From An Ace Point Of View

Personally, I have found a lot of acceptance from the rest of the LGBTQIA+ community in real life during in-person conversations.

Online, and during discussions and forums where there isn’t much scope for communication and connection beyond words, with any body language, there have been instances of ostracism and discrimination from within fellow members of the community, mostly gay cisgender men, who’ve said stuff like, “You’re not a real Queer person,” or, “You’re not a real member of the community, you’re just an Ace,” or, “Cisgender Asexuals are not members of the LGBT community,” while they were cisgender homosexual men themselves. Or how I, bisexual people, and anyone apart from them have it easier because it’s easier for us to hide and mask. As if anyone wants to do that. As if I did not spend more than half a decade thinking there was something severely wrong with me. (I am a childhood domestic abuse survivor and have a lot of trauma and issues to work through because of that.) I thought I was “sexually repressed” and that’s just another thing in the long list of things wrong with me due to my childhood trauma. I did not stop to think that I had only been abused physically, verbally, and psychologically, never sexually. Why would I be sexually repressed? I just accepted it because I was used to discovering the results of a lot of repressed trauma coming out at the time. As a trauma survivor, I know there must be so many others like me who think that the absence of sexual attraction towards anyone is a defect in them instead of a very important and natural and normal part of who they are. It took me so long to figure out that at least this, wasn’t anything wrong with me, it was just a part of my identity. Who I am. Another few to come to terms with it. All thanks to the sheer utter lack of representation and zero visibility of Ace people in the media. I had already been a part of the movement as a “straight ally”(which is what I thought I was at the time) for almost three years when I discovered what asexuality is and that there are other people like me and that it’s not yet another thing I’ll have to “fix” about myself(amongst all my psychological damage). If I was a lesbian, I would have not taken that long to figure it out or lived erroneously thinking there was something severely wrong with me for so long. Because at least they get more media representation, even if it’s not very accurate. I understand that certain factions of the community take more heat in the form of more open and violent persecution and discrimination compared to others. But others also struggle with the basic acceptance of who they are a lot more than others. And self-doubt living inside can be just as corrosive and damaging as external persecution.

So one would understand why comments like that from a few members within the community, who know what it’s like, sting particularly.

Nevertheless, there haven’t been many people like that. Most of the community, apart from these people whom I later learned were also discriminatory towards bisexual and transgender people, has been extremely welcoming and inclusive. Made me feel like I belonged. I don’t really have the personality to feel the need to belong anywhere. Not even during those troublesome teenage years when getting accepted somewhere seems so important. It wasn’t even important enough for me to rebel against. I’ve always been indifferent. When I did get to experience what it’s like though, to find your people, I felt a sense of kinship I haven’t found with any other community I identify with. Not among intellectuals, not among artists, not even among actors and writers specifically. My experience at the victory rally in Siliguri on 15^th September, 2018 showed me that Queer(used as an umbrella term, here) folk are also intersectionally inclusive. In terms of race, caste, religion, class, and even disability & neurodivergence. In implementation too, not just in principle and lip service. Even neurotypical Queer folk. Unlike cishet neurotypicals, whom I deal with on a daily basis, who have never shown me that level of inclusivity and respect for my space and voice. I have to keep asking and negotiating for my own personal space and proving my credibility the entire time I’m outside my room, i.e. anywhere in neurotypical territory, and still have to be placatory and polite and compromising as though my existence is a huge inconvenience to them, which it is, going by their begrudging behaviour every time they have to adjust to my OCD needs. I have been conditioned and tone policed enough to feel the need to clarify I don’t mean all cishet neurotypicals. A few are nice about this. Nevertheless, it’s exhausting.

Not so with members of the LGBTQIAPD+ community. They’ve all been extremely welcoming and adjusted to my neurodivergent needs seamlessly as if it was effortless and came naturally to them and never complained about having to do so. Most of the time, they did it without my having to ask or say anything. Magically being able to sense how to make me feel more comfortable and doing it. Even though they didn’t HAVE TO. I’m grateful for that. It gives me back a little bit of my dignity. The kind I used to enjoy before I started suffering from OCD.

This neurodivergence and gender identity intersectional feminism has been acutely felt and greatly appreciated. Thank you.

Nevertheless, there are certain issues I would like to raise where I see room for improvement:

1. I still feel like the activism and intersectional feminism in India is rather primitive. I witnessed way too many of my cishet friends jumping on the bandwagon of being woke and supportive allies on September 6, just to display herd mentality rainbow capitalism because it was in trend. I understand huge capitalist corporations doing that. It’s still unethical, but one could see the profit-driven reasons behind it.

Individuals who wish to show support and solidarity have no valid excuse for it, though. This is the 21st century! Ample information available on the internet, researched articles, websites rated according to how useful or how misleading their information regarding these issues is, everything available and easily accessible through phones. Not knowing better is no longer acceptable.

One should know the difference between real support and rainbow capitalism. Being a good ally means putting in the effort and time to educate oneself. To see past the outrage tactics(we do not care if the Abominable Snowman or the traffic lights “walk” sign is male/female/norbinary/any other gender; we care if all gender get equal pay for the same amount of work like cishet men do, and have marriage equality like cishet people do, but a lot of media outlets try to direct unnecessary outrage towards us by trying to trivialise and misdirect from the real issues just for cheap sensationalism) and the way media would have you believe that only gay men(and that too a manufactured stereotype of them, not the real people) are the entire LGBTQIAPD+ community. Most of my budding straight allies have a long way to go before they learn how grossly MISrepresented gay men are, and how grossly UNDERrepresented the rest of the members in the community are. Popular media does not help, but does hinder any progress in that regard.

2. I have seen a lot of encouragement, that at times crosses the fine line and becomes pressurising, in all that enthusiasm, towards all members to come out of the closet. I understand that the more number of members come out, the greater our strength and visibility and it helps the cause. But at what cost?

The whole point of making a statement about Queer solidarity and the fact that we’re here and not going anywhere (Get used to us!) is for the betterment and upliftment of the lives of individual members. For some members it means validation and celebration of who they are and empowerment. For others it simply means safety, liberty, and borderline acceptance without violent persecution. Our community has members from all walks of life. Not all of us are privileged enough to be able to come out and still be safe. The other members with privileges like financial, legal, physical, and emotional security, and a supportive family, need to be ever mindful and sensitive of this reality of the lives of fellow members who are not so fortunate.

The primary attribute of our community is inclusivity. We’re the most inclusive community among all. The whole point is unconditional acceptance for all our members who do not get it elsewhere. That’s why we have factions like, “Questioning” for those members who know they aren’t cishet but are still figuring out what gender identity labels they’re most comfortable with or those who aren’t comfortable with labels whatsoever and hence do not identify as cishet or anything else- who have faced discrimination from the hetero normative patriarchal society for it; and “Allies” for those who know their gender identity but can’t come out yet but wish to still be a part of the movement and community so they say they’re “supportive straight allies” even when they’re more than that, in order to stay safe. “Allies” isn’t actually for real straight allies. They’re not members, they’re supporters. It’s not for them, it’s a cover for those who can’t come out yet but aren’t cishet.

We need to understand the fundamental foundations and principles and nature of our community and uphold the inclusivity regardless of whether the individual members can come out to the rest of the world yet or not. Sometimes it’s not safe. And no matter how much support the community may be able to provide, the harsh reality is that in India we can’t actually provide enough shelter, food, clothing, education, and other things some of our members risk losing after coming out. We don’t have enough resources yet. So encouraging or pressuring members to come out of the closet when neither they’re ready nor the rest of us are ready to take care of them in the aftermath, is akin to irresponsibly starting something we cannot finish.

4. Representation is a very real problem for us. The rest of the world, specially media and cishet allies, and even some members within the community, behave as though the representation of the various identities in our community goes as follows:
   
   1. STRAIGHT ALLIES! (Booming voice on a mic)
   2. Gay. (Normal voice)
   3. lEsBiAn (whispering)
   4. (in sign language): “B-i-s-e-x-u-a-l”
   5. (beeps/taps in Morse code): T-R-A-N-S….
   6. Rest of the sexes and sexualities- inaudible, invisible, not even Braille.
      

I don’t intend to say this as an offence against anyone, I’m not angry about this, I just want to point out, that it is a testament to the gross imbalance in representation that there’s a separate letter in the acronym for male homosexual folk, and a separate letter in the acronym for female homosexual folk, god knows where norbinary homosexual folk are supposed to go, but there’s only one letter each for all bisexuals of any gender, and all transgender folk having any sexuality. Moreover, there’s just one letter, ‘A’ for all Asexual folk of any gender, all Aromantic folk of any gender or sexuality, and all “Allies”(closeted members).

A lot of people seem to have the misconception that the letter ‘Q’ after LGBT denotes Queer as an umbrella term and hence there’s no more need for the rest of the letters or even the ‘+’ at the end denoting that there are more gender identities and sexualities not denoted in the acronym because that would make the acronym too long. Queer, the word in itself, used all alone without the prefix of LGBT denotes the umbrella term. The letter ‘Q’ after LGBT stands for only genderQueer and Questioning folk. If one meant to say Queer as an umbrella term, the ‘LGBT’ would come under it too. There would be no need to mention them separately. Mentioning the first four(most popular) letters and then trying to cover up one’s gross neglect and underrepresentation of the rest of the community by adding a ‘Q’ at the end is either ignorant or wilful rainbow capitalism.

The ‘+’ is important. One could understand not being able to mention all the letters that represent all the factions within the Queer community(see what I did there?). But wilful neglect of even mentioning the ‘+’ at the end means saying one does not acknowledge the factions represented by the letters not included in the acronym at all. Hence, “LGBT+”(or any no. Of the letters of the acronym in order, followed by the ‘+’ for the ones inevitably left out) is more respectful and valid than “LGBTQ”, although “LGBTQIAPD+” is best, if one is not just saying “Queer folk” as an umbrella term without any acronym. Adding the ‘+’ at the end is really the least one could do.

A lot of members, especially those represented in the first four letters, might feel this is being nit-picky. Some might even say, they’re “just letters” after all. Well, each letter is a symbol of the validity and visibility of the factions it represents in the community. And representation MATTERS. Any reluctance towards being careful about this is a symptom of a deep seated hidden sexist mentality at worst, and the intention of scoring more points for being a “good ally” than actually deserved(since they only care about the most visible factions, and not all of them) at best, in the person using the acronym incorrectly.

5. The transgender members have gotten their long overdue well deserved recognition and representation recently due to the whole outrage about the extremely cissexist Trans Bill the Indian Parliament is trying to pass. It’s two primary flaws are that it provides no fruitful rights and protections necessary for Trans folk at the level of those outlined by the Supreme Court(like marriage equality, freedom from professional discrimination, right to adopt, etc.), just the ability to be able to claim government support and protection when violently persecuted, which means nothing in real life outside paper given the state of India’s law enforcement and judiciary; and even for that, one us required to register and “qualify” as a transgender person after “proving” it to a screening committee made up of CISGENDER people. This is the appallingly outrageously unethical and illogical result of cisgender privileged people trying to make laws for transgender marginalised folk.

One’s gender identity, even the so called “biological” construct of sex, not just the social construct of gender, is just that- A CONSTRUCT. Very human fallible scientists, cishet white men at that, got together and arbitrarily decided that XX is cis woman, XY is cisman, and those are the only two “normal” or “valid” genders and the rest are “abnormal” genetic combinations which were named as afterthoughts. There is nothing scientific about that type of nomenclature or about the idea that merely genes or chromosomes dictate one’s sex and it has to be cis. Imagine if these scientific conventions treated the periodic table the same way. Hydrogen and helium, the most abundantly found elements in the universe, are the “normal” ones, with helium being lesser in quantity and hence inferior while Hydrogen being the superior one since it is more in quantity and also more reactive. And the rest of the elements are found in exponentially lesser quantities in the universe, when compared to these two, so they’re “abnormal” and we must disregard them and only allow the most abundantly found elements to be considered valid. An analogy showing how ridiculous the reasoning(or rather excuse) of the population % of the other genders being much smaller compared to cishet men and women, for the heteronormativity and cissexism in even the “scientific” labelling and categorisation is.

Therefore, we have established that both sex and gender are constructs and no one has the right to construct yours apart from you. Same goes for sexuality. It is against the fundamental human rights of an individual to even have the concept of asking them to “prove” what sex and sexuality they identify with. The concept is both unethical and impractical. And even if there were a way to define and hence determine who is trans and who isn’t, cisgender people should not be on the screening committee determining that. That is gross institutional discrimination. This is what happens when cisgender people try to make legislation for trans people. Or any privileged community in a power dynamic tries to make laws for the disenfranchised one. Like white legislators making laws for black citizens; cis men making laws about women’s and femme’s reproductive rights to health; gentiles making laws for Jews; Savarnas making laws for Bahujans/Dalits; rich making laws for the poor; and the old making laws for the young. We’ve seen myriad examples of how disastrous the results of that are throughout history, all over the world. Even in developed nations.

This should be a wake up call for the youth of the nation bringing them face to face with the dire need of the requirement of more members of the LGBTQIAPD+ community becoming our representatives, and being put in positions of power in all the three wings of the govt.- legislative, executive, and judiciary. Even the fourth estate of the press. Or disastrous blunders like the wolf in sheepskin that the Trans Bill is, will keep recurring. Progress regarding this is too damn slow. How many more lives have to suffer or be lost entirely? We need to push for more active political participation of more members of our community as well. Concentrate our mass efforts in not just social activism, but smart politically savvy moves backing the members with the most leadership qualities among us and empowering them with safety and security. It’s high time we started working on that. We’re ready.

Author: Luna

Author Bio: Luna is an asexual neurodivergent cisgender woman, intersectional feminist, and a bibliophile and had a love of writing from a young age.

She’s had her entries published in a few local magazines and newspapers like Sparkle, Dainik Jagran, and Janpath Samachar, etc; and has a poetry anthology on the way.

She was a child prodigy but now struggles to still perform well in all spheres of her life, social, academic, and personal, in spite of having suffered several academic setbacks and career changes during high school and 

higher education while coping with her chronic illnesses and the trials of being Ace and neurodivergent.

She’s influenced by myriad authors from a wide variety of cultures and eras. Mary Shelly, Oscar Wilde, Suzanne Collins, Rick Riordan, Wakamiya Bokusui, Audre Lorde, and Arundhati Roy are among her favourites.

Author Notes: The piece is a journal entry based on my experiences as an Asexual person within the LGBTQIA+ community in India in 2018.