"Friendzoning" is not a thing and other truth bombs

By Victoria Stiegel on November 25, 2012

Jenni and Tim are in a happy relationship, though Jenni is asexual and Tim is not. Picture via BBC News.

The Daily What is a blog that posts links to a variety of interesting, amusing, or otherwise noteworthy posts from around the internet, often news articles. On Friday, November 23rd, they posted a link to a BBC News article by Lucy Wallis entitled “What is it like to be asexual?” The article features an interview with a young British woman who identifies as asexual and her boyfriend, who does not. (For the record, they both sound eminently satisfied with the state of their relationship.) It also discusses some statistics about asexuality, a topic about which there is very little research. Indeed, asexuality is something of a recent idea as far as the scientific community is concerned, and the Asexuality Visibility and Education Network (AVEN) was only founded in 2001. Finally, the article also touches on the difference between being aromantic (i.e. not experiencing romantic attraction or desires) and asexual (i.e. not experiencing sexual attraction or desires), and notes that it is possible to be one without being the other. On the whole, the BBC article is respectful and non-judgemental.

Unfortunately, the post linking to the article from The Daily What was neither.

Giving the post a headline “Meet Tim, the Mayor of the Friendzone” and including a screencap of an anonymous comment reading “Good lord. That guy got friend-zoned so hard he made it into the news,” the author of the TDW post had this to say about the story:

Not to be such a cold-hearted cynic, but I think this anonymous user has a point. For more details on this story, check out the original BBC article on the phenomenon of asexuality.

Not to be a cold-hearted bitch, but I think you’ve got a problem with your brain being missing.

First, let’s deal with the part where the TDW author refers to the “phenomenon” of asexuality. Asexuality isn’t a phenomenon any more than heterosexuality, homosexuality, or bisexuality are. Human sexuality exists on a continuum, and lest you think I’m making that up, scientific research into human sexuality has been proving this for years. Alfred Kinsey, pioneering sex researcher, developed the Kinsey Scale in the late 1940s to describe the range of human sexuality. His initial scale went from zero to six, with a score of zero representing someone exclusively heterosexual and a score of six representing someone exclusively homosexual. His colleagues would later add a score of X to represent, you guessed it, asexuality.

Talking about asexuality as if it is entirely unnatural or a disorder is just as wrong-headed and ultimately harmful as talking about homosexuality in that way. We’ve come far enough that reasonable, non-bigoted people no longer think of homosexuality as a disorder. It’s time asexuality got the same courtesy. If someone claims their sexual identity as asexual, that should be respected just as much as any other sexual identity. Part of that respect means not acting as though their existence is an unnatural or deviant phenomenon.

Secondly, let’s dive into the thorny, misogynistic, and frankly really freaking sad concept of “friendzoning.” Look, I’ve had crushes on people who had no romantic interest in me, and it sucked. I’ve even joked about being “buddy cursed,” because guys always seem to see me as one of the guys, a buddy rather than a potential romantic partner. But I haven’t accused any of them of “friendzoning” me, because you know what? They didn’t owe me anything. They didn’t owe me romantic attention. They didn’t owe me sexual favors. The only thing they owed me was basic human decency and respect. And looking back, at least a few of those guys might have responded favorably if I’d had the guts to say “hey, I really like you and I think we should date.”

When a guy says “dude, that girl totally friendzoned me” it’s generally tied in with the idea of the secret-douchebag “Nice Guy (TM)” persona, in which a guy is super nice to a girl (i.e. is there for her when other guys are jerks, hangs out with her when she’s down, does things for her even if she doesn’t ask, etc) and then gets resentful and pissed off when that girl doesn’t want to have sex with him out of pure gratitude. The gross thing about it is that it implies that the girl owes the guy sex because he was so nice to her. Or, a guy might say he got friendzoned if he met a girl, was sexually attracted to her, and was rebuffed upon suggesting that they get it on. “I wanted to bang that chick, but I totally got friendzoned.” The gross thing about this is that it implies that guys have a right to have sex with any girl they want. That if a guy is interested in having sex with a girl, she should be so flattered and so grateful and so honored that she shouldn’t even think of refusing. That if a girl does tell a guy she isn’t interested in having sex with him, it’s because she’s frigid/a bitch/a cocktease/only into jerks/witholding sex unfairly, as opposed to that she just isn’t interested in having sex with him.

The really freaking sad aspect of friendzoning – and the way the TDW author immediately classified a celibate but romantic relationship as friendzoning – is that it implies that the only human relationship worth anything is a sexual one. That romance is nothing without sex. That romance is impossible without sex – the couple mentioned in the article isn’t having sex, so they aren’t actually a couple. This attitude is evident in all kinds of things besides the friendzoning concept and the reaction to asexuality – would Viagra be nearly as popular as it is if our society weren’t placing such a huge emphasis on sex as the entire basis of romantic relationships? When I told the nurse at my last doctor appointment that I, at 28, am not sexually active and never have been, she looked at me like I had turned into a unicorn or a dodo bird.

So, to sum up, these are the truth bombs I am dropping on your heads:

  • Asexuality IS a legitimate thing and you should respect people who identify as such.
  • Friendzoning is NOT a legitimate thing.
  • No one owes any one else sex.
  • Ever.
  • The only people who get to decide what makes a relationship valid or what makes a relationship work are the people inside that relationship.
  • Sex is not universally necessary for any and all romantic relationships at any and all stages of said relationships.
  • The key to successful, healthy relationships is mutual respect and openness.

Learn ‘em, love ‘em, live ‘em. Most importantly, just try to live your life in such a way as to be respectful of your fellow human beings.

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