General public ignorance about asexuality can cause a surprising array of problems, even in these sexually enlightened times. This is why David Jay, the charismatic San Franciscan who has become a poster boy for asexuality, set up the Aven website (Asexuality Visibility and Education Network) in 2001, an online community that has grown to include more than 50,000 members who lie somewhere on the spectrum of asexuality. Jay is the focus of a new documentary called (A)sexual, in which he explains the "icky mystery" of going through adolescence without developing sexual attraction.
In the opening scenes of the documentary, director Angela Tucker asks people to tell her what asexuality means to them. "I think… moss is asexual?" one woman ponders, while another talks about tadpoles.
Listen to asexual people talk about everyday life and you realise they face social minefields that don't affect people of other sexualities. "Living in a world that holds the romantic and the sexual as the highest ideals possible is difficult," says Bryony, a 20-year-old biology student from Manchester. "The most pervasive effect on my life at the moment, as a student, is how many conversations revolve around sex and the sexual attractiveness of certain people that I just don't really want to join in with."