The Hater Anon

Happy Asexual Awareness Week!

Educate yourself about what being asexual is all about - and check out some events going in Massachusetts to celebrate and raise awareness about asexuality.

[image transcript:  -Hallo! - It’s Asexual Awareness Week, so I’m here to bring some awareness. Wooh! - This is not going to be one of those comics with facts and figures about asexuality.  - Other people have explained this much clearer than I ever will, so I’m gonna post some links in the description for you to check.  - What I do want to discuss is how just sharing that type of information isn’t enough.  - You can know the theory and still not realize you’re asexual. (And thus, struggle with your identity) - “Asexuality means you don’t experience sexual attraction” - “…”  - How is that supposed to mean anything to people who don’t experience it in the first place? - We literally no frame of reference here - Something that can* happen becuse of this lack of reference, is assigning the wrong feeling to the concept of sexual attraction.  * and I do mean can, in no way does this happen to all of us. - To explain that, imagine you equate ‘smiling’ with ‘happines’. - But instead of wondering why, unlike others, you aren’t happen when you smile… - … You assume that the other emotion you feel when smiling is happiness. -The same thing can happen for sexual attraction. And once you have that mindset, ‘people who don’t experience sexual attraction’ will no longer resonate. - Because you think you do, even though you don’t. (and the world isn’t gonna disagree) - Personally I mistook ‘thinking someone is pretty’ for ‘sexual attraction’ for a long, long time. - And although that can be part of it, it’s not the full range of that feeling. - It’s really easy to  be wrong in a situation where you only have dry info and no stories about people. - So, please. - If you participate in raising awareness for Asexuality, - Don’t stop at sharing definitions and orientations. - Share people’s experiences too.]

Reading about Asexuality didn’t make me identify as such, because it didn’t make me aware of a mistake in my thought pattern. Watching The Big Bang Theory connected the dots for me. I have to live with the fact that over ten years of soul searching was resolved by watching The Big Bang Theory, and I don’t necessarily wish that fate upon others. OTL 

So share people’s experiences! Share media featuring asexual characters! Share anything that makes us as human and diverse as we are. I mean, share the facts too, but don’t just leave it at that. We have faces, we have lives and we have stories. And often, they’ll overlap with yours. 

And when I say we need to share people’s experiences, I don’t just mean the ones of Very Specific People, share diverse experiences. Share the experiences of asexual POC, of asexuals with a disability, of asexuals of any gender, and of asexuals of any romantic orientations.

…Also I feel like I’m a little clumsy in my explanation but again, this is why I said I wouldn’t make a regular infographic, ahah.

Links to a few resources as promised!