Thanks in part to the efforts of David Jay ’04, people all over the world are finding the name and the identity they have been searching for: asexual.
The weekend of Nov. 22, seven people from various parts of the country, including Jay, gathered in person for the first time to film an episode of the Canadian Discovery Channel’s show “Sex Files” on asexuality. The group met through the website Jay created, www.asexuality.org,
The group spent Sunday meeting with the show’s production crew, during which they held a question-and-answer forum on the steps of Olin and went bowling. Jay sat through an individual interview.
“Everyone I think felt pretty good about it,” Jay said. “People were really happy to do something to raise visibility.”
The group discussed many issues relating to asexuality with the show’s producers, including relationships and self-identity. For some, asexuality does not simply affect one’s views on sex.
“It goes beyond who you happen to be sleeping with or not, to how you approach the world and how you approach relationships,” said Todd Niquette of St.Paul, MN. “At the end of the day it’s really about a broader question. People who don’t have that kind of drive or attraction, they have a pretty tough road ahead.”
The website was founded three years ago by Jay, who initially intended to provide information on asexuality and later added the forum, a message board with over 600 members.
“I founded it because asexuality is something that I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about and have had a lot of struggles with in different ways,” Jay said. “I wanted to make resources available and see if there was some way that I could build a community and find other asexual people.”
When first considering a word for his own sexual identity while still in high school, Jay chose “asexual,” which was not commonly used at the time and has become internationally accepted due to his efforts.
Asexuality is described on the website as a person who feels sexual drive but no attraction to others, a person who feels non-sexual attraction to others, either or both.
For many members of the site, understanding their identity, labeling it and then coming across a website addressing it was a long process.
“I had been looking for a word to define myself,” said Kate Goldfield, a student at Goucher College in Baltimore. “The word asexual sort of popped into my mind. I was excited to find that I wasn’t the only one to experience these feelings. It definitely was a freeing experience for me.”
“I realized it was a frame of reference and a way of looking at oneself and looking at my own experiences that gave me a language to talk about something that I had experienced all of my life, but I had never seen talked about before,” said David Warner, of Falls Church, VA.
Spreading information about asexuality is a major objective of Jay’s and the site’s members, and they see the television special as an important opportunity to raise visibility.
“The fact they’re doing an episode on people who do not experience sexual attraction is pretty telling and I think as far as we’re concerned for people who as far as we knew two years ago didn’t exist two years ago, it’s pretty wild and out there,” Warner said.
According to Goldfield, asexuality has a slightly different role within queer politics.
“Homosexuality is not heterosexual and asexuality is not heterosexual,” Goldfield said. “In both cases they’re about something that goes against what is the norm. There is the problem where queer activism is inherently sex-focused.”
Unlike homosexuality, asexuality has not faced great resistance as it has inched closer to the mainstream.
“In terms of threats to the government and the established social order, it’s pretty low on the list,” Niquette said.
“John Ashcroft would probably like us,” Warner added with a laugh.
Despite an apathetic public reaction, asexuals are no more likely to be understood or accepted by others.
“People have a difficult time being accepted,” Jay said. “I think a lot of people have a difficult time understanding or accepting the idea of asexuality.”
In a culture that often puts undue focus on sex and sexuality, asexual people often find themselves alienated from the mainstream, and even their friends.
“I think asexual people run into problems whenever sexuality is both assumed and when sexuality is assumed to be important,” Jay said.
“I think where I experience the most profound disconnect in talking to other people isn’t so much talking about sex or sexuality as being the person in any social group I’ve ever been a part of who’s permanently uncoupled,” Warner said.
As the site grows in popularity—Jay estimates 30,000 hits per day—and opportunities like the Discovery Channel show arise, some group members hope to further increase their efforts generating awareness.
“With the existence [of the word asexual] eventually will come acceptance and people will understand,” said Josh Reagan, a student at the University of Connecticut in Hartford. “I think that right now it’s just starting to get off the ground and it’s going to go a lot further.”
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