By David Futrelle
Unable or unwilling to deal with real-life women, more than a few misogynists have turned to imaginary substitutes — from video game hotties to hypnogogic hallucinations they think are succubi.
But the imaginary ladies they feel the strongest about are of course their anime waifus, whom many misogynists have come to feel are superior to IRL women, and not just because their giant eyes would be better to see with,
Now one dude has apparently decided that his obsessive love of 2-dimensional women isn’t just a slightly sad kink but is his actual sexual orientation. You know, like being gay. According to a quite possibly true posting in the Am I The Asshole subreddit, he recently “came out” as an anime lover to his parents and his extremely annoyed sibling.
Anime dude really needs to learn the difference between a fetish and an orientation.
The post inspired quite a debate on Reddit before it was deleted by the subreddit mods.
H/T — @AITA_reddit on Twitter for the Reddit post and the DisgustedAnimeGirls subreddit (yes, this is a real thing) for the graphic.
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Yes, it is. People who are consistently single for other reasons do not tend to be subjected to corrective rape to try to “fix” them, for example. (And being asexual doesn’t preclude someone being in a relationship, anyway.)
Even if society didn’t discriminate against asexuals (and it does frequently), it would still be a valid orientation. Orientation is defined as the genders who you experience sexual attraction to (often in relation to your own gender, which is a distinction I find a bit baffling and something I imagine would make it difficult for NB people to have words to express their orientation, but I digress). “None” is a valid answer to that, same as any other gender.
Well, you’re wrong. It’s focusing on a body part, not a human. It’s objectifying. It’s not an orientation. Big titty is not an orientation. (I actually had to type that out in the year two thousand and nineteen. Hoo boy.)
@Lumipuna
I have no expertise in this area, but I’ve always been under the impression that sexual orientation is relatively permanent (if that’s the word I want). If you’re bisexual, you’re still bisexual even if you are in a monogamous relationship with a man, for example. Likewise, you can be asexual and still be in a relationship, and even have sex (since asexuals can have a libido and enjoy sex).
It’s a natural trait to personify and see human behavior in non-human things, so I generally think an attraction to a fictional character of any kind is like that, but made even easier through the virtue of them having the aesthetic trappings of a human. Artists express their sexuality through art written, drawn, sculpted, or otherwise; but that, and others responding similarly, doesn’t make them some kind of unapproachable obtuse fetishist. We all like the things we like and fill in the blanks otherwise.
I’m fine with people having rich fictional lives that make them happy. I don’t think this guy’s family really needed to hear about how he physically doesn’t want to have sex with women, but I get the feeling they seemed to need some kind of big ‘reveal’ to get them to stop bothering him about why he’s not dating. At least, I hope that was the line of logic, and not “everyone in my family needs to hear about what I crank it to.”
It’s a different issue if he wants to date, or have a sexual relationship with ‘a woman’ or ‘women,’ but is too repressed, insecure, and uncomfortable with the human body to attempt one… which that whole “knobby elbows wouldn’t bang” shtick reeks of. Speaking of, I wonder if he actually has any experience with the “smells” he finds unappealing, or if this is just cultural osmosis from the extreme misogyny of chan boards (or similar), where the only good woman is the kind invented by a man.
If what the OP says is true then it sounds like his brother is deep into black pill ideology and, if so, then this is probably the least harmful byproduct of that worldview, one which minimises the harm to actual women. Assuming he keeps himself to himself and doesn’t feel the need to track down women online or IRL and tell them about all their perceived shortcomings. The fact that he had to “come out” to his family might suggest he isn’t banging on about it constantly to them but the odds aren’t great that he isn’t an online jerk.
If he has been radicalised by some of the worst corners of the Internet, and I can’t imagine an anime-fetishising misogynist hasn’t ended up on 4chan, then he is going to need a lot of help but, if the family are overly focused on his fetish, it is doubtful that he is going to get the help he needs.
@Catalpa
It is difficult. I now know that I am a woman, but for a long time I was unsure of my gender and identified as non-binary. During that time, I was almost entirely closeted (there were maybe 3 people who knew) and I dated mostly women, so most people thought I was a heterosexual man, but on my own I had no terms to describe my attraction (heterosexual and homosexual don’t mean very much when you don’t fit into a binary). And terms like gynephilic and androphilic, while not defined in relation to one’s own gender, are not well-known and have problematic connotations.
That’s not true. Sure, he’s not actively abusing a partner, but holding these beliefs about women absolutely harms the women around him. If he has a job, it affects his coworkers. If he goes to a restaurant, it affects to women he interacts with there, especially if his server is a woman. If he posts online, and let’s face it, he 1000% does, it affects the way he interacts with women who post (or even just femme-sounding nyms he interacts with).
This idea that if misogyny is held by someone without a sexual partner it’s fine and not harmful to women is wrong. We need to stop acting like an ideology that literally gets women killed is just fine to hold.
Somewhat O/T; but pertaining to the recent thread about cacti. I was in London this weekend and I found this cactus shop…
@kupo
It’s like how if someone is a Nazi, even if they aren’t actively assaulting Jews and POC, it’s not ok to be a Nazi. Not to mention that most Nazis are misogynists.
@kupo
That’s why I added the caveat that it is assuming he keeps his ideas to himself. Which I’m sceptical about, but we aren’t given enough information to reach a conclusion.
kupo:
Well, this supports my earlier hunch that personal trait interests are considered fetishes when they are blatant and objectifying.
I still think there are more subtle personal trait interests that we call “my type” or something like that. I guess in both cases, social insignificance is what makes them a not-orientation.
Masse_Mysteria:
I know. Then again, kinks tend to be permanent too. Or at least mine are.
This is literally impossible to do. We live in a society. He has communication with his family, so he’s not off solo in the woods fending for himself. He comes into contact with women, at the very least with his mother (and possibly OP? Did OP ever state their gender?) so we already know it’s not harmless. There is no misogynist who lives in a vacuum. Misogyny is always harmful.
Edit: I was unclear. His ideas affect his behavior. That’s true for everyone. Even if he never tells another person his ideas about women, he’s still going to interact with them differently because of his profound misogyny.
Am I missing something or are people extrapolating behaviors based on this dude’s self-identified “orientation”?
The actual words reported by the sibling seem to be very much couched in his personal feelings rather than stated as some absolute truth about women. He’s stated that he does not get physically aroused by women and that he finds women’s smell as unappealing to him. Smell plays a large role in attraction for me, and I don’t think that this is just a personal thing.
Regarding OP (and assuming it’s a true story), I also smell a creepy online misogynist who’s likely deep in the chan culture.
As for why he “came out” to his family, he was probably seeking social validation in a not very appropriate manner. Lots of people yearn validation, especially for their non-mainstream tastes. I’ve heard sexual oversharing is a thing some people in kinky culture do, as well as trying to frame your kinkiness as a sexual orientation. I’ve been tempted to do this myself. When I was 27, I was even more unclear than I’m now on the orientation vs. kink distinction.
@Lumipuna
I didn’t mean that kinks wouldn’t be permanent. I guess what I really meant was to say that the public/private thing seems kind of complicated, since in a lot of situations the only way to be public about your orientation is to just keep coming out, or something.
I remember reading somewhere that the word “kink” in itself can be a handful, since it can be used to mean something that’s supposedly abnormal, you need to rely on someone’s definitions of normal and abnormal for that. So maybe that would mean that anything outside of the “I would like to have sex with women/men/people of any gender/no one at all” would be a kink and not an orientation.
@Shadow
I mean, the smell thing is interesting to me, because I’m very sensitive to smells, myself. I could get that hampering your sexual drive/encounters.
But what gives me the perception that there’s something more insidious there is the fact that a huge trope against women’s genitals being perceived as especially smelly or disgusting gets played up a lot in misogynistic hatefest circles. The way they think straw-feminist TERF-y types talk about penises is how they legitimately talk about vaginas.
Masse_Mysteria:
I was wondering exactly this about asexuality and single people above. Same would apply to ace, bi, gay and pan people who choose to be in a heterosexual relationship.
In response to me, Catalpa hinted that there’s significant special prejudice against (mainly AFAB) ace people. Could be, my own impression as 36 yo never dated cis man is that hardly anyone knows or cares why exactly you’re single. Frankly I don’t even know myself if I’m ace or possibly demi or aro or just not very much into other people socially.
This, plus the fact that the whole concept of sexual orientation was originally established to describe the distinction between same-sex vs. opposite-sex attraction.
Was he seriously calling Gal Gadot fat? I thought the “waist too wide” was a joke, since Gal is 3D. Any amount of width is too much.
@Kara.
It’s a means of shaming women for having bodies and natural bodily functions, so they latch onto it. That was another thing that tipped me off in the post.
My message to the men complaining about vaginal odor is “it’s not like any women are going to be letting you near their vagina anyway!”
@Lumipuna
Another thing ace people face is erasure. A lot of people think they don’t exist or that they “just haven’t met the right person.” And even a lot of LGBTQ people refuse to acknowledge the existence or oppression of ace people, or try to remove them from the acronym. A lot of ace people are gender non conforming as well, so TERFs and other assorted transphobes are also often acephobic. TERFs have been trying to remove the A from LGBTQIPA for some time.
Disclaimer: I am not ace. I am sure some of our ace commenters could provide a better response, I’m just giving a general overview of what I know about ace erasure.
@Lumipuna
Ace people absolutely face prejudice. Especially AFAB and trans ace folks. From my own experience almost every ace or proximate person I know has dealt with pressure to be sexual, often in ways that were traumatizing, if not outright forms of corrective rape.
Don’t believe acephobes, they are full of shit.
@Kara
Yeah that part read as misogynistic to me too. And like I get that smells can be a huge thing. But the context, and with the stuff about Gal Gadot, and all? Just… no. This guy is soaking up red pill stuff.
@All
I get the misgivings about someone putting this on Reddit without their brother’s permission, but my sympathies are with the person who posted; their brother put it out there openly in what’s in context a really creepy way, and if nothing else I understand why they’d want to vent about it online. IDK the whole thing seems super off and creepy.
Also, hi, yes it is possible to engage with many kinks/fetishes/paraphilias without harming others. But most men don’t bother because patriarchy.
Hi All. It’s that time again when I ask for help with article titles. This month its an article about Injunctions. Those are the court orders telling people to do, or more often, not to do, something.
All suggestions once again gratefully received.
“Injuction Junction”, with a tagline like “What courts can and cannot tell you to do”, or whatever the aim of the article is.
Tangentially related: A while ago I was discussing depression meds with a friend of mine who has experience on those. She’s somewhat older than me, long divorced, a literal cat lady.
It was noted that the meds might ruin your sexual function as a side effect. Her comment was, “Eh, I guess it doesn’t matter for a bachelor like you”. I didn’t say anything, but thought, “Seriously, masturbation doesn’t matter now?” Besides, I still think it’d be cool to try partnered sex someday, even if it doesn’t look like I’ll ever get around to it.
Most of all, I feel a bit sore because depression and early aging have been eating away my sex drive/sexual energy at an alarming pace. I used to enjoy not just masturbation and self-cuddling, but also elaborate kinky fantasies and elaborate solo fetish play. It was important to me, and reading stuff from other kinky people online helped me understand it. I felt entitled to unlimited play with myself, and now I’m losing interest.
I still feel like being kinky “should” be my primary orientation, rather than waffling somewhere between hetero and asexual.