Carletoncolton - GPOY 3

Do you…. Have any trashy romance novel suggestions 👀

Absolutely. I can give you some author recs, if you're down for it? They're really prolific authors and have a range of stuff, so you'll probably find something to your tastes.

Cat Sebastian mostly writes Victorian/Regency romances with queer characters (I particularly rec A Little Light Mischief which is unbearably cute).

Alyssa Cole has a lot of great, diverse romances with POC and queer as the MCs (particular rec for How to Find a Princess, which is about security officer and the princess she's trying to get to claim her title).

Rebekah Weatherspoon is really funny and writes really great characters, and her fairytale retelling series (esp. If the Boot Fits) is one of my favorites.

Yvette Hines is one of the funniest writers I've read, and she has a bear shifter romance series that is so full of bear puns it's amazing.

Sam Burns is also really fun, and mostly writes queer paranormal romances that are really fun and full of relatable characters (I'd rec the Fantastic Fluke series because who doesn't love ghost romance and mysterious plots?)

Alexis Hall is maybe my favorite on this list? They write really, really entertaining "traditional" sorts of Victorian romances (among others) but with queer protagonists. My personal go-to when I'm feeling down is A Lady for a Duke, with a trans woman MC and a childhood friend romance. It's lovely.

I just read this super sad post about this girl who’s asexual and married and everyone is basically telling her that she doesn’t deserve her husband/she’s just a prude/she should just do it anyway. So I want to tell you all right now that if people tell you this, or if they tell you you’ll never have a relationship, it is BULLSHIT. My husband is asexual and I’m not. He’s sex repulsed, we don’t have sex, we never have. And it doesn’t matter to me. You know what does? He does. His mental health and wellbeing matter to me. Because he is my best friend and he’s one of the smartest, kindest, funniest people I’ve ever met. And he’s had people tel him that he’s broken and it makes me SO ANGRY because they are WRONG. Being different doesnt mean you’re broken. If you don’t like sex/don’t want it/etc. Do not let anyone tell you that you’re inferior because you’re not. Do not let anyone convice you that you’ll never have a relationship because they’re wrong(if you want one). You are not broken, and it will be okay.

Reblog this and I'll send your URL to BC

I’m filling a notebook with the URLs of the Cumber Collective to send with the Relax the Real Project. Reblog and I will include yours!

carletoncolton - GPOY 6: Value World

A shout out to writers who support writers

Writers who may be feeling insecure out their own writing, yet still enthusiastically reblog and comment on someone else’s fic.

Writers who may struggle to find time to write their own stories, yet still read fics and take the time to let the writers know how much they like it in tags, asks, comments.

Writers who can appreciate and share a fic even though it might not be their ship or their “thing” because they respect the quality and the writer.

Writers who have tons of followers and share lesser known fics to help them get exposure.

Writers who have a small number of followers and will still reblog the popular fics.

Writers who will help another writer brainstorm or get through a tough part of their fic.

Writers who beta for other writers.

Writers who are kind and secure enough to support other writers.

I see you, and appreciate the hell out of you.

Ok Dr. Phil’s wife, Robin, (yes groan, but listen up) has this new app out (iPhone and Android) that’s for people in abusive relationships. It’s called Aspire News and it’s disguised as a regular news app, but when you go to the “Help” section of the app, it leads you to...

You seem pretty open about this, and I don't know anyone else to ask, but you can ignore this completely if you need to. I think I might be asexual? But I'm not sure. I've never looked and someone and thought sex, and usually sex just sounds meh at best. But I have had it before, and I liked it? Is it possible for me to still be ace, or if not, what am I? Thank you

::puts on Official Asexual hat::

I can’t, despite this fabulous hat, actually make a ruling on your sexual orientation or how you want to identify. But that said: the definition of asexuality, as I understand it, is a sexual orientation that consists of not feeling sexual attraction to anyone. Period. Everything after that is a different question. Your sexual orientation is about who you feel sexually attracted to and if the group of people you feel sexually attracted to is [file not found] then, congratulations, you’re asexual and you are entitled to cake.

I think that a lot of confusion–and especially a lot of the people who basically feel like they want to identify as asexual but don’t qualify–comes from piling two or three different factors onto the identity of asexuality and conflating them, or treating them like the more of those factors you have, the MORE asexual you are, like there is a ~gold star asexual~ class that you only get into if you are attracted to no one, have never had sex, never want to have sex or even think about sex, think sex is totally gross and inexplicable, and never experience sexual urges or sensations. But that’s a whole bunch of other factors getting piled on to a sexual orientation in a way that just demands you fit into a stereotype.

Sexual orientation: What group of people, broadly speaking, do you look at and think: Ooh I want to have sex with you.

If it is people of the opposite gender, heterosexual! Same gender, gay/lesbian/homosexual as applies in your case! Two or more genders, bisexual or pansexual or omnisexual or some other word according to fine gradations of meaning and gender identity and so on! If nobody, ever, asexual! If very few people, very rarely, generally for reasons other than physical/gender characteristics, demisexual or gray-asexual!

Sexual behavior: Do you have sex? Have you ever? Do you masturbate? How?

These are all super prone to be influenced by circumstances! Maybe you’re really young or you have moral/religious/emotional/psychological/etc reasons to refrain from having sex. This doesn’t mean you can’t belong to ANY of the sexual orientations listed above; you can absolutely be gay or straight or bi or pan before you’ve had sex with anybody, or if you’re currently not having sex.

Maybe you are or were in a relationship with somebody, of any gender, who did or didn’t belong to the group of people you find you’re sexually attracted to, and you had sex with them–because they wanted to, because you wanted to for reasons other than sexual attraction, because you thought you would find you liked it once you tried it, because you didn’t really think about reasons and it just seemed like a good idea at the time.

That ALSO doesn’t mean that you automatically belong or don’t belong to any sexual orientation listed above. Gay people experiment or even wind up in lifelong sexual relationships with people of the opposite sex for various reasons; straight people have sex once or many times with people of their own gender; bisexuals do not have to perpetually have sex with people of both genders to still be really bi; asexuals can have sex and still be asexual.

[There is not a good word for this one–Sexual enjoyment, maybe?]: Quite aside from how skilled you or your partner are, do you basically LIKE the sexual behavior you engage in, if any? 

There are a bunch of variations to this–some people just really really like sex even when it doesn’t result in orgasms, some people think sex is gross and unpleasant even when it’s taking place in a loving relationship and technically everything is going great, even when they’re masturbating in exactly the way they prefer. For some people this dislike or discomfort might come from trauma or social conditioning that sex is dirty or wrong, but for lots of people it’s just how they feel! THERE IS NO INNATE REASON WHY THIS SHOULD CORRELATE TO WHO YOU ARE ATTRACTED TO. A person could be attracted to everyone in the world and still think the actual act of sex involving their own actual body is really gross and unpleasant and not desired, or a person could never be attracted to anyone and still find themselves having a rad time when they decide to get it on, and every variation in between. And a person could find sex with other people super DNW but enjoy the hell out of masturbating. We don’t really have a standard word for people who REALLY REALLY ENJOY sex (or not a non-insulting one); people who don’t enjoy sex at all are called sex-repulsed.

Sexual drive: How often do you find yourself wanting to have sex or masturbate? 

For some people, ALL THE TIME, for some people, never. For MOST people, this varies with hormonal shifts/age/psychological and emotional factors, etc. And again this is separate from who you are attracted to, separate from whether you act on those urges (or choose to have sex in the absence of any physical urge), separate from how much you enjoy engaging in sexual activity if/when you do. This is the one that people are thinking of when they ask if your asexuality is being caused by your meds/thyroid/whatever. But again, having zero libido could happen to somebody who’s actively attracted to all kinds of people, and having a constant urge to get busy could happen to someone who’s not attracted to anyone–even to someone who’s not attracted to anyone and is sex-repulsed, etc.

SO IN CONCLUSION: sexual identity is complicated! Sexual behavior is driven by lots of factors! But if you’re not attracted to anyone, the word for that is asexual, and there’s no wrong way to be asexual. You just are if you are.

"Welcome to Night Vale" style angel #2

Other entries in this series: 1

Seggesting a character might be ace.