Month: June 2012

Passion, Sensuality, and Self-Love for the Celibate Asexual

My brain’s been churning with ideas lately, all centered around celibacy and living a celibate life. This post probably won’t be that cohesive or fleshed out because I’ve very much in the exploration stage of these thoughts and I’m a little excited to get them down in words.

First of all, it’s occurred to me that living a celibate life is something that deserves a person’s full consciousness just as much as sexual activity deserves it. I think it’s too easy for asexuals, especially those who are sex-repulsed/averse and/or virgins, to just sort of assume celibacy as a default result of their asexuality and their sex-aversion, without coming into full awareness of what that celibacy means to them and how they want to actually live with it. It may make sense to live without closely inspecting your sexual orientation’s personal meaning because that IS a default state—but even if you’re asexual, arguably even if you’re a sex-averse/repulsed asexual, celibacy is independent of your orientation and a choice, whether one you make consciously or not. I think celibacy should be something we spend time thinking about deliberately, not just in terms of how it affects our belonging in the sexual world, but what it means specifically to us as individuals. How do we feel about it? What do we want to gain from it? How do we relate to ourselves, being celibate? To our bodies? To others? Even just stepping back and consciously saying to yourself “I want to be celibate” or “I want to be celibate for life” can be a powerful thing to do in your own life. Recognizing that your asexuality and your celibacy are two separate things can bring you new insight.

Celibacy can be about so much more than not having sex. That’s something I’m realizing for the first time. The world usually thinks of celibacy the same way they think of asexuality: what it’s NOT and what you AREN’T doing, rather than what it is or could be and what you are doing. I’ve operated out of this socially conditioned perspective before too, without seeing that the sexual world had trained me to perceive my own asexuality and celibacy in a negative filter rather than a positive one (I don’t mean “negative” as in “bad” but rather, as in negative space and the lack of something rather than the presence of something else).

What does celibacy add to my life? What does it mean to me? How can I understand and construct its presence in my life, in my relationship with self, in my relationships with others? How can I use celibacy to relate to my body? To my mind? To my heart and soul? How can I honor and respect my own celibacy?

These are questions I think are worth asking. They’re worth asking of your asexuality too, if you’re asexual.

I’ve recently discovered the concept of tantric celibacy, and I am absolutely fascinated and excited by its possible meanings for my own life. There is one book in particular that I haven’t read yet but intend to read: Stuart Sovatsky’s Eros, Consciousness, and Kundalini. It looks like he talks about a tantric way to practice celibacy, which includes deepening interpersonal intimacy, and that already strongly resonates with me because I have always seen and desired the spiritual and sensual potential of nonsexual love. The spiritual nature of tantra appeals to me greatly, and I want to pursue this idea of having a spiritual experience of celibacy and nonsexual sensuality with myself and others. Tantra is about spiritual enlightenment, and while sex is the more popular path to that enlightenment in tantric philosophy, I believe celibacy is another path. And I think that sensual touch and intimacy between two people in a nonsexual relationship can become a way to experience and achieve the same kind spiritual enlightenment that authentically tantric sex strives toward.

On a related note, I want to share some thoughts about passion and sensuality as they relate to asexuality. The sexual world often falls into the terrible habit of equating passion and sensuality with sex, and in that same vein, identifying people as more or less passionate, more or less sensual, based on how sexual they are.

Merriam-Webster defines passion in many ways but a few of the definitions include “ardent affection: love” and “a strong liking or desire for or devotion to some activity, object, or concept” and “an object of desire or deep interest.” Passion is primarily about emotion. It’s about desire. It is not exclusively a euphemism or synonym for sex and sexual desire. Sex is one form of passion. Some sex is passionate, and some sex isn’t. Some people are passionate about sex, and some people aren’t. Equating sex and passion goes back to the word “frigid” as a demeaning label for sexually disinterested people, and it’s time that this way of speaking and thinking stop because it’s not only linguistically false and lazy, it’s also completely disrespectful toward asexuals, nonlibidoists, and celibates.

Asexuals have the same capacity for emotion and desire as sexual people. Even a nonlibidoist sex-repulsed asexual can be a passionate person because they are an emotional person. Human desire is unlimited, and lacking a desire for sex doesn’t take away the multitude of other desires a person feels. We can feel intense desire for love, for people, for experiences, just as easily as sexual people. We can feel passionately loving. We can feel passionate about people, about art, about our professions, about politics, religion, philosophy, food, fashion, anything.

Ask the friends who have known me since childhood to describe me in three words and I guarantee that they’ll all list “passionate” among their descriptors. I’m a celibate asexual virgin who is deeply passionate in love, passionate about writing, passionate about my beliefs.

It’s funny because I was just reading an interview about tantra, in which the interviewee (who is a serious tantra practitioner and student) made a juxtaposition of tantric sex and celibacy that didn’t dismiss celibacy as the right path for some pursuers of spiritual enlightenment, but she did say that “tantra is for passionate people,” meaning that tantra involving tantric sex is for passionate people and those who choose celibacy are probably not passionate. This is her view in the context of seriously studying tantric philosophy, and I respect her knowledge and experience that far exceeds my own in this area. But as a celibate asexual, it simply does not ring true that celibacy is antithetical to being a passionate person. Tantric celibacy, from what I’ve read so far, is all about sublimating one’s sexual energy in a directed way that enhances spiritual experience. It’s not that a celibate lacks passion; the celibate simply channels their passion into something other than sex.

My ideal love is completely nonsexual. It’s also the highest form of emotional and spiritual passion available to me as a human being. Every asexual, celibate or not, romantic or not, has a different ideal relationship scenario and I can only speak to my own vision of love. Some asexuals may not associate the word or the feeling of “passion” with love and their own ideal relationships at all. Which is fine. But “passionate” is definitely something I want my important life relationships to be, along with nonsexual.

I’m a celibate asexual, I’m a passionate person, and I am also sensual. Turning to the dictionary again, “sensual” is defined as: “sensory” and “relating to or consisting in the gratification of the senses or the indulgence of appetite.” Notice that it doesn’t say anything about sex. Another poor use of language in vernacular English leads people to use the word “sensual” as a needless euphemism for “sexual.” Sensuality is not sexuality. It can be part of sexuality, and there is some logic to the mental association of “sensual” and “sexual.” But sensuality is simply about the senses: taste, sight, sound, smell, touch. Just as not all sex is passionate, not all sex is sensual. In reverse, you can experience sensuality nonsexually the same way you can experience passion nonsexually.

Sensual pleasure is not outside the realm of asexual interest. We’re emotionally functional to the same degree as sexual people, and we are also physically functional to the same degree. We can and do still value pleasure, and sensual pleasure encompasses a wide variety of experiences, not just sex. Sensual pleasure can be had alone or with someone else. Being someone who values and desire sensual pleasure means being someone who wants to see beauty for pleasure, to hear beauty for pleasure, to smell pleasurable aromas, to take pleasure in the taste of food, and to experience the pleasure of touch—whether that means touching the textures of objects that please you or touching yourself or sharing touch with another person.

I express my sensuality in all kinds of ways: reveling in the smell and texture of leather, looking for clothes made of soft or sensuous fabric, breathing in deep the smell of a delicious perfume or food or incense, listening to music that moves me, fully immersing myself in the taste of orgasmic food. Last night, for the first time, I set aside several minutes to give myself a massage with this bottle of massage oil I just bought. The oil smells heavenly. I’ve decided to install this practice as a regular part of my life, in the spirit of mastering self-love, because touch is my love language. I figure even if I don’t have another person in my life right now who can touch me the way I like most, I can give that attention to myself as much as possible. So I locked the door of my room, got into bed naked after a shower, and touched my body all over with the oil. I spent the most time on my shoulders and my back. It was very sensual and afterward, I felt amazing. I can’t tell you how empowering it is to know that I can do this for myself: show myself love through touch. It’s not just about the touch either. I was present with myself and my own body. I burned incense. I thought and spoke love to myself and my body, and most importantly, I felt it.

It is actually a beautiful discovery: the fact that sensuality and sensual pleasure can be entirely self-centered and self-fulfilled. I’ve decided that in my life right now, the only relationship I’m focusing on is the one with myself, and I’ll spend as little time as possible thinking about my relationships with others, because I want to teach myself that self-love is the only love I need. Expressing that love, showing that love, in a sensual way is the fastest and most effective method of viscerally feeling the love.

But even in the context of relationship with someone else, sensuality can be a huge part of the celibate asexual’s life. I believe that wholeheartedly. To me, sensual touch is the most powerful way of creating emotional and spiritual intimacy with another person, and I think that it’s one advantage of being a celibate asexual that I can fully appreciate and use and be aware of sensual touch for this purpose. Most people are sexually active, but not many of those people are sensual with their sexual partners on a consistent basis or with awareness and intention. How sensual you are with a partner has nothing to do with sex. Sensuality, like sexuality, requires intent. And you can’t have an intention without awareness.

All of this circles back. You must be aware of your celibacy to use it or direct it in a purposeful way. You must be aware of your emotions to fully experience and direct your passion. You must be aware of your own sensual nature to experience the world, yourself, or another in a sensual way. And I want celibate asexuals to have that awareness because I believe that it can lead to a more deeply fulfilling life and to more satisfying relationships.

The stories I write, whether original fiction or fanfiction, have always prompted skepticism and misinterpretation from sexual people who can’t separate emotional passion and sensual touch from sexuality. But this kind of relationship has always been my vision of perfect love: the deepest level of emotional passion, a spiritual union, extremely sensual, and completely nonsexual. I’ll continue to write about this love not only because it fills me with joy more than anything but because the world must learn that the absence of sex and sexual desire, whether in a celibate asexual person or in a nonsexual relationship, does not limit the potential for emotional passion or sensual touch.

And I believe in the core of my being that whether I meet the right people in this life or not, the pleasures of passionate love and sensual intimacy are open to me, not just in spite of my celibacy but perhaps because of it.

Celibacy and Nonsexual Love: What They Mean to Me

I recently decided that I should take the time to seriously reflect on what living a celibate life and pursuing celibacy and celibate love mean to me personally.

Being asexual and being celibate are two different things. There are sexually active asexuals. There are asexuals who are totally indifferent to sex whether they’re currently having it or not. There are asexuals who end up in a series of romantic-sexual relationships and asexuals who even end up in normative romantic-sexual marriages. There are asexuals who have had a lot of sex with several different people and asexuals who have a lot of sex within one particular relationship. There are asexuals who do not want to have sex but who do want to have a primary partnership in life and thus decide—with no small amount of anguish—that eventually, they’re going to have to force themselves to have sex for the sake of keeping a sexual person’s love. There are celibate asexuals who are sex-averse, repulsed, or indifferent with celibate leanings that simply give up on primary love altogether based on the sole fact that they won’t consent to sex. Finally, there are celibate asexuals who stay hopeful about finding the kind of love they want and the ones who already have found it.

So as you can see, when I think about my asexuality, it isn’t the same as thinking about my celibacy, which is sort of a new realization for me. I’ve always contextualized my celibacy and my desire for nonsexual primary love through my asexuality because I’m sure the two things do go hand in hand for me, to some extent. Yet I had formed the concept of my own ideal nonsexual love years before I became conscious of asexuality as an orientation and as my orientation, and in a way, it matters more to me that I choose a celibate life and that I desire nonsexual primary relationships than it matters that I’m asexual. I like being asexual, I’m proud of being asexual, but because asexuality does not automatically cover the celibate part of my identity, I have to pause to think about why I like being celibate too. I could always be an asexual who has sex, an asexual who has ordinary romantic-sexual relationships, an asexual who enters into an ordinary romantic-sexual marriage and creates a relationship hierarchy based on romance and sex, the way the average romantic-sexual person does. There are asexuals who do those things, regardless of their asexuality. The way I look at love and relationships and touch and intimacy and romance and friendship and relationship structures have actually very little to do with my asexuality; those views are simply part of who I am as a person, not an asexual.

I want to be celibate for the rest of my life. I’ve known this for a while. Staying celibate means a lot of different things to me. It’s a statement of what I value, how I love, how I relate, how I want to be treated. It’s a major political statement about how I reject the way sexual society sees love and relationships and intimacy. It’s an exercise of my freedom and autonomy. It’s a decision that I make intelligently, deliberately, and with awareness of what it implies. I may live the rest of my life without ever experiencing the kind of love I desire, without ever having a primary/cohabiting relationship, without having consistent physical affection and sensuality (which has always been very important me), etc—all because I choose not to have sex, I choose not to do love and relationships the way almost everybody in the world does them, I choose not to accept the relationship framework that society suggests is the one and only “normal” way. I do acknowledge now that this divergence of mine is largely a choice. I could theoretically force myself to go through the motions of normative romantic-sexual dating, of sex, of the romantic-sex based relationship hierarchy, etc. (Well. Realistically, I couldn’t because all of that feels so antithetical to the core of who I am, that I probably wouldn’t get very far in the charade.) Instead, I have never bothered trying to be that person. I felt tortured for a long time about not having the relationships and love I really want or any love at all because of this lifestyle choice, but instead of forcing myself to try being normative, I eventually got on a road to inner peace.

Celibacy and my refusal to participate in normative serial dating with sexual people has brought at least one blessing to me already: it led me to learn self-love, to grow in my wisdom regarding love and relationships, to become emotionally independent and whole, to develop genuine self-confidence and esteem. I haven’t had other people to use as a crutch. I haven’t had temporary love from others to rely on, in the absence of self-love. If my observation of others is reliable, it looks like most people live into middle age or even old age without ever learning how to love themselves completely, how to be whole, how to be self-fulfilled, how to be emotionally independent and take sole responsibility for their own happiness and feelings. Part of the reason why is they put all of that on their romantic-sexual partners instead, which is never healthy or functional in the long-term. So I have a deep, resounding appreciation for having spent my teens and my early twenties as a celibate person removed from the conventional dating world and instead doing this self-help work because in the event that I do meet the right people to love passionately and intimately, I’ll show up as someone who’s truly ready for a spiritually mature, emotionally mature connection. And if nothing else, I feel at peace with myself in the mean time.

Living a celibate life is important to me because my ideal nonsexual love is important to me. Since I was a child—as young as nine years old—I have had this image in my head of a bond between two people that is deeply emotional, passionate, devoted, intimate, sensual, and which connects them mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and physically, all while remaining completely nonsexual. This is the kind of relationship that thrills me, that captivates me, that excites me. This is the kind of relationship that I adore so much that I’ve spent a decade writing about it in fiction, researching it, writing about it academically, looking for it in literature and TV and film, reading fanfiction about it, etc. My value of this ideal has nothing to do with asexuality. It materialized in my head years before asexuality came into the picture, like I said. It’s this love that I want to be surrounded with. Romantic-sexual couple relationships do nothing for me: they’re boring at best, annoying at worst, problematic in the context of my views on love to the point where listening/watching/thinking about those relationships feels like the emotional equivalent of nails on slate, the ultimate dissonance with who I am. And it’s not because of the sex. What separates romantic-sexual couple relationships from my ideal nonsexual love is an entire culture, a way of being and thinking and feeling and acting day to day, a personal ideology that is so much more significant than the act of sex. Sex is almost irrelevant in comparison to these different relationship cultures.

Being someone who wants primary nonsexual love is as much of an identity issue for me as being asexual and celibate. Thus, being a lifelong celibate is so much more than just “not having sex.” It’s about how I see the world, how I see love, how I love, etc.

I believe that two human beings can experience the height of emotional connection, the most intense love, the deepest spiritual/emotional/mental intimacy, the most loving sensuality, the most magnificent friendship in a totally nonsexual relationship. I believe that with every cell in my body. I believe it so much that I refuse to surrender to the way sexual people do relationships on the grounds that their way is the only way to know primary love. It’s not the only way. It never has been. I know that for a fact, after looking for historical examples of primary nonsexual love. I choose to be celibate because the love I want is that love I’ve described, and I want that love because it strikes me as indescribably beautiful and wonderful. I choose to be celibate because I reject the power that society has assigned to sex. I choose to be celibate because I reject the romantic-sex based relationship hierarchy: I will not accept the idea that there is some kind of love or emotional intimacy that I can only know with a sexual partner and not with friends or family. I refuse to accept that there is an inherent emotional ceiling on nonsexual relationships and love. I refuse to accept the idea that there are hard-drawn emotional distinctions between “romantic” and “not romantic” love. I refuse to accept the ideology that says only romantic-sexual relationships can be primary partnerships that include cohabitation, formalized commitment, physical affection, emotional exclusivity, child-rearing, financial support, etc. I’m celibate because I won’t play by sexual people’s rules when it comes to love and relationships, and the way I see it, by seeking intimate love in romantic-sexual relationships simply because that’s what most sexual people do, I would only contribute to the power and existence of their relationship system. I want the world to change, and the only way to help make that happen is by doing things in my life differently. Even if that means being alone and unloved by others forever.

I also choose to be celibate for the same reason I decided my partners must be asexual too: because there are so many other celibate asexuals who want nonsexual love and nonsexual primary partnerships. I want to spread love in my own community, especially my section of the community. I want to be that miracle of love for a man and a woman who may be out there right now, feeling lonely and sad because they know they don’t want to have sex but they do want to love and be loved. I want to love those asexuals. I want to make the world a little brighter for celibate, sex-averse/repulsed asexuals. Even if it’s only one or two.

I want to be a part of asexual strength and pride and empowerment, in a world that says sex is the most important thing in life and a marker of human value. I want always to be someone who can say to other celibate asexuals that yes, it is possible to feel at peace and happy while being true to yourself as an asexual who doesn’t want to have sex. It’s even possible to feel at peace and happy with only your self-love to keep you. I want to be the example of self-love mattering so much more than love with any other person. And part of loving yourself is allowing yourself to be who you really are, to follow your natural desires and inclinations, to do what you want to do and to say “no” to the things you don’t want. Part of self-love for a sex-averse/repulsed asexual is saying “no” to sex and feeling totally at peace about it.

My celibacy matters for all of these reasons and because it’s my way of saying to the world that I decide what I do with my body on my own terms, that I deserve to have love on my terms, that my value as a partner has nothing to do with my sexual availability but with who I am as a person, and who I am as a person doesn’t change, whatever my sexual behavior is. My celibacy is important to me because it’s one way I know that I am living with authenticity, that I don’t put what others think before what I think, that I am a liberated and independent person who doesn’t care what other people believe I’m supposed to do or want. My celibacy is a way for me to know that I am not going out of my way to please others at the expense of my own feelings.

My celibacy, my devotion to the ideal nonsexual love, and my determination to take only other asexuals as partners keeps me focused on who I really am, what I want deep down, how I feel about myself, and how I feel about being an asexual. And I must say that whenever I think about this lately, I feel so appreciative for this time I have in my life right now where I don’t know my asexual partners and I’m not dating at all, because I don’t want to become involved with my life partners until I know myself as intimately as possible, until I love and accept myself completely and unconditionally, until I am so whole and so ready for long-term, serious love that I am actually capable of co-creating those relationships well.

And figuring out what celibacy means to me is a part of that journey.

“Platonic love” is a problematic term.

I do my best, these days, to avoid using it. Let me tell you why.

First of all, the original meaning of “platonic love” comes from Plato’s The Symposium, where the ideal kind of love was described as a kind redirecting the lover’s focus from the beloved (and sex with the beloved) to “the divine” or “philosophy,” basically to an interaction of the mind or some outside pursuit of knowledge. Plato (and Socrates) did not mean to exclude sexuality altogether from this ideal. They condemned the kind of erotic love that keeps two people obsessed with sex and each other’s body, to the point of neglecting those higher ideas, pursuits, etc, but they did not quite say that the ideal love is totally nonsexual.

The contemporary use of the term “platonic love” is obviously an inaccurate one. It is not true to Plato’s philosophy. In English, we understand “platonic love” to mean love that is not sexual—and that’s problematic for reasons beyond the disconnect to the original idea.

Usually, when people use the term “platonic love” to describe love that isn’t sexual, a simultaneous lack of romance is implicit too. In other words, if you “platonically” love someone, you don’t want to have sex with them and you don’t want to be a couple either. This usage does absolutely nothing to acknowledge the complexities of possible relationships. It conflates romance and sex and makes couplehood or primary partnerships synonymous with a romantic-sexual relationship.

Here’s the thing:

You can have a romantic nonsexual relationship.
You can have a nonromantic sexual relationship.
You can have a nonromantic nonsexual relationship.

Everybody would probably agree that the last kind—a nonromantic, nonsexual relationship—is “platonic.” But what about the other two? If we use the word “platonic” to mean a nonsexual relationship, then the romantic nature of the relationship makes no difference, but ask any romantic asexual or cross-orientation sexual person if their nonsexual romances fit into their understanding of “platonic love,” and they’ll most likely say, “No.” Then, there’s the nonromantic sexual relationship. Is that “platonic” because it doesn’t involve romantic feelings, despite the fact it’s sexual? The problem you’re most likely to run into if you love someone you have sex with but don’t have romantic feelings for them is that no one can believe that nonromantic love and sex can coexist in the first place. To say, “I ‘platonically’ love this person I’m fucking” just sounds weird and dishonest, to most people. You can have sex with someone you don’t love at all, but if you do love that person, the impulse is to label it “romantic” love.

Of course, all three types of relationships can’t be called “platonic” if we go by the original, actual meaning of “platonic love.” But because the term has already adopted its erroneous meaning on a widespread level, we can’t really go back to the true meaning either. “Platonic” probably got hijacked to describe nonsexual love because it’s useful to have a qualifier for the word “love” in English when we have such a fucked up, poor habit of using it to exclusively mean romantic-sexual love and otherwise, tossing it around in the vaguest ways possible.

It’s nice to have a way of saying “I love this person nonsexually and nonromantically” without actually phrasing it like that, simply because what I just wrote is wordy, clunky, etc. People like it when language flows, when we can get our point across in a way that’s short and sweet, but when it comes to emotions and relationships, this “short and sweet and simple” linguistic approach only holds us back. Emotions, love, and relationships are NOT short, simple, and sweet. There’s nothing more complex in our experience. It’s utterly fucking ridiculous that we’re so reluctant to use more sophisticated language to talk about love and relationships, when our actual experiences of them are frequently complicated as hell.

The asexual community inadvertently points out that the “romantic-sexual/platonic” love dichotomy is useless, problematic, and inapplicable for a lot of people. Romantic asexuals, whether they consent to sex or not, love their romantic partners romantically but not sexually. They would not use the term “platonic love” to describe their romantic feelings, even though those feelings stand without sexual desire/attraction. Cross-orientation sexual people can say the same of their romantic attachments.

Likewise, aromantic sexual people run into the problem of labeling their relationships/feelings when they have sex without ever feeling romantic love for their sexual partners, no matter how much they care. Yet obviously, you can’t really categorize a nonromantic sexual relationship into the same box as your nonromantic nonsexual relationships. Calling them all “platonic” misses the differences between the two, both sexually and emotionally.

Then, there are the aromantic asexuals and aromantic sexual people who want primary nonromantic partnership, aromantics whose nonromantic love for others can be just as intense as textbook romance. And almost no one understands them and what they want or how they feel because in the world’s understanding of love and relationships, if you don’t love someone romantically, you love them “platonically,” which means that you want to be friends and not a “couple,” because only romantic-sexual pairs can be couples with a primary relationship.

“Platonic love” is usually equated to friendship in our minds. If you love someone “as a friend,” meaning you don’t want them sexually or romantically, that love is “platonic.” Except—people do sometimes love their friends nonromantically but want to fuck them (and do!). And it’s now a very common thing in 21st century English-speaking societies to conceive of the ideal romantic-sexual relationship as inclusive of friendship anyway (which is a relatively new idea in civilization and still doesn’t exist in many different countries all over the world). I also happen to think that you can love someone romantically without being friends, just as you can be sexually involved with someone who isn’t your friend. So which relationships are “platonic” and which aren’t? And if they aren’t “platonic” but they aren’t “romantic,” then what are they?

What Plato was getting at in The Symposium was essentially: the ideal love may include sex but the intellectually-based friendship in it is far more important, without which the relationship is base and carnal in a way we shouldn’t settle for. The main problem with using “platonic love” to mean friendship is that friendship itself is the most ambiguous kind of connection between two people in the first place! I say this as someone who has been studying friendship and nonsexual love for years, from literary, historical, and philosophical perspectives. Philosophy in particular makes a big deal about the ambiguity of friendship. Erotic love is relatively simple in comparison!

The “romantic-sexual/platonic” love dichotomy leaves no room for the real emotional nuances people experience in their attachments, and I think that it often causes us to live with simplified relationships not because we want to or because we have simple desires and feelings but because we have no experience, cultural context, or language to accommodate a complex social life or set of relationships. This is why language is so important. This is why words and labels matter. How can you have the kind of relationships you want with anyone, if you don’t even have the words to accurately express how you feel? Hell, half the time, people don’t even understand their own feelings and relationship desires because what they feel is not simple at all, but the only relationship framework they know makes everything seem simple and clear cut: romance and sex go together, friendship is separate from both of those things, couplehood/primary partnership is exclusive to romance and sex, etc.

But if we are to accept the possibilities and realities of asexual romance, primary nonsexual/nonromantic love, nonromantic sex and sexual friendship, romantic (nonsexual) friendship, queerplatonic nonsexual relationships and sexual relationships, etc…. we have to drop this way of thinking and speaking about relationships and love in a romantic-sexual/platonic dichotomous way. None of those “complex” relationships fit into that model, which is why the average romantic-sexual person who has no exposure to anything other than normative relationship style will almost always react to those other kinds of relationships with total confusion, rejection, etc.

Unfortunately, I don’t have an alternative to “platonic”, for describing nonsexual/nonromantic love or nonromantic love coexisting with sex or primary partners who are neither sexually nor romantically involved. Right now, I’m just going through the trouble of saying “nonsexual” and “nonromantic.” The one thing I like about using those words is their specificity. They clearly communicate what I mean, with no room for confusion other than the kind that might arise when the relationship or love in question appears “complicated” to someone else. If a relationship is romantic but nonsexual, I’ll say so. If it’s nonromantic but sexual, I’ll say so. If it’s nonromantic and nonsexual, I’ll say so. Clarity is worth a little wordiness.