Understanding Asexuality

In the wake of this medicalization of asexuality, the modern asexuality movement began. David Jay, the founding member of the most popular asexuality website, AVEN, has explained at various times why he began the site. His reasons seem to reflect a number of the identity issues mentioned above. For example, one reason was personal: “He was driven by memories of feeling alone. As a teenager in St. Louis, he searched the Web for asexual and found only research on amoebas” (Bulwa, 2009, August 24). Another reason was educational—to help other asexual people understand more about themselves (Bulwa, 2009, August 24). Indeed, there are various stories of asexual people “discovering themselves” through AVEN. For example, one young woman recalls that AVEN “described her so accurately… that she cried over her keyboard” (Bulwa, 2009, August 24).

It is also clear that, over time, Jay wanted to build a community that would enable asexual people to change the way the world (especially the medical world) views them. Thus, this last reason for developing AVEN is in line with (public) identities being a means of social and political change. He has said, “When I was younger, the message I would always hear is that you need sex to be happy” (Childs, 2009, January 16). He has also said, “We need to know we’re not broken” (Bulwa, 2009, August 24), and “We need to have more discussion about how people can not have sex and still be happy” (Childs, 2009, January 16). This last reason for founding and expanding AVEN has led to an active movement to do just that: Some AVEN members have become a vocal group lobbying to change the way the latest DSM edition labels asexual people, particularly if they are not distressed about their lack of sexual interest/attraction. One media report stated this directly: “AVEN members have one concrete goal: changing the authoritative Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders to make explicit that asexuality is not a hypoactive sexual desire disorder” (Bulwa, 2009, August 24). However, such change begins with, or at least is facilitated by, a cohesive group rallying around a relevant identity or common label. After all, having an identity as an “asexual” person has its benefits, both personally and politically. In the recent scientific and clinical literature, the words most widely used to describe asexual people have intimated, if not actively embraced, the language of illness and disease (e.g., “hypoactive sexual desire disorder”). In contrast, the word “asexual” is merely descriptive of the phenomenon and not laden with values; it does not imply that a specific level of sexual interest or attraction is correct and healthy. Thus, people who embrace the identity of an “asexual” are likely more positive about their self-image than those who are asexual but do not identify as such, and particularly relative to those who use medical or clinical language to describe themselves. People who embrace an identity as “asexual” are also, I expect, more likely to form a cohesive political group than those who do not identify as such and/or those who choose more medical or clinical language to describe themselves. Embracing an asexual identity also, in turn, potentially enables asexual people to change the medical establishment, or at least its rules for what is and what is not a mental illness. And they may succeed in doing so.

Summary

Identities allow us to know who we are and to stake our claim as unique and worthy of recognition. They also allow us to seek solace and comfort with, and forge ties to, those with whom we share commonalities. Identities also often emerge out of and serve social and political ends, allowing us to rally our group in defense of our interests.