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I asked if it made any difference if I should cross the line
Formulated in a friend's comments, transplanted here with minor emendations so that I remember it:
Since I continue not just to dislike but feel actively alienated by the term "demisexual" even though conceptually it is the closest of the extant labels to the mode in which my attraction to other people operates (all physical interest in a person follows from emotional and intellectual interest in them: I have never had a sexual partner who was not a friend first and I don't even seem to develop crushes on people I do not know; I suspect it of being linked on some level to the part where my interest in people's bodies does not take their sex or gender as a relevant consideration), it appears that my personal fix-it is "philosexual," because the connotations of Greek φίλος "beloved" do not confine to a particular kind of love. The professor from whom I learned Greek always translated φίλοι as one's "near and dear," encompassing family, lovers, friends. "Philosexual" would accurately convey for me the sense of "hot for the one you love" which is totally lacking from the construction of "demisexual," where the focus is on the half-quality of the sexuality over the experience of its activation. Now I just have to hope this term was not previously coined by some deeply skeevy human being and that's why it never caught on.
(My alienation and welcome to it: speaking personally, I don't feel I do sexuality by halves, and sociologically I have a lot of problems with the idea that a person only counts as a fully sexual being if they want to climb strangers like Kangchenjunga. I understand the value of the term by the number of people who use it as a self-identifier, but the idea that I should consider the manner in which I acquire my partners a significant part of my sexual identity remains, honestly, peculiar to me.)
Since I continue not just to dislike but feel actively alienated by the term "demisexual" even though conceptually it is the closest of the extant labels to the mode in which my attraction to other people operates (all physical interest in a person follows from emotional and intellectual interest in them: I have never had a sexual partner who was not a friend first and I don't even seem to develop crushes on people I do not know; I suspect it of being linked on some level to the part where my interest in people's bodies does not take their sex or gender as a relevant consideration), it appears that my personal fix-it is "philosexual," because the connotations of Greek φίλος "beloved" do not confine to a particular kind of love. The professor from whom I learned Greek always translated φίλοι as one's "near and dear," encompassing family, lovers, friends. "Philosexual" would accurately convey for me the sense of "hot for the one you love" which is totally lacking from the construction of "demisexual," where the focus is on the half-quality of the sexuality over the experience of its activation. Now I just have to hope this term was not previously coined by some deeply skeevy human being and that's why it never caught on.
(My alienation and welcome to it: speaking personally, I don't feel I do sexuality by halves, and sociologically I have a lot of problems with the idea that a person only counts as a fully sexual being if they want to climb strangers like Kangchenjunga. I understand the value of the term by the number of people who use it as a self-identifier, but the idea that I should consider the manner in which I acquire my partners a significant part of my sexual identity remains, honestly, peculiar to me.)
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I was thinking of the sliders in this case being more "how likely is it that I will want to have sex with you before I get to know you," but I can understand and appreciate that will also have variance, enough that trying to pin it to a single number or value is fruitless.
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φίλος isn't a word that excludes the erotic—it can be used for lovers, e.g. the Homeric kenning of Patroklos as Achilles' φίλος ἑταῖρος "beloved companion" was a slash magnet even in classical days—but ἔρως absolutely means passionate sexual love, so the coinage itself sounds a little tautological to me, but I think it gets at the distinction you're trying to make: people for whom the desire itself is enough to act on.
people will understand what it means. I think it's worth throwing at the wall and seeing what happens.
I was thinking of the sliders in this case being more "how likely is it that I will want to have sex with you before I get to know you,"
Ah! No, that makes sense as an axis in its own right, and actually might do a lot to solve the issue of [the experience currently described as demisexuality] being conflated with the ace spectrum.
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Thank you for explaining! It's good to have a more correct understanding of words and their uses.
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Maybe we need to loop more classicists in on this discussion. In the meantime, I like your theory of this axis.
Thank you for explaining! It's good to have a more correct understanding of words and their uses.
You're welcome! I am glad it was useful.
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