here goes the first time i "coin" a term in my life in a public space
homoacephobia - combination of homophobia and acephobia
(a combination that impacts me personally, on daily basis, as a gay asexual man)
this is a personal opinion / essay on society, oppression, and some upsetting and potentially triggering topics such as historical regimes, discrimination, online discourse, and many many many more.
please, proceed with care!
why put the two words together?
(or a simple note on "intersectionality")
when it comes to being discriminated, a lot of people see it through a very simple framework
if you're black, you often experience racism
if you're a woman, you often experience sexism
if you're a trans person, you often experience transphobia
an identity is seen in very simple terms where you're either not discriminated (you happen to be cis, white, not poor, etc) or you are discriminated (trans, or of color, or poor, etc)
it happens though,
quite often,
that one has more than just 1 single identity that causes them to be discriminated.
there are asian lesbians ; disabled trans people ; black bisexuals;
since you can't really CHOOSE what traits you end up having, you might end up having more than one socially unnaceptable thing.
what happens when you experience more than one type of discrimination, is that it can end up manifesting in a unique way.
i say "unique way", because someone who only has one of your traits might not recognize what you're experiencing.
black men are hated for being black;
women are hated for being women;
but a black woman often will be hated being black AND a woman, at same time, and the way that these two identities manifest, and the way how the two types of discrimination blend in together.
when someone studies discrimination by looking at the ways how different identities from different groups of oppresion work together, rather than in seperation,
it's called "INTERSECTIONAL RESEARCH".
this concept emerged in 1989 thanks to Kimberlé Crenshaw, a black feminist american scholar who noticed how seperately blackness and womanhood is treated in social studies and law;
and similarly led to coining of the term "misogynoir" in 2008, by Moya Bailey (another black feminist american scholar) : a word for experiencing misogyny and anti-black racism at the same time and the way two connect.
when i am discriminated for my personal identity, it often ends up not being as simple as just being hated for being asexual or hated for being gay,
which is why i started to use "homoacephobia" as a word.
homophobia (sentiment against gay people) often looks a particular way.
disgusting/sinful/gross/unnatural/invented by the west
if you're reading this article, you likely know SOME common homophobic narratives.
similarly, aphobia and specifically acephobia (sentiment against asexual people) often looks like
mental illness/physical dysfunction/made up/wanting attention/not queer and not oppressed
and on surface level, there isn't a lot of overlap!
if you had to guess what's in common, maybe you'd see that both are about your orientation, and that "unnatural" often applies to asexual people and "mental illness/physical dysfunction" often applies to gay people.
when you dive a little deeper,
such as if you ever had to read about "historical queer people" or read on "queer-coding" of media characters,
you might also notice that there's a commonly shared topic of "NOT HAVING ATTRACTION TO THE GENDER YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO HAVE ATTRACTION TO" between lesbians/gays and aromantics/asexuals.
whenever you have a woman who's not interested in men, how can you know whether she's not interested because she only has attraction to women; or if she's not interested because she has no attraction to anyone?
the debates about whether a given figure, fictional or real, is a part of one group or other group are quite common, and can even get quite heated,
but nazis don't care differentiating, they gave the black triangle to both.
when you dive a lot deeper, and by that you, just as me, might have lived an asexual gay life and have spent YEARS in the queer scene,
you'll notice that a lot of more hidden from general society narratives about asexuality and gayhood
in asexual online community, there is a common term known as "ACE DISCOURSE", mostly originating from queer culture of Tumblr, but also existant across social media and, unfortunately, even in real-life spaces,
and "ACE DISCOURSE" refers to common topics of discussion about asexuality which are typically used as a way to exclude ace people from having a community,
whether community refers to "QUEER COMMUNITY" or "ASEXUAL COMMUNITY"
here are some fun "ACE DISCOURSE" messages that you might see circulating online, constantly, all the time:
"if you are asexual, you cannot be a part of queer community, because you pass as straight"
"if you are sex-repulsed, you cannot be a part of queer community, because you're a prude"
"if you are demisexual, you cannot be a part of queer (/ace) community, because you just made up this term to be special but you're actually normal and you're just wanna feel oppressed"
but you have to understand, it doesn't stop at just 'you cannot be a part of a community',
it often goes to say "you cannot be X identity"
and even more often, it goes to say
"if you are X thing, you are inherently immoral",
and sometimes, "you deserve to die"
and suddenly, all of the things that are commonly said about homosexuals and the sentiment of "you are disgusting and sinful and should not be a part of society" doesn't feel a lot different from asexuality at all!
the more years i spent learning about lives of gay men throughout history,
reading their personal letters, hearing them ache about being born wrong, ill, unnaceptable,
the more i felt understood, as an asexual, even though i should've related most due to being a gay man.
but the gay movement have went a long way to make it slightly, just slightly easier to be gay without that terrible shame:
we're yet to exist, as an a-spec movement, long and strong enough to do the same.
(unfun fact: all of this crap happens to aromantic people, too. i am writing this paper with asexuality being my primary/focus identity over my personal aromanticism, but it should not be underestimated how extreme and prevalent arophobia is. it's never hatred against one group: it's against all of us, always.)
BEING GAY (MALE) AND ASEXUAL AT THE SAME TIME IS NOT AN ACCEPTABLE CONFIGURATION
remember the discourse about how cishet aspec people should not be a part of the LGBTQIA+? (hey, the A is literally there, by the way)
unfortunately, being an ace and a gay person*
(gay man, albeit formally "turian homoalterous" by self-identification)
does not specifically make me feel very safe being in the queer community, either.
when it comes to my interpersonal identity, and to my coining of "homoacephobia",
one of the biggest reasons for WHY i needed this term was a result of hypersexualization, objectification and fetishization that came with me being gay.
look, lgbtqia+ and sexual liberation movement came hand in hand. it's not very hard to understand why there is a lot of topic on sexuality for a community that is literally called "sexual minorities" in research (i'll admit, occasionally "gender and sexual minorities" instead, but only in recent english-language western-focused research; a lot of places haven't caught up yet)
and there's nothing bad or shameful about having your queer or gay identity be connected to being sexual: it just happened that for me personally, it isn't.
i identify as gay because i am a man who loves men; i think fondly of them, i tend to think that many look wonderful; and i would happily spend my life in a company of another man who's similarly fond of me. i cannot imagine myself in a happy relationship with a woman; i can imagine myself raising a child with a man without much issues, though.
im gay. just also asexual.
the issue happens when people
not just assume that me liking men, as a guy, might be sexual; (which is related to something called "allonormativity" : a very default set of beliefs that everyone experiences attraction the same; similar to "heteronormativity": belief that everyone is straight ; which are flawed but get internalized easily by people and typically aren't done in intentional hatred)
but when they FORCE it to be a sexual thing;
rejecting my boundaries, including ones i've had before i was 18, since it's reasonable to not want anyone, especially adults, to be talking about your sex life when you're a kid;
and rejecting validity of identity when it doesn't fit their beliefs or personal preferences.
being a gay male typically comes with sexualization by (typically straight) men in form of them assuming you're a sexual beast who only cares about hitting on them;
and sexualization from (typically straight) women who assume that you're going to act as their cute little gay best friend from movies;
in queer community, little comments about how loving men is gross and disgusting sometimes stays; and objectification stays, also;
this is the regular acephobia + homophobia (formally "gayphobia" specifically, but i don't think "gay" should belong to gay men only) which i have to go through.
but within ace and gay communities, it's hard to find solace, either,
since gay community, especially gay male community focuses very heavily on sex and body features;
and asexual community often focuses on terminology and classifying specific identities and attractions; but doesn't as often explore other things, such as the asexual life experiences, relationships and culture.
homo-asexual people aren't a particularly large or visible group,
poll of AVEN (Asexual Visibility and Education Network) users done in 2014; a large asexual english-speaking forum;
poll of archiveofourown users done in 2024; a large fanfiction website with large queer community in it;
and when you look at the statistics of homoromantic people,
if we talk about my identity specifically,
you have to keep in mind that only a small percentage of self-identified asexual people are male,
which further alienates me, leaving me without meaningful representation or community.
"homoacephobia" is a combination of homophobia and acephobia.
it is a word that i use as a gay asexual man to talk about my experience with discrimination and invisibility.
my specific "type" of it correctly might also be called gayacephobia, since it's homophobia specifically against gay men;
but i believe "homoacephobia" as a word has the most weight to it, and can also be useful for people outside of my specific identity;
such as by asexual lesbians!
this essay also is focused on asexuality, even though i also am aromantic, and "homoaphobia" or "homoarophobia" might also be words that are needed for the community; same for something like "biacephobia" or "transacephobia".
intersectional talk on the topic of a-spec identities tends to be very quiet, even within the very community,
but i would love to mention that some activists discuss what it means to be BLACK + ASEXUAL as well as what it means to be DISABLED + ASEXUAL (< the latter being an identity i share)
and without them, i would have never written this.
WORTHY READS ON BLACKNESS + ASEXUALITY:
"Stereotypes & media about Black masculinity made it harder to come out as asexual" by Tyger Songbird
"There's A New Holiday For Black Asexuals, And I'm Here For It" by Latonya Pennington
^ Marshall Blount, Alyshia Rodgers and Kimberly Butler created Soul Ace Day: a designated day that explores intersectionality of African American asexuals!
PERSONAL NOTES ON BEING DISABLED + ASEXUAL
i didn't mention my disability in this essay prior, but as a matter of fact, i AM disabled.
ABLEISM + ACEPHOBIA often work hand-in-hand
but it's also notable that
ABLEISM often is found within ASEXUAL spaces
(asexual people are often medicalized ("hyposexuality" as one real example); asexual community puts effort to stand against that;
however, when not done carefully, results in asexual people who DO have some medical conditions being thrown under the bus, not included in conversations, or seen as the enemy)
and ACEPHOBIA often is found DISABLED spaces,
(disabled people are often forced into desexualization (compulsory sterilization as one real example); disabled community puts effort to stand against that; however, when not done carefully, results in disabled people who ARE non-sexual by their will being thrown under the bus, not included in conversations, or seen as the enemy)
asexual writer and activist COURTNEY LANE, who's known for the podcast she leads together with her husband, has explored this topic personally and has created DISABLED ACE DAY, something that i thank her for a lot.
as this is a topic heavily personal to me, and is written as an essay rather than a scientific work, please know my replies to it might be scarce and i will delete negative and controversial comments freely.
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