demisexual

Can Demisexuals Enjoy Porn?

Kate Sloan
A blurry still from a porn scene I once performed in for Spit

One of the most striking changes in my sexuality as I’ve grown older is how much more demisexual I’ve gotten. I went from being a horny, flirty 23-year-old who could spot my next fuck from across a crowded swimming pool, to being a grizzled, grumpy 30-year-old who needs to have a 3-hour conversation with someone before deciding whether she wants to hold their hand. (That’s a slight exaggeration… maybe…)

I’ve seen the question of demisexuals’ porn consumption come up in a few of the online sex discussion spaces I participate in, and I think it’s an interesting one. If the primary purpose of pornography is to arouse the viewer, and the viewer is someone who is far more aroused by brains than bodies, and far more interested in intimacy than insertions, can porn really do its job? I have a few points I’d like to make in response to this question.

Quick refresher before we hop in: Demisexuality is an identity on the asexuality spectrum. Demisexuals find it difficult or impossible to experience sexual attraction until and unless they’ve developed an emotional connection to, or at least an emotional familiarity with, the subject of that attraction.

 

Point 1: Sexual attraction and sexual arousal are not the same thing.

Sexual attraction, generally speaking, is the visceral pull you feel toward someone you want to kiss, touch, and/or fuck. It is aimed at particular people; if someone said to me, “Do you feel like having sex right now?” my answer would be rather different than if someone said to me, “Do you feel like having sex with James Dean circa 1955 right now?” (My answers at the moment, respectively, are “Ehh, not really, ask me again after I’ve had my coffee” and “OMG, yes, give me 10 minutes to throw on some red lipstick for him to mess up.”)

Sexual arousal, on the other hand, is the physical (and, arguably, also mental) state of being horny. It can involve noticeable changes in your physiology, like engorged genital tissue and a quickening heartbeat, as well as more psychological effects, like the pressing desire to be imminently touched by yourself and/or by someone else.

These two things are different. Certainly one can facilitate the other – and for many demisexuals, sexual attraction precedes sexual arousal and is itself preceded by emotional attraction – but fundamentally, they are separate, and don’t always occur at the same time, in the same situations.

Without trying to speak for other demisexuals on this matter, I’ll say that I can become sexually aroused by porn without feeling sexually attracted to the people in it. It certainly helps if I’m attracted to the people in it (more on that below), but just witnessing certain sexual acts can rev me up, especially if they’re acts I’m already intimately familiar with and/or acts I already fetishize to some extent. And so, yes, I can jerk off to porn, and often find that it adds measurably to my arousal and pleasure, just as it does for many allosexual people (i.e. people who are not on the asexual spectrum).

 

Point 2: Porn can become familiar.

In an age of OnlyFans feeds and live sex cams, it’s easier than ever to follow the careers of porn performers you enjoy. Whether you become a fan of theirs because you think they’re cute, because they remind you of someone you used to date, or because your favorite sex acts and kinks are fairly aligned with theirs (or all three!), you can definitely develop an “emotional connection” – albeit a one-sided, parasocial one – to certain performers over time.

This noticeably increases my enjoyment of porn, as a demisexual person. Of the porn performers whose work I follow closely, what they all have in common is that there’s a lot of personality infused into their work, so that I get a sense of who they are (or at least, who their porn persona is) on a deeper level than I would if I’d just watched them get fucked once. This creates a sense of heightened connection and therefore generates heightened sexual attraction on my end.

I’ve noticed that this effect can also occur even if I’ve just seen a particular porn clip several times. It’s like the raunchier version of how I feel more attracted to Jennifer Beals every time I re-watch one of her sex scenes from The L Word…

If you’re not sure where to even find porn performers you might develop a fondness for, I’d suggest scrolling through clip sites like ManyVids, or flipping through the pages of free adult webcams listings, and clicking on anyone whose aesthetic or vibe provokes a positive response in you. Follow that little glimmer of potential attraction and see where it leads you.

 

Point 3: You can make porn that’s familiar.

Now, granted, not everyone wants to set up a camera to film themselves while fucking. You may have concerns about this related to cybersecurity, future employment, etc. and that’s fine.

But if you are willing to make your own porn, I think this can be one of the best solutions for demisexuals who want wank fodder but don’t connect with much/any of the porn they see online. After all, what could be more demisexual than jerking off to the sight of a person you know IRL and already have a deep connection with?

I’ve made amateur porn with a few partners over the years, and it’s always served me well when incorporated into my spank bank. It reminds me of hot sex I’ve had, because it depicts… hot sex I’ve actually had! And it’s therefore a lot easier for me to get turned on by it and get off to it.

 

Fellow demisexuals, what’s your experience with porn? Does it turn you on? Bore you? Or does it depend?

 

This post contains sponsored links. As always, all writing and opinions are my own.

Online Dating Tips for Demisexuals

Kate Sloan
My actual Tinder profile

I’m demisexual, meaning that I don’t have the capacity to feel sexually attracted to someone until I have some kind of emotional connection with them and have a good sense of who they are as a person.

Mostly I’m fine with being this way – my demisexuality fits nicely into my introverted lifestyle – but sometimes I wish I were capable of developing sexual attractions quicker, especially since that seems to be very much the norm on dating sites/apps. It can be hard to navigate these fast-paced online hubs of sex ‘n’ romance when you’re slow-moving in these realms. Sometimes it’s difficult enough to make a person want to give up altogether.

I’ve found a few strategies that help me in this regard, though. Here are some online dating tips for demisexuals. As per usual, take ’em with a grain of salt, because we’re all different – but I hope they help you, if indeed you need/want help with this issue.

 

1. Choose the right site/app to begin with

It’s easy to get intimidated when you look through a list of dating sites or apps and don’t even know where to start. But many apps and sites designed to facilitate human connection are geared toward a certain type of human connection – and likewise, there are some apps and sites that don’t explicitly try to be hookup-focused, or queer-focused, or kink-focused, or whatever, but may attract certain demographics anyway for various reasons.

In my experience, for instance, Tinder is not always the best choice for someone who wants a long-term relationship, or a relationship where sex is of minimal or no importance. On the flipside, I wouldn’t typically recommend Match.com for someone who just wanted a hookup. Do some research (including “field research” if need be) to get a sense of which sites and apps are most aligned with what you’re looking for, and use those.

Some of these services are more demisexual-friendly than others. I like the text-forward interface of Lex, for example, because it allows me to get to know someone’s communication style and a little bit about how their brain works, before seeing what they even look like. OkCupid can also be good for demisexuals because its filtering tools and compatibility questions are powerful and can help you narrow down your dating pool to people you’re mostly aligned with.

 

2. State your hopes and expectations in your profile

I often include a line in my online dating bios that’s something like “More into fun dates than hookups” and “I like to take things slow and get to know people.” I think a statement like this can do a lot of heavy lifting in terms of attracting people who have similar desires and repelling people who don’t.

I’ve also seen people say they were looking for “friends, and maybe more eventually,” which I think can be a good approach for demisexuals. If you do become friends with someone you met on a dating site/app, then at least you’ll still have a friend even if an attraction doesn’t end up developing between you.

An important thing to keep in mind here is that there’s absolutely no need to shame people who are more interested in casual sex than you are. We all have different needs, wants, and preferences. Yours isn’t more ethical, good or “respectable” just because you like to get to know people before potentially boning them.

 

3. Ask questions whose answers you might find hot

I know myself well enough, at this point in my dating life, to know that I find it attractive when people are highly enthusiastic about a particular passion of theirs, whether that be movies, music, cocktails, video games, or just about anything else. So I’ll often ask people about their passions, or about activities in their life that light them up, because the answers to these questions can awaken a spark of attraction to me that is sometimes later fanned into a proper flame as I get to know them better.

Consider what questions you could ask to take the fastest (or funnest) possible route to info that might stir your interest, and ask those more often when you’re chatting with potential dates online. In doing this, you’re helping them out and helping yourself have a better time.

 

4. Consider limiting initial dates to the daytime

I have a hard time saying no to sex when I have a strong sense that the person I’m on a date with is expecting or hoping for sex to happen. Most of the people I’ve been on dates with have been kind, considerate, and non-pressure-y, so I’m aware that this is a problem that exists largely in my own head and that it’s okay to have boundaries. But, for this reason, I often find it easiest to go on first dates (or second or third dates) in the daytime, because there tends to be less of an expectation that sex will happen at the end of the date.

Afternoon coffee dates, weekend brunch dates, and walking-through-a-park dates can all be good for this. If I want to be extra sure that sex won’t be expected, I might let the person know about what I’ll be doing afterward, e.g. that I have to get back to work or that I have plans with a friend.

It’s not that I couldn’t have consensual, enjoyable sex if I went home with someone on a first date. It’s definitely happened. But for me, sex on a first date is almost always sex without sexual attraction, because I usually simply haven’t had enough time to develop an attraction at that point. And personally, I’d rather wait until I really want to have sex with someone before having it.

 

5. Remember, above all, that your boundaries are valid

It’s okay to want to wait a while to have sex. Hell, it’d be okay if you never wanted to have sex. It might mean that you’re not compatible with some of the people you go on dates with, but that’d be true no matter what your deal was. Sometimes people just aren’t compatible with each other, and that’s okay. Either one or both of them can compromise, if they’re comfortable doing so, or they can go their separate ways.

An important caveat there is that you never have to compromise if you don’t want to have sex. “No” is a complete sentence, as the saying goes. It can trigger a lot of shame and self-doubt when someone pressures you into moving faster than you want to, especially if they start making claims like “Other people I’ve dated haven’t wanted to wait this long to have sex” or “The way you feel about sex isn’t normal.” But please try to remember, if you can, that anyone worth dating (or fucking!) will respect your boundaries.

Sure, they might end up saying, “You know what? This isn’t working for me, so I think we should stop seeing each other.” That’s a normal part of the dating process, for anyone. But never forget that you are well within your rights to say no, or even to get up and leave. You don’t owe anyone sex. You don’t even owe anyone an explanation for why you don’t feel like having sex. And the more you can internalize that knowledge, and the more you practice setting and holding your boundaries, the more delicious it’ll feel when an attraction finally develops and you find yourself wanting to have sex with a particular person.

A true “yes” can’t exist in an environment where a “no” is shamed, dismissed or belittled. I hope that you find your true “yes,” because it feels so damn good.

 

This post contains a sponsored link. As always, all writing and opinions are my own.

Can Demisexuals Have Casual Sex? (& If So, How?!)

Kate Sloan

Ever since I came out as demisexual 2 years ago, people have had a lot of questions for me about that identity. Some of these include:

Q. What is demisexuality?
A. It’s an identity on the asexual spectrum, characterized by developing sexual attraction only to people with whom one has an existing emotional connection. In other words, demisexuals don’t (and indeed, can’t) become sexually attracted to strangers, or people they have just met and know nothing about; it takes some amount of intimacy, mutual trust, and/or get-to-know-ya time before a demi person can develop a sexual attraction.

Q. How is that different from just preferring sex in relationships over hookups/one-night stands?
A. What you’re describing is a preference; what I’m describing is a sexual orientation. If you don’t like hookups but nonetheless find yourself regularly feeling sexually attracted to people you don’t know or have just met – such as thinking the stranger across the bar is hot, or wishing you could fuck the cute person who just walked past you on the street – then you aren’t demisexual. Also, it’s worth noting that sexual orientation and sexual behavior do not always “match,” so just because a demisexual may not feel sexual attraction toward a person they’ve just met doesn’t automatically mean that they won’t hook up with that person, or won’t enjoy hooking up with that person.

Q. Wait, what? Why would you hook up with someone you’re not sexually attracted to?
A. Oh, gosh. So many reasons. For me personally, the main reasons I do this tend to be 1) the desire for the fun, excitement, and pleasure of the hookup itself, which can exist independently of whether or not I’m attracted to the person I’m hooking up with, and 2) the desire to use sex to get to know someone, so an attraction may develop. (It’s important to remember, too, in trying to understand this concept, that “not attracted to” is not usually the same thing as “repulsed by.”)

 

I thought today would be a good day to dive a little deeper on a question that is related to these, which is: Can demisexuals have casual sex? Or, more to the point, can they enjoy it?

I have indeed jumped onto a free sex app looking for a carnal meet-cute from time to time. I have swept my eyes over the stranger chatting me up at a sex club and thought, “Sure.” I am not immune to these temptations, though for me they are not based on sexual attraction. They’re more based on a desire for pleasure, excitement, and adventure.

In some ways, I think of sex like dancing. Some people say dancing is the most romantic, the most intimate and fun, when you do it with someone you’re in love with, or even just someone you’re attracted to. It may give you that buzzy feeling of crackling energy flowing between you, the desire to lean in close for an impulsive kiss, the sense that everyone else in the room has faded away and it’s just you and your dance partner, whirling and gyrating. But at the same time, I’m sure you can think of instances when you’ve danced with (or near) someone you weren’t in love with, weren’t even attracted to, and still had a good time. Perhaps you didn’t even know their name. Maybe the music was good, or the athleticism of the dancing got your heart rate up in an invigorating way, or you just enjoyed the fun of getting to know someone from the way they move. It may not have even mattered if you ever saw the person again; your one shared dance was a self-contained encounter that was pleasing in and of itself, and required neither a deep emotional connection nor a later reunion for more dancing. It is likely that your dance partner, or you, simply disappeared into the night sometime after the song was over, and you both moved on with your lives, not feeling pulled to reunite and reconnect, but still happy to have shared that experience with someone who seemed cool.

That’s how I feel about casual sex as a demisexual. It’s not necessarily the best version of sex I can have, or the most emotionally resonant, but that’s not really the point. It’s about fun and frivolity and feeling alive.

 

I suppose this raises the ethical question of whether your “dance partners” – by which I mean sex partners – need to know you’re not attracted to them. After all, to visit site after site and use app after app searching for a hookup can be an exhausting process; if mutual attraction is what they’re after, don’t they deserve to know upfront that it’s not an option, so they can swipe left and move on to the next?

I actually don’t think so, and here’s why. Most people don’t know what demisexuality is. Hell, most people don’t even know what asexuality is. They have not probed the concepts of sexual orientation versus sexual behavior. They have not pondered the ways a person can enjoy sex without attraction. So all they’re gonna hear, when you try to explain, is “I find you repulsive, but I’ll still have sex with you, if you want, I guess,” even if that’s not at all what you feel you’re expressing.

Should an opportunity arise in conversation, I’ll sometimes disclose something like, “I generally take a while to warm up to people,” or “I enjoy sex more when it’s with someone I’ve already had sex with a few times.” These statements have the added benefit of planting the seed in the other person’s head that you’d be open to an ongoing friends-with-benefits arrangement or similar, rather than just a one-off encounter. But they’re also a way of telling your date the truth about yourself, hopefully without making them feel like a gross gargoyle being thrown a bone (so to speak).

 

I will say, my demisexuality works more like a dimmer switch than an on/off toggle. If a deep emotional connection gets me hot, a shallower-but-still-present emotional connection gets me… warm. This – among other, more practical reasons, like my physical safety – is why I prefer to go on a date that may or may not end in a hookup, rather than just going over to a stranger’s house (or inviting them over to mine) for immediate sex. You typically can’t develop profound intimacy in the timespan of just one date, but you can develop some intimacy. I like to ask people not only basic first-date questions (job, family, hobbies) but also slightly more probing questions, that may reveal something deeper about who they are, such as:

  • What’s your passion?
  • Read any good books lately?
  • Does the climate crisis worry you?
  • Overall, are you happy with your life?
  • What’s the best thing that’s happened to you today?
  • What’s the last thing that made you laugh really, really hard?

Beyond helping make attraction possible for me (even if it’s just a mild attraction), these types of questions are also just… fun to hear people answer, even people you’ve just met. One of my favorite things about dating and hooking up is getting to know new people. Even though I’m a huge introvert and can only handle it in small doses, I find it delightful and eye-opening to chat with people from different walks of life about their experiences, opinions, hopes, and fears. Getting to learn more about humanity and get laid in the same evening? What’s not to like?!

 

Lastly, I feel it’s important to add that you can always say no to sex, for any reason you want. You can say no to the idea of casual sex altogether, and just stay home reading a book. You can say no to the random person who asks you out via Tinder, if their vibe rubs you the wrong way or you just don’t feel like going out. You can say no to staying for another drink, if by the end of the first one you’re bored to tears or just wishing you were home watching Netflix instead. You can say no when your date asks you back to their place, whether it’s a “no, but maybe next time” or a permanent kind of no. You can say no when you’re back at their place (or yours), after a nightcap or after some kisses or after some touching or whenever the hell you want. You can say no to seeing them again. You can say no at any time, for any reason or for no reason at all, and anyone who makes you feel like you can’t is someone you should get away from as soon as you possibly can. (Block their number, too. You deserve better.)

As a demisexual, I’ve found that the most likely juncture of a date when I might need to say no is when we’re paying for our drinks/dinner/whatever and have to decide whether to move to a second location. If I don’t want to have sex with them, right then or perhaps ever, but they’ve made an invitation for me to do so, I can say:

  • “Thank you, but no.”
  • “I’m not really feelin’ it.”
  • “It was nice meeting you, but I need to get some rest.”
  • “I don’t think we’re a great fit, but thanks for your time.”
  • “I’ve had a lovely time, but I think I’m just gonna head home.”
  • “I’m not really feeling sexual chemistry here, but I hope you have a good rest of your night.”

I used to feel guilty about doing this, as if I had “wasted their time” by declining sex when there was an unspoken agreement that sex would (or could) happen. But frankly, anyone who believes sex is an obligation, in any context and for any reason, is not a safe person to have sex with. This is also why I prefer to pay for my own drinks/food/transport on all first dates; I need all the help I can get convincing myself that I never owe anyone anything and am free to say no at any time. There is always a chance that someone will get angry and/or aggressive when rebuffed in this way, however gently; this is one of the many reasons it’s best to have all first dates in public, well-lit places where there are plenty of other people around.

 

Are you a demisexual person who enjoys casual sex? What are your tips and tricks for having demi-friendly hookups?

 

This post was sponsored. As always, all writing and opinions are my own.

I’m Dating a Demisexual!

Kate Sloan

Have you ever heard of demisexuality?

It’s okay if you haven’t. I hadn’t either, until I read a post on a friend’s blog, a response to a woman who had recently come out to her mother as being demisexual (i.e. she doesn’t experience sexual attractions to people unless she already has a strong emotional bond with them).

The argument against this woman (which I do not necessarily agree with – I’m still not entirely sure) was twofold:

1. You should not use LGBT terminology like “coming out” to apply to an identity that is not nearly as oppressed or disadvantaged as LGBT identities are.

2. You should not regard demisexuality as a legitimate identity, because it’s just a way to slut-shame women who don’t need to be emotionally connected to someone to have sex with them.

Initially, as a queer and sex-loving woman, I thought, “Yeah! Stop appropriating our terms and making other folks feel shitty for enjoying loveless sex!”

And then my boyfriend told me he believed himself to be demisexual.

Obviously, this required me to re-examine my beliefs about this orientation. And I realized what I always end up realizing when I initially reject someone’s self-professed labels: We each get to choose how we identify, and it’s no one else’s place to dispute that.

The thing is, there are people who genuinely aren’t sexually interested in folks until they know them a lot better (or, to quote Ewan McGregor’s character in the movie Down With Love, “all the way better”). It’s not intended to slut-shame on any level; it’s not a case of sexual elitism or puritanical ethics; it’s just the way their brains work. And if they feel like they want to use terminology like “coming out” to describe their experiences, we should allow them to do so… provided they are willing to accept the fact that they are (assuming they’re also straight) inherently privileged and not oppressed to nearly the same degree that LGBT people are.

Look, no one’s going to call you a freak for wanting to wait until you know someone better to have sex with them – no one, at least, who isn’t either totally stupid or totally joking. No one’s going to try to strip you of your basic human rights for being sexually choosy. So yeah, it’s probably going to piss some people off if you try to group yourself in with other non-standard sexual identities like gay or asexual or even kinky. That’s something you basically have to be willing to deal with if you want to proudly identify as demisexual.

As for the practicalities of dating someone who’s demisexual, here’s what I can tell you:

1. When we’re out and about together – walking down the street, getting drinks at a bar, whatever – I will occasionally see people that I find attractive. People who, if I were single, I might flirt with. People who seem cute and fuckable to me. By contrast, this never happens to my boyfriend. Literally never. If I point out some girl and say, “Wow, look at that foxy lady,” my man might acknowledge that said woman is pretty or is wearing a nice outfit, but he will express ambivalence on the topic of whether or not she is sexy or whether he would “do” her. I find this a bit vexing.

2. Recently I told my boyfriend that I sometimes wished our relationship was closer to “monogamish” than monogamous – that I would feel happier within our relationship if I were able to kiss and flirt with other people on occasion. While he was okay with this, and readily agreed to this “rule change” in our relationship, he could not fathom feeling how I felt. He could not identify with my need for the excitement of pursuing, and being pursued by, other people. I tried to explain it to him, but he couldn’t really get his head around it.

3. He is much more interested in emotionally-based sex than I am. I’m not sure if this is because he’s demisexual, or just because he’s a gentle, sensitive kind of guy (or maybe they’re related?), but it’s very noticeable. Sometimes I joke that, in some ways, he’s “the girl” in parts of our sexual union, because if he had it his way, I think we would always have slow sex in missionary position. I, on the other hand, would be happy to have hard, fast, doggie-style sex almost every time. We both enjoy having sex both ways (and other ways too), but it’s clear that we each have our favorite way, and they differ.

I believe strongly that the universe delivered me exactly the kind of lover that I was yearning for in the months before I met him. My previous boyfriend had exhibited signs of possibly being very bad at monogamy, and so I felt an acute desire to be with someone who had eyes only for me. So of course, I ended up with a demisexual – someone who can be hit on by a random hot person and have no interest in them whatsoever. I find it amazing how this worked out.

This is a huge topic, one I have a lot of interest in and haven’t yet formulated strong opinions on. So I have to ask you, readers: What’s your take on demisexuality? Do you think it’s a legitimate identity? Are you at all offended by it? Do you know any demisexuals? Tell me all about it!