Hus / asexuality in the media

[darkoshi]

Today's episode of House includes asexuality as one of its topics/sub-plots. Yet to see how they end up dealing with it. They also showed a neat-looking large touchscreen computer panel/display thing in one scene.

And this commercial amused me greatly.

"DIRECTV - Don't Have a Grandson with a Dog Collar 2012 Comme" (Watch on YouTube)

Video title: DIRECTV - Don't Have a Grandson with a Dog Collar 2012 Commercial
Posted by: Directtvdeals
URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VYyvBg9OHRw




Spoiler for the House episode...


They ended up trying to explain away/discredit asexuality. The guy's asexuality was scripted as being due to a medical problem, and his wife's asexuality was scripted as being a white lie she engaged in, because she loved her husband and wanted to be with him.

Sigh. I don't know what is worse - having it not be shown/discussed in popular media at all, or having people try to discredit it. But I suppose you have to start with the latter, before people can begin to accept it.

Another thing about the episode that seems odd, is that they implied that non-asexual females can be happy without sex - that a loving relationship is more important for them (or at least for some of them) than sex. So, apparently the wife is not really asexual, but she's fine with or without having sex.

The show also implied that asexual people don't masturbate and don't have orgasms. I suppose that would be too complex a topic for them to bring up as part of a single episode sub-plot. And it's not actually relevant to asexuality, which isn't about whether one enjoys sex or not, but whether one experiences sexual attraction.

Hmm. So the wife really may have been asexual - she claimed to enjoy sex but showed no clear sign of having a sex drive or of experiencing sexual attraction. But House and Wilson weren't considering/understanding asexuality from that standpoint, or else Wilson wouldn't have agreed that House won the bet.

Comments

[hebinekohime]

It was kind of a mess, wasn't it? Though, it's interesting to me that the indigenous understanding of 'asexuality' is very different from the one that society at large has.

Also, I assumed that the writers felt they were being enlightened to make the wife the person who was sacrificing her enjoyment of sex to accomodate the husband's asexuality. It read as more of a play on traditional gender assumptions than a commentary on what it means to be asexual.

[passionrlsusall.livejournal.com]

House the character, and the show, like to discredit a lot of things it seems (not that that's an excuse).

They didn't deal with bisexuality so well for quite awhile either, with all the jokes House made about Thirteen all the time, as if it defined her, and how she'd have one-night stands with women, but only was in longer relationships with men on the show. But then when she left this season, she did seem stable and healthy and in a relationship with a woman, so yay for that (but not at all yay for her leaving). I like that she was always matter-of-fact and confident about her sexuality though, but at the same time didn't feel it was anyone's business.

In general, I tend to not take this stuff too seriously on shows, because it's not a PSA about the issue, it's how the characters are interpreting it and that particular characters' situation. But I get how it can be frustrating if something you identify with is never represented properly. Like, say, when an outspoken environmentalist on a show is ridiculed and shown to be some crazy person..that bugs me. And like you say, for all we know both of those people could continue to identify as asexual after the procedure..they might realize that it's still right for them.