Comment 109430

Parent Comment

MaskedLin
Jun 14, 2021, 7:47:04 PM UTC
There's a ton of ways Ace people can be, their spectrum is just as wide and varied as those of allo and gender spectrum. It's sad that it isn't explored more, its probably because a lot of people still don't understand it in a simple form yet, so the level of subtlety isn't something they grasp yet. It's a shame though, and I love that you're exploring it with Silvyr. I fall somewhere in the gray area as well, and it can confuse people when I try to explain precisely what I mean, so I describe it plainly as "ace," even though it doesn't truly fit what I feel. The sense of closeness these two show right here is incredibly sweet, I look forward to seeing more of them.

Comment ID 109430

[Art] Pride love
ArkillianDragon
Jun 14, 2021, 10:48:58 PM UTC on [Art] Pride love
Oh yeah- I think the big problem is that a lot of people see the greyer areas of asexuality as "well, that's just normal", but it's NOT what they feel, cause they don't cap out at sex but only if you have a long attachment, or sex only sometimes. For an Allo person, that rule can be broken due to medication or the correct sexual partner. Not for an ace, and that's hard to portray, cause a lot of the time, the rejection of allosexualness is seen as rejection of love when it's just setting boundaries. I HONESTLY wonder if we understood asexuality more if the odds of it is actually way higher cause people don't realise that they're forcing themselves to fit a normal that doesn't exist.

One of my big concerns with this comic is that Silvyr will read as gay, or that Silvyr will look like he doesn't deserve Phoenix's love cause he isn't sexually attracted to anyone. I... don't know how to shorthand it so I'm going to have to slow burn it which is gonna be hard T.T It's way easier to pin point a character as gay or sex repulsed. Something as subtle as a demi? That's gonna be a challenge T.T I hope I'm up to it ^^;

Replies

  • MaskedLin
    Jun 17, 2021, 6:56:40 AM UTC | Total Edits: 1 | Last edited on Jun 17, 2021 by MaskedLin
    That is an issue grey aces face, yeah. With demis in particular, they mix up "only *feel* sexual attraction when an emotional bond has formed" with "only *want to*act* on sexual attraction when an emotional bond has formed." Those two are not the same, no no no. Maybe with greater understanding and less social disapproval of the ace spectrum, more people would identify on it. At the very least, I think people who are would find out sooner and not feel broken like many do in our current social setting. I certainly felt stress until I realized there were others specifically like me, grey aces.

    Yo, I love slow burns, and that probably would be one of the better ways to show it. If you show the closeness they have like you have here, people will be able to tell that they care about one another, regardless of how often or seldomly they express it in a sexual way.

    There's a character in a story of mine who is ace, I was planning on making him a far end, sex-repulsed ace. Reading through this though got me thinking how it skips over nuances present in the a-spec, I'm considering rethinking some aspects I had previously scrapped with him. Not that being a classical ace is bad, but I think I this direction speaks to my feel of his character better, and I was glossing it over before.
    • ArkillianDragon
      Jun 17, 2021, 9:38:51 PM UTC
      Right- a lot of people see asexuality as that cute "They don't want sex before marriage" when it's like actually no- after marriage they may not have formed a strong enough bond yet. Or perhaps they never will. An allo that holds off waiting for their partner to be "ready" is not ok. The love needs a better base than "One day I'll be worthy" Sad

      I love a slow burn too, but I'm very aware that I have a comic cap of 30 pages. I can free style a comic and draw it and finish it for a thing but as soon as it hits 30 pages, I'm on borrowed time. I have no idea how I'm going to break that threshold. I'm scared that I'll do book one, and then stop at that T.T I've done that so many times that my friends wont consume my content till I finish it now which is so isolating T.T

      If your character has been simplified to be sex repulsed cause you can't imagine writing an ace that isn't sex repulsed then ABSOLUTLY re work the character. I get that there's a lot of sex repulsed people in the ace spectrum. I... may be one. I don't know. I know I don't want it for myself, but I may be grey or demi and change my mind when I fall in love. There's so much room for sex repulse, as well as demis and greys Smile Not everyone needs to dedicate thier love only for hamburgers or thier work. I feel that is a very allo way of writing an asexual character. It is one way they can present, and it is romantic in a vague way, but you can be sex repulsed and still love someone with all your heart Smile
      • MaskedLin
        Jun 21, 2021, 7:36:39 PM UTC
        Waiting on an ace person for that kind of intimacy isn't healthy for either- if you're allo, you have needs and from what I've heard it can be stressful to leave them abandoned. On the other side, one shouldn't expect the ace person to eventually want it- it can put pressure on them to do things they don't feel, even if their partner isn't asking. There has to be an understanding of the situation, and how you can't go into it like an investment or something.

        Ahh, that would be an issue. I kinda have a similar one? Except I world build excessively and it outlives the will to write the story. I've been working on directing that into a means that will get me to writing, I'm seeing how that goes. Maybe you could approach the comic with more outlining? Outlining is a lot faster than page making, maybe it'll help you keep up momentum?

        It's not that I can't imagine him as not sex-repulsed, but that I was wanting it to be clear he was ace. But it's not fair to him as a character to simplify him for the sake of being easily digestible to an audience who likely will not have much knowledge of the spectrum. He'll probably confuse people, but putting him into a neater box won't mean that will stop happening.
        • ArkillianDragon
          Jun 21, 2021, 10:29:17 PM UTC
          How do you outline? I'm not very familiar with writing techniques. I normally free style
          • MaskedLin
            Jun 23, 2021, 11:40:49 PM UTC
            I'm relatively new to it as well, but I make a bullet point list. In this outline, I'm putting things in loose, big terms. It just describes big plot things, with any relevant notes if something doesn't make sense at face value. This creates a skeleton of sorts, acting like a guide to direct the creative process. Granted, there are a *lot* of ways to outline a story, depending on preference! Here's a link to a video with some different methods.
            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kieAfi3hLEY

            If you want to put it in terms of the video, I'm between a timeline and a skeleton outliner. Doing this gets me excited to hit the plot points, and acts as a sort of motivation.