Foundinthegrass - WE KEEP WHAT BELONGS TO US

This is your reminder that ace rings are as old as 2005

2005

It’s almost 2020 as of writing this so do the math… that’s about 15 years old

AVEN was founded in 2001

The asexual flag was announced as the official asexual flag in 2010

The ace rings are older than the ace flag and only about four (4) years younger than AVEN

Keep this info laying around somewhere, you’ll need it whenever an acephobe on tumblr makes a claim about the asexual community

nicegoth reblogged your photoset "Nocturnal/Diurnal - Unfired" and added:

this is so neat

Thank you so much! (◕‿◕✿) And that reminds me - I've had these back from the kiln awhile now. It's time I properly photographed them fired, isn't it? In the meantime, here's a quick preview snap:

Boone - Preview for Scrapbook #16

Help would be appreciated.

If any Star Trek fans could fill out my anonymous questionnaire (here), it would be greatly appreciated. It’s for a major assessment at school, so I would prefer if it were kept to serious responses. A summary of responses is provided upon completing the questionnaire, or may be seen here.

Thanks.

You seem pretty open about this, and I don't know anyone else to ask, but you can ignore this completely if you need to. I think I might be asexual? But I'm not sure. I've never looked and someone and thought sex, and usually sex just sounds meh at best. But I have had it before, and I liked it? Is it possible for me to still be ace, or if not, what am I? Thank you

::puts on Official Asexual hat::

I can’t, despite this fabulous hat, actually make a ruling on your sexual orientation or how you want to identify. But that said: the definition of asexuality, as I understand it, is a sexual orientation that consists of not feeling sexual attraction to anyone. Period. Everything after that is a different question. Your sexual orientation is about who you feel sexually attracted to and if the group of people you feel sexually attracted to is [file not found] then, congratulations, you’re asexual and you are entitled to cake.

I think that a lot of confusion–and especially a lot of the people who basically feel like they want to identify as asexual but don’t qualify–comes from piling two or three different factors onto the identity of asexuality and conflating them, or treating them like the more of those factors you have, the MORE asexual you are, like there is a ~gold star asexual~ class that you only get into if you are attracted to no one, have never had sex, never want to have sex or even think about sex, think sex is totally gross and inexplicable, and never experience sexual urges or sensations. But that’s a whole bunch of other factors getting piled on to a sexual orientation in a way that just demands you fit into a stereotype.

Sexual orientation: What group of people, broadly speaking, do you look at and think: Ooh I want to have sex with you.

If it is people of the opposite gender, heterosexual! Same gender, gay/lesbian/homosexual as applies in your case! Two or more genders, bisexual or pansexual or omnisexual or some other word according to fine gradations of meaning and gender identity and so on! If nobody, ever, asexual! If very few people, very rarely, generally for reasons other than physical/gender characteristics, demisexual or gray-asexual!

Sexual behavior: Do you have sex? Have you ever? Do you masturbate? How?

These are all super prone to be influenced by circumstances! Maybe you’re really young or you have moral/religious/emotional/psychological/etc reasons to refrain from having sex. This doesn’t mean you can’t belong to ANY of the sexual orientations listed above; you can absolutely be gay or straight or bi or pan before you’ve had sex with anybody, or if you’re currently not having sex.

Maybe you are or were in a relationship with somebody, of any gender, who did or didn’t belong to the group of people you find you’re sexually attracted to, and you had sex with them–because they wanted to, because you wanted to for reasons other than sexual attraction, because you thought you would find you liked it once you tried it, because you didn’t really think about reasons and it just seemed like a good idea at the time.

That ALSO doesn’t mean that you automatically belong or don’t belong to any sexual orientation listed above. Gay people experiment or even wind up in lifelong sexual relationships with people of the opposite sex for various reasons; straight people have sex once or many times with people of their own gender; bisexuals do not have to perpetually have sex with people of both genders to still be really bi; asexuals can have sex and still be asexual.

[There is not a good word for this one–Sexual enjoyment, maybe?]: Quite aside from how skilled you or your partner are, do you basically LIKE the sexual behavior you engage in, if any? 

There are a bunch of variations to this–some people just really really like sex even when it doesn’t result in orgasms, some people think sex is gross and unpleasant even when it’s taking place in a loving relationship and technically everything is going great, even when they’re masturbating in exactly the way they prefer. For some people this dislike or discomfort might come from trauma or social conditioning that sex is dirty or wrong, but for lots of people it’s just how they feel! THERE IS NO INNATE REASON WHY THIS SHOULD CORRELATE TO WHO YOU ARE ATTRACTED TO. A person could be attracted to everyone in the world and still think the actual act of sex involving their own actual body is really gross and unpleasant and not desired, or a person could never be attracted to anyone and still find themselves having a rad time when they decide to get it on, and every variation in between. And a person could find sex with other people super DNW but enjoy the hell out of masturbating. We don’t really have a standard word for people who REALLY REALLY ENJOY sex (or not a non-insulting one); people who don’t enjoy sex at all are called sex-repulsed.

Sexual drive: How often do you find yourself wanting to have sex or masturbate? 

For some people, ALL THE TIME, for some people, never. For MOST people, this varies with hormonal shifts/age/psychological and emotional factors, etc. And again this is separate from who you are attracted to, separate from whether you act on those urges (or choose to have sex in the absence of any physical urge), separate from how much you enjoy engaging in sexual activity if/when you do. This is the one that people are thinking of when they ask if your asexuality is being caused by your meds/thyroid/whatever. But again, having zero libido could happen to somebody who’s actively attracted to all kinds of people, and having a constant urge to get busy could happen to someone who’s not attracted to anyone–even to someone who’s not attracted to anyone and is sex-repulsed, etc.

SO IN CONCLUSION: sexual identity is complicated! Sexual behavior is driven by lots of factors! But if you’re not attracted to anyone, the word for that is asexual, and there’s no wrong way to be asexual. You just are if you are.

I just read this super sad post about this girl who’s asexual and married and everyone is basically telling her that she doesn’t deserve her husband/she’s just a prude/she should just do it anyway. So I want to tell you all right now that if people tell you this, or if they tell you you’ll never have a relationship, it is BULLSHIT. My husband is asexual and I’m not. He’s sex repulsed, we don’t have sex, we never have. And it doesn’t matter to me. You know what does? He does. His mental health and wellbeing matter to me. Because he is my best friend and he’s one of the smartest, kindest, funniest people I’ve ever met. And he’s had people tel him that he’s broken and it makes me SO ANGRY because they are WRONG. Being different doesnt mean you’re broken. If you don’t like sex/don’t want it/etc. Do not let anyone tell you that you’re inferior because you’re not. Do not let anyone convice you that you’ll never have a relationship because they’re wrong(if you want one). You are not broken, and it will be okay.

2000 (+) Followers Givaway

To thank my followers old and new for their support, I’m giving away some stuff. Here’s what you can get:

a copy of my "Sherlock after the Fall" Fanbook

a t-shirt with one of my Beowulf designs (lilac, sizes S, M, L)

another Beowulf t-shirt (white, sizes L, XL)

a set of six postcards with motifs from my book Beowulf and the Dragon

a set of eight postcards with my Tolkien illustrations (LotR, Silmarillion)

an drawing of a Sherlock scene of your choice in ink or pencil, size A4, motif to be negotiated.

And here are the Rules:

REBLOG and/or LIKE this post. No need to spam your followers, though.

NO GIVEAWAY BLOGS. 

This is for my followers, so you have to be following me.

You must have your ask box open, and be willling to give me your address.

If you’re not of age, make sure your parents are okay with someone sending you stuff.

I will ship anywhere.

Giveaway ends September 9th 23:00 GMT+1

I’ll use the random number generator to pick the winners. First person picked is the first to choose something and so on …

Good luck :)

A shout out to writers who support writers

Writers who may be feeling insecure out their own writing, yet still enthusiastically reblog and comment on someone else’s fic.

Writers who may struggle to find time to write their own stories, yet still read fics and take the time to let the writers know how much they like it in tags, asks, comments.

Writers who can appreciate and share a fic even though it might not be their ship or their “thing” because they respect the quality and the writer.

Writers who have tons of followers and share lesser known fics to help them get exposure.

Writers who have a small number of followers and will still reblog the popular fics.

Writers who will help another writer brainstorm or get through a tough part of their fic.

Writers who beta for other writers.

Writers who are kind and secure enough to support other writers.

I see you, and appreciate the hell out of you.

Scrapbook #3: C.L.A.N. (Click for full-size image.)

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