Sex-Ed Series: On Asexuality & Masturbation
In May 2020, during the nationwide lockdown to combat the covid-@9 pandemic here in India, Revathi and I began an Instagram live series to discuss aspects of sexuality that were considered kinks, quirks, and taboo…basically a lot of topics that were grossly misunderstood.
The first topic we decided to talk about was at the intersection of two different subjects actually — both very personal to us as individuals.
It was on Asexuality and Masturbation.
Asexuality is SOOO misunderstood. There’s very little representation in mainstream media and during dialogues about asexuality, but then again, the diversity of its experience is rarely explained.
You can watch the full session here and here.
We had some interesting ‘takeaways’ from the session, which emphasized on how important it is to discuss these subjects widely and repeatedly so as to combat the overwhelmingly singular narrative of hetero-normative allosexuality.
Asexuality in human beings (as a definition of our social behaviour) is not a reference to the biological ability to reproduce asexually! It is about the experience (or lack thereof, rather) of sexual attraction.
We had to reiterate that when talking about human beings, we need to do so with respect, affording everybody the dignity of their own lived experiences, which may be dissimilar to our own. Certain topics were raised but subsequently derailed because of active ‘trolls’ and others who were just chattering out of ignorance, I think.
The breadth of sexual experience is rarely acknowledged. It is often reduced to penetrative sex, which goes on to underlie the legal definition of rape in many countries across the world. Sexual experience can be wide-ranging and any sexual encounter which is non-consensual should be considered a full-fledged assault, a.k.a. rape. The procedure of finding semen traces in the walls of the vaginal canal are not the only indicators of such an assault. The nature of such evidence invisibilises the sexual assault experienced by those of other genders/sexes by those of other genders/sexes. Remember, rape isn’t about sex, it is an abuse of interpersonal power dynamics, and sex is just a tool in such a situation.
