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Hey everybody, it's swankivy.
I'm making a video on my laptop, so I think
the video might be a little bit grainy, but
this is gonna have to do for now.
Today's video is about my upcoming book,
which is tentatively titled So You Think You're Asexual,
and the subtitle is An Introduction
to the Invisible Orientation. I'm making this video
well before the projected release date, which should be sometime in September
2014,
but if this video is still up after the release,
you can at least get some idea what we planned the book to be and what it
should contain.
And it's possible that with some
feedback from my publisher, the
items in the book might be moved around or I might add content,
but I figured what I would do is tell you guys a little bit about what the book is
going to cover,
because I know a whole lot of people are very excited about finally having a book
for the asexual community that isn't an academic text, and
is supposed to be widely available because it will be distributed
through mainstream channels. There already is one
self-published book, which is by Asexuality Archive,
and that was--that was self-published through I guess Amazon's CreateSpace,
so mine is gonna be--it's gonna be in more
mainstream places, and I think that that's really gonna help
reach a demographic that we currently aren't reaching.
So, without further ado, I'm going to discuss
what the different sections of my book are going to be about,
and just a quick overview of what they'll cover.
The book opens with an introduction. I start with my own story and explain
what it was like to discover as a teenager
that I was not experiencing what everyone else seemed to be experiencing
and, you know, gave a little bit of understanding about my motivation for
going from being an alienated
teenager to deciding to become an activist about
this subject. So, I discuss my own experiences and
then I go into sort of some introductory ideas about what the book
is supposed to be about, who it is for, which includes non-asexual people as
well as asexual people and anybody
who's interested in finding out more about it for, say,
academic or, you know, school
report purposes. And I give some explanation
of why the book was written, mostly justification to explain
you know, asexuality is not covered in sex ed
in most places, and it's mostly--
we live in such a sexualized society
that people who are asexual or people who know someone who's asexual
don't have any context to understand it, so. The introduction is very short
and just kind of introduces you to who's writing the book,
why, who for, and why it's important.
Part One of the book is called Asexuality 101.
I give some basics, like a quick factsheet
at the beginning, and then I open by explaining that
asexuality is a *** orientation and what that means.
I say it's a mature state so that people understand it's not what you call
yourself until you develop a different *** orientation,
although of course there are people who go through
a phase of their life where they identify as asexual and then
realize that that was not the right term for them or that their sexuality is
fluid, so I cover that.
I say that asexuality is a description,
not a declaration, not a behavior,
et cetera, and I say that asexuality is
a healthy state. That is not to say that you can't
have an illness or a disability or some kind of condition
and also be asexual, but I'm saying that asexuality itself is not some kind of
psychological or physical condition.
And finally I wrap up and explain that asexuality
is a reasonable possibility. It's not something that should be treated like a
last resort diagnosis,
because you don't get diagnosed with a *** orientation.
Nobody diagnoses you as straight. No one diagnoses you as gay.
So it should be treated like it's a reasonable possibility without
treating asexual people like they have a responsibility to try to
figure out what else, any other possibility they could be
before they finally settle on understanding themselves as asexual.
So that's
the opening of the book's first part where I just go over the basics.
Part Two of the book is entitled "Asexual Life."
This section goes into all kinds of experiences that asexual people have
and it begins by discussing the
types of asexual people. I begin by talking about
romantic orientation, and it's a pretty extensive
section that goes into all the different types
of orientations that you can be amongst the romantic spectrum and also covers
aromanticism.
I then discuss libido
and ***, and how that fits into
people who identify as asexual's lives,
and then I go on to discuss intimate
and *** activity, and kinda discuss the different types
of intimacy that asexual people can want
without it being based on *** attraction. I discuss sensual attraction,
aesthetic attraction,
all kinds of different possibilities for
what asexual people are willing to tolerate,
what asexual people desire themselves as far as
physical contact, and I discuss the whole spectrum of
different experiences that people who consider themselves asexual may have,
it's very diverse,
so I go into all kinds of discussions of those. I go on from there to
discuss also gray areas which--
this is a topic that gets left out of a lot of mainstream discussions of asexuality
because it's usually considered like beyond the scope of
asexuality and it's also kind of confusing for a lot of people;
it makes sense that there are always gray areas.
For any kind of orientation there's always maybe people who have a primarily
asexual experience in their lives, but
do experience *** attraction once in a while or under specific circumstances,
so I do talk about graysexuality
and demisexuality. I also discuss
demiromanticism and grayromanticism
and how all these things work together.
So the next section of the Part Two
that I discuss is called "Asexual Relationships."
And I kinda talk a little bit
about--a little bit of advice
for people who might be in mixed relationships or might be an asexual
person wanting to find another asexual person to be in a relationship with,
and while I give the advice
I also discuss what these--what the terminology is,
and just kinda give an overview of how asexual relationships work.
The next subsection of my Asexual Life section
is called "Society, Discrimination, and ***
Communities." I think that this is probably going to be my
most controversial section, and it was very difficult to write
but I did have quite a few people who were
not asexual and were identified as
something on the *** spectrum to read the section and I didn't get any
objections,
really, to anything that I was saying regarding our
discrimination experiences and prejudice and whatnot, and I was really
worried about that section
offending people, and that's why I really wanted to check for understanding, so
you can--you can be assured that it's a sensitively rendered section
and that it has been at least vetted by some members of
the *** community, so that I'm addressing in an inoffensive
way as best I can, so I do discuss
the overall societal pressures that asexual people have to deal with,
and how we in fit in with and ally with
and work with *** communities, what the attitudes are,
discussions of privilege and
all kinds of very difficult topics.
And then finally, the last part of the Asexual Life section
is "Asexual Community." And in that I kind of go into all kinds of
different subsections, demographics, intersectional issues,
because, as we should all know
by now, there's not just one asexual experience. There
are all kinds of kinda complicating factors
if you belong to, say, another
group that experiences prejudice or discrimination,
or you have a special experience because of
your demographics that other people that don't match
those traits might not be experiencing. So I kind of
went through and highlighted a whole bunch of different
demographic subsections
of the asexual community and talked about their
experiences and their and special issues.
So I deal with being young and asexual,
I deal with being older and asexual,
I deal with asexual women, asexual men,
I have a section devoted to asexual people of color,
I talk about if your romantic orientation is gay,
or somewhere--somewhere that you would consider ***, and
also you're asexual, there's a specific experience
that goes with that. I talk about being
trans and asexual, I talk about other non-cisgender
or non-binary identities and asexuality. I discuss
being asexual and autistic.
I also discuss disability and
illness, mental illness, any disorders
as they intersect with asexuality because there are lots of people who have a disorder
of some kind, a disability, an illness, a mental illness,
and they're asexual, and that's kind of a special issue because
asexuality usually gets blamed
for the disorder or the disorder gets blamed for the asexuality
and their larger issues where
people who have any kind of illnesses, disabilities, mental illnesses
are often desexualized, so
I discuss that. And then,
I also go into asexual people
and entertainment, I talk about it in popular culture.
I talk about the asexual community and some of its
inside jokes, some of its symbols,
and some of its--famous people who identify as asexual
characters in media who identify as asexual,
so I kinda go over some culture, and I also
have a little section there about non-asexual people and
their interaction with us,
and sum up with like an asexual experience discussion.
And that's the end of the second part.
Part 3 is entitled "The Many Myths of Asexuality"
and many of these are things that I've addressed in my individual videos, I
made a video for each one of these things,
but they're all covered in the book and--
and then some. I start with a bingo card, you may have seen Asexual Bingo,
my video, and/or
other bingo cards across the Internet so I start with that and introduce the
concept,
and then I go into some specific misconceptions and I address each one.
I start with "Aren't you using the word 'asexual' incorrectly?" and
throw out all that asexual reproduction, all the jokes
about that.
I discuss why asexuality is not
a fear of or hatred toward
other genders. I talk about
why asexuality is not a dating failure.
I talk about why saying that people
become asexual because they're physically unattractive is incorrect,
and offensive. I talk about
whether asexual people have a sickness or a hormonal problem. I talk about
whether we are considered distracted by our lives or throwing ourselves
into some other thing to care about
so we're too busy to have *** relationships. I talk about
did we just have bad sex and swear off sex.
I talk about could we be
suffering from trauma--and that's a very--
it's a sensitively handled discussion
of *** assault and abuse.
I talk about whether asexual people could possibly be
secretly gay and discuss the problems with that assumption.
I discuss whether we've "just not met the right person."
I discuss whether asexuality is a religious statement,
and also kinda go into some stuff about
the experience of religious asexual people of various religions.
I talk about why it would be incorrect
to call asexuality a phase or
accuse us of looking for attention or trying to be different.
I talk about addressing
"wouldn't asexual people be lonely all the time?"
I talk about why it's a poor assumption to
claim that we're boring or dispassionate.
I talk about whether it's fair to say that we're being selfish
and the whole "aren't you a tease?" idea.
I discuss whether we need to procreate and
how that's related to asexuality. I talk about
do we hate sex or
do we hate people who have sex, and you know, attitudes,
sex positivity, sex negativity, that sort of thing.
I discuss whether asexual people should
have to look for therapy to be "fixed." Obviously the answer is no,
but, you know, I discuss also, some--you know,
if you do wanna--if you're asexual and you do wanna approach therapy,
some things you might want to watch out for.
I talk about why it is wrong
to approach an asexual person by saying that their lives are so uncomplicated
and they're so lucky to be asexual
and, you know, why that's a misconception. I talk about
why it's not
appropriate to tell people that they need to let an experienced
or talented *** partner change their minds.
And so, that's--that's basically like an overview of all the misconceptions
I address,
and some of those have some nuances that I
tackle in the discussion of each section.
Part Four of the book is called "If You're Asexual (Or You Think You Might Be)."
This section, I anticipate that maybe
asexual people or questioning asexual people might see the book
and turn right to it, so I kinda give an introduction to
how you tell you're asexual and kind of go into a discussion
of some
experiences you might relate to if you're asexual, and I talk a little bit about how to--
how to handle it,
you know, some reassuring phrases
to help newly identified asexual people,
and discussions of whether and how to come out
if you choose to. I give hints on how to handle criticism
and I address the special issues of
like what if you're a teenager and people keep calling you a late bloomer,
and also some hints for, from an asexual
perspective on what if you're in a relationship, how should you handle
your--your relationship with a person who is not asexual,
and/or whether you want to get into a relationship like that.
And then just some
advice on where to go from here, just some resources
of what you might look for and who you might try to
connect with, in your order to feel
more secure and more supported in your orientation.
Part Five of the book is called "If Someone You Know is Asexual (Or Might Be)."
So this is the section that I think people who, if someone recently came out
out to them, or they recently heard about it, or they know somebody
that they think is asexual, they might go get the book and turn right to this section,
so I do repeat a little bit
in the beginning and give them a special message and explain what asexuality
is in kind of a--
an abbreviated fashion. And then
I basically just give non-asexual people some advice
on you what we would want from them and how they can
help us feel accepted--how to acknowledge their existence in everyday
life;
what you should avoid doing, and the kinds of questions
you should avoid asking; how to determine whether it's okay to ask something;
and also kinda how to deal with it if you've already said something
that's offensive and, like, an asexual person might be mad at you for it
or to recognize that you may have said something that was--
that was inappropriate, how to--how to
reconnect with that person to help them
understand that you want to be an ally.
It addresses the special issue of if you're a parent
of an asexual person or you know someone much younger than you is an
asexual person,
and why you shouldn't approach that as, like, "you're too young to know
what your orientation is," like a good explanation of
why that's not gonna get you anywhere. And also from--
for--for non-asexual people I explain, what if
your partner just came out as asexual or you want to date someone and you found
out they were asexual,
how do you proceed from here. Just sort of a flipped version of
the same relationship guide that I gave in the asexual section
for purposes of people who wanna have a relationship
with one of us. I discuss
how and whether you should ask questions,
what to ask without making people uncomfortable and what you should and
shouldn't
assume about asexual people. And that's
the end of that one.
And then the last section of the book is called "Other Resources."
Part Six. And that's really just--
it's a list of links and books.
I open with some basic information: introductions, organizations, and
frequently asked questions, mostly Internet links that people can go to to
find more information. I have a section for discussion groups and
networking and
forums. Then some
academic resources and some research collectives for
people that wanna see the scientific studies. I have
some downloads, some links to brochures and educational materials,
some published papers on the subject,
book chapters and whatnot, some published articles
on the subject and some interviews.
I also have a short section that gives
links, mostly YouTube links, to professional media that included
interviews with
or discussions of asexuality, and then
I also have some, just, links to
Internet videos that are made by asexual people like my channel and
some other YouTubers
that make asexuality-related videos. I have a section for
asexuality-related blogs, and
then I also list my contributors.
I don't believe I mentioned it earlier in this video, but my book is
actually punctuated with quotes that were
that I was given permission to use from somewhere around twenty
talented asexual bloggers.
So that it's not just a single perspective that I'm
offering here and so I have a list of all of their--
of their names and their blogs. And then I just put my bibliography.
And that's the end of the book.
If you see this video and you've heard my overview
and you're still wondering if I address a particular topic in the book
and you'd like to find out, feel free to comment,
send me a message and I'll let you know
whether and in what capacity I've addressed your issue, and
other than that I just hope I can keep you guys up to date
on my book news. I have a newsletter,
so I'll put that link in the description, and
I hope that everybody who enjoys my videos
is going to like when I've come up with in the book.
So, more news as it develops and
I'll see you guys next time!