Asexuals and Pride — The Saddest Parade

Photo by Chiara Guercio on Unsplash

My friend Jim had introduced me to his girlfriend several weeks ago. Now, he came to me over a cup of espresso at Crescent Moon Coffee and said, “I want you to sing at my wedding.”

Jim had a great smile, and it was such a nice offer that I knew it was wrong to start planning to plant a small bomb in the wedding cake and set the Pine Hills Reception Center on fire.

“Fine,” I responded, with the fakest smile since someone painted over the Mona Lisa. “What do you want me to sing?”

Having to sing at the wedding of someone you are in love with is not the kind of persecution the rioters at Stonewall faced. This is the quiet, constant persecution asexuals face — erasure. I had spent several years building a relationship with Jim, cooking for him, working out with him, comforting him when his anxiety overcame him. We spent most of our time together, and I was experiencing what I wanted in a long term relationship.

Then, he met someone he had sex with, and our relationship cooled. In Jim, I had found my life partner — in me, Jim had found a stop-gap until he found a sex partner. All of the intimacy and closeness we had developed went out the window when he started having sex.

Asexuals can’t beat sex. Allosexuals have a trump card that wins every hand they’re dealt. We have nothing to offer that matches that. There is no Grindr for people who want to build intimacy over time, without sex. Nobody wants that, so we sit at home with our cats, staring at the contact list we never call because they are busy with their families.

Gays can now look forward to getting married. They’ve won a major battle. Yay! I’m looking forward to the first time I fall in love with a gay man who dumps me once he starts to have sex with someone. Maybe I’ll get to sing at a gay wedding!

Pride is not about asexuality, and it’s not about the kind of quiet persecution asexuals deal with. We’re not fighting for jobs or getting into the military or the freedom to become a priest or to dress flamboyantly in public. We don’t have a history of being sent to prison or concentration camps.

We have a history of being ignored.

We have a history of being alone.

We have a history of dying alone.

Very few people want the kind of partnership we have to offer, one without sex but with a lot of board games. A lot of cats. A lot of cake. A lot of walks in the park. We are auxillary and expendable. We are the relationship you have on the way to another one — a vine that the monkey grabs on the way to the next tree.

Maybe that’s not persecution, and maybe it doesn’t deserve a parade. But it’s painful in it’s own quiet way, so it at least deserves a letter and a stripe on the flag.

I sang at Jim’s wedding. I wanted to sing “I Will Always Love You,” start crying, and walk out. But I sang “The Lord’s Prayer.” Jim smiled at me. I smiled at Jim.

And I said goodbye.