“Parker and I are going to start dating,” Riley said abruptly, causing me to spit out the sour lemonade that was flowing down my throat.
Thankfully, I avoided hitting the playing cards in my hand or on the table. It would have been a shame if the cards got marked with sour-flavored liquid stains. Parker passed me a napkin quickly, as I coughed profusely.
As I wiped my face of the spit-mixed yellow beverage, I looked up to meet Riley’s eyes, her face wearing a serious expression, unfazed by my messy reaction. “Congrats?” I replied questionably, confused by her serious expression, “Is everything ok?”
“Are you?” She asked, staring at me with worry in her eyes.
“Well, yeah,” I lied, “You two dating doesn’t really have anything to do with me.” That part was truthful. Riley and Parker were both adults, granted they were on the younger side but they didn’t need anyones permission to date, least of all mine.
“It’s just that — well,” her eyes met the two empty seats at the table, our game night party of five was down to three due to the upcoming wedding. Riley continued “Gina and Marcus get married next week and they’re gonna move to Idaho immediately after, we were worried that us dating would make you feel lonely. But hey, don’t worry your turn will come and we’ll be celebrating your wedding soon.”
I knew she was trying to cheer me up, but I already knew marriage wasn’t in my future, at least, not in the way she thought of it. I don’t think they’d understand if I told them everything. So, I put on a fake smile. “I’ll be fine, just promise that you two won’t drop off the face of the earth once you start dating,” I joked.
They promised they wouldn’t, but they lied. That was our last game night together and the three of us went from talking daily to barely seeing each other once a month. I had expected this of course, this was how my life works. Our paths were too different. I’ve known for a long time that love and romance was never in my path.
My name is Colt Candland, and I am an Aromantic Asexual.
Those who identify as Asexual or Aromantic make up 1% of the human population, one in a hundred, but despite that ratio, neither sexuality is discussed or known to the common person. This is for a multitude of reasons, but before then, what is Asexuality and Aromanticism?
Starting with the more well known of the two, Asexuality (also referred to as Ace) is a sexual orientation that is a part of the LGTBQ+ community that refers to a person who has little to no sex drive. Aromanticism (also referred to as Aro) is another sexual orientation that is a part of the LGTBQ+ community that refers to a person who experiences little to no romantic feelings or experiences them in a different way.
There are also different subcategories within both the asexual and aromantic spectrum, including, but not limited to: “Demi,” “Gray,” “Lith” and “A”. “Demi” requires a bond with a person before they form sexual and/or romantic attraction/feelings. “Gray” rarely experiences sexual and/or romantic feelings/attraction (typically falls between “Demi” and “A”). “Lith” feels sexual and/or romantic attractions towards others but does not have the need to have their attraction or feelings reciprocated or enter into a relationship with said others. Finally, “A” does not feel sexual and/or romantic feelings/attraction in any form.
Kasey Jones, a member of EvCC’s GSA club (Gender and Sexuality Alliance) and student, identifies as Demi-sexual. They explain the difference between Demi-sexuals and those who are sexually attracted to others. “The difference is if you can feel sexual feelings towards someone without a bond of any sort, can you look at a picture of a random person and be like ‘Aw yeah’?”
A person can identify as both aromantic and asexual, referred to as an Aromantic-asexual (also called Aroace), but just because someone identifies as one, doesn’t mean they also identify as the other.
“People have the inability to separate the two sexualities,” said Aaren LaFayette, a member of EvCC’s GSA club (Gender and Sexuality Alliance). LaFayette identifies as Aromantic after discovering his feelings towards their partner weren’t romantic and reflecting on their prior relationships.
LaFayette continues, “When I see discussions online about Aromanticism, such as people describing their experiences I often see a large group of people ask about Asexuality which hasn’t been brought up in the conversation thus far.”
When asked about their experience as a Demi-sexual, Jones described it as weird. “America is built upon puritan values despite many people being atheist in modern day, but those values are still ingrained in people’s minds,” they said. “It’s Hypocritical! You see sex everywhere. And you see things being marketed via sex. Porn is super common especially in the states, that are like ‘sex is bad’, and somehow those rates of porn are much higher. But then at the same time, if you dress provocatively or get pregnant when you’re young, all these things that come with sex, if you do it, you’re a bad person. But people who say they don’t enjoy sex get weird looks. It doesn’t make any sense whatsoever. No matter what you do you can’t win.”
In the minds of the other 99 %, relationships both sexual and romantic play a huge part in our roles in society, afterall finding a partner is often associated with being human However we are entering into an era where Asexual and Aromantic people are able to share their experiences with others and help those who don’t understand or who are questioning their sexuality.
Mangaka Uta Isaki wrote a short manga series titled “Is Love The Answer?” The story follows college freshman Chika Hanai who feels alien as she has never fallen in love or had a crush on anyone before but as she enters college and finds peers like her does she discover that she might be asexual. The book is a deep dive into Asexuality and what it’s like to discover one’s self.
The Author spoke in the books afterword about what the book’s purpose and what it means to them. “I wanted to tell my past self that I had been wrong, and that being different isn’t something that needs ‘fixing’.”
Before writers and creators like Isaki began writing about Aromantic and Asexual characters many representations found in media of either sexuality came from aliens and robots who’s sexuality was discussed as a way to make those characters feel more alien compared to the rest of the human cast.
One of the most infamous examples of this could be found in Data from Star Trek, an android. In an early episode in shows run titled “The Measure of Man”, Data was put on trial to determine if he was legally classified as a sentient being with freedoms and rights. What convinces the court is that Data once was “intimate” with fellow crewmate, Tasha Yar. Not his friendships, not his bonds, but the fact that he had sex once.
One of the themes of early star trek was that having sexual and romantic feelings made one human and the lack of these emotions made one inhuman and unnatural.
While Asexuality and Aromanticism has been used to alienate characters from the rest of the cast, discussions of both sexualities have slowly increased overtime so too has its representation in pop culture and media. Though both sexualities are still underrepresented in mainstream media they’re starting to get representation in more natural and realistic ways with many characters coming out over the past decade.
Characters like Todd from “Bojack Horseman”, Florence Simmons from “Sex Education” and Jughead Jones from “Archie” came out as Asexual while others like Lilith Clawthrone from “The Owl House”, Gwenpool from Marvel Comics and Isaac Henderson from “Heartstopper” came out as Aro-Ace.
Many other characters like Viktor from “Arcane”, Alastor from “Hazbin Hotel” and White Widow (Yelena Belova) from Marvel Comics were confirmed all to be asexual by their creators or staff working on each series.
While asexuality is slowly gaining representation within the media, unfortunately the same cannot be said for aromatics.
“Aromanticism representation is hard to identify because if a character is shown to be having sex but not having relationships the audience views it more as a character is ‘Sleeping around’ or promiscuous or being a playboy. This also happens a lot.
In real life this happens too. Is this character Aromantic or a character being shamed by shamed by the writers,” LaFayette said. Identifying and understanding Asexuality and Aromanticism is difficult whether it’s within popular media or in real life. Many people who identify as either or both struggle with feeling seen and understood by friends and family. More awareness and representation in popular media is great but it can only help so much.
What does help the most is supporting those who struggle with their identity, whether they struggle with their sexuality or who they are as a person.
EvCC has an on-campus safe zone committee, which is a team of faculty and staff who are made up of a lot of queer people and ally’s with the goal is to increase awareness around queer identities on campus. They offer free training for staff and faculty online and in-person. Students may be able to attend these trainings, but they are primarily targeted at staff and faculty so when students interact with a member of EvCC staff or faculty they will be aware of queer identities, use correct pronouns and know what to do if they ever misgender someone.
Some online resources for those who wish to learn more about queer identities include: Pflag — a national queer organizing group, Glaad — an LGTBQ+ non-profit and the Human Rights Campaign.
