There are so many things I like about the idea of being an ace/asexual which happily correlate with things I already am. I'm not a great student of the subject, but can assert confidently that I....
1) Don't go for sex as the main thing. Don't get me wrong, I like sex and all the pageantry around it. Sex is natural, sex is good, yadda yadda. But the main thing I'm going for is usually comforting intimacy and that's a different animal with a lot of overlaps.
2) Believe it's awesome that you get to call yourself an ACE.
3) Am generally interested in women, but not so much in a "I need to get laid critically-soon or some sort of bomb will explode" kinda way.
4) Am exhausted with the default-heterosexual narrative of being hard up, in a dry spell, or lacking game. The narrative enforces the idea that if you don't have a regular sex life, you're doing something wrong. It's particularly tough on Asian-American dudes, who are the most desexualized of American ethnicities, consistently labeled in media and in online dating as the Not Fuckable Type.
5) Believe it's a very important vowel to maintain in the more-or-less-all-encompassing acronym QUILTBAG, which I'm told stands for Queer Undecided Intersex Lesbian Trans Bisexual Asexual Gay.
6) Don't try really hard, and in sexual pursuits, it's a sort of sin to not even try. I don't try because the thing I would try for is so often misinterpreted, it is not even funny.
7) Am envious of those who own a sexual identity and can plan their lives around it.
8) Don't really know anyone else who identifies as asexual, but would be eager to meet someone and talk about it!
9) Don't really know anyone else who identifies as asexual, so it must be the hippest one.
10) Maintain that hookup culture is an asshole.
11) Just wanna be me, man.
12) Believe in real-shit love with someone you've never had sex with. Still a problem, but to me, a much more interesting problem.
13) Am probably seeking a path of less resistance on some level, since it's the one least subject to obvious persecution 'cause you pretty much aren't fucking with anybody.
14) Am well-prepared for any form of stigma or persecution that does occur, if it's on the level of being perceived as some sort of asexual freak, because am an Asian American dude, and that's not unlike what the mediasphere is saying about us every day anyway.
15) Don't want to belabor the point, but ironically, "Ace" is one of the sexiest words you could categorize yourself as.
16) Also like the terminology" gray-asexual" because you get to be a GRACE, how fucking rad is that.
17) Need to make a coherent move past the depressing loop of "You want something, I want something, but the murky potential of sex activity sabotages the important objectives like companionship warmth and understanding so we both end up feeling worse than when we started."
18) Am a huge fan of WILD CARDS. (My affection towards being an "Ace" on a purely linguistic level might be as whimsical as others' fixation on certain people's sexual equipment, okay.)
19) Am really full of love, so fuck you. :)
20) Wish to be part of the open-minded restorative solution, not part of the overcompensating creepy-guy problem.
21) Blackjack! The end.
(Ace card img courtesy of this Tumblr.)
