To celebrate and learn more, please download Black Ace Culture: A Digital Zine by blackaceculture and donate to the contributors if you can!

The asexual experience for white people is not the same for racially and ethnically marginalized people. Black aces and other asexuals of color must fight against stereotypes like the Jezebel, the Mammy, the China doll or the Geisha Girl, or the desexualized Asian male trope that have historically stripped our personhood of any nuance. Therefore, the insecurities we harbor that prevent many from even identifying within the community are valid.

Yes, diversifying spaces online and IRL can be hard. As the ace community continues to grow, BIPOC aces speaking on our experiences should be listened to and affirmed by white aces and all allosexual people alike. White aces with platforms in the community and beyond should especially “take the initiative to actively address anti-Blackness, they need to credit the Black aces they learn from, and they need to acknowledge the fact of that their whiteness helps to propel their careers,” Sherronda explains in the same interview. As even within the ace community, Black and POC asexuals often endure the harm of white supremacy and/or racial antagonism with little to no defense or solidarity from white asexuals.

BIPOC aces should know that we have long deserved better than the colonization of our sexuality. Societal myths, racial stereotypes, and tropes shouldn’t dictate our perception of ourselves. Luckily, in our broad understanding of (a)sexuality, we have many of the tools, knowledge, and resources to begin shifting narratives of sexuality that can ultimately benefit all people of color, whether they’re self-identified as asexual or not.

I’m just gonna focus on Black ace symbols for this post, but if any black ace wants to add any ideas in the notes feel free to.

I like the idea of a Black ace version of indigo fingers and Elukami for Gullah Geechee and Soulaani aces. I also like the idea of sweet potato variants being used as a symbol since a lot of Black cultures use them.

Another Black ace symbol I thought of is a hibiscus flower since hibiscus is a plant that has importance throughout the African diaspora. For example, using this guide:

Purple hibiscus: General symbol for Black aces no matter the romantic orientation or asexual identity(there’s even a variety called Mr. Ace)

Yellow hibiscus: Aromantic Black Aces

Red hibiscus: Sex favorable and romance favorable Black aces

Pink hibiscus: Platonic Black Aces

Orange hibiscus: Aspec Black Aces

Blue hibiscus: Sex unfavorable and romance unfavorable Black aces

White hibiscus: Alloromantic Black Aces

Peach hibiscus: Sex neutral and romance neutral Black aces

Multicolored hibiscus: A mix of the descriptions I did a above. For example, I’m asexual demiromantic so I’d be a purple yellow hibiscus/Night runner hibiscus

Ace Dad Advice has interviewed Marshall, Lici, and myself for this upcoming Soul Ace Day 2026!

Check out what we said about Black representation in both real life, cartoons and comics for Black American Asexuals! Get a history lesson on the hypersexualization of Black Americans through chattel slavery, a look into Licis recommendations about new and flourishin Black Ace books and characters, and what Marshall thinks has changed since he started his work in Ace activism!

Get your SoulAce Day artwork ready, celebrate your fav Black Ace Characters, Comics, and celebrate your friends and YOURSELF! 🎉

Hope to see you all on SoulAce Day this FEBRUARY 16, 2026!

See you there!

(And if you have any suggestions of things you want to see or do let us know!)

Sharing an article from my creative passion project Spinster Speaks (a FREE, digital magazine accessible HERE). Next issue will drop during late April- sign up HERE to be added to my mailing list if you’re interested and haven’t already :) 💜 IG @diaryofablackspinster

ASEXUALITY: THE HIDDEN QUEER IDENTITY

Asexuality is a distinctive and meaningful queer identity that challenges dominant cultural assumptions about sex, desire, and queerness. In ‘Refusing Compulsory Sexuality: A Black Asexual Lens on Our Sex-Obsessed Culture’ by Sherronda J. Brown (see page 21 for commentary), Brown argues that sexual desire, like heterosexuality, has been positioned as a default state of being, where sex is assumed to be a core component of any and all romantic or domestic relationships. Similarly, it challenges the ideas of what it means to be queer, as asexuality exists beyond the scope of heteronormative expectations and sexual norms often perpetuated within queer spaces as well.

BLACK, ACE, & CURIOUS

When I think about my own experiences with asexuality, a lot of words pop up. There’s a newness to it as it becomes something I grow more comfortable casually sharing with other people, but there is also a deep sense of familiarity because even before I knew what asexuality was, I knew that I felt differently about sex and relationships than my peers. I can see why some people “come out” to their peers, but I personally felt like it was/is not necessary because the only thing that has changed about me is the language I now have to describe this detail about myself that has always been present, even when I didn’t know the scope of it. So if you’re a close peer wondering why you didn’t get an “Im gay-adjacent speech”, it’s because I didn’t feel like its necessary since nothing about me has changed besides a self-described label.

The idea of asexuality has fleetingly crossed my mind for many years, but it wasn’t until this past summer that I did some soul searching and realized it was a key piece of who I am. See, a year prior I was attempting to read what has become one of my all-time favourite books, the aforementioned Refusing Compulsory Sexuality, but it wasn’t the right time for me to read it. The theory felt heavy and I was struggling to connect with it, because I think part of me didn’t want to ‘other’ myself if I related too much with it. I felt strange enough already and hadn’t yet realized that I process theory-heavy books better when I can listen to them in a way that feels more conversational (audiobooks).

Cut to the Summer of 2025 and I’m REALLY thinking about the facets of my personhood. Who am I really? What are the orientations or characteristics that define me truly, and what are imposed defaults that I have just not taken the time to question. I listened to the audiobook and flew through it in 2 days; the experience was like night and day when I was in a better headspace to potentially confront something I had been subconsciously avoiding. It felt like all the strange romantic experiences I that had chalked up to me simply being abnormal were validated.

Little moments like sitting in the car with a man and being dumbfounded when he huffed in irritation because I was more concerned with the raccoon by my front door than giving a goodbye kiss. Or being accused of not liking prospective partners because I never thought to initiate physical or sexual contact, and feeling like my company just wasn’t enough. It’s being confused when my girlfriends complain about crawling back to exes that mistreat them because 2 months without sex is worth the price of their disrespect, while I manage nearly 4 years of intentional celibacy with ease and no boy-drama to share. Little things that I assumed were the quirks of simply liking my own physical space, being anti-social, or preferring emotional intimacy to physical displays, were actually silent indicators that I have different orientation than those around me.

WHAT MAKES AN ASEXUAL QUEER?

Asexuality is more than just a physical lack of sex-drive, an affinity towards abstinence, or not having met the “right” person to make your coochie explode- this rhetoric is both surface level and dismissive. It’s easy to assume that asexuality is just being straight with prude-like views on sexuality and romance, but ace people are queer because their natural rejection of compulsive sexuality— the belief that sex is universal and required for fulfilment in life or relationships— puts them outside the typical heteronormative culture. Hence why the ‘A’ in 2SLGBTQIA is for ace, not ally.

Being ace is not a choice to be different in one’s approach to sex, romance, and relationships for the sake of having a quirky label, it’s being different by design. It’s queerness is being an automatic challenge to the dominate sexual standards that exist both beyond and within queer spaces; questioning why sexual or physical attraction is treated as a universally high value component to one’s personhood. And notably, it intersects with both racism and misogyny which further defines its unique position as a queer identity. It’s a defiant contrast to the hypersexualization of Black bodies and Black women especially.