/u/KasaiKas on Stigmas against certain genders being asexual

I asked one of my male ace friends about this once and, in short, he said that there's a really big assumption from other people that he's just lying, or failing to perform his gender properly, or homosexual, or actively "punishing" a potential partner.

I think that's fairly unique in some ways compared to women. From what I can tell, women still have to deal with "you're just lying", but there's an added "you're being selfish"/"Well, I can change that".

It's almost as if with women, there's an assumption that she's just playing hard to get, or is refusing to provide sex (which is apparently a bad thing to some people), while with men there's an assumption that the lack of sexual attraction also removes his gender, or makes him unjust.

What I find interesting, as someone who is agender, is the way non binary people are treated. Now, a lot of it will still match up with someone's assigned gender, but I also find that there's an additional "you are mentally ill" aspect. While this is thrown at most asexuals, it seems even higher in nbs because there's an air of "Of course there's something else 'wrong' with you." Almost like an exasperated "why can't you just be normal in any regard?"

January 26, 2023 at 11:35PM