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Firstly, the OP of the tweet just happened to cut off the name of the subreddit this was posted to. Turns out it was posted to r/Asexual. You know. The subreddit dedicated to talking about asexuality and related things. It makes sense that the original poster and a mod of that very subreddit would emphasize the inclusion of asexuality in Niger’s article 25.

Here’s a link to the actual Reddit post btw

Secondly, while all persecution of queer identities is evil and unjust, it is significant to point out asexuality being included. Most of the time laws don’t go into specifying more than gay or trans identities when it comes to trying to bar rights to individuals. This article has go so far to break down and specify the meaning of every single letter in LGBTQIA and call them all an “act against nature” to justify punishing anyone under the banner. It makes sense to, again, emphasize that asexuality was also included when this was posted in the r/Asexual subreddit.

And thirdly, and this is kinda the most important part imo, this means ANYONE CAN BE ACCUSED AND PERSECUTED UNDER THIS CHARTER. People in the subreddit and even the OP of the tweet are asking “how can you even prove that?” And that’s the thing. You can’t. So it makes it that much easier to just accuse someone of asexuality in order to force them into a heterosexual relationship or punish them.

Think about it. What’s stopping a bitter ex or an abusive spouse from accusing their partner of “denying sex due to their asexual tendencies” in order to punish them? Maybe someone is career driven or just not interested in a relationship at the time. What’s stopping a business rival, a jilted flirt, or an obsessed stalker from leaving an anonymous tip that the object of their ire is an asexual deviant? Absolutely nothing.

Taking this post and dismissing it as “no one cares you don’t want to fuck” is completely missing the point on why this is exceptionally dangerous. And acting like a mod of the r/Asexual subreddit is being silly for putting emphasis on the dangers to their community is rude at best.

The fact that everyone with a queer identity now can face prison time and ridiculous fines is terrifying and it breaks my heart to know more and more countries are baking these laws into their charters and constitutions. But we should be bringing these things into the light and condemning the people pushing for this kind of cruelty, not throwing stones at each other for pointing out a specific part of the article that affects us personally.

“I’m not into Indian girls, but you look [other ethnicity]” you’re into Indian girls.

“Omg I love Indian food” and it’s just butter chicken or chicken tikka masala.

“Chandelier earrings” you mean my jhumkas?

“I love avatar/atla” you don’t know what the concept of an avatar even is.

“Your slums are dirty” tell that to the unusually low Covid rates in those slums.

“Indians don’t experience colourism” that is certainly an echo chamber chronically online take.

Exams during our festival season while every other religion gets their days off. Told to speak English when many of us in the diaspora already do (thanks colonialism!). Made to take English exams or considered international students on the basis of our names. Overlooked in job applications. Blamed for climate change. Blamed for lack of jobs. Blamed for crashing economy. Blamed for terrorism (more issues there). Random TSA checks. Random hate crimes. Stolen culture. Stolen property.

Uncredited for simple things everyone does nowadays. Coconut oil, miswak, mehndi, indigo, the number 0, banking cheques, chess, yoga, chakras, third eye, evil eye, turmeric, clean girl aesthetic, lost wax casting, bindis, kohl, dupattas, bangles, courtyards in houses, paisley, the very concept of rebirth and reincarnation. I could go on.

The racism towards Indians is so entrenched in every single western culture that nobody bothers to look twice when India suffers a heat wave. You all love Greece and Rome but did you know they directly benefitted from trade with the Indian subcontinent? Did you know Indians were taken as indentured labourers too? Did you know we were slaves too? And I’m speaking for South Asia as a whole here, did you know many of us are still slaves?

Here are some basic primers. If someone is wearing what look like Meta glasses, they usually have a small circular camera in the outer corners of the lenses, like the one on your phone.

I would also regularly check their own product pages so you're on top of what the models look like. They tend to have larger frames, but come in a variety of shapes and colors.

A new hobbyist developed app warns if people nearby may be wearing smart glasses, such as Meta’s Ray-Ban glasses, which stalkers and harassers have repeatedly used to film people without their knowledge or consent. The app scans for smart glasses’ distinctive Bluetooth signatures and sends a push alert if it detects a potential pair of glasses in the local area.

The American Foundation for the Blind has said that "The Ray-Ban Meta glasses are an accessibility tool only by coincidence. That makes them more affordable and, in many ways, unaware of the needs of users with reduced vision" although they do have seemingly positive views on Meta Glasses as a whole. (source 10). It also seems like their marketing push as accessibility devices began last year (source 11).

But to add even more into the nonsense, Meta is now toying around with adding a "limit" to the functionality of their glasses unless their users pay for more access (source 12). AND, as stated above, Meta has officially added facial recognition code in their glasses and only admitted it after being called out, which is basically the death of privacy as we know it (source 13, source 14, source 15). And oh look another lawsuit because of it (source 16) THAT THEY LOST (source 17)!

Long story short: I don't begrudge someone using them as a disability aid overall, but ultimately both their privacy and other people's privacy are being disregarded by Meta and that is not and should not be acceptable by any means.

I understand there is no ethical consumption under capitalism but there is a level of personal responsibility someone has to take when using them if they truly truly need them, such as opting out of sharing information, not filming strangers without permission, not posting footage of strangers online, opting out of facial recognition if possible, etc.