Asexuality or being 'ace' (short for asexual) is a newly invented LGBTQ+ category promoted by former gay rights charity Stonewall. What is it? Asexuality includes being 'gray sexual', meaning feeling more inclined towards sexual activity some of the time than at other times, and 'demisexual', which means wanting to develop romantic feelings for a partner before engaging in sexual contact i.e most people, most of the time. You can be an 'asexual lesbian' or 'demisexual gay man', so asexuality is not so much of a claim to orientation (which sex you fancy), but a characteristic of that sexual orientation or its overall sexual character. 

Where does the category come from? We discuss 'asexuality' as reaction to, and logic of, pornography: that there is now an invented group category, who are supposedly a minority, who refuse the pornographic representation of being sexually available for immediate sexual contact with strangers at all times. It also, we say, represents the instantaneousness of access to pornography online and as if refuting this, and preferring greater sexual connections with real people in real life, is somehow novel or now a marginal view, placing you in a minority status sexual group.

We also discuss the impact of SSRIs on women's libido, Jen refutes any claim to asexuality at all from a Freudian perspective, and we consider whether Stonewall is simply looking for its next 'young person' cohort to claim it represents now that the Trans train is grinding to a holt. What services would asexuals need? Are Stonewall planning to campaign for those in sexless marriages, who number in the millions? We also consider 'asexuality' as a way to frame the volcel and incel trends, and that most people as they mature do not consider their sexual orientation, or their sexual life, to be the most important things about them - are they therefore, in their tens of millions, also asexual?

We think through 'asexuality' as an effect of alienation, the loss of third spaces, Trans and Asexuals as an oddball club, and how these new sexual categories are an attempt to create subcultures and social scenes after their decline this century. Towards the second half of the episode other themes include lifestylism as competition e.g. mommy vloggers and lifestyle bloggers, organic fun as the only real fun, and we discuss why women love True Crime so much?