Dear Poly Hannah,
I am an asexual lesbian. My experience with dating apps has been very hollow. The conversations tend to be tepid at best and I find myself trying to force romantic interest in strangers. Is there something I should be doing to improve my experience on these apps, or are they better for casual hookups anyway? How can asexual people get into relationships?
What are dating apps if not the attempt of trying to force romantic interest in strangers?! It’s a high bar to assume that any person could develop real romantic interest for someone whose sole context they have is a few messages and three to five highly curated pictures. When you’re mostly looking for sex, it’s easier to gauge whether or not you’d be attracted to someone based on a few pictures, but when romantic compatibility is the primary thing you’re looking for, it’s going to be harder.
That’s simply because the most popular apps are built for the sexually utilitarian. Dating apps like Grindr are exceptionally efficient if you are looking to have sex with someone within the next two hours who lives within two miles of you, but also a little unnerving when you see the profiles of people you can track like an alien closing in on you. One hundred feet…50 feet…10 feet…HairyBear87 is in the room now! For the sake of directness, I do sometimes wish that I was a horny gay man browsing photos of headless torsos, but I’m not and neither are you.
While it’s true that the apps are easier for hookups, it’s not impossible to form a long lasting romantic and completely non sexual romantic relationship from someone that you meet on an app. I’d suggest making your asexuality clear in your profile (no pussy for you) and highlighting non-sexual elements of yourself, so someone who might message you is reaching out because of shared interest, as opposed to that killer swimsuit pic.
It's good that you already know you are asexual. Many people don’t realize this until years down the line and whatever our identity is also happens to be the best part of ourselves. Put that in the front, as you’re better off dating other asexual people rather than trying to find a compromise with a sexual person. (Even those who experience physical attraction run into major relationship issues because of mismatched libidos.)
So much of queer culture is dominated by sex. It is an important part of our liberation, but I can imagine, for an asexual lesbian, this could feel quite isolating. Queer spaces, like bars, can also be pretty sex focused, but even sexual people are not looking to fingerbang in the bathroom stall every night. We have our Wednesday nights too. For you, my answer is fairly straightforward: focus on meeting even more people, exploring your own interests, and in the pursuit you’ll likely find someone who wants the same passionately non-sexual relationship that you do.
Dear PolyHannah,
I went out with my trivia friend, had a nice time, but he kissed me and it didn’t do anything for me. If he weren’t someone I knew, I’d probably give it another shot to make sure it wasn’t just first date nerves, but since he’s my friend I don’t want to lead him on. Do you think I cut this off now, or go out again?
Dating is literally a strange social experiment involving placing a stranger in different scenarios and based on your physiological and emotional response to them, deciding whether or not you want to spend a significant percentage of your life with them. Whether you’re trying to figure out if you’re politically aligned, romantically aligned, or sexually aligned, it’s going to take more time than one date, and more than one kiss. “No time wasters” is a trendy term on dating apps, but I suspect the people who state that are probably the worst offenders. Finding out if there is a connection, more often than not, takes time—so enjoy it. It’s not leading someone on to continue dating them if you had a nice time but are still figuring out your feelings. What would be leading them on, was if you were certain that you didn’t want anything with him, but wanted to keep him around because he has a niche area of knowledge that you needed for your trivia team.
You’re not leading him on, you’re still figuring things out. As opposed to torturing yourself about one peck, I’d recommend making out with him more and in between kisses casually ask, “Do you know who crowned Napoleon emperor of France?” Make your decision after that.