The Rise of Asexual Representation
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- Опубліковано 7 вер 2024
- from jughead to spock, todd chavez to sheldon cooper - let's talk about the history of ace representation on screen!
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*content warnings: this video contains brief mentions of sex and child abuse*
Additional research and scriptwriting by Yaz Coonjah and Isabel Moncloa Daly
My experience being Ace is like... Imagine the entire world is obsessed with Hiking. And it's a nice activity I guess? Its fun to do and all but I don't go out of my way to do it and I feel bored seeing people talk about it constantly as if that's the most important thing in the world.
people who hike are insufferable
It's like everyone's constantly asking "How can you feel complete without your perfect hiking buddy?" or making veiled remarks about how they'd love to go hiking with some stranger, wouldn't you? All chocolate ads include a hiker installing a trail marker before cutting back to chocolate. Every single movie and tv show takes 15 minutes to shoehorn in a camping trip subplot despite this _NOT BEING THE RIGHT TIME THERE'S A BOMB TO DEACTIVATE WTF_ and you're pretty sure none of the characters even want to hike together. It's the rare hiking subplot that makes you appreciate what people enjoy about it, though it's not really for you it seems like the scenery in this one is nice so good for them.
Come to think of it, sex is to our media landscape as Pokemon battles are to the Pokemon universe. Like imagine being someone in the Pokemon universe who didn't like Pokemon battles- that's what being asexual is like.
I'm very much hiking repulsed so... Fits my ace experience 😂
For me (autochorissexual) a large part of it is that I do enjoy hiking... by myself. But I absolutely do not enjoy hiking with another person, and can't even begin to imagine hiking with a bunch of other people. I might be fine going on a camping trip with some friends who then go for a hike together while I do my own thing, and I might even enjoy hearing about other people's hiking trips or even writing about couples or groups going on hiking trips... it's just simply not something I want to do except by myself or in the confines of my head.
god i hate hiking
Something that happens many times is that a character will be called asexual, but is actually an aroace who doesn't want an intimate relationship. Outside of the queer community, people have never heard of the words "aromantic" or "queerplatonic." Even inside the non-aspec queer community, people think that more-than-friendship relationship=romance. But something I am worried about is that media writers will amplify the idea that aroallo= predatory and/or will sleep with anyone.
I think aromantic is not that uncommon actually, particularly because the term has existed outside of the community.
But you're obviously right that queerplatonic, as well as all of the shorthands and portmanteaus like a-spec, aro-ace, and particularly aro-allo won't ring a bell.
Due to asexuality being barely discussed, the more specific aspects on it are even less likely to be thought of, yet alone knowing the term for it.
It's why they were thought up within the community, and will presumably either stick as they get more public exposure, or get the latin/greek scientific term treatment.
often ace rep can lean hard on the whole humanising a character with romance which ends prettt poorly for aro folks
@@arkavi yup...
Tbf I tried finding out about people who are aromantic but allosexual but I found nothing so I just assumed it wasn't even a thing.
@@arkavi yeah, the trickiness with ace representation is that due to the diversity of the community, it’s difficult to make everyone feel seen. For alloromantic aces, it can be really frustrating to always see ace characters also be aromantic, because that perpetuates the misconception that sexual = romantic and hence all ace people are aroace. On the other hand, presenting all ace characters as alloromantic erases the experiences of aroace folks. The only solution is really just more representation so that there are more opportunities to show different experiences!
i think that if there was better ace representation, there would be more people who realize they're asexual. personally, i realized i was aspec because i started reading through asexual headcanon tags on ao3 and related a lot. representation is important!
Oh my god that's exactly how I figured out I was ace too!!
I learned the word "asexual" from a les mis fic on ao3 💀😂
I only learned I was ace because my then boyfriend had seen Bojack and suggested that might be it. I'd never even seen ace rep on my own, I had to learn about it through someone else.
Exactly!!! I myself only discovered I was bc one of my best friends came out as ace and it was through talking to him about it that I noticed "hey I feel like that as well!". I could have discovered much earlier if we had more representation, and it would have spared me of a lot of pain
I found out I was ace when I saw a bunch of tik toks talking about how they didn’t know songs were about sex and experiences of forcing physical attraction
Just commenting to say that Jean saying "sex doesn't make us whole, so how could you ever be broken" makes me cry every time I see it
And then SexEd writers completly forgot about Florence and ace representation
I remember watching that episode, and Otis was all like “you’re just not ready” made me kinda mad… then that scene came and I was so so so happy they put it in there
I know im not even ace but when I heard that I was like *oof* right in the heart
Same! It literally takes all my will not to start sobbing.
@@beelzemobabbity Iirc, in the same episode Otis' mother speaks with her and corrects Otis' mistake, by telling her that asexuality is a thing.
"Asexual as nonhuman" trope ties in really well with the "non-binary as non-human" trope. I think on one hand it's nice to see humanized and well-developed characters not automatically fall into human ideas of gender and animalistic sexuality, but on the other hand why is this almost more common than human representation. Gender and sex don't make you human, they're just things that many humans happen to have but plenty don't.
And those two both often cross over with non humans or characters in general who are autistic coded
Myeah as an asexual nonbinary autistic person, not a good combo. Don't love being dehumanized. I've had classmates ask me if I have emotions and if I'm 'like, an actual person.' And at that point I didn't even know I was asexual, nonbinary (neither of which I knew existed) or autistic. I just thought I failed at being human at a fundamental unfixable level.
It hurts cuz my fave characters are always non-humans and I love representation of n-b/aspec on them......... but I know how it can be bad overall too q_q
@@charliev4156 Yeah, that's a great point!
I think it's because romance n sex are such beloved themes in all media so having desirable character be asexual will often dissapoint fans
Semi-regular reminder Cole Sprouse would have been fine with Riverdale Jughead being ace and The CW where aware he’s ace but they didn’t want it in the way of shipping so they kicked the can down the road saying they might do it in later seasons to shut people up then turned around and said he was too established as allo when people started bringing it up more.
Hating this for all of us
As though character orientation has ever got in the way of shipping, anyhow.
@@bdm483 Riiight? smdh
@@bdm483 well he's specifically like aro/ace, so while people would still do it, it'd be harder for the show to market the shipping (while keeping their representation brownie points)
reminder he's canonically aro and romantically uninterested in women (or men or nonbinary people) as well as touch averse and not into romantic relationships (some aros are) in the comics. he's never been alloromantic either and people just gloss over that saying 'well he can still be ace!'. yeah but he wasn't heteroromantic, or alloromantic at all, really. also cole was all for it in the beginning but was told off by the creator and then said 'it's tought bc asexual people deserve representation but so do betty and jughead shippers' L O L I can't make this shit up, as if they were on par AT ALL, ever
Natalie Wynn, a trans woman and one of my favorite UA-camrs, said that being born one gender and living as another comes with many inherently funny situations, but cis people don't know what they are. I feel the same is true of ace people. Living as an ace in a highly sexual world is honestly a comedic goldmine. But non-ace people suck at portraying them because they lack the personal insight into those everyday funny situations. Often we're just a punchline. There's a difference between being in on the joke and being the joke itself.
Yeah I feel like for some ace ppl the idea of sex is default absurd and hilarious but then it turns out other people don't feel that way
I agree. Once i was talking with a friend on how i find hilariously bad the lyrics of Candy Shop by 50 Cent. I said something like "There's no way he was serious!" And he replied with "Yeah. He was" and he felt pretty confident about it, like he didn't even felt that they were weird. I personally cringe when someone sings "I'll take you to the candy shop, i'll let you lick my lollipop" but i guess it's not as absurd as i thought it was
@@jooree7696 it’s similar to the way asexuality is often presented as something inherently awful and tragic by allosexual writers, when in reality what’s honestly pretty tragic is living in a world where people refer to their genitals as confectionary and everyone accepts this as normal and serious
@@jooree7696 I'm super late to respond to this but I'm not ace and that song is actually ridiculous
Hollywood's "sex sells" motto is probably the main reason for the large lack of ace representation currently. Most producers/directors feel like the audience won't be interested unless there's sex or romance involved in their main characters' storylines so we get missed opportunities like with Otis and Sheldon.
In some stories the romance feels forced. Like an afterthought. Something the writer had to add in order to get published.
I don't remember where I saw this, but I remember seeing a thing where someone asked Steven Moffat of Sherlock would be ace and he said something along the lines of "it wouldn't be interesting to tell a story about someone who's asexual" 🙄
Yeah I'm getting really tired of romance being shoved in. Like I'm jungle cruise I can see the two main characters being really close freinds but then at the end they randomly push a relationship on them. Like it's so unnecessary to the plot. Like she could also want to save him and be sad for his death of they were freinds too but Hollywood don't see it that way
nobody cares about your sexuality at all keep it to your self
@@CabinBoyProductions Which is stupid because the show didn’t even really have a prominent romance storyline aside from John and Mary. So it’s not like they even gave Sherlock a love interest anyways (aside from vague allusions to Irene Adler)
I was on r/asexual the other day and someone was asking who people's favorite ace character was (and another post asking for examples of ace characters) and the top comment was Todd and then just a bunch of characters that are just headcannoned as ace and not actually intended to be or confirmed ace.
Like... that's nice and all but none of those are actually ace. I'd bet most of creators don't even know what being Asexual is. Like you just know it was coincidental.
It annoys me so much when people say their favorite ace character is someone that isn't even ace! They just don't show any on screen desire for romance! It's just super disheartening.
A wonderful asexual character is Chloe from the fiction podcast “the bright sessions”!! She actually states that she’s asexual! She’s the first ever and,,, only ace character I’ve ever seen.
That's true but if people had to list their favorite _canonical_ ace characters, everyone would end up with like, the same list lol
The thing is it's so hard to find characters who are ace and that I like. I when I find a character that I like and isn't interested in dating then I'm going to headcanon them as ace. Even though I know part of their character arc may include getting a girl/boyfriend, and it's going to frustrate me to no end. In the game I'm currently playing, there's a guy I'm hopeful about. He had a heartfelt conversation under the stars with his friend who is a girl, and thought it was completely platonic when ribbed about it the next morning. I'd think this would go "haha look guy doesn't notice girl likes him" except he has noticed and thinks everyone is misunderstanding the situation. Is it likely he'll explicitely state he's ace? Nope. Is it likely he'll "change his mind"? Unfortunately yes. But I'm sticking to my headcanon until proven otherwise.
I think asexual representation could really be improved by having separate aromantic representation (or ya know....any aromantic representation!) because I am so fed up of having to tell people that I AM NOT ASEXUAL when they know I'm aromantic, and I'm sure the issue goes both ways.
I'm ace not aro but cringe so hard when I see 'Sex without romanctic love=broken or evil' as a trope in media. It's strange how little I've seen it discussed given how f'ed up it is.
@@gota7738 Yeah, being alloaro and seeing that really sucks. It's a horrible trope. The idea that love makes you human is just so common in fiction and that's so harmful to aro people (look up loveless aro people for further reading).
You are so right, and I am very sorry you have to deal with that! I am ace, and don't really want to tell my family in case they bring up how much I wanted I family growing up (and still do). As if sex was the only possible thing holding couples together or as if queerplatonic partnerships did not exist
THANK YOU! I honestly hope the future brings more characters that offer wider representation because I am so tired of characters being labelled 'asexual' and then you see the writers do NOT understand the difference between asexual and aromantic characters. Obviously there are people who are both, and that is so valid. But I find it exhausting that you never see an aromantic character who can still have sexual partners (without being portrayed as a heartless douchebag) and a lot of ace representation is 'oh, I'm asexual, I don't want to date you'. It's honestly frustrating.
I actually think that there would be a lot of narrative potential for interesting and three-dimensional characters on the ace and aro spectrum, especially if you include demi and grey, etc.
@@seafridge Exactly. This really ties into bi+ representation too and how they are often shown to be promiscuous and how harmful that is. It's super fun for me being an alloaro pan person, so according to the media I should be basically MegaSlut or something and I mean I WISH but alas my romance repulsion means I don't like anything my brain sees as being romantic and that includes sex. I'd love to see positive representation of alloaro sexual characters, but I think it could also be interesting to explore how aromanticism can shape someone's relationship with sex....
I found this somewhere as an image and i'm going to transcript:
_"Being asexual is like being born without a sense of smell but everywhere you go people are spraying perfume in your face and when you tell them to stop and tell them it's irritating and you can't smell the perfume anyway they get huffy and respond with_ ``dont lie to me; I can clearly see you have a nose. Everybody has a nose therefore everybody smells things and besides maybe you just haven't found the right scent yet.`` _and then you want to scream."_
I was born without a sense of smell and I’m ace so this hits on both.
@@xenon8117I had no sense of smell for several years, a small surgery fixed it. So I understand how this feels - not perfumes but foods. I couldn’t really taste very much so answering a question how I liked something was not really easy to do. I’m straight as a laser beam but I really enjoy learning about our differences and probably half of my friends are LGBTQ. I actually came here hoping for Spock and Data to be included.
I was so confused about being Ace for so long. I thought I couldn't be because I still had some kind of sex drive, it just wasn't really directed anywhere specific. For the majority of the time, I didn't even know what Asexuality was and I grew up in a conservative Christian household, so I just thought that my lack of interest in sex was only tied to the perception of virtue and purity that I grew up with.
omg SAME. It took me so long to realize that it wasn't actually that I was a good little Christian that wanted to wait until marriage. Like... it's not waiting if you don't want what happens at the end.
Same! My initial exposure to ace representation was from the sex-repulsed viewpoint, so I thought that asexuality was something I didn't "get" because sex was for the most part enjoyable to me. I thought I was just bi/pan because I felt neutral towards others. It wasn't until I read a thread that was basically "What does being ace mean to you?" that suddenly some of the perspectives really resonated with me. Growing up in a conservative+religious environment cut off so many chances for experiencing other perspectives.
I felt the same way. I tried to be a good little Christian woman...well, that turned out swimmingly.
Are you now free from the Christian mythology?
@@mikean7074 Yes, I actually am. Mike, after a priest asked me with concern whether I was happy when I said I wasn't married with children, something went off in my brain. I was considered a lesser person because I wasn't in a relationship when society said I should be. That was the last time I attended church for over five years now. I joke with my father (my mom would disown me if I ever told her I was asexual let alone biromantic) that I'm going to dance around paganly in the woods and build and alter to the "Olde Gods" and demand sacrifice. Honestly, I think Jesus would be pretty damn cool and loving of LGBTQIA+ people...it's just some of his followers that concern me.
This video was incredible. I'm so glad you brought up Otis from Sex Education in potential ace rep section cause that is also a hill I would die on. He gave off huge ace vibes in the beginning out the show and having him figure out his asexuality while giving sex advice at school would have been so incredibly compelling. And all of it would have lead up to him finally having honest conversation with his mother. UGH!!
Omg same, while I adore the show, I cannot express how disappointed I was with the opening to season 2. The ace vibes were so strong, and he would have been an incredibly positive example of ace representation. I will always be grateful for the ace representation we got in Sex Education, as it is one of the few positive examples, but I can't help by agree with Rowan, that in a show focused so heavily on exploring sexual identity, it seems like a token gesture.
Honestly I feel the same I love the show, And I was really hoping for Otis to be an ace rep, A little disappointing the writers and go that direction but I still love the show
Edit: so I recently re-watched season 1 And I think I might have found a semi crucial reason as to why Otis wasn’t written to be ace, it probably would’ve made Eric ridiculously unlike able in retrospect, throughout the entire season he’s constantly pressing Otis to get laid and even while I was watching it it felt real pushy so that Might have something to do with it
I cried at the scene with Florence, I had never heard acceptance like that, and I spent most of my teens thinking I was broken and had to like something and girls were pretty so I'm a lesbian??? and I would have looved it if Otis was Ace too, because he would have been me basically, my mum was the school nurse, so everyone asked me who's never even seen someone's genitals irl about sex (and relationships and I've never been in one of those either, woo AroAce 😅) And I'd just go 'hey so someone wants to know what happens if X happens while you're having sex' or 'does anal hurt' and I'd just get an answer with an added, 'tell whoever to be safe, there's condoms and lube outside the nurses office, and remember foreplay'
I really wish they'd at least made him demisexual to account for the sudden interest. It would have made sense and still represented something really underrepresented. It was a huge bummer for me too, more as a writer, I felt like it was poor character writing and they changed his character.
I’m so glad I’m not the only one who was disappointed by the chance they totally missed with Otis. And while the actual canon ace rep did feel pretty tokeny, it’s still a scene that makes me cry every time i see it (/pos) and that I hope has helped a bunch of people who didn’t know the term asexual figure themselves out and feel less alone.
Part of what feels so charged about ace rep is that it's practically nonexistent AND it can be erased at basically any time. For me, that's particularly true for aroace rep, which is even harder to find and easier to negate. I spent so long knowing I was ace and assuming that romance would eventually happen for me. Partially because that's how it worked for all the ace characters I'd found, partially because aromantism seemed both terrifying and monstrous. Going into Critical Role knowing that Cad was aroace was honestly revolutionary and I'm not sure I would have managed to finish coming out otherwise.
I should probably, y'know, actually finish the video before commenting, but even as someone that isn't aro, Caduceus absolutely warms my heart.
The way both player and DM seamlessly integrate scenes that show, even if it's in a particularly silly manner, the experience of being blind to these things that everyone assumes are universal, is just great.
Same here, I'm so glad that cad is openly aroace. That was the main reason I started watching the show, the casual representation without any harmful questioning by any of his friends was so meaningful to me.
He also feels like a completed character, not like there is any missing due to his lack of romantic interest.
Oh Cad’s aroace? Cool, explains why I vibe with him so much lol
@@AtlasNL Yes, he is. He pretty much describes his feelings in ep 114 (coincidentally it aired during ace week) and out of the episode Taliesin confirmed his sexuality.
@@sturmklinge9642 Ah cool! I’m not that far with C2 so I didn’t know that
Making the character of Otis asexual would have also gone against the stereotype that ace people are frigid sex-hating people, or are just too naive to understand sex. This been said there are members of they asexual community that dislike sex, and there is nothing wrong with it, my point is that having a health knowledge of sex is useful for everyone, ace people included.
I also really wanted an ace sex educator
Exactly! I know a lot about sex, and I'm ace lmao
With all those historical quotes lining asexuality up right alongside homosexuality and bisexuality is proof we Aces DO in fact belong in the LGBTQIA community. I get told so often that we don't belong, or we can only belong if our romantic orientation is gay/bi/etc. It'll be great having some actual historical references to fall back on in defense of our inclusion. While I personally fit into the LGBT in ways other than being Ace (I'm biromantic and nonbinary) it gets on my nerves when I keep seeing my fellow Aces being brushed off and excluded by other LGBT folk.
I saw someone throw a tantrum online, declaring separate romantic and sexual orientations is homophobic. They turned their nose up when others brought up the existence of people who are ace or aro, but not both. They only quieted down when I mentioned I’m physically attracted to one gender and romantically inclined to another.
In my day, I was taught to use "Q" in LGBTQ for all the other ways in which my romantic/sexual orientation/gender identity didn't line up with cis/het/romantic frame work, and I still kind of like that. I feel like sometimes it can be overwhelming to try to find a word for all the ways I'm different, but I am different. I think the community should welcome all comers- I see the side of LGBTQ as a safe place for people awakening to the fluctuating, amorphous, ever evolving nature of human consciousness and therefore all aspects of human Identity, sexual, romantic, gendered, and otherwise. I was also taught by older queers in school as a baby queer that "Q" also stood for "Questioning" who you are, what you want, what feels good. I think we are all entitled to keep making it up as we go along, and I think our community should be a home for people who awakening from the limiting sense of identity we get from the mainstream cis/het/gender binary and sexual stagnation. In the old mainstream culture, even questioning is a cardinal sin.
Yesssssss I'm so exhausted being told I'm not valid from fellow LGBTQ+ people it hurts and is tiring
There is something for gatekeepers.
It's called a bat.
@@saraquill so in their brain a man who's ace but is daiting another man and deeply in love with him is somehow homophobic. People have the weirdest ideas
honestly I hadn't realised how scarce asexual representation has been. It actually disgusts me how much modern media equates sex with love/ a way of validifying a romantic relationship is so tired. I really hope western media moves away from hypersexualisation at least a bit.
Side note: when she discussed asexuality being a spectrum it really pleased me, because a lot of people don't seem to understand that.
Well to be fair this video only focused on tv and movies - there's more ace representation in stuff like books, comics, etc (tho tbf mostly in niche/non-mainstream circles)
The lack of any basic knowledge of ace stuff is so frustrating, especially because it means that all of us have so little room. Explaining ace stuff is very important but also as a sex-repulsed aroace person, it's super dehumanizing to continually explain my existence in disclaimers that don't apply to me. Its already pretty alienating to go through life as a person that doesn't do sex or romance in a culture that's obsessed with them. To have to also explain my identity to every random cishet gen-x co-worker with caveats that some aro/ace people DO still have sex and relationships is exhausting. Like it's important, but it sucks. Can we just have some basic representation already?
i say i use "i don't get the hubbahubbas"
There might be something off about me; if someone doesn't know shit, I'm happy to share knowledge with them, and if they're dickheads.... bruh, I know how to be a dickhead, too, you wanna throw fighting words, you better be ready to catch some fighting words. Or I might just laugh and point out how their way of life is dumb as shit and essentially "no u" them to death.
I agree. I feel like most times when an asexual and/or aromantic person comes out, you have to explain so much terminology and everything and it can be really tiring. As a bi greyromantic asexual, it is so exhausting to feel like if I want to fully come out to someone, I have to take them through each part of my identity and explain things, but then if it’s their first time hearing these terms, I feel like I have to talk about all these nuances so they don’t get one idea of asexuality and whatnot. So I never know where to draw the line. I have definitely gone too far into very ace-specific discussion topics with unsuspecting allos who just learned the term “asexual” lol
ANYWAYS, I agree that it’d be great if most people had a general understanding of asexuality
God yeah, work and family functions can be exhausting along this vein
The most ace experience of my life was my mum saying 'what's that' to my coming out.
If people don't see us in media it's difficult for them to see us in life
The massive lack of asexual representation in media is probably a big part of why I latched onto The Outer Worlds so hard when I played it for the first time, major character Parvati Holcomb is a bi ace woman whose asexuality is a major aspect of her storyline, and while going through it, you have the option to say your player character is asexual too, and if you do, her sheer relief at finally meeting someone else like her and finding out she's not alone is... one of my favorite moments in any piece of media, ever.
Parvati was my absolute favourite companion
I was so shocked when I came by this reveal when I was playing through for the first time! I already liked the game and Parvati, but this made it one of my favorite games for sure.
@@killedbyrabbits Yeah I didn't really notice until I watched this video.
Then I say "me too", I just started crying for about five minutes. It was so important to me because I was dating a guy I loved but didn't understand what was going on. And at that moment I understood.
@@Glashata Well I'm really glad you were able to figure it out as that must have been so difficult to deal with before.
I read a popular WEBTOON Brimstone and Rose’s where the main character is Bi and it’s offhanded mentioned in extra content that her endgame love interest is ace and I’ve seen people complaining it ruins the ship and the author literally had to be like, I’m ace ace people are real he’s literally and old times detective demon, I don’t know why the asexuality is the detail y’all are getting caught up on.
I love that comic! Knowing that he's Ace is just a massive bonus for me because as a Biromantic Ace myself, I feel represented by both of the main characters :)
@@spacecloud6979 Laz is biromatic ace/ demisexual
The thing in Sex Education that made me so irritated was that Jean never said to her son in the first season, "hey, you're valid even if you never want to masturbate ; asexuality and any other orientation is valid". Because he obviously didn't know what asexuality was when talking to Florence, so he didnt learn that from his mum like he learned about all the other sex-related stuff. So it was annoying that a) Otis seemed ace and then 'got over it', and b) that his mum the sex therapist only seems to bring up asexuality when it's like the clearest, most stereotypical and perfectly articulated case of asexuality ever. Not that Flo's situation was bad, but the reality can be more complicated and confusing than that-- it would have been great to see Otis be ace too to show that.
You put the feelings I got from the show so perfectly into words, I’m amazed! I honestly hoped that Otis was going to be ace (maybe demi?) but they absolutely butchered that hope in the later seasons ;__;
I think the show made Otis allo by default. I thought he was ace at the start and I don't wanna remove autonomy, but he's grey ace to me
@@grimgingrin830 At least I can do words! But when I was watching those first episodes it took me ages to figure out my *feelings* and why I felt so uncomfortable! Eventually I figured it was probably because even as I was seeing Otis as ace, I was already mentally preparing myself for the fall -- for them taking that hope away. I can imagine how thrilled I would've been if he'd been confirmed as somewhere on the ace spectrum! If only! One day we'll have (many more) nice things!
I think that part of the story though, both Otis and Jean seem to have all this insight into relationships but still really struggle with their own relationship and communication. jean obviously has huge blind spots when it comes to otis.
@@zenithquazar4767 Yes! That is so true but I had never thought it in those words before!
I know this isn't a channel that talks about anime, but I think it's worth mentioning - Bloom Into You has some complex aro representation, it starts out with two girls bonding because they've never fallen in love until one of them falls for the other. The other girl is possibly demiromantic, in the manga they eventually form a relationship, but her arc in the anime shows how the way she cares for the other girl isn't the same, but she still wants to be close to her. There's also a character of a boy who doesn't experience romantic attraction, but likes giving other people advice on their relationship problems.
There's also the main character in the comedy The Disastrous Life of Saiki K, who says a few times he's probably never going to be in a relationship and doesn't understand his peers obsession with seeing girls naked. Saiki has literally every power in the world, including seeing through objects and reading people's minds, so the way he sees other humans is muscle and bone, and mind reading allows him to know people for who they truly are so he's the only one not smitten with the most popular girl, but that's never something he's troubled by, he just doesn't like people that way.
omg yes. anime sometimes seems to be a whole other world on the video-essays environment, but it would be amazing if she talked about these two shows. maki explaining to yuu the difference between them (that i interpreted as: he is aroace and she is demiromantic) helped me so much accepting myself as aroace
These are great recommendations and I would also toss in The Case Files of Jeweler Richard. One of the main characters, Seigi, has a close friend, Shouko, who has a crush on but is awkward about acting on it. But as we learn more about her, especially after her focus episode, It seems like while she cares for Seigi back she's also some flavor of ace and not really interested in romantic relationships, though she feels pressure to get married and like something is wrong with her that she didn't really want to.
I've also seen people make an interesting case study of the main character of Dr Stone. Mostly yt clip compilations but they felt pretty compelling.
Saiki K has an openly bisexual character (who’s the most sexualized character unfortunately) but I remember that meant a lot to me at the time
Omg I love bloom into you!! When I realized that Yuu was most likely ace I was so happy lol
I know that not many people think this, but i always wished that Captain America was asexual. As yes he loves peggy carter but it was never shown to be more then strong romantic feelings. And as throught out the whole MCU he was never really shown to have strong sexual desires. And he as a character would have been really good representation if the writers when with it.
You have opened my eyes to so many possibilities
Yes, Captain America gives of very strong ace spec vibes. Personally I think he is demi. But either way I too wish they had made that canon.
Time for me to go find some fanfiction, methinks
Yep, I really like Cap for no sexual desires, romantic were fine. But they're ruined it in She-Hulk where Jennifer had obssesion if Cap was still a virgin or not. They revealed he had sex (we don't know with who) and was not a virgin anymore. So this more virgin-shaming here. Why it bothered her so much? It was really unnecessary, not only for Cap, but really made nothing with Jennifer character. It was really forced.
I have a love/hate relationship with Sebastian. On one hand, terrible representation, but on the other hand, ✨asexual icon ✨
I think he made some great points about Tron
The Tron clip made me laugh out loud and I cannot think of a funnier choice they could have gone with for that one.
In terms of unconfirmed Asexuals in media; I've always looked to Elsa from Frozen as being either Asexual or even Aromantic Asexual. When I was teenager and not yet realized that I was Ace I found Elsa very comforting.
For me it was the misanthropy of metal that gave me comfort. Classics such as Slipknot's People = Shit, and My Plague; Spineshank's Violent Mood Swings; Soilwork's Distance; Fear Factory's Linchpin, and Edgecrusher; Mudvayne's Dig; Chimaira's Army of Me; Arch Enemy's Nemesis.. stuff like that. XDa
As for me I don't like unconfirmed asexuals. I want text; not subtext.
Its not a show, but i HIGHLY recommend The Magnus Archive, a horror podcast. The main character is ace, but hes openly bi and his man romance is with a man and sex is just not really relevant. Their romance is deep and intense and grows organically.
Showing being ace doesnt mean you cant also have romantic relationships if theyre not aromantic.
@UCa67ZH0T1w_FM8JBAf_hYUg and also Sam from the sheridan tapes!!! and jet sequliak from the penumbra podcast is aro/ace. Theres just. Such diversity.
Came here to recommend TMA for the same reason of the asexual protaganist. That said, do not go in there expecting romance to blossom immediately or take up a large proportion of the plot through most of it, and DO note that it is anything but an upbeat and uplifting story. It is, however, utterly brilliant and extremely well written and well acted.
@@Graid oh yeah for sure. The romance is very slow burn but boy. Is it beautiful.and heartwrenching. That said the show is a tragedy cosmic horror so yeah keep in mind it is Not a happy story
podcasts honestly put other media to shame for queer representation lol. the main lead in ars paradoxica, sally grissom, is canonically aroace and chloe from the bright sessions is asexual as well :)
As a person who is aroace, I usually find characters that arent in a relationship and headcanon them as aroace. There is still a shockingly minimumal number of characters who dont get into relationships.
Yes! It's sad that we basically have to reclaim those characters for us because nobody will have the guts to finally make it canon. C'mon, not that difficult but apparently if Disney made Elsa explicitly aroace the world was gonna break or something
Same! Since there is next to no explicit aroace rep I have decided to operate under the assumption "aroace until proven otherwise" lol. If a character isn't shown to experience romantic or sexual attraction they are now aroace. Like, if they don't give us rep we'll just have to make our own :D
and then people insist on shipping those characters bc apparently they "need" to be shipped *sigh*
@@shinekitten7669 yes!! like reyna from heroes of olympus/trials of apollo (mostly toa because this scene is from there) she specifically mentions that she kinda “forced herself to be attracted to people” and how she doesn’t like being forced shipped. the word asexual or aromantic wasn’t explicitly mentioned in the book but it’s basically what the conversation was about how she’s not broken, and she doesn’t need someone else to “heal her heart”. she is pretty commonly shipped with another character and headcanoned as a lesbian (she could be ace lesbian but she gives me major aroace vibes) and when i say that i don’t think she’s lesbian, people call me homophobic (ma’am i am literally a sapphic aroace wtf-)
@@shinekitten7669 Well we can't have characters being happily single now can we? /s
"Humans are complicated little flesh beings" definitely needs to be on a PRIDE t-shirt!! 🙆🏾♀️😹💥💯👍🏽 If you ever decide to make merch Rowan, I'm buying that one for sure! 😉🥰
the loss of potential for ace story-lines is crazy to me. just looking at a fandom i read fics for regularly, the magnus archives, (who's main character is asexual though it isn't explored very much within the text, just established as a norm as the rest of the rep in the story is) its so easy to see the potential that asexual stories have. if you look at the asexual tag on ao3 tma has the most fics under that tag. i tend to read the pairing jon/martin or some poly variation of that and within that pairing there are so, so many fics that deal with jon's asexuality. a lot of coming out fics, depicting conversations and negotiation around his asexuality, what it means to him personally and people's take on that. some of them are smut fics and even then, there's conversation or mention of such that describe his personal 'brand'' of ace as established by the author who is usually asexual themself. in fact, a vast majority of creators in the fandom are asexual and the fandom has created a safe space for ace people to congregate. i've met so many people in the fandom who are ace, had extensive discussions with them, read fics, seen art and just so much positivity. i've identified as ace for years but this fanbase allowed me to explore my sexuality, understand it and its intricacies (as well as my aromanticism), understand queer platonic partners and so on and this is honestly thanks to fanfic writers. i think having stories that serve as this pathway to acceptance within the mainstream media would do a lot of good and also open up a new world of stories to write.
THIS!!! I literally had the exact same experience, searching for ace Jon fanfics on ao3. I love the exploration of asexuality in all of these fics, its so nice seeing ace content in such a welcoming fandom. As an ace person, I was so happy when I found out that Jon was canonically asexual, and then seeing all the ace content that the fanbase has created. There's so much potential and need for ace stories in mainstream media, and I hope it continues to get more and more representation.
LITERALLY same, it feels so so so good to see fellow aces address and use Jon’s (canonical :D!!!) asexuality to create amazing stories.
I've had TMA on my list of podcasts to listen to for a couple months now, but this has inspired me to finally listen to it
a character i've always thought gave off the STRONGEST ace/aro vibes is Saiki from "The disastrous life of Saiki K". i'm not sure if you didn't cover him because he's from a japanese anime and you were focusing more on western representation, or if it's because he's one of those characters who never explicitly say "i'm asexual", but to me (an aroace person) the representation is there even if it wasn't intentional.
the show is a comedy and a bit that becomes a running-joke throughout it is that saiki keeps having girls fall in love with him, but he makes it very very clear that he's not interested and that their attraction to him are bothering him. even when the prettiest girl in his class who EVERYONE has a crush on becomes increasingly interested in him, he does everything in his power to try and make her dislike him and leave him alone. he never shows romantic or sexual interest in anyone, even goes so far as to say that he doesn't understand romance and sex and why everyone else is so obsessed with it.
i kept watching the show waiting to be disappointed and have an episode where saiki would eventually start being interested in someone or develop a love interest, but it never happened. so as far as i'm concerned, even if it's never made explicit or confirmed, he's one of the best representation of an aro/ace character in modern media.
Yeah I got ace vibes from him as well
Ngl it seems pretty hard to not be aroace with his powers
About Sex Education: in season three there's a shot that very briefly lingers on Steve (Aimee's boyfriend) wearing a sign that says 'I think I might be demi-sexual'.
Aside from it being blink-and-you-miss-it and not as explicit as I would like, there was a shriek from me.
The Otis example is so interesting to me. Like, it's not as if writing a straight character with a debilitating sexual hang-up isn't valid or interesting, but you can't blame ace viewers for reading asexuality into it and then being disappointed when it doesn't pan out that way. It reminds me of Alex Strangelove, which many people expected to be about bisexuality, since the plot revolves around a teenage boy with a girlfriend who also becomes attracted to a man. Then, when he turned out to be gay, lots of bi folks were disappointed, but as a gay man I found the film to be a really valuable exploration of compulsory heterosexuality. The writer was doing something good and interesting, but it's totally understandable that not everyone was happy with it, too. And I think neither example would be so painful if there was just more good ace and bi rep out there to begin with.
I’d say it’s not really fair to compare it to Alex Strangelove, because even if Alex isn’t bi, he’s gay which is still rep, but Otis being allo (not ace/aro) isn’t rep at all. In one of these situations there is still representation in the other it’s just a missed opportunity
Yeah, I'm gay and Allo, and while watching series 1, I was convinced that he was going to come out at the end of the series (or at some other point) as ace, and when he didn't, I was mad and confused, because it felt like it came out of nowhere, and felt queerbaity, even if it was unintentional on the part of the writers
@@mai-ya-hee It may be important rep for people of a variety of allosexuallities who have gone through sex-related trauma though
@Joëlle Weetjewel I don't recall that, I must have not noticed or forgotten about that while I was watching it
In the Ace spectrum I find it's especially difficult to convey Demi without accidentally undermining Asexuality itself... Too many people lack the knowledge that Ace exist much less that there's a variety to it, making the Grey and Demi-sexual parts of the spectrum even more difficult to give examples of. The sheer level of knowledge needed to be given to the audience makes it so much more difficult than it should be.
There is a fairly simple solution (in concept at least) to this. There's no need for ace representation, what we need is normalising not wanting sex or relationships, so people stop pressuring us about it. And also sending "ship culture" to graveyard :')
You don't have to spell it out how aromantic or asexual a character is, you just have to teach people to stop caring about the romantic life of
1. fictional characters (except when it's necessary for the story)
2. Especially real people. The number of dare i say creeps who ship real people is.. scary.
the outer worlds has parvati! she brings up that physical stuff just isn't for her and her campaign missions involve helping her get things for the perfect date with another mechanic lady she fancies. it's so sweet and wholesome.
I also love basically any interpretation of Nikola Tesla, which tends to play up the fact he prioritizes science over sex. I'm pretty sure his closest relationship was with a pigeon, and it was obviously a friendly one more than anything.
She was the best part of that game!
Yes! I was hoping she would’ve been mentioned because she’s a great example of representation imo
One day I will write an essay on Perry the Asexual Platypus.
No seriously, it's canon and...really interesting?
Please send me a link when you do!
What makes it so interesting is how hypersexualized spies are in pop culture and not only is Perry the Platypus not hypersexualized but also asexual. Dan Povenmire originally said that Perry is married to his job, and I wonder if the decision spanned from him and Swampy Marsh being tired of people asking him to give Perry a girlfriend (which he has talked about in unrelated contexts).
@@shoyuramenoff See I hadn't even thought about this angle.
I don't think at the time they knew they where writing an Asexual character but I do think they where writing a character who didn't experience sexual attraction from at least early on and where set on sticking with it.
Especially considering the strange relationships villains and their spies have toghether
I still remember this bizzare episode where dr. Doofenshmirtz got himself a new spy and it was treated as if he cheated on Perry
I don't think the relationship between a villain and a spy is romantic in the universe. I also don't think it's friendship. It's just own thing. Just like bromance. Not a romantic relationship but much more intense than just friendship
@@angelikaskoroszyn8495 Yes!! I'd argue that it's one of the few, if not intentional at first, canon depictions of a queerplatonic relationship on tv. Especially when you get in to the Good Doof episodes and MML where the nemesis aspect is gone so they're just written as...platonic life partners.
I was really disappointed that they didn't do anything more with Florence. I hoped they'd expand her role in S3. In her conversation with Jean it was clear she's ace but not aro, so they could have explored that (I was thinking maybe they could do something with Jackson, if he continued to do theatre; maybe they'd become close and fall for each other, so it'd be interesting to see them navigate a relationship). But nah, she wasn't even in S3. 😑 Btw, it seems like Steve is demisexual (he wore a "I think I'm demisexual" sign during the rebellion scene) so now I'm hoping they explore the ace spectrum more through him next season. But after Florence I'm not holding my breath (also because Steve is a pretty minor character so idk if they'll even want to expand his role). But here's to hoping, I guess.
for a show that's completely about sex i appreciated the "subversions", like:
1. otis' suppression and complicated relationship to sex (at least initially)
2. inclusion of an ace character (and a great line from jean), even if she was a very very minor character
jackson's been portrayed in a pretty cishet way, except for his attraction to cal and the conversation they had about it (really good convo tho). it would've been really interesting to explore boundaries and nuances in attraction with florence and jackson. as a nonbinary person i have mixed (but overall positive) thoughts about cal, and i think a florence-jackson arc would've made cal even more of a character with their identity as their only plot point. this happens a lot with people of all sorts of identities, but nonbinary people throw a wrench into the entire binary system that's the foundation for most societies currently.
from a plot standpoint cal obviously makes sense, but i think it's just a case of more and more characters being added. i like steve a lot too, but i think the like "main" of the main student characters have gone from
S1 - otis, maeve, eric (jackson, adam)
S2 - otis, maeve, eric (jackson, adam, ola, aimee)
S3 - otis, maeve, eric, adam (ruby)
after s1, the focus on characters has increasingly spread more evenly, and more characters have been introduced. so after a character not in the main trio's arc is done, they fade into the background or completely disappear. it's hard to balance so many characters, and while it's definitely a missed opportunity (otis and/or florence and/or steve) it's really hard to work out the logistics.
@@victai7014 Yeah, I totally get that and I loved Cal this season (and liked the storyline with them and Jackson). I still wish they explored the ace stuff more but I do understamd they have to juggle a lot of characters and only have 8 episodes to do that in.
One of my problems is with the term asexuality, since everyone quickly assumes asexuals = no sex. Even people that are deep in the queer space. You are then talking to people who are telling you that they of course know what asexuality means but don't really. I mean, my own therapist didn't really know for like a half of a year what I really mean by asexuality.
So I really like that usually every other video about asxuality start with a little explanation.
It's important to think of sexuality in general as a spectrum that is fluid and flexible.
Thank you for saying this, I feel your pain ❤
This was something I didn't understand and I've been openly bi and active in LGBTQ+ spaces since the 90s.
Someone pointed out to me that Ace folks still do things like holding hands, cuddling and kissing, they just don't think of them as sexual. It kinda blew my mind because I hadn't thought of that. It's totally obvious and speaks to the blind spots of my preconceived ideas.
Yes, this! People get very confused by the fact that I'm married and a parent and still asexual, because they automatically equate asexuality with no sex. I usually stick demi (thus the name) on the end. Even with other LGBTQ people, I usually have to explain :(
I had a long discussion with a friend outside the LGBTQ the other day. He could in no way wrap his head around asexuallity being fluid. "The A in front means NO sex. Linguistically that is true so people who calls themselves asexuals should never have sex. They should invent a new name for the other things then".
I tried to explain that there are other names already, but people barely know what it means to be asexual already. It is both a spectrum and an umbrella term, but he would not get past the "A".
You are so right about Otis Sex Education. I didn’t even realize how much I internalized his plot line until you mentioned it in this video. After watching seasons one and two, I kept thinking that I was like him, and if I just tried it I would be ‘cured’, and I got incredibly frustrated with myself when it didn’t work. I’m only recently coming to terms with my own asexuality after wrestling with it for at least five years now, because I kept waiting for myself to grow out of it or change the way I felt. Representation is really really important.
Something I think you missed here with Sheldon, Spock, and Data here is that there is a lot of crossover between what people interpret as ace-coded and autistic-coded characters. Not sure if you plan to touch on that in your next video, but it's a big issue when people conflate these two identities or imply that there is some sort of causal link between autism and sexuality. Both labels in the eyes of the general public imply a certain degree of immaturity and childlike naivety that can be dehumanizing, and the implicit linkage of these identities contributes to the desexualization of disabled people.
One thing I love about the audiodrama community in podcasts is the asexual representation. It is of course important to have on screen representation since that is much more visible, but podcasts and audiodramas often have reasonably large followings of dedicated listeners and it's nice to feel seen/represented in the narrative.
I was really disappointed in The Big Bang Theory with Amy and Sheldon because it would have been such a great opportunity to have an asexual couple on screen in such a big way and then there was a flip switched and Amy became so sex obsessed. Given the time that show came out and the kind of people who were behind it, I don't expect it's something that would have been handled well if they did go that way, unfortunately.
Mainstream rep is lagging behind indie rep, as always. Most a-spec rep is in self-published works, such as webcomics, indie books, fanfiction, or web series. Then after this come books in general. Then TV. Then movies. Unsurprisingly there is less rep the more money and large production teams are involved. And I love indie rep because it's often ownvoices and because it can go deeper than Asexuality 101, which I'm a bit bored of as someone who has identified as ace for eight years. But if we want to raise awareness about a-spec issues we need good mainstream rep.
Yeah, I too, get board of Asexuality 101 and would like to see more representation that get's past the basics. I'd be nice to see peeople talk about sex favorable vs sex neutral vs sex repulsed. And talk about stuff like demisexuality/romance and graysexuality/romance
but I guess we're not gonna see more of that stuff without more people being familiar w/ the very basics
For the Kdrama fans the Series Run On has an asexual side character who explicitly states that she’s ace and explains that that doesn’t negate the fact that she loves to date and wants to find love!
I highly, HIGHLY recommend the book Ace: What Asexuality Reveals About Desire, Society, and the Meaning of Sex by Angela Chen. I've known I was asexual since I was a pre teen but even reading this book this year (I'm now in my late 20s) I learned so much, both about my own asexuality but also about how others experience asexuality differently.
just bought the book, thank you for the rec!!!
@@TheFishWhat Yay! I hope you get much out of it!
I'm learning a LOT from this one. I hope the algorithm picks it up.
I'm slowly but surely coming to terms with being on the ace spectrum. I've known for a decade i wasn't straight-I find both women and men attractive sometimes-but something always felt off. Different. It's only because of UA-cam, and a small community of fellow lgbtqia+ writers on Tumblr that I've finally started understanding more about myself. Thanks for this video, Rowan!
It has taken me 35 years to finally come to terms that I am biromantic and ace. I too always felt twinges of attractiveness and almost platonic longing for both men and women, but something always felt off as well and I couldn't place it. I was told my doctors and therapists that it was simply my ADHD medication causing lack of sex drive or a repressed memory. I went through years upon years thinking I was a monster until I discovered a wonderful ace model on Instagram and and ace comic writer who I always admired-- it made be feel less alone and broken.
I’ve felt the same as well! I had “crushes” on both genders growing up, but sexual attraction never “kicked in” for me ever.
I like hearing this side about Sex Education because I was SO disappointed with how little Florence was in, how her whole discovery was all in just one episode and then she vanished until the last episode of Season 2 when she says "She changed my life", but like, we never see how!
And you're right that Otis had so much potential to be ace and could have been such and interesting storyline!
I was rereading Anne of Green Gables and realized that Mathew Cuthbert is an aroace icon
Yes! Anne herself has a pretty queerplatonic relationship with Diana and I just love everyone in that story.
@@heatherlee2967 I always think their relationship is the definition of a romantic friendship!
I did the same! When I watched Anne with an E I immediately went "OH aroace icon alert!"
Tbh her absolutely *hating* gilbert blythe for the first book or two bc she couldnt stand men seemed pretty aroace to me lol
I would just like to say thank you so much for such an incredible video. Living in such a hypersexualised world, I often find it difficult to express my asexual identity and live as my most authentic self, but it is content like this that helps remind me how valid we are. Given how little we get, it's always an absolute kick in the teeth when we get poor or downright harmful representation, but those very few times that it gets done right, like Todd Chavez, just shows how important good representation is. To all my fellow asexuals, we are here, we are valid, and most importantly, we are not broken.
I really love Jughead in the comic books. When I was younger, he was just that fun "oh no I only love food" guy that made me really happy. I related to him and enjoyed his stories more than Archie's. Because I mean, everyone can relate to only "falling in love" with someone for their cooking right? ...right? Well anyway, when his new comic came out (in which he explicitly states he's asexual) I was really happy. It went beyond coming out and more into the problems you can face with friends or potential partners that don't understand you. Those plotlines were, sometimes painfully, relatable but it was refreshing to see. Jughead has always been wonderful representation for me and, while it does suck he wasn't depicted as asexual in the show, his depictions in comics leave me feeling seen.
I find it kinda sad, that they don't have a regular character who's ace in Sex Eduaction
I think it’d be really interesting looking into the frequency of asexual characters in podcasts like The Magnus Archives, Ars Paradoxica, the Bright Sessions and a weird quantity of others. It seems it’s where we get the most representation.
I work in a kids toy shop, and I had a customer at work today in her early 70s, late 60s who was looking for something her grandson had circled in a magazine but she'd forgotten it, and I suggested s few things and ended with Pokémon cards due to his age, and we got to talking and she saw I really enjoyed my work and I told her (as I do everyone) growing older is inevitable, growing up is a choice 😉 and she got a laugh out of that one and she was saying something about how her grandson was growing up quite fast and she said with pride that some of the adults had been talking about a kid maybe being gay, and their tone was obviously a little not happy or something, and he'd just gone 'and so what?' and completely dismissed it as anything and we talked some more about how people don't seem to think that it's just human naturr, so I figured she seemed nice so I said "personally I'm asexual and I've even been asked by my doctor, 'are you sure it's not brain damage', so I'm happy that kids these day will stand up for others who might not be exactly like them" and she went "oh, my granddaughter said she was asexual, but I didn't really want to ask too much" so I told her that for me it's like I'm missing a part of my brain, the one that sees flirting or experience sexual desire for others, like I've been bitten by what I thought was a friendly conversation, you see how I am, we've been talking while I'm at work for almost 10 minutes, so I've not understood that something was flirting befor I had to shut something down because to me it came out of the blue with sexual intentions, so then other times I've been too harsh when something wasn't flirting and been bitten that way with a potential friendship.
And I wish I hadn't got another customer at that point I would have loved to talk a little more, especially to say it's different for everyone and that I'm also aromatic so that puts another filter on my experiences, or mention that were something like 1½-2% of the earth's population... So 120-160.. million people who identify as Ace, so we're not some rare find
This is such a needed video. I used to work in a mental health practice where the owner, an older LGBTQ+ woman, said asexuality was the product of trauma and shouldn't be treated as a valid expression of sexuality. I left not too long after that, but it woke me up to how dangerous this lack of information is.
I first learned of the ace spectrum in my 50s, when I read an original superhero universe fic that used the word 'demisexual' to describe one of the characters. Once I looked up the definition, I recognized a lot of myself... and also (posthumously) each of my parents. So I was faced with the hilarious irony of thinking myself as het all my life, when the two people who modeled for me what I thought heterosexuality looked like weren't het, either. ...So I never felt "broken," growing up -- just utterly confused by everyone else. Like being the only sober person at a party watching everyone else get progressively drunk.
Thanks for making this! My favourite asexual character is still Granny Weatherwax from Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels. Though the term is never used, it's quite clear she's asexual and quite likely aromantic, in fact it becomes a small plot point in Lords and Ladies when other characters are surprised she is able to ride a unicorn (which supposedly is something only virgins can do). And this came out in 1992! Reading that book really helped me understand and contextualize how I felt myself.
In Star Trek, Odo reads a lot more as ace than Spock imo. Most of the time Spock could just be read as not wanting to mix his work and personal life, but because in DS9 we see characters in downtime as well so much more than in other most other Star Trek shows it becomes a lot harder to read Odo (especially in early seasons) as having sexual or romantic attraction (and then the show adds in a really forced romance with no chemistry with obvious Lesbian Major Kira, and the weird thing with the Female Changeling, but neither of those seemed to have any chemistry whatsoever to me). It's a real shame of a missed opportunity for me because otherwise Odo looks like a big example of being triple-A, Ace, Aro, Agender, but it being the 90s they had to go and ruin it :(
yeah odo definitely has aroace vibes; he's said many times that "he doesn't understand the human need for romance/sex"
Thank you for this! Spock reads way more as gay to me than ace (although you can be both), not only because it's established he's not interested in women but also a lot of the things he says can be seen as either related to his difficulty accepting his emotions/the fact he's half human or a really compelling experience of internalised homophobia. I have nothing against people who see him as ace, but as you say Odo fits it way more accurately.
Spock is really complicated because the whole point of this chatacter arc is that he DOES have feelings and emotions, just that he is Vulcan so he does not express them in way human society is used to.
I would love nothing more than to see a heteroromantic asexual woman be in a romantic relationship with a man but sex isn't the reason why they are together. I would love to see myself. A woman is nearly always a sexual object. I'd like to see a mutual relationship focused on the romantic attraction and how they enjoy each other as people and one anothers company.
Speaking of non-representation representation: I hadn't even realised how firmly I'd headcanoned her as ace until I experienced crushing disappointment when Daniella from Sense8 ended the series in bed with Lito and Hernando. Honestly, I really thought they'd portrayed her in a queerplatonic relationship with the gay couple - enjoying *their* sexual relationship without wanting to be an active part of it herself, which I as an autochorissexual very much identified with. I try to pretend those last few minutes of the show never happened... ;)
On the other hand, I have a number of demisexual headcanons that you can pry from my cold, dead hands - most well-known is probably Alec from Shadowhunters, who seemed to have no interest in sex whatsoever until *after* he'd fallen in love with Magnus. It just seemed so obvious to me, because you have the direct comparison with his sister Isabelle and his parabatai Jace; both are shown as enjoying sex even when not in serious relationships. And considering the show had an ace character in Raphael, why not a demisexual Alec?
I will happily join you in that headcannon my friend
Spoilers for Fantasy High: Sophomore Year!
It might fall into the whole "not confirmed ace rep" situation, but I really loved how Riz Gukgak talked about not having an interest in sex or romance, even thoigh all of his friends are super interested in them. And how he notes that he doesn't know if he will ever be interested in smooching and such. And how his dad reassures him that he might experience those feelings later, and that would be okay. And that he also might never experience those things, and that would also be okay. I think that one of the many points of bi/ace solidarity is being told that our sexuality is "*just* a phase", which I know made me really nervous to come out as bi when I was younger. And I liked that the characters acknowledged that not being totally sure what your sexuality will be for the rest of your life doesn't make what your sexuality is right now any less legitimate.
I was surprised this wasn't mentioned when talking about dimension 20! I guess it could be interpreted as him not knowing what he likes yet?? But it seems like everyone interpreted that scene as him being aro/ace. I'm not sure if Murph has commented on it or anything tho
The main character of the horror podcast The Magnus Archives is asexual but not aromantic, which ends up being pretty rad representation. :)
I handed in a term paper about this topic just a week ago - representation is so important! I used Loveless as my main example 😊
(and I happy cried when book-Raphael had a szene where he comes out in the Malec Book)
I think my favourite ace representation is from a podcast called The Magnus Archives. The main character, Johnathan Sims is canon asexual and queer (not sure exactly of that label) but through out the podcast he has a happy relationship with his boyfriend and I saw myself for the first time. I don't have to be alone, I don't have to be seen as weird and I can be happy ^^
My teen years would have been so much less stressful and confusing if I'd come across any explicit representation at all in media and understood what tf was going on with me. I felt so isolated and alien. Seeing this rise in representation is great and all, but it's still largely based on meh stereotypes (which I'm sure you'll get into in the next video). I hope it continues to grow and more people can understand that asexuality is nuanced and complicated.
* btw, I know the Critical Role clip was centered on Taliesin, but man...Ashley dressed as Henry Crabgrass...I can't 😂
as an asexual from an older generation I have never seen any representation for us growing up and it was....extremely nightmarishly isolating....like I at one point was legit convinced I was an alien because as far as I knew I was the only one who felt this way let alone what it was even called there was no term for it in my culture back in the early 2000s and late 90s I did not first hear the term until i was in college and seeing any representation is very new for me I have been still vastly unexposed to this content until now even though i keep seeing little bits of it begin to crop up and i m told its not exactly new it feels very new to me because even in it existing for the most part i have never seen it before
I feel like the others in TBBT joking about Sheldon never bothered me. Sure, it's slightly dehumanising, but It for with their generally snarky humour (and also wider experiences of unsure/closeted asexual people being joked about by friends, even if it shouldn't). What bothered me more about the show is that Amy treats it like any psychological state: throughout the show Sheldon clearly says he does not intend to have children through sex, yet she uses "psychology" to make him want them. That, along with the other moments she treats him like a child being bribed, emphasise the trope that not wanting sex is due to immaturity.
On a side note, one character who gives me serious aro-ace vibes is Todoroki from My Hero Academia. I doubt that it's the writer's intentions (he's just meant to be the one who never learnt how to hang out with other children), but his genuine concern in response to flirtation really resonates.
Yeah.... really started hating her because of that.
Todoroki is a relatable character pass it on. I also read somewhere on the r/asexual someone having a headcanon of Bakugou being aroace, and I vibe with it ngl
One of the things I hate most about JJ Abrams' Star Trek films (and I hate a lot of things about them) is the relationship between Spock and Uhura. If one chooses to read Spock as romantically attracted to anyone in the original series, the fanfic writers had it correct-it's clearly Kirk! In general, however, I'd argue based on the categorization made by Star Trek in general that asexuality outside of pon farr is the norm for Vulcans; Tuvok, T'Pol, and Vorrik all seem to find it a distressing experience, and I'd argue that it's not meant to be asexual representation but rather an exploration for the damaging intersection between emotional repression and sexual shame.
I think JJ Abrams spent way too much time trying to no homo Kirk and Spock (and then Kirk and McCoy after the first movies) and that's one of the main reasons they are horrible.
KIRK AND SPOCK ONLY BECOME FRIENDS BECAUSE SPOCK FROM AN ANOTHER DIMENSION TELLS THEM TO DO IT. THAT WAS SO OBVIOUSLY TERRIBLE WRITING.
Beyond was the best one
like, I know pon farr is ridiculous (and I dont know how you kept a straight face talking about it ksksk) BUT, for me, as an ace afab person, it just sounds almost exactly how I fell whenever that time of the month comes up ksksk
What a great video! I realized I'm ace because of Sherlock (oh boy) which is hilarious because Moffat literally stated in one interview for the guardian that "We're not writing Sherlock as asexual because that would be boring" or something like that. And I was like. In that case you failed?
I haven't seen that Star Trek episode, "The Apple," but while I understand the disappointment of it not meeting the potential for an asexual portrayal, I think it makes sense in the context in which it was made. Star Trek was made on the 1960s, the time of the sexual revolution. I can totally see that storyline as part of a desire to break away from the prudishness constructed and perceived in a lot of mainstream 1950s culture.
Star Trek has so many "if only it wasn't the sixties" moments...
I really love the way that "Straight Up" on Netflix portrays two people's complicated relationship with sex. Two people who don't have sex enter into a non sexual relationship that is really loving and fulfilling for them, but have to grapple with whether or not non-sexuality is right for them
Does anyone else get Ace vibes from Matthew in Anne with an E? I know it could be a problematic inference as it could be inferred that his lack of sexual interest comes from trauma around his mother's death and also hes too old but it's nice to see a loving ace dad building his relationship with his sister
I love explaining the split attraction model to people - they learn so much about themselves
Wonderful video, as always.
I'm not ace really - I experience sexual *attraction* - I just don't have much libido, so I feel a good bit of solidarity with ace folks. It's good to see more visibility. A lot of it's imperfect, as you note, but it is nice seeing a greater range of human experience represented in media.
Honestly, i'm not even ace myself and i had otis headcanoned as ace from the very beginning. i was so certain that i was kind of taken aback when it was revealed he wasnt. I hope florence comes back and i hope they don't do the same with cal. they had a great arc in this season and i hope that the show does explore having sex as a nonbinary person in season 4
Not technically "on screen" but Jon the main character of the podcast the Magnus Archives is canonically ace and bi(?), its not a massive aspect of his character but it's cool to see an ace character that also gets to have a romance and not be deemed weird or strange because of his asexuality
One character I for sure headcannon is ace is Elsa from Frozen. Show Yourself feels like an accidental Ace/aro anthem. Basically she's finding comfort in the fact that she is enough just as she is. It made me so happy in theatres, you have no idea.
I wrote an essay about asexual representation in media for my Intro to Media class in 2014. The instructor was so happy because, in her own words, "it's a whole new topic!" She had never had anyone write about ace rep for her class, but she was also worried about whether I'd be able to find enough about it to fulfill the prompt. At the end of the essay, I included a paragraph about how the lack of positive ace rep in media (I only had negative or ace-bait examples in the body) affects ace people negatively due to lack of understanding and lack of visibility. I earned a 95% on that paper.
I'm not as much a TV watcher as I am a gamer. I can literally name 2 Ace characters in gaming. And 1 of them is only mentioned as Ace by the developers. Maya from Borderlands 2, I've been told by interviews with the game creators, is Ace. And Outer Worlds has Parvati. She is my shining example. She doesn't say the word, but how she describes herself... All Ace people I know, including myself, we know the feelings she talks about. Worried about being broken literally made me cry. Because I lived it so long. I thought I was bi because other than my thing for dude voices, I felt the same for girls as I did guys. Then I thought, naw maybe I am hetero but frigid. Because it was easier then trying to explain my lack of attraction to anyone. When I came out to my friends, I was told not to say it so loud because one of my friend's kids had friends over. And she didn't want to explain Asexuality to her kids and friend's kids. Worse, the friend who said it was Bi. I was told by another friend, well even though you have had to hid your sexuality from your job, you don't understand how it feels to be queer in the work place. Both have since apologized. But it still hurts to know that even parts of the queer community sees us as broken or so far in the closet we live in Narnia.
Worth pointing out that Parvati's writer is Kate Dollarhyde, who is herself ace!
Good to know, Thank You! 💜 🖤
Not gonna lie - I kept waiting for her thoughts on Nickelodeon using Spongebob in their Pride post and then later saying he was ace but it was something that was never mentioned or established in the show - other than that, great video! very informative :)
I was looking for someone to mention Spongebob!
Spongebob was actually explicitly called asexual in an interview with his now deceased original creator! I’m kind of disappointed Nick didn’t make it explicit he was ace in the pride post because a lot of people misinterpreted that and thought “oh Spongebob is gay now” and you really have to dig deep into decade old interviews to find his identity. It’s one of those odd ones where he’s explicitly ace but it’s hidden behind a curtain of non-specific queer that most audiences can’t be bothered to peek behind.
I really liked this video Rowan
Asexuals representation makes me so happy
Can we have Ace characters that AREN'T in relationships and want nothing to do with sex at all PLEASE. They're still pushing the idea that everyone wants to or needs to be in relationships. Everytime there's a "ace" character in something, but they're in a relationship and have sex makes me groan. It feels like such a cop-out. People always say "not all asexuals don't want sex or a relationship etc" but, PLEASE don't forget that MANY of us don't want those things.
The way I was introduced to asexuality/aromanticism was by a manga called "Bloom Into You". While none of the characters are labeled directly, some do state their interests.
The main character, a girl who is confused during the series about her feelings (and lack thereof) is someone that I headcanon as demisexual. There is one chapter where she talks about her lack of feelings to a guy she knows who responds saying that he feels the same. While the conclusion of that chapter is that while he is aro-ace, the main character is in a different situation (this and later developments make me think that she's demi/gray). They're conversation about their feelings really struck a cord with me, they say that romance feels like an entire different world (like watching a movie). They understand it but don't feel it. The guy is also interested in other people's romance, just not for him. That what separated him from other characters who claimed they had no interest in romance; Other characters were mostly geniuses that had no time for romance and saw the whole thing as a waste of time. The guy has fully accepted that he won't know love but still sees it as valuable/beautiful. This entire manga made me question who I am and made me realize that, like the guy, I'm too am asexual and aromantic.
YAY! I'm so glad to see this from you, your vids are always so well done and informative, I'm excited to have a video I can share with my family to explain asexuality and representation better than I could hope to explain.
Oh wow, I didn't even know about a lot of this rep, I thought House was the first show to represent asexuality (poorly). And YES THANK YOU Otis is so asexual i was hoping to god he would be revealed as ace, it was such a horribly missed opportunity. There are a ton of Definitely Ace characters in gaming too, I wonder if you'd be interested in tackling someone like Kiryu from Yakuza or Sam (who is "diagnosed" as asexual) from Death Stranding.
I'm so disappointed because generation got cancelled. The show is just OK but I adored the ace rep in the character Greta. She's a queer ace latina and she gets proper storylines and development and I would have loved to see her arc continue in future seasons 😢
I think I like genera+ion more than anyone else alive atm. I was crushed when it got cancelled. It’s hilarious, authentic, characters are lovable. I really don’t understand people’s dislike! Furthermore people gush over Love, Victor, like what??
as a fan of the shadowhunters books i feel the need to say that raphael's aroace identity is clearly stated in later books :)
rapahel in ths shadowhunters show was my ace awakening 😭
love to all my ace friends!♠️♠️♠️
I will be watching this tomorrow!! Ace pride!! ♥💜🖤♠️!
I'm watching this for the second time, and one thing I'd love to see explored a lot more in media is aesthetic attraction. I've recently worked out that I'm definitely ace, and I think demiromantic, but one of the things that made me take a long time to figure that out is that aesthetic and romantic attraction aren't at all linked for me. The idea of "if you love someone romantically, you will think they're the most beautiful person you've ever seen, and that's necessary to be attracted to them in any way" is so strong in our culture.
ah... forty two minutes and nineteen seconds of me smiling uncontrollably even as Rowan describes the pitiful lack of representation for my sexuality because... hey! it's Rowan & it's ace content!
I don’t know how common my situation is in the grand scheme but I was such a late bloomer to realizing that I was an asexual lesbian because I was so misled about what sexual and romantic attraction *actually* is. All the people I chased after and cried over were never because I wanted them, rather I wanted validation from someone like them that I was pretty/good enough/etc. When I started questioning my own sense of gender and sexuality and getting involved in queer communities and I found out what sexual and romantic attraction actually means, I realized I’d never had any of those experiences with men and little to no sexual attraction to anyone at all. I’m lucky I got to figure it out in my mid 20’s but I feel like I went through so much unnecessary hurt that could’ve been avoided if I had good quality sex ed and role models for healthy relationships.
I wrote an essay on ace rep a few years ago for my media studies class (so you can imagine it was even sparser on the ground). And no discussion of queer baiting would be complete without BBC Sherlock, so I talked about the history of ace and gay readings of the character and the way Cumberbatch and Moffat referred to this adaptation's version in interviews. Namely, how they yes-and-no it in such a way that makes it pretty clear they aren't really aware what asexual means. I give Moffat more blame for this and for Johnlock queer baiting since actors don't tend to have much control on the path of a show, but it's telling how Cumberbatch doesn't give much credence to ace and gay readings of Holmes.
Cumberbatch: "He's asexual. He doesn't want any, and it's very purposeful on his part. I think he's been burnt in the past. I think he also realizes he can't beat female intuition; he can't. So to embroil himself where he might be enslaved through adoration or sexual desire or any kind of power or chemistry to do with love is too big a risk for him. That doesn't make him gay, and it doesn't make him asexual. It means he's purposely abstaining for the sake of his craft." (Jada Yuan, "The Wit and Wisdom of Benedict Cumberbatch," The Vulture 2014).
Moffat: [Sherlock's celibacy is] "the choice of a monk, not the choice of an asexual. If he was asexual, there would be no tension in that, no fun in that-- it's someone who abstains who's interesting." (Stuart Jeffries, "There is a Clue Everybody's Missed: Sherlock Writer Steven Moffat Interviewed" The Guardian 2012).
Wow good to know that asexuality isn't deemed "interesting" enough. Isn't that comforting... /s At least they know that asexuality is not the same as celibacy though
It's really funny that Dimension 20's ace rep is mentioned, because though I loved Liam being ace, maybe my favorite coded ace scene in all of media is in a different season of Dimension 20. Fantasy High Sophmore Year has (spoilers) a really interesting character arc in Riz, a teen character who is struggling with his friends' hyper romantic and sexual interests that he just doesn't understand. It's played out in a really interesting way I don't see many ace rep doing. Ace rep tends to be "hey this is a thing that exists and is valid" end of storyline, but Riz' story is about his insecurities - that his friends will all find someone who matters more to them than him, that he will never have a relationship like his parents', and that he will be left alone with no one who truly understands him. It really gets into the damage that the focus media has on romance and sex can do to people who don't feel it. I don't think it's ever confirmed in either canon or by the creators, but it legitimately made me cry.
Describing "The Great" as an occasionally true story made me pause the video to laugh for a good full minute.
It's literally the tagline of the show!
The fact that this video predates heartbreak high is CRIMINAL I am screaming cash’s name at the screen right now
I've not watched "The Great" yet but that scene with Orlov was so hilariously relatable that I might have to dive in.
My first experience with Ace rep was Todd, like many people. I started watching BoJack a little late and knew going in that Todd would get to have his coming out moment, but when I actually watched the scene where he first admits that he might be Ace I still found myself in tears because it was so validating.
so happy you mentioned Liv from emmerdale! I also found out watching robron's sl but I absolutely fell in love with Liv's character and her journey discovering her sexuality
I always had an idea liv was ace and I'm actually really impressed atm with the number of lgbt characters in soaps now
and not just bisexual or gay but people who don't label themselves or aren't sure .
Coronation Street also having a queer goth character(Nina) paired with a pansexual Asian character(Asha) is pretty iconic too
And neighbours had a nonbinary character too :D
A problem I've been finding a bit more recently is asexual characters tend to be the comedy relief of the show. They often get portrayed as kinda whacky and idiotic when it comes to social ques
It was super heart-warming to read comments about what ace representation means to people, and how these particular examples have made people feel validated and seen. Looking forward to the next video, and to more and better ace representation in popular culture!