if you’re grey-ace, you’re allowed to reblog posts about being asexual that you relate to even if they’re not specifically about grey-asexuality
if you’re grey-aro, you’re allowed to reblog posts about being aromantic that you relate to even if they’re not specifically about grey-aromanticism
if you’re grey-aroace, you’re allowed to reblog posts about being aroace that you relate to even if they’re not specifically about being grey-aroace
if you’re in any way grey a-spec and id with other terms (gay, lesbian, bi, pan, etc), you’re allowed to reblog posts about being gay/lesbian/bi/pan/whatever even if they’re not specifically stating they’re for grey a-specs
sometimes as a grey a-spec it’s hard to really fit in and it can feel like you’re always on the outside of the ace and aro communities and any other communities for other labels you id with, but you’re allowed to participate in them! you’re allowed to reblog these posts. you’re allowed to find them relateable. you’re not stepping on anyone’s toes or hurting anyone or swerving out of your lane by doing this.
grey a-specs belong just as much as anyone else, please don’t listen to that little voice in your head telling you that you don’t. ✨
You might be sexually attracted to that person if…
- You think sexual thoughts about the person out of nowhere
- You feel aroused upon seeing the person outside of a sexual setting
- You find yourself wondering what the person is like in bed and what their genitals look like
- You want to have sex with that person because your body is screaming for sex with that one person in particular.
- Seriously though if you’re already horny and that person is there you will feel all hot and sexually aroused and might drool a bit and fantasies of doing X-rated things to that person will fly through your mind and your body will literally be screaming for that person to take you or for you to take that person. Even just thinking about that person while horny can do this to you.
- TMI but if you get off while fantasizing about you having sex with that person, the orgasms can be absolutely mind-blowing and may even give you leg cramps.
- You really do “just know.”
You might not be sexually attracted to that person if…
- You make a conscious effort to fantasize about sex with that person, mainly to see if you actually want to
- You feel aroused during a sexual situation, but that arousal has more to do with the activities instead of the specific person. Alternatively, you just don’t feel aroused at all.
- You feel aroused at random, but it’s directed towards no one
- You want to have sex with that person because you want to make them happy or are just horny and want to get off with a partner or want babies or want money or literally any other reason aside from your body screaming for sex with that one person in particular.
- TMI but if you try to get off while fantasizing about you having sex with that person, you may get bored and start thinking of other things. Or, you may start fantasizing about that person doing sexual things that don’t involve you in which case aegosexual might be worth looking into.
- You just don’t know.
If the “you might be sexually attracted” list boggles your mind, you are possibly asexual.
If the “you might not be sexually attracted” list boggles your mind, you are possibly not asexual.
If you can relate to the “might not be sexually attracted” list, but also feel like you’ve experienced some of the things on the “might be sexually attracted” list, it may be worth checking out some acespec identities.
(Disclaimer: This is strictly based off of my own experiences as acespec and is meant to be a guide for people questioning sexual attraction. Overall, you know yourself best and I’m not gonna tell you what you’re feeling or how to identify.)
These types of lists are always so helpful!
A big one too, I think is, you may fantasize, but the people in your fantasies are never YOU. They’re fictional characters or your OCs but they’re never you specifically. And if they are it’s an idealized version of you.
That top list makes me realize I’ve never experienced any of that, it’s kinda like when I stumbled into an ask Reddit about what sexual attraction felt like and I went “yeah, I have never felt THAT way and whatever I feel isn’t sexual attraction”
here it is, the info I’ve always wanted to see, breaking down attraction vs not-attraction in intense, analytical detail
Here’s a few more for aces who do experience aesthetic attraction and who aren’t repulsed, because goodness knows these are the ones that confused me when I was figuring things out.
If you have sexual fantasies that involve things being in a certain situation or having things done to you, but you aren’t visualizing anything or imagining specific people, you might not experience sexual attraction
If you’ve ever had the thought “masturbation is better than sex because it is more efficient and skips the boring bits,” you might not experience sexual attraction.
If you find someone attractive, but the thought of seeing them with their clothes off isn’t more attractive, it probably isn’t sexual attraction. (A naked body is just a naked body. But people are so lovely when in a look they’ve picked out to express themselves.)
If you occasionally notice body parts considered sexual and think they look nice, but do not want to do anything sexual related to those parts, it might not be sexual attraction. (I will occasionally think someone has nice boobs or a nice butt, and I assumed that was sexual attraction for a long time. But I’ve learned that for allo people, thinking those things leads to them having a response of “therefore I want to tap that” which is absolutely baffling to me. Also, again, those thoughts don’t lead to “and therefore I want to see them without clothing.”
If your response to something that seems to be making others horny is very similar to your response to those videos of “oddly satisfying” things, it might not be sexual attraction.
10 Slides is not enough. So many other things I wanted to talk about, like Sex-Repulsed and Sex-Positive Aces and everything in between.
But in the end, I really wanted to give Aromanticism some visibility, and Demisexuals and Grey-As I thought rounded the thing out nicely by helping explain to people searching for their identity that asexuality need not be black and white.
BY POPULAR DEMAND, I HAVE AMENDED THE SLIDESHOW TO SPECIFY THAT IT IS ROMANTIC LOVE THAT AROMANTIC PEOPLE DON’T FEEL. THERE ARE MANY OTHER KINDS OF LOVE WHICH AROMANTIC PEOPLE DO FEEL. THEY LOVE THEIR FAMILIES AND THEIR FRIENDS AND THEIR PETS AND THEIR HOBBIES AND ALL KINDS OF OTHER THINGS.
A lot of people pointed out that this kind of implied aromantics couldn’t feel love at all. They do, of course, so I’ve fixed it to say “romantic love”.
Allosexuality is the real spectrum here. There are many ways to experience sexual attraction. There’s only one way to experience no sexual attraction.
please let this become common knowledge. I’m so tired of demisexuals, greysexuals, etc. saying they’re ace. No you’re not. If you experience sexual attraction even once, you’re allo.
Normalize low libido
Normalize all levels of sexual attraction and that there are many ways to experience allosexuality. Low and high libidos are still allosexual. No libido is asexual.
Exactly, in America it’s set up that if you’re not fucking twice a week then there is something wrong with you, that there is a special term for you. No, the sex crazed have just taken over now they have been released. Just let them do their thing bro
OMFG we really need to talk about how weird Murricans definition of asexuality is:
Like this post right here has a checklist to see if you’re ace and more than half of them are just normal traits! Not even traits of introverts! Just normal traits! Worst of all this is culture-specific so by this logic - every Asian and Jewish person is ace!
The most egregious is “you can’t understand why people would cheat.” Being faithful to your partner makes you ace?!? Murricans?! Are you okay?!
Same with aromantacism, there’s no “spectrum”, either you feel romantic attraction or you don’t.
^^ yup! Typically when I discuss topics involving asexuality I also mean the same with aromanticisn.
[ID: a series of images of two pride flags fused together down the centre. The flags are: lesbian & greysexual, greysexual & gayflagblog’s gay man, greysexual & green and pink gay man, greysexual & transgender, greysexual & genderfluid, genderqueer guy & greysexual, genderqueer gal & greysexual, . End ID.]
in case you don’t know, it’s pride month !!!!!! be yourself and be proud of you!! also remember that YOU ARE VALID, DONT LET ANYONE TELL YOU OTHERWISE!!!! ❤️❤️
was gonna leave my comment in the tags but tbh i’m silent enough about this as it is.
seeing stuff like this is so upsetting because these terms were well known and widespread in the ace community but because of exclusionists many people stopped using terms like this because they felt uncomfortable and unsafe.
i loved these terms when i was in highschool, i loved the feeling of community, but i lost that because i didn’t feel comfortable openly and proudly calling myself asexual.
they’ve hurt so many people and damaged our community badly and i will never forgive them for that. we deserve to use our own terminology and feel safe within our community.
sometimes i notice i haven’t seen “grace” (grey-ace) in a while and consequently wonder if i made it up.
I remember ppl - even other ace ppl - saying the card suit thing was “cringey” and “straight ppl aren’t gonna take us seriously” (sounds familiar?) So i guess the community wound up abandoning it. We were also having severe issues at the time with aces being stereotyped as “childish/immature” for associating things like cake, dragons, and space with asexuality, plus in general as most aces just don’t “get” allosexual things in media and irl. We were starting to be viewed as ignorant, virginal, childish, losers, etc. I haven’t seen an ace-cake thing in a good while now.
This was the infancy of exclusionary influence on us. I didn’t realize it did more damage than just closeting us. Whole symbols and terms have been lost. Community has been lost.
I remember three-four years ago I got myself into the ace community on Insta, and I came across these terms. People in these circles would talk about cake, space, dragons, and the black ring on the middle finger. Then, a year or two later, ace content fizzled out (I thought it was Insta’s algorithm figuring out that I knew all this and didn’t bring me the old stuff) and young aces had no idea what any of these were - including the black ring. Finding out young aces had no idea what the black ring meant nearly snapped my heart in two - I proudly wore the black ring, I drew characters with it, and it was my quiet way of communicating to others what my sexuality was. I was baffled at the lack of knowledge - and it turns out that exclusionists got their hands into our community and snuffed us out.
Anyways, we need to bring this back. I thought the card suite thing was cool, it taught people the different ways people can experience attraction, I loved making jokes about preferring cake, I loved wearing the black ring and talking about it with my fellow queer people at my highschool QSA club.
I’m sorry, people don’t know about the cake or ring anymore? I remember being welcomed with spams of cake gifs, photos, and MS Paint drawings. I also distinctly remember that the block solo ring in the midle was meant as reference to the Ace of Spades (black, solo, middle of card). Only thing I didn’t know was that other aces could represent a more refined nuance. Let’s see if we can get this all rolling again.
Welcome to anyone who is interested in helping with the culture revival.
Ijust lost my black ring today (3/25), otherwise I’d take a pic for y'all. It’s black with a very subtle purple & galaxy sheen to it. Gonna order a new one ASAP and I’ll be sure to get a pic once it arrives.
Ace of hearts! I identify as ace/ace-spec, I know I’ve felt attraction a few times, but so rarely I can’t really classify it more specifically.
I got a black ring a few months ago and I now wear it all the time (though I sometimes leave it by the sink after doing dishes ) and I have a collection of different ace pins I keep on my hiking backpack, my favorite sweater, and my work lanyard. I’m going to redo my nails in ace inspired colors soon so I’ll post my ring when I do and get both at once!
(Note to those asking about the black ring: middle finger of the right hand; the swinger community also uses black rings to indicate they’re open for encounters. From what I’ve seen the swinger community is well-aware of the ace black ring, and advises its members not to put theirs on the middle finger out of respect.)
