A review by mirichasha
Ace: What Asexuality Reveals about Desire, Society, and the Meaning of Sex by Angela Chen

hopeful informative reflective slow-paced

4.5

I didn’t agree with or buy into every single thing stated and most of my raised hackles came from the salvaging of TERFs’ work, which, honestly fine is important both historically and in a collective understanding of sex and sexuality, without actually clearly addressing and warning about those writers TERF (trans exclusive/exterminatory radical feminist) tendencies and focus, and the ways that SWERF (sex worker exclusionary radical feminist) ideology puts sex workers in danger rather than “helping” them at all. But those were not the center of this book, which was an eye opening (personally and in general) collection of personal testimonies and research and history about asexuality, and to a lesser extent, aromanticism. Even to me who has been on the outskirts of this conversation for close to ten years, I learned much and appreciated the way the author arranged this book and brought readers through each subtopic so by the end, we understand many aspects of Ace identity and experience in a multifaceted way. Anyway. Read this book, just be wary of uncritical engagement with harmful TERF figures and their work. Also it says homosexuality sometimes which is a big pet peeve - let’s leave that word for historical examinations of the Holocaust and very early sexuality studies from last century, not for anything modern please thanks.