gay as hell

isadora. she/her. cis het aces are not lgbt. terfs fuck off.

[soft-butch-cassidy]

Just FYI there’s been info about asexually being a thing in LGBT+ magazines since the 80s, so I don’t understand the sudden disgust towards ace people? Are ya’ll personally offended by the fact that they don’t experience “typical” attraction??? Sure I’m a little annoyed because for Gods sake does it matter; but what gives? :/

without getting into any #discourse bc im really tired right now, no one’s saying ace people arent real or are invalid or whatever. this has been dumb discourse for years, its not sudden. its mostly bc gay people are tired of cisgender, heteroromantic asexual people (who are straight) coming into gay and trans spaces. their lack of sexual attraction doesn’t make them not straight, and doesn’t make them not our oppressors, and doesn’t make us feel any more safe around them than around any other cis straight person. any time someone who is lgb makes a post pertaining to same-gender attraction, asexual people hijack it. lgb asexual people have expressed discomfort with cishet aces in lgb spaces and talking for them. lgb asexual people experience homophobia just as much as non asexual lgb people. 

tl;dr: lgbt people (ace or not) feel unsafe with cishet people (ace or not) in spaces designed for lgbt people. it isnt so much about asexuality so much as it is about cis straight people (yes, including cis straight aces)

addendum: the discussion people want to have is: does being asexual make someone lgbt? no, it doesnt. being asexual doesn’t make someone lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender. duh. L G B T. experiencing no sexual attraction doesn’t have anything to do with same-gender attraction or gender identity. in my opinion, asexuality and aromanticism are like… neighbors to the lgbt community. trans, nb, and lgb aces/aros exist, but i dont think asexuality means someone belongs in lgbt spaces because of the oppression same-gender attracted people face from straight (even straight ace) people. it’s not a ~fun club~ it’s a community built from a group of people targeted, murdered, raped, imprisoned, and hated for nothing more than who we love or for being a gender we were not assigned by a faulty western binary. asexuals didn’t want any part in pride (i’ve seen them saying gays deserve HIV/AIDS for being sexual) until we made it a party, just like straights. 

[exclusionistxculture-blog]

Exclusionist Culture Is claiming that only gay people have ever been called queer as a slur.

-

[baudelairre]

hot tip, misdirected slurs don't count! queer is a slur against gay bi trans and nb people! if someone calls you queer and you ain't one of those things, it's not a tool of oppression against you! if a cis straight woman with short hair gets called a dyke, it doesn't mean she's suffering from lesbophobia! apply the same logic, geniuses.

[star-fall-system]

if you think the definition demisexual (ie. Needing to like someone romantically before feeling sexual attraction to them) is what everyone feels and that all non-ace people could fit the qualifications to be demi and that’s why it’s a useless term or whatever, you’re demisexual. Because I’m not and many others aren’t. Im attracted to people I’ve never met or spoken to; I could easily meet someone and be attracted to them straight away; I could easily be sexually attracted to someone without romantic attraction; I’m not demisexual. You are, though.

[baudelairre]

okay but if so many people are demisexual and don’t even know it...why is it a meaningful distinction and label that people need to have?? you guys know that there doesn’t have to be one ‘normal’, right? when we say that ‘demisexuality’ is normal we’re not saying it’s the only thing that’s normal. we’re saying that it’s one of many normal experiences that a significant number of people experience without it affecting their lives the same way being gay bi or trans is. just like you’re completely normal for not needing a connection, so are people who do. that’s the point. there doesn’t need to be a labelled ‘it means i’m special!!!’ distinction. how about people should just respect that everyone has a different experience with attraction and sex and relationships without thinking there’s oppression involved. some aspects of society shame sex, and others shame people who take it slower. but there’s no systematic oppression throughout all forms of society that shame people for only one or only the other - like there is for gay bi or trans people. the very fact that some people will be disrespectful to “”””demi”””” people and others will be to “”””””allo””””” (that word is the shittest) people MEANS that maybe people are just assholes and there is misogyny and racism and ableism at work, but in different ways and it doesn’t exist on its own as a label.

look, if someone wants a label like demi, have it. whatever. but it doesn’t mean that they’re oppressed or that they’re not ‘normal’ (and that’s a harmful thing to advertise anyway). If your relationship to sex and attraction isn’t causing you harm beyond the usual parameters of human difference, i promise, you’re fine. 

[tenderlesbian-deactivated201807]

I've seen your posts going around and I should have known you were an exclusionist based on your lesbian url. You're just another sex crazed lesbian who can't take the thought of someone being normal and not wanting to fuck everything

this is quite literally the funniest ask i’ve ever gotten

[exclusionistxculture-blog]

Exclusionist Culture Is...

claiming “corrective rape” is a term that only applies to lesbians and that ace rape is a product of misogyny, despite the fact that gay men face corrective rape, as do ace men by women, and ace women by other women. Our rape happens IN RESPONSE to outing ourselves to people has ace who believe sex can “fix” it. WHAT ELSE are aces supposed to call it?

[colorisbyshe]

Do you… not realize how much “rape” is done to “fix” or punish the victim? And how many excuses rapists will use to blame the victim?

If a rapist is raping you because you are not attracted to them or are saying no to them, that’s not corrective rape. That’s just… rape. And the “just” there is very misleading because rape in and of itself is fucking awful.

But you don’t seem to understand what corrective rape actually is.

Corrective rape is not JUST someone being raped to be “corrected.” It is not one person meeting another person and being offended that the person they want is not exactly what they desire. Corrective rape was made to describe an epidemic in South African where gay and trans people, primarily lesbians, are targeted on the streets and by their families. It’s not an accidental meeting.

It is families inviting rapists into their house to “fix” their daughters because they’re tomboys and they’re afraid they’ll grow up to be lesbians. It’s two women holding hands walking down the street or being visibly gay and being raped so they don’t feel safe doing that anymore.

The term “Correcitve rape” was coined after the MURDER of Eudy Simelane where a woman was abducted, gang raped, and then stabbed dozens of times because she was one of the only women to live openly as a lesbian in her community. Four people got together to plan this out and make sure she suffered.

Corrective rape is where LGBT people, primarily LESBIANS (not only lesbians though and tbh that rhetoric has only popped up recently), are SOUGHT OUT and TARGETED.

Cis straight aces, cis straight aros, and cis aroace people are not targeted, taken by their homes, hunted down by hate groups, or forcibly married to fix their asexuality or aromanticism.

There is no communal or societal effort to “fix” either thing. People, especially women, being raped for not wanting sex or for not being attracted to their rapists, is a product of misogyny, toxic masculinity, and rape culture. There is no separate force between a non-ace woman being raped for saying no and a ace woman being raped for saying no.

Lesbians are being raped so they’re not longer attracted to women. Trans people are raped so they conform to their genders. That’s clearly lesbophobia and transphobia, respectively.

Aphobia as a motivator cannot be clearly separated from misogyny, toxic masculinity, and rape culture (and we should all realize these terms are redundant but it’s worth parsing them out).

Women are raped for being too prudish, too promiscuous, dressed the wrong way, for being too flirty, for being too womanly. These are all things to “fix” them. To correct them. That’s not corrective rape.

Corrective rape has a very specific context. And that context is within a larger system of homophobia, transphobia, and lesbophobia.

The rape of ace women is not meaningfully different from the rape of non-ace women. The rape of ace men is not meaningfully different from the rape of non-ace men. The motivations are… the same. Women are raped for not serving men. Men are raped for not being masculine enough and craving sex.

The rape of lesbians and bi women is meaningfully different from the rape of straight women. The rape of trans folk is meaningfully different from the rape of cis folk. Lesbians and bi women are being raped to punish them for their same gender attraction. Trans folk are raped to punish them for “choosing” the wrong gender and to be put in their place.

Corrective rape is about visible identity being hated and people wanting to destroy it, to literally erase every person under that label from existence. Visibly gay folk and non-passing trans folk are the targets of corrective rape. “Visible” asexuality is not a thing. Aces are not targeted on the streets. There are no hate groups plotting your demise.

I really recommend you read up on corrective rape within the context of South African lesbians. It’s literally entire community’s getting together to abuse, torture, and even murder gay folk (especially gay women) and then corrupt police forces going, “Nothing is happening here, it’s all okay.”

Like, educate yourself. And then think about how fucking RIDICULOUS it is that you’re trying to claim cis straight people (some of whom are “sex positive” and therefore are identical to all other cishets) are being raped to be turned… straight. Like… just think about that.

[allitalksfandom]

Hi there! I hope you won’t mind my coming onto your post too much, but in hopes that you’ll perhaps be receptive to listening, I’d thought I’d share some links with you. While it’s true that the term “corrective rape” originated among wlw in South Africa, its usage has expanded beyond that to include other individuals, one example (as you noted) being people who are trans. It turns out that members of the community in which it originated do not want to prevent aces from using it. (Content warning for rape, sexualt assault, and discussion of homophobia.) In addition, here’s a masterpost exploring prejudice against asexuals.

[colorisbyshe]

Socialjusticeichigo is a pedophile apologist and therefore not a source on rape. And a single blog is also not a source on who gets to use language and strip it of context, especially since that post only proves that corrective rape is about… perceived gayness. Geekandmisandry having spoken to South African lesbians who came to her on ANON is also… not a source.

Also, that masterpost has been readily debunked about a million times. Group x has been debunked. The Campus survey on rape rates groups asexual with questioning people and pansexuals KNOWING bisexuals and other mga people face the highest rates of sexual assault and is also bad because… many asexuals are in fact gay/bisexual, which would then factor into their sexual assault. Those are the only two “fact based” links in that entire masterpost that literally only has dozens of links so as to tire people out because they know no one will read them all. The pathologization stuff? Based on a lie even David Jay won’t back up.

Aces may face some discrimination–as I’m sure virgins do and lots of other people who have “non-normal” relationships to sex and relationships like polyamorous people, kinksters, furries. But they are not oppressed.

And they are not victims of hate crimes like corrective rape.

[thewordvalid]

arguing that aces can reclaim the word “queer” on the basis of being ace is so incredibly stupid no matter what your reasoning is… you either think that:

1. “people on the ace spectrum are queer because queer just means anyone who deviates from the norms of attraction/relationships”

which is intentionally reductionist and ahistorical, and resorts to straight people’s “peculiar/unnatural” definition of queer that is used to ostracise and demonise us. you’re denying the reality - that it’s a slur used on the basis of homophobia and transphobia - because it doesn’t suit your desperation to use trendy words.

or 2. “asexuals have been called queer before”

which is stupid as fuck because if a straight person knows you’re not gay and still calls you “queer”, they’re trying to insult you by calling you gay - because in their eyes, this is the worst insult imaginable. the motive is still homophobia. erasing this and using queer people’s oppression to say “a homophobe called me queer once so it’s my word now” is absolutely disgusting, and what’s even more stupid is that you think when a homophobe calls you a homophobic slur, the motive is your asexuality and not society’s disgust towards lgbt people.

[baudelairre]

Hey man, so like, I'm in charge of my school's GSA and I'm afraid that the topic of including cishet aces in the lgbtq+ community is gonna come up some time, and I'm worried that if someone accuses me of being an "exclusionist" (what does that even mean cishet people are cishet, of course I'm gonna exclude them, the fuck), I'll get essentially voted off the island or something, what the fuck do I do then??? You don't have to answer, I'm just wondering what your thoughts would be over this thanks

hey!

this is certainly a difficult one and i’m unsure if i’ll have a good answer for you. i went through my high school years closeted to all but close friends and we didn’t really have anything like a GSA.

However I guess my advice would be to not be outright about it? don’t like...bring it up but i would just like....keep the acronym at LGBT? if it’s a gsa i’m assuming you technically have to let allies join, and i would honestly just refer to anyone who is not sga or trans as allies? i don’t really know if that makes sense. Also make it Clear that the GSA is a place where gay bi and trans kids can be unapologetically themselves, ie appropriate PDA is Good and anyone who complains about it can leave because primarily a GSA should be about supporting lgbt kids and making a space for them, and anyone trying to change that is the reason there’s this discourse in the first place.

at the end of the day, cishets turning up to a gsa isn’t bad per se, it’s when people start wanting to make it about them. Support ace lgbt kids and hopefully if a discussion does come up, don’t get angry, just explain why you think LGBT should stay a place for people affected by homophobia and transphobia. if ace kids want to talk about their experience, encourage it, encourage support (especially if they’re also gay or bi or trans)  but make it clear that the reason the club exists is for sga or trans kids.

also i’m not exactly sure what a gsa does, but like....anything you advocate for will be for gender reasons yknow. like letting ppl take same gender dates to dances, or fighting for uniform changes or making sure trans kids can use the right bathroom. none of those are inherently ace issues either, which is another reason why those stories of gsas getting taken over by cis straights horrify me.

anyway i got off topic but tl;dr i would stay inclusive to a degree bc im guessing you have to be, but i would just be clear about the reasons the GSA exists and the behaviour you expect from anyone who joins. 

[meangirlnurse]

that’s one of the things about defining “sexual attraction” as “looking at someone and thinking that you want to fuck them”

i think lesbians in particular often have a difficult time even recognizing that what they’re experiencing is attraction?

i rarely look at a woman and think to myself “dang i want to fuck her.” it’s always more just a strong feeling, like a sense of being really drawn to her or being interested by her or enjoying her a lot, that just feels different than finding someone intriguing or cool in a platonic way. 

i’ve known i liked women since i was thirteen years old and i still have a hard time recognizing when i feel attracted to a woman! on more than one occasion i have misinterpreted those feelings as intense dislike or outright HATRED. sometimes i’ll walk by a woman and think to myself “i wonder why i found her so interesting to look at,” before remembering that i’m a big fucking lesbian 

it’s just a very internal and subjective personal experience that won’t be the same for everyone and attempting to concretely define it or dissect it into discrete parts is always going to be a fool’s errand 

[meangirlnurse]

every time one of y’all reads this post and somehow still manages to imply in the tags that i’m talking about purely non-sexual attraction, another part of me dies inside 

[allosecual-archive]

so i recently got an anon asking to explain the difference between platonic and romantic relationships and i think it warrants a longer and more accurate explaination than what i gave, mostly because these definitions, and these concepts of different types of “love” in general, are the basis on which we can look at both “queerplatonic” relationships and the split attraction model and realize they’re both full of shit.

a lot of people have a hard time differentiating between romantic and sexual love, and that’s for a very specific reason. these concepts of love as we know them are societal constructs. now i don’t mean this in a “love is fake, kindness is bullshit” kind of way, i mean that our entire system of life partner-based love is constructed around the concept of marriage, which originated for two purposes. one was to ensure that there was a patriarchal bloodline (therefore sex was necessary), and the second was to enforce patriarchy with women as secondary citizens (and that’s not even to mention the homophobic, transphobic, and racism elements of marriage as an institution). our traditional concepts of both rom-sexual relationships are based on the institution and constructs of marriage, from the courting system, which was very still and formal and is now modern day dating, to marriage and the idea that sex came after marriage, and that sex was required of a married couple (in order to carry on the bloodline and therefore the family). because the concepts of romance and sex are so closely intertwined within this system, not only is it hard to define modern day romance (because we are moving further and further away from the courting > marriage > sex > kids model) but it also makes it difficult for people to differentiate between the two. not only does the SAM, when used on those who don’t want it, sexualizes where it’s not supposed to, it also complicates things that for a lot of non-sex repulsed or sex-neutral people, are just naturally conjoined concepts.

and if our concepts of romantic and sexual love are rooted in social constructs, isn’t platonic as well? the answer is yes. you can see very clearly even by looking back on fairly recent history (namely the 1800s and early 1900s if i’m remembering correctly) that platonic relationships were once a lot closer to what some might consider romantic, with a lot more intimate language and physical contact. it was this closeness that allowed especially lesbians of the time to pursue relationships without quite as much backlash (and this is also a likely reason as to why such close relationships fell out of style). platonic relationships involving physical and emotional closeness were not uncommon then and do not remain uncommon now.

if the “types” of love as we know them are concepts, then why would it be so difficult to accept queerplatonic relationships? here’s why - redefining love for the modern world doesn’t need to involve another restricting definition that is already covered by other types of love. most queerplatonic relationships are either:

close friends that think that their closeness is somehow special. it is not. nowadays thanks to our digital world with things like facebook skewing our idea of what “friends” are, and our social groups growing ever larger and more shallow, people are forgetting that close platonic friends are a real thing that can happen - you can live with your friends, go on dates with them, cuddle, and spend ridiculous amounts of time with them, and they can be your best friend. there’s no need to redefine this - they’re your best friend. this phrase already in our vernacular dictates the exact same concept - “closest platonic person(s) in my life” that you’re trying to achieve.

or, people use the phrase because to them, romance indicates adherence to the aforementioned system above that is incredibly constricting and hetero-patriarchal in nature. it’s no wonder that women - especially wlw - like to go for the qpr label instead. it can be for many reasons - they don’t want to date, maybe, because it’s expensive, boring, and unnecessary. or perhaps it’s because romantic figures in their life (increasingly cishet and almost always forced, rushed, or unattainable when looking at media) do not indicate what they want out of a relationship, which is mainly emotional closeness and trust. what people fail to realize is that in modern relationships, this is what we’re going for. calling something that is romantic “queerplatonic” simply because traditional methods of romance don’t suit you isn’t the answer - the answer is to move away from the traditional romantic structures. one doesn’t need to date to be in a romantic relationship, and kids don’t have to be the end goal.

basically: because we are moving away as a society from the traditional concepts of romance, we are having trouble understanding the relationships we have. the solution is not to rename these relationships, but instead to realize that the conventions we were raised on do not fit us and need to be expanded for the modern world.

[homoethotic]

(1/2) So basically, I made a post saying that parents telling their daughters that they’ll have to have sex one day as part of their “wifely duties” isn’t ace oppression, but rather misogyny. Someone responded and asked if it was still misogyny if the child was a boy. Tbh I wasn’t exactly sure so I said that it still wasn’t oppression (I’m shit at debating so it’s partially my fault that it went so crazy). So we got into an argument about whether or not aces were oppressed, and they brought up

(2/2) corrective rape and conversion therapy as examples of asexual oppression. I thought those were valid points but I don’t know how to explain that experiencing these types of oppression/issues doesn’t make them LGBT? If you want I could send you the post or tag you in it if that would make it easier. Thanks! 

Women are expected to procreate not only as a way to keep them in their patriarchal role but also just due to society putting such a large focus of importance on having kids and families in general. Even boys are expected to find someone to have kids with. That doesn’t constitute oppression in itself, just a problematic idea that our culture has. 

However, it’s certainly not aphobic. As most aces on here will tell you anyway aces can still have sex and kids. If it were oppression it would have to affect all aces in some way or another and would result in serious legal discrimination. That’s an aspect of oppression that people forget about.

Typically when oppression is discussed in social justice circles It has to do with widespread societal bigotry against a group accompanied by some kind of legal or governmental aspect. Disenfranchising and segregating people of color, denying LGBT people the right to marriage or proper Healthcare for AIDS or transition, legislating the ability to discriminate against minorities. You can’t legislate attraction. You can’t legally force someone to have sex because of their asexuality. That has never happened and it won’t ever happened. Sure some people will expect you to feel sexual attraction but aces have never ever been legally targeted

Ace Conversion therapy concepts are fear tactics. HSD is separate from asexuality and is ace tumblr’s ONLY major talking point for oppression and its disgusting how they take a very real issue and try and make it sound fake and like it harms them. I don’t want to get into corrective rape because I don’t like having discussions that might sound like they discredit rape victims. However It’s not oppression and it has much more of its root in misogyny and toxic masculinity rather than aphobia. If it were an ace issue only it wouldn’t be able to happen exactly to same to non ace women. None of those issues directly target ace people. 

It’s sad that asexuality is still misunderstood and not always treated with visibility today but aces need to realize that they aren’t oppressed and even if they were for their sexuality it wouldn’t automatically make them LGBT as the LGBT community was founded to combat homophobia and transphobia.

[baudelairre]

can someone explain to me the difference between romantic and sexual attraction if it's possible for aces to still want sex with someone?? disregarding the fact that prefix-sexual was never about level of sexual attraction but about WHO, i don't understand why and how y'all define what 'sexual' attraction is?? if you like someone and want to have sex with them.... is that not sexual attraction right there? and if not, what is it. and regarding that explanation i dearly want... why exactly does that make you oppressed? so you're not attracted to someone in this very specific way... okay?? how is that affecting your life other than the circumstances with a specific partner?? why is it that you think other people will be bothered by this??

liking someone and not wanting to have sex... that's extremely valid and that being called asexual would make sense. but y'all seem to define it as this very specific thing that exists between romance and having sex and i cannot for the life of me understand why that distinction is needed or how tf it would make sense to be in a community with gay bi trans or nb people.

[dragonprinxe]

regardless of where you stand on ace discourse, if you’re cishet asexual, cishet aromantic, or cis aro/ace, you can’t reclaim queer. figure out your own different word for not straight and not gay. queer has never been used against you in a derogatory or degrading way. it doesn’t belong to you.

[lesbitchka]

terms like “homophobia” and “transphobia” have History they came into use to describe the oppression that LGBT people face. you can’t just tag on a prefix to “-phobia” and expect it to carry the same weight as these existing terms lmao… this is what we mean when we say “acephobia” doesn’t exist it’s literally not a systematic problem! isolated cases of bullying do not equal oppression! it’s that simple yall

[conflagrationamalgamation]

I am not going to even bother to explain to you your erroneous logic as you plebean mind probably would not comprehend actual logic when not convenient. Thusly I will just say this. You are wrong Fuck you, asshat for never bothering to push your comfort zone to empathize with fellow human beings. Sincerly, someone completely done with all this bullshit

[lesbitchka]

this wins the most reddit fedora mcgee reblog we’ve ever gotten wow

[baudelairre]

mmmm friendly reminder that lgbt has never been about inclusion of people different to society's expectations. lgbt is a community of people with specific identities? it's not a minority vs the world club with everyone being able to join bc yayyy! it's literally a community formed around shared experiences of homophobia and transphobia.

including people who systematically hold power over people who experience those things is counterintuitive to the whole reason we exist.

[discourseful]

fucking hell the worst thing to come out of ace tumblr is actually “lesbian doesn’t imply romantic or sexual attraction to women” IT LITERALLY DOES! THATS WHAT BEING A LESBIAN IS! OH MY GOD!!!!

[baudelairre]

cishet aces: we are victims of hate crimes!

exclusionists: that's not what a hate crime is

cishet aces: well we hated it!

[baudelairre]

.