What is your favorite types of cake? (Or, is pie an acceptable replacement for cake?)
I love both cakes and pies. Apple pie is my favorite and chocolate cake is my favorite.
Just looking at these beauties I can hear the “Hallelujah” chorus playing in my head.
What is the worst argument you’ve heard against asexuality?
I’m not sure if “worst” means “ridiculous” here or more like “moon landing was faked”. The difference being that the latter is accepted by an alarming number of people. I guess the worst argument is that sex=human, humans are sexual beings, “be fruitful and multiply” and similar veins of thought.
It would make more sense to me if the argument was “to love is to be human” with the understanding that love comes in many forms. There’s love for one’s country, love for mankind, love for the divine, love for the family, love in the form of friendship, and, of course, love in the form of passion. I think the problem lies in that English has one word to describe what was traditionally seen as completely separate ideas.
Traditionally the love for one’s country and duty to country was more important than the love and duty to one’s spouse. Modern thinking has completely reversed the idea of love and placed the importance on romantic passions above all else. Historically speaking, we’re the weird ones to think that way. Until modern times the idea of marrying for love was seen as irresponsible and actually looked down upon as a sin. One needn’t look further than a high school text book to see at least that much. So with that understanding I think the argument of humans as sexual beings (while ignoring the other capacities of “love”) is odd because it’s almost like we regressed instead progressed as a society.
Write something or post a picture about asexuality that upsets you.
What do you believe causes asexuality?
I think it’s part genetics, part environmental. I personally think that I was born asexual or rather that I was always going to present as asexual. I’m the oldest of my siblings so it makes evolutionary sense for me to remain with my family unit as a caregiver/nurturer rather than go off and make my own family unit. The character archetype I identify most with is The Mentor. My instincts tell me to gather knowledge and share it with the group. I’m infatuated with information and information gathering. I think every sexuality is an evolutionary adaptation that benefits us as a social species and serves a different purpose. It’s not against “God’s Plan” to be gay, lesbian, bi, pan, or whatever. If it were against the “natural laws” it wouldn’t exist. You can’t violate a natural law. It’s like trying to violate the law of gravity. We exist because we’re supposed to exist.
What do relationships mean to you?
I have so few relationships right now and none of them are what I would consider ideal. I blame Hollywood for a lot of things. Society has built up what romantic relationships should look like, what friendships look like, even what family relationships look like and I think those models are very far from reality. Speaking of reality, reality television isn’t much better at portraying relationships (because reality TV is all SCRIPTED!!!).
I think that’s sort of the point really. When dealing with actual relationships there is no script, there are no outtakes, and we kind of just play it by ear. Each relationship is going to be different depending on the individuals involved. I understand that my view is a unique one. Today two of my coworkers just randomly asked for advice about relationships. I was really caught off guard because I’m so bad at interpersonal relationships even though I have a B.A. in Communication Studies. The basis for both of the questions was “What does it mean when…?” and I guess they asked me because of my assigned gender, but the point was they needed outside perspective and I didn’t really have a clue what to tell them. So I guess in a only a few words, relationships are a mystery to me.
What is your favorite asexual pride image?
This one is easy. I adore the asexual Captain America Shields. I make my own using a photo editing program and digital coloring pages. Thinking about it right now makes me want to buy an Avengers coloring book and deck out all the Avengers in LGBT+ pride colors. I’m thinking Hawkeye would look very good in pan pride colors. If anyone else finds a superhero coloring book and colors the heroes in pride colors I would love to see it. I’m not very good at shading, but if I find a coloring book I’ll post the pics.
In the meantime here’s the shields I use-
Your favorite “asexual” book (as in, sex and/or romance are not the main focus) and/or Your favorite “asexual” movie.
My favorite “asexual” book is the same book that gave me my infatuation with reading and sparked my life long obsession with dragons; Patricia Wrede’s Dealing with Dragons.
Dealing with Dragons a cracked fairytale story where the main character is a princess who runs away from home to avoid an arranged marriage and she asks a dragon to “kidnap” her. If I had to pick a book that has impacted me the most in my life and as an author, this 100% the book I’d pick. It was fun, it was different, and remains one of my all time favorites.
My favorite “asexual” movie is The Martian.
I love science fiction and I feel like I’ve been waiting years for a good hard science fiction story to come out. Soft science fiction is very similar to fantasy, which is nice and I enjoy it, but nothing tops the feeling of seeing the pure sense of possibility play out on screen.
The great thing about both these works is romance isn’t a focus and doesn’t even affect the main characters. The adventure is it’s own reward and love is no the “prize” they win at the end. I hope to stumble upon more stories like these in the future.
Your favorite asexual character/celebrity/person.
I don’t know of any characters/celebrities/persons who are openly or in plain text asexual, or at least I can’t think of any at the moment. I would pick a person in the online community, but I only know them by their usernames and online personas. I have several headcanons that have asexual and/or aromantic characters. I would say those headcanon examples would be my favorite, but I’d be too embarrassed to list them. I hope someday I can do the challenge again and have a better and bigger answer or character/person pool to draw from.
Tell us about a time you met another asexual, whether in real life or online.
The majority of asexuals I have “met” are online. I’ve met only one asexual in real life since it turned out that one of my friends from high school is also an aromantic asexual. We met up for tea and I basically just blurted it out because I just wanted someone to know and they said, “Me too.” We didn’t end up talking about our asexuality, but I wish we had. I would have been nice to discuss asexuality outside of the internet so it would feel more legitimized for me and not “just a tumblr thing” as some would claim. Unfortunately since then I have lost touch with this friend despite several attempts to reconnect. Since then I’ve felt distant from most of my friends from high school.
There were four of us who were really close, shared interests, have similar world views, and are unfortunately in the same drifting-not-knowing-what-to-do phase in our lives. All of us are college educated, for all the good it did us. Another of my friends is moving out of state an I can’t find the energy to pick up the phone and talk to them or confess to our mutual friend that I didn’t keep the number when I switched phones. I’ve come to the conclusion that trying to tether these old friendships instead of letting them run their natural course would do me more harm than good. It’s lonely sometimes, but I realize that’s just how I am. I’m not really the one to make the first move which makes me appear unfriendly, guarded and uncaring. I care deeply, but quietly. I need friends who understand and accept that as well I my “new” identity.
I’ve met one asexual in real life, but I hope to meet many more and make new friends where I can be myself and not just the warped shadow of who I was in high school.
Your favorite asexual Tumblr site. Your favorite asexual website.
I don’t have favorites. Early on I favored several ace-advice/help blogs, but now that I’m more comfortable with my identity I’ve found the blogs to be repetitive. I’ve briefly glanced at the AVEN website when I was first learning about asexuality, but I haven’t visited it much since then. I’ve heard unsavory things about forum participants (which will be true of any forum, really), but I haven’t had a negative experience myself. I just don’t prefer the forum format. Forums have their uses, but I prefer tumblr and twitter because the most resent post shows up first so I don’t have to read through old information. Twitter and tumblr also have filters that forward information I might find more relevant to the top of my feed. Forums just feel slow in comparison. I wish I did have a favorite. I would love to spend some time enjoying myself on an ace specific website, but I have no idea what that would look like. Sometimes it’s hard to connect with other aces because the only thing we have in common for discussion is our asexuality while other things like hobbies, interests, life goals, and such will be vastly different. Other times it’s just nice to bask in the presence of other aces because even though we’re usually very different, we’re not alone and that’s what’s important.
A³ 