Asexuality and Consent Issues

So I’ve been thinking a lot about consent and asexuality lately.

I think that asexual people are at special risk for being affected by sexual situations to which they have not freely consented.

Consent is the basis I use for all of my opinions about what kinds of sex acts are morally acceptable. But consent needs to be freely given in order for it to be worth anything. If part of the reason you agree to have sex with someone is because bad things could happen if you don’t, then your consent is not freely given. If you agree to have sex with someone who has power over you, and who cannot be held accountable if they use that power against you, then your consent is not freely given. If you agree to have sex because it is expected or required of you, and you do not realize that you have the option to say no, then your consent is not freely given.

I’m not saying that the consent in those scenarios isn’t real, or that sex in those scenarios is wrong, or that people cannot have happy relationships in those circumstances. But I am saying it means that one of the sexual partners is not free. Consent can only be freely given when all people involved are mentally, physically, socially and financially able to say “No.” An imbalance of power or of information limits the options that one of the partners can take, and it casts doubt on the voluntariness of the relationship.

Most asexual people in this world do not know that they are asexual, or that asexuality exists. And many asexual people report feeling broken, dysfunctional, abnormal, isolated or ashamed of themselves until they discovered asexuality. We grow up in a world of compulsory sexuality, in which every person is expected to either have a sexual partner or be sexually available. (In conservative cultures, “sexually available” often means “available to marry,” but the underlying attitude is similar.) To be unpaired and unavailable is abnormal, and it reduces your value in the eyes of other people. Even for people whose choice to be celibate is respected, i.e. clergy of certain religions, they are still expected to *want* sex, and their celibacy is seen as a sacrifice rather than a valued lifestyle in its own right.

An asexual person who does not know they are asexual will grow up believing that they must be sexual, feel sexual attraction, and be sexually active. Sexual desire is thought to be as natural and universal as breathing, and a person who does not have it must be abnormal or defective in some way. Asexual people are pressured into being “normal” by the stigma and stereotypes our culture has regarding virgins, celibacy, aromanticism, and several other concepts. An asexual person who does not conform to compulsory sexuality will encounter prejudice, harassment, pathologization and other problems; they are, essentially, being pressured or coerced into acting allosexual.

And much of the time, these messages are so universal, and so unquestioned, that we internalize them: we learn to silence our own objections to sex, and we scold ourselves for being “abnormal.” The discovery of asexuality is a turning point for many of us, and transforms our sexuality from a problem that needs to be fixed into a different yet beautiful thing we can be proud of. To identify as asexual means we no longer apologize for what we are, and that we know we do not need to follow our culture’s expectations about sex. The asexual identity frees us to say “No,” with a confidence that we did not have before.

But what of the asexual people who do not know what they are? What of the asexuals who consent to acts of sex purely because they think it’s what they’re supposed to do? What of the asexual people who have sex because they want to be “normal,” knowing that their friends, family and lovers will reject or look down on them if they are abnormal? They do not have the information about asexuality that they need to make fully informed decisions about their sex lives. They might not have the confidence needed to resist people and social standards that would pressure them into having sex that they do not truly want. They can still consent to sex, and may even enjoy it, but they are not entirely free, and their consent is not freely given.

How many asexual people consent to sex that they would not have consented to if they grew up knowing that asexuality was a good, normal, and healthy way to be? How many people are pressured or manipulated into sex because they believe that they need to be fixed? How can an asexual and allosexual person have a sex life based on equality and mutual respect if society has conditioned the asexual person into believing that their sexual needs, preferences, and boundaries do not deserve to be respected?

This is why asexual awareness is so important. We need everyone in the world to know that we exist, not only so that we can be respected, but so that millions of other asexual people can have the power to make informed, confident choices about their own sexuality. We need asexual people everywhere to know that they are not broken, abnormal or wrong for what they are feeling, and that they have the right to reject sex at any time, for any reason. When asexual people can confidently say “No,” then they will also be able to say “Yes” with more certainty and weight, and they will have the option of forming sexual relationships that respect their asexuality and bring them happiness.