If nature prohibits sexual desire, how would an egg meet sperm? Naturally speaking, the genes of an asexual wouldn’t be passed to another generation. There wouldn’t be children from someone who doesn’t need or want sex.
(Asexuality is the ‘A’ found at the end of LGBTQIA acronym. It’s the letter that frequently gets left out. It’s the sexuality without sex.)
But there are times when egg and sperm will meet without mutual sexual desire to encourage them. These are:
- Forced sex: Children are a by-product of the evil act known as rape.
- Religious Convention: Procreation occurs as a duty to a belief system, not sexual attraction.
- Social Convention: Tradition and social guilt are good procreation motivators.
- IVF and Surrogacy: Circumventing sexual attraction and the act of sex using modern medicine.
Without situations like these, asexuals would not naturally reproduce. Their genetic line would end.
There is no on-switch for an asexual. The only button they have is off.
For those of us who are just plain, simple, sexually active beings who seek sex, get turned on, muster passion, and find pleasure in our sexual experiences, this post might present as an unusual first-time topic. How can someone not want or enjoy sex? Is there such a thing as not having an on-button?
Surely not. It must come from having a bad experience or not finding a compatible lover. It can’t be that someone is born this way.
Surprise!
Asexuality is real!
While some asexuals are the result of past traumas, most are born without a natural sexual desire. They simply don’t want or need sex, not ever.
This is not celibacy. And it’s not like they aren’t fertile or can’t perform the act of sex or can’t reproduce. Many can (and do) reproduce. It’s about not wanting sex. They’re not interested. Period.
Fertility and attractiveness confuse potential suitors. An asexual can look the part with perfect teeth, a wistful, disarming smile, a great personality, and a body to suit. They exude fertility, but it deceives. Many fools have been made trying to woo the hearts of asexuals.
Foreplay and sweet talk have no effect. It’s as real as gay and lesbian sexuality types are to same-sex individuals. It’s possibly more frequent as it’s often misunderstood for something else or disguised by social traditions.
Imagine a child growing up asexual. The road to adulthood is complicated enough without finding out you’re not built for sex. For young asexuals, the path to discovery will most likely take a few failed relationships to work out what’s not right.
And then there are the asexuals who ignore the signs and must follow tradition at all costs. They marry because that’s what adults do and have always done. Their grandparents, parents and everyone else did it, so they must do it, too. They play the allosexual game for as long as they can.
That’s why many asexuals live in heterosexual relationships, bear children and raise families. Outside, they act for the eyes of others to see. Inside, they are closeted asexuals who got caught in a self-perpetuating lie.
In truth, relationship-affirming sex doesn’t make sense to them. They get nothing out of it. They don’t see what the fuss is about. They get more joy from reading a good book or solving a jigsaw puzzle!
How can you tell if you’re asexual?
The following advice comes from information broadcast by a self-proclaimed asexual. Jo Qualmann is in her twenties and aware of her sexuality. She says many things about her asexuality and experiences, but there was one point that really stuck out to her. She recalls that 80’s movie with the robot trying to convince its maker that he’s alive. It comes down to being able to connect with jokes and their punchlines.
Humour is human unique. A good punchline taps into our emotions, thoughts, desires and experiences. According to Jo, jokes of a sexual nature aren’t understood by asexuals. That special connection to the joke doesn’t exist. While her friends were laughing at sexual humour, she was left scratching her head.
That makes sense. My ex-wife doesn’t laugh at adult jokes, either. She doesn’t get them. She doesn’t hate them. There’s just no funny to be found. Her eyes glaze over. She smiles because she’s polite, but there’s no laughter.
What to do if caught in a relationship with a partner who is asexual?
Scream help!
I’m not going to dance around my answer: Life will turn to SHIT if you both don’t speak the truth. One of you is going to have to admit to being an asexual, and the other will have to listen and support that finding. Both of you must seek ways to cope with the outcome of such a revelation—and it IS a revelation for two people.
If the relationship is new, breaking up may be easier than continuing. If it is long-standing and has deep roots, sacrifices will need to be made to keep it alive—on both sides.
One solution is to open the relationship. It’s time to be responsible and fair to each other. Love can last through open, ethical relationships. They don’t follow religious and traditional conventions, but sharing a marriage with an asexual isn’t conventional either. Many couples find harmony this way and even stay in love.
As far as asexuals choosing to bear children, if someone’s mind isn’t built for sex, then impulses won’t reach their body. They weren’t meant to have children. It’s nature’s way of terminating a cycle.
Nature knows best!
-Michael Forman (Author of SEETHINGS)
Discover more from Michael Forman – Author of Dark Fiction & Drama
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You do realize many asexuals can, and do, enjoy sex, right?
Asexuals who enjoy sex? Hmmmm. No, never heard of it. But before I state the blatantly obvious, perhaps you should reveal your definition of asexual. I wouldn’t want this confusion hanging over my head. -M
My definition of what an asexual is is…. the correct definition. An asexual is a person who doesn’t experience sexual attraction. That’s all. Sexual attraction and sexual desire are two different things.
No definition provided? Okay. Yes. Sure. They are?
Nope. You can have sex with someone you’re not attracted to. I’m pretty sure a lot of joke punchlines center around that concept.
I don’t disagree. That’s not asexual. That’s surprise. I didn’t think I liked olives and then I ate one. I enjoyed it and then had another.
You’re sexual.
It is according to the definition of asexual, so… shrug
So? That explains nothing.
If you participate in sex, you’re sexual. So you don’t initiate. Big deal. You’ll go along if someone else does.
Make excuses if you like but you’re sexual.
So, angel, food for thought: if a self – identified straight woman has sex with another woman, does that automatically make her gay or bi?
She needs to review her use of the word straight. If deception, drugs or trickery wasn’t used to get her to have sex with another woman then she could be bi-curious or gay.
She’s having sex. That means she’s sexual.
I don’t know who is in “charge” of creating the definitive definition of asexual, but here is the AVEN definition.
Asexual: Someone who does not experience sexual attraction or an intrinsic desire to have sexual relationships (or the adjective describing a person as such).
https://www.asexuality.org/?q=general.html
While sexual attraction and sexual desire are definitely different (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E9VG82JA1NQ&list=PLcuLk8ccfldofT2R2toJvf7fpMC02pHo5&index=87&t=203s), the AVEN definition makes room for both to be counted under asexuality.
However, if someone doesn’t experience sexual attraction but experiences sexual desire, that also isn’t excluded from asexual under the AVEN definition. (They said OR, not AND)
Some people these days identify as cupiosexual and aegosexual, which are people who do experience sexual attraction but they still want or enjoy sexual relationships.
https://lgbta.wikia.org/wiki/Cupiosexual
https://lgbta.wikia.org/wiki/Aegosexual
hmm… I see what you mean here. Well, there could be a connection between asexuals and philosophical minds. Most thinkers are antisocial so to say and this means they meet ill or nil luck with the opposite sex. With time, these minds grow to become asexual. Not by birth, but by social predisposition. Society is majority, and it’s somewhat difficult to blame society when you’re minority. But truth is some traditions and norms have been passed down by our forefathers that have had a hard time fading out. There are fantasies about sex, relationships, marriage, procreation, that might not go down for everyone. An asexual might have his/her way of wooing the opposite sex and enjoying sex, but this way might appear strange to the social sexual. It’s all social misconceptions, I guess. Sometimes, someone loves sex, but because of difficulties in relation to people around, they are left starving even for life.
Hi victorenesi, thanks for adding your comment.
I get what you say. You think much. The more you think, the more people are unappealing to you. Animals probably make better sense to you. (They have sex too)
Having sex because it’s been practiced for a long time is a very interesting angle on this topic. ‘Because that’s what people do and have always done’ is new one to me.
‘Sex for tradition’ is okay but I it’s not enough to make one generation become the next. -M
I haven’t been this offended by a blog post in a long time.
First of all, there has never been a study suggesting asexuality is genetic. Many asexuals have had children and the vast majority of their children don’t seem to be ace from my own anecdotal observations. I attend in person asexual meetups frequently and so the Asexual people who have had children I’ve met are generally men and women who never had heard of Asexuality so they assumed they were just straight people for a while and often got married and had children prior to figuring out themselves.
And by the way, asexuality is also not a curse where if your child turned out to be asexual that would be the end of the world.
Many asexuals find sexual humor funny, btw, but other Asexuals are made uncomfortable by it. It’s much like a gay man perhaps not being able to find a bunch a straight men joking about sex with women super relatable, and especially if he’s not out to them as gay or even perhaps in denial himself, he might not enjoy the jokes in the same way.
Another side note: Talking about “diagnosing” someone as asexual really pathologizes a sexual orientation in an unnecessary offensive way.
Asexual people are just as capable of being parents as anyone, and your bigotry seems to be based on the idea that asexual people are inferior in every way or something. There really should be no connection between finding people hot/sexy/sexually attractive and raising children successfully. Same with if you define Asexuality as not ever desiring sex. And if your concern is more about how the children will genetically turn out if produced from the egg and work sperm of an asexual person and a non ace, or possibly from two aces in a relationship with one another… even if given up for adoption and raised by other people, that seems equally unfounded.
*from the egg and sperm of
Well said
Hi. thanks for writing.
I never said asexuals were inferior.
What I did write came from the angle of a partner who finds themself in a relationship with an asexual – a closeted one. It’s a real perspective.
You identify as an asexual but have had children. If it wasn’t done via non-consensual sex or helped via medicine, in my book, that’s a sexual act.
-M
What in the world is this response? You wrote an entire blog post called “Should Asexuals Have Children?” and then reply: “The part of my post you appear to be offended most is not about [the idea of aces “lying” to their heterosexual partners] but the bit about asexuals having children.” – this wasn’t just a “BIT” of the post. This was THE post.
As an asexual person myself who intends to become a part one day, and who knows many asexual people, this blog post spewed extreme views from the very first sentence.
Claiming you’re not homophobic or anti-ace as you write: ” If nature made you anything but heterosexual (male + female) then children won’t exist. That’s not inferiority, it’s a fact of life. You may not like the sound of it but I can’t change your perception of nature. ” is ridiculous. First of all, bisexual or pansexual people can fit your mold anyway. So can sex-favorable aces who are bi/pan/hetero.
But the truth of the matter is, as long as a high enough percentage of the human population is putting egg and sperm together, children will keep existing. And when we have various means of creating children besides through cis men and cis women first experiencing sexual attraction and then having fully desired sex, as well as various ways to become parents including by the way, adopting them, to claim ace people should not be parents because “NATURE” is not only rude, it’s also just inaccurate.
You say: “I know we have science and medicine to bridge the gap – but that’s still not nature. The ramifications of bringing two worlds together that wouldn’t ordinarily be together are yet to be discovered and fully understood.
“So your offence seems to be nearer to the ethics of artificially assisted pregnancies and whether it’s right or wrong to bring a sperm and an egg together via a non-natural way – but that’s another debate for a different post. ”
But no, that is not “a debate for another post”. That is pretty much the whole heart of this post and part of why I’m so offended. You’re telling all infertile couples, same-sex couples, and even ace cis-man/cis-woman couples that they shouldn’t be ALLOWED to have children because “it’s not natural”.
I highly recommend you read this: http://www.patheos.com/blogs/unfundamentalistchristians/2014/04/top-7-claims-for-same-sex-relationships-being-unnatural/
And while obviously you already agree with parts of it, maybe it will make you rethink parts of your “natural” argument.
As an asexual person myself who intends to become a “parent” one day — Sorry for the typo.
Hi and thanks for dropping by your view / opinion,
I’m not a God person. I’m a realist.
Your message comes with a hostile tone. Mine is neutral. I see nature doing its job. You see an attack.
-A
So you believe in vaccines? Antibiotics? Surgery in any case even to save lives? Modern medicine challenges nature. Yes. That’s a good point. Do you believe hip/knee replacements or headache pain reliever medicine is really morally wrong because it’s not life-saving and it’s challenging nature?
Of course.
Of course to which part, that you believe in the use of vaccines as a positive thing? Or of course, it is morally wrong that I had my foot joints fused together 4.5 years ago and a metal plate inserted to lose 15 degrees of motion but save me tons of pain from when my broken foot over a decade ago didn’t heal right and left me with osteoarthritis?
You do realise you can have children without them being your biological children, right? Fostering and adopting are both things that happen, or you may enter a relationship with someone who has children from a previous relationship. Any of these would make you a parent.
Thank you BGF for that additional comment because YEAH that’s how I intend to become a parent with my ace queerplatonic partner someday, fostering and possibly later adoption children. And I will be a parent. I will have children.
Hi. Thanks for writing…
Yes, of course. It goes without saying.
Adopting or acquiring children via a previous relationship is something else… another discussion.
-A
*Do you, I meant to ask. (sorry.)
Personally I don’t think my body wants or doesn’t want children.
Someone’s libido is really not relevant to whether or not they are allosexual or asexual. Saying “perhaps I’m really someone who isn’t ace, I just can’t get laid/keep a sexual relationship alive” is a new one, I’ve never been accused of such a thing in my life. Wow.
No I’m 100% sure I’m asexual, very much not attracted to people in that way, am kind of even kissing repulsed, don’t even really get the idea of aesthetic attraction or romantic attraction and feel like I’m not really attracted to anyone at all, probably, although I have friendships of course and can enjoy who people are/etc. I’m actually a nonlibidoist ace who can’t even masturbate and who wants to foster and later adopt rather than have biological children. But that truth is irrelevant to the arguments here and for you to say same sex couples, infertile couples, and even a couple with one asexual partner should never choose to have children because it’s against nature, I mean… Wow. I believe you really holds this view but it is pretty surprising and makes no sense. What do you think about condoms and/or hormonal birth control? That’s against nature too you know. Do you only use what, the rhythm method to avoid creating a pregnancy every time you have sex? Or do you try to make a pregnancy every time, like the Quiverfull movement? Which is more what nature wants anyway?
As onlyfragments above was beginning to try to explain but to which you don’t seem receptive, for years and years asexual identified people have been trying to figure out what should or shouldn’t count as ace and we’ve been settled for years that never feeling attracted to other people and feeling a disconnect from other sexual orientations is enough. The majority of asexuals masturbate but that does not negate their asexuality. Most of those aces, even if they never want sex, consider that masturbation drive/ability/etc a libido. Then there are plenty of aces who have sex, some who consider themselves still to feel enough commonality with asexual experiences to consider themselves 100% ace in terms of attraction and yet who enjoy satisfying their libido with a partner, others who are having sex they don’t actually want to have, and others who consider themselves somewhere on the gray-asexual spectrum. They all count as ace. While yes the majority of aces are sex-averse or sex-repulsed, not sexually active, and not interested in sex, that doesn’t mean they all are. And most Asexuals define whether or not they have any kind of libido on masturbation rather than sex, so most aces do have a libido. I’m a rarer exception.
Wow, thank you SO much for deciding that aces shouldn’t have children. (that was sarcasm, btw- this post is awful.) I so very very much appreciate appreciate you telling us that we’re broken, reminding us that the world doesn’t want us to reproduce, and violently misunderstanding what asexuality truly is. (that was sarcasm too btw) You seem to be thinking of aces as a monolithic group, but there is a lot of diversity within the ace umbrella; it’s a spectrum, not a binary identity. But based on the language you use throughout this post it’s pretty clear that you have a rudimentary understanding of sex, sexuality and gender- one heavily couched in binary, either-or distinctions. I hope you’ll read up more about asexuality and stop perpetuating these acephobic ideas (that you can’t be ace if you’ve ever had sex, that aces shouldn’t have children, that they’re somehow hurting their partners if they don’t or aren’t able to come out before the relationship begins).
Hi PAPERSLIGHTERTEXT,
Ouch! That hurt!
If you weren’t built for sex, why do it?
-A
I think the premise is irrelevant i.e. should asexuals have children? They already are and will continue to do so – whether they were aware of their sexuality, or not – like my wife.
However, I think it’s important to consider the social context of the act of having children, its purpose, and it’s specific chances of being successful in that context. For example, marital fights about sex between allos and aces may not be the best situation for raising happy, well-adjusted children. So maybe the premise should be, “Should allo/ace partners have children?” Now there’s an argument (maybe that was implied).
As far as nature goes, we can’t pretend to know the purpose of asexuality in nature any more than we can pretend to know the mind of god (if you believe in such a thing). Too many variables. It’s just an observable fact: asexuals are as natural as anybody else because they exist in nature.
To question if asexuals SHOULD have children, you might believe that the only purpose of having children is sex, and that the act of sex is only for those who experience sexual attraction. There are other reasons people have children: life-chances due to scarce resources, economic advantage, continuing bloodlines, cultural expectations (as you mentioned), rape without the recourse of abortion, and even psychological reasons (e.g. people looking to create little extensions of themselves), etc…
Thanks for the compelling, if contentious post. 😊
P.S. I find the personal attacks you’ve suffered in the comments unnecessary and only detract from the discussion. Also, i’m likewise frustrated with the myriad definitions of asexuality that pop up, some of which render the term confusing and functionally meaningless when you consider the Latin prefix of “a-“, meaning “off of, away from”.
Thanks for participating in the discussion.
It’s an old word applied to a human context recently. We are still learning what it means to us. The definition of which continues to be refined as each year passes.
Yes, allos and aces were implied. As the piece unfolds, we come to find a sexually mismatched couple near its end. But most readers only see the title, get furious and then launch into a tirade. The consequence of mismatched coupling is lost in favour of a soapbox lecture. The story is as much about a partner of an asexual as refers to baby making (a minimum of two people to make one).
Children is an issue you raised in your reply, and this goes in a brilliant direction. What are the ramifications of bringing up children who are the product of a sexually mismatched coupling? Is there a long-term struggle to be found here? If so, what is it? Should the coupling be avoided if the mismatch is identified early? 😉 -M