On just saying no thank you

Phoebe of What would Phoebe do?, in a larger post about the idea that abstinence should equal "purity" even for the non-religious, includes this thoughtful, if tangential-to-her-point, point.

Somewhat tangentially, this is where I disagree with the (rest of) the left: I believe that there are individuals, gay and straight, who are actually happier abstinent than sexually active, because it would be so upsetting to them to indulge that it would cancel out any pleasure sex would bring them. I don't think sexual desires are somehow inherently stronger than religious fervor, so if a desire for "purity" exceeds one for sex, that's the desire that wins out. Of course, I say this from the perspective of someone who is completely secular, so perhaps I'm wrong, but I think many secular, liberal types like myself make the mistake of thinking that everyone who doesn't have many sexual experiences, preferably with both sexes, is somehow miserable. I say this not out of some all-encompassing idea of moral equivalence--I do not believe that if someone's religion dictates female genital mutilation, beating women, etc., that that's fine, too--but out of a sense that different people want different things for different reasons, and to assume a healthy, fulfilling sex life is everyone's first priority is unfair.

It's a good great point! If you're into sex it's kind of hard... ok, maybe *really* hard to imagine having no such urges. But somewhere between five and fifteen percent of men and roughly the same percentage of women never, ever have orgasms and, while this is frustrating for quite a few of them, for others it's as natural as not being able to taste colors is to the rest of us.

I remember hanging out with a friend who was reading an essay by, I'm pretty sure, Shulamith Firestone of The Dialectics of Sex fame, who wondered how people could get so heated up over what amounted to the "friction of mucous membranes." Though my friend and I weren't having sex with each other we still goggled over the notion that anyone could reduce all of sex to such a characterless description. On the other hand, if you don't feel it that's probably what it must look like to you. (On a related note I distinctly remember feeling intense dismay as a pre-pubescent when I realized that I too would probably eventually enjoy kissing on the mouth -- which at the time seemed like the height of disgustingly germy. (Sure enough, a few years later... thank goodness!!!)

Anyway, it's worth remembering that if we're going to honor diversity we probably ought to honor all of it. On the other hand, as Phoebe hints in the main body of her post, it would be awfully nice if those who feel that way (or, more properly, don't) would return the favor. (There's no more virtue in chastity if you're utterly asexual than there's virtue in not drinking vegetable oil.)

And by the way, you really ought to read the rest of Phoebe's post. She makes some wonderful points about problems with the abstinence-only movement.

Update: I sort of left the impression, above, that asexual people are a subset of those who can't have orgasms. Just as some people wish rather passionately that they could have orgasms, there are asexual people who could have orgasms if they were interested. In other words asexuality isn't as simple as cause or effect. I should also add that our initial reaction that there must be some unacknowledged childhood trauma, repression, closeting, or other psychological dysfunction behind someone's asexuality isn't always born out. (To show my own bias the way I see it is as an extremely long refractory period.) Anyway I should have been more thorough..