If we don’t have words, people think we’re a single person on whom they can impose whatever ideas they want.

If we’re asexual, and we’re told that word isn’t important enough to be used, it’s a lot easier for people to erase us, and write in what they find more interesting: straight, closeted, confused, scared, naïve, or alone. An aberration, a freak of nature. Forgettable.

Introduction

I’ve been thinking about starting a blog about asexuality and the experiences that I have being an asexual person since December, and it’s taken me a while to come up with a name. “ace space” was actually already taken (there were pictures of cows, when I checked), so while “asexual space” doesn’t have the benefit of rhyming, it was available, and accomplishes nearly the same thing. I suspect most people will read the link as A Sexual Space, though.

The idea of writing about asexuality alternatively fills me with excitement and dread. I do have things I want to muse on. While my friends who know about it are supportive, it’s not quite the same as discussing asexuality with someone who really understands where you’re coming from. In that vein, this isn’t really going to be a 101 space, partially because writing 101 makes me feel like shit. An emotion which I may eventually talk about.

The dread comes at the thought of violating my standard operating procedure of being relatively silent in public spaces. Since I’m not a very talkative person, and since I know (and I don’t even know them that well) a grand total of two asexual people, I’m hoping this blog will help me get more comfortable with myself. Which hasn’t really been a problem before, but some recent gender revelations have put me in a position where I know I’ll need to go to therapy at some point in the near future. I want to have explored some more stuff before I go in.

And, now that I’m older, I’m noticing things about the world that I didn’t notice in seventh grade. Such as the lack of asexual literature out there, which made me flounder a bit when I went looking. I’m not really an AVEN person, for a variety of reasons, and as horrifying as the prospect of putting myself into a public arena is, I would like to be a part of the asexual community. I think this is a decent way to do it.