Reddit reviews Understanding Asexuality

I'd first recommend going to [The Asexual Visibility and Education Network's FAQ] (http://www.asexuality.org/home/overview.html) which is fairly comprehensive and gives a good 101-style overview. There's also this video which gives a much shorter overview of what asexuality is. There's also the (A)sexual documentary on youtube which portrays how asexuality impacts real-life people and shows how even confident, outgoing, and charismatic people can start to doubt and be demoralized about this aspect of themselves.

If you're interested in research, I'd also recommend looking through this list of much of the research that has been done on asexuality. Included in that list as a good place to start is a book by Anthony Bogaert, a professor at Brock University and one of the leading researchers on asexuality, called Understanding Asexuality. That book is pretty highly recommended for anyone wanting to look at asexuality through various different lenses: history, biology, psychology, and our social interactions and formation of relationships.

Part of the reason why it's difficult for asexuals to accept their asexuality is because desiring and having sex are seen as fundamental to being human and even to existing as a sentient living being. Sex is seen as something that is so intrinsic to life itself, so much so that to not have the innate desire for it can often be seen as one of the worst things in the world. What's your purpose if you don't even want to do the one thing you're "supposed" to want to do as a living thing? Planned Parenthood says we are all sexual beings from the day we're born to the day we're die. Up until last year, the DSM listed a lack of desire or interest in sexual activity as a disorder. As of now, a lack of desire towards sexual activity with another is not a disorder only if the person is not distressed about their lack of desire. But in a world where asexuality is not known or seen as a legitimate way of being - of existing, even - it can be difficult to escape such a diagnosis of hypoactive sexual desire disorder when one is in actuality, asexual but doesn't know it.

As an example to your football analogy, it would be like if there was a disorder for people who lack an interest in playing football and if football was considered a fundamental aspect of human relationships that all human beings can and should enjoy. This video reveals some of the negative comments that asexuals can and do receive if they reveal their lack of sexual attraction towards another or lack of desire to have sex with someone else. Being on the receiving end of those comments can be difficult to deal with and make some asexuals reluctant to open themselves up to questions from other people, even well-meaning ones.

http://www.amazon.com/Understanding-Asexuality-Anthony-F-Bogaert/dp/1442200995

http://www.amazon.com/Asexuality-A-Brief-Introduction-Archive/dp/1477428089

Can't really speak to their accuracy however.

Editing out the researcher's name gives the wrong impression of this. His name is a citation. He published about autochorissexuality in an actual book. This is not Tumblr shit. Also, he defines autochorissexuality as a paraphilia, not a sexual orientation. The orientation is still asexual. It's genuinely interesting that some asexuals have this paraphilia, and others do not.

The only part I'd call Tumblr-crazy is when they start complaining that it must be recognized as a "full sexuality", not a paraphilia. For added lulz, the friendly autochorissexual who wrote that refers to people with fetishes as "broken" and "strange". She then complains about other people labeling her.