postscript: an interview with Collin Brice
the voices behind my asexuality feature for Sojourners
Hey everyone,
There was no way I could fit everyone I interviewed into my feature story with Sojourners, as much as I wanted to and tried. Regardless of whether some interviewees were quoted once, a couple times, or not at all, everyone I spoke with meaningfully shaped the article with their insightful perspectives.
I think it’s important to lift up voices of asexual people and people who study asexuality for Asexual Awareness Week, so I’m taking some of the interviews and posting abridged versions for y’all to read. I have permission from Sojourners and each interviewee to do so. As another disclosure, my publication of their views doesn’t mean I endorse all of them. These are discussions, not debates.
My third interviewee is Collin Brice: a homoromantic asexual man who is an author and PhD student. Here is my conversation with him …
JOEY THURMOND: Colin, you are the author of Birds, Bees, and Me: a memoir with reflections on being a gay Christian. You're also studying speech language pathology. How else would you describe yourself?
COLLIN BRICE: I'm pretty simple. Gay pride colors are a little too bold for me. I like a gray scale. I like watching TV and movies, brewing tea. Like taking baths. That's a big hobby of mine. What else? I think I'm really funny. I think that I would like to try stand-up at some point. I just need to figure out how to work in how boring I am to a sketch. I'm in PhD school right now. I love to teach and mentor, and just teach people how to be. I've been a therapist for five years, so at this point, I really like to just jump in on the nuance regarding human science, and how to see people as people because that's easy to forget once you're a clinician. Especially when you're being graded.
There were some semesters in undergrad where I took 24 hours and finished with a 4.0. None of that made me a better person. It was when I realized there was a person sitting across from me that I think really tapped into how to be a professional healthcare worker. And that translates to everything, right? That there's a person across from you.
You grew up as a PK and in the charismatic church, yeah?
I was a PK and I did grow up in a charismatic church, but there’s no overlap between those facts. My dad's church wasn't Baptist, but it was that non-denominational Baptist. He went to Dallas Theological Seminary, if that tells you anything. And then whenever that crashed and burned, I started going to an Assemblies of God church. Shortly after, probably starting in middle school, I went to an AOG church, which is a branch of Pentecostalism. Both, but not at the same time.
What were some particular things you learned in the church growing up pertaining to teachings on, very broadly speaking, sexuality? How did your church communities and family talk about and view things like marriage and sex?
I don't know that I feel equipped to talk about my dad's church — the non-denominational church. We left there when I was 11. I didn't know what sex was until college. Somehow, I evaded a lot of those topics. Probably on purpose. […] I'm sure it was not a healthy environment, but I don't have any stories to back that up other than people older than me who I've reconnected with who have felt similarly, especially about homophobia.
In the AOG church, the woman was always blamed. There was a lot more spiritual language being used. If sexual abuse happened, it was because she had a … what was the phrase? A Jezebel spirit. She was a temptress. Looking at the heterosexual dynamics, that was often a thing: Let's look and see what the women are doing to make them our scapegoat.
With gay stuff, it was also spiritually worded. “They’re carrying a spirit of homosexuality.” That was even weaponized against people who weren't gay. If they just didn't like something that someone was doing, especially if it was a man doing something not masculine, then you could call them out that way. The subtext was that that was the worst thing you could be.
My school was a Christian school tied to Assemblies of God as well. If I came out to a pastor and he told me I wasn't gay, erasure was a way of handling it. “You're just having gay thoughts,” which is just hilarious to me. Or he tried to convince me that my dad had raped me when I was little. There always had to be a way to dismiss it. And I never pushed back, but other people did. “You have a demon inside of you that needs to be cast out,” they’d say. And functionally, whenever someone tried to cast out the demon and you were still gay, it was your fault for not having enough faith. You're clearly doing something that is empowering this demon — this spirit of homosexuality. There was a lot of language that escaped any responsibility from having to deal with nuance.
How would you define purity culture? In what other ways, might that have been a part of your upbringing?
Gosh, I don't feel equipped to define it, but it's evangelicalism where … you know it when you see it. My mind goes to a lot of the products of purity culture, such as many straight male friends having difficulty humanizing women to the extent that they're aware it's a problem. They almost sense that there's this illness in them that they have yet to unlearn. As a gay man, I was spared from that because I wasn't objectifying women in the first place. But a lot of people were, and a lot of men were able to get away with it because it was on the women. Always. The shame and guilt of purity culture for them was perverted, like “You're the man; you're supposed to be the leader.” Those types of sentiments still dehumanize the women in the way. “Okay, so [the woman] didn't have any option other than to follow the man, or they didn't have any free will in this situation.”
On the flip side, I found a lot of men bearing all of the shame if something did go public because they're the leaders in charge. A lot of men’s reputation was shattered by a mutual mistake. Like, it was almost seen as sexual abuse when it was really just consensual sex between teenagers. Or even less than that.
I think there's a lot of anecdotal damage. Me, as a gay man, I think that it almost painted me because I was closeted and later discovered that I'm probably ace. [Writer’s note: “ace” is shorthand for “asexual.”] And so it bolstered my pride a little bit because I met the goal: complete control over my desires. But I never did those things; I never looked at a woman that way. It did keep me under the radar for a long time because I was seen as making the desired decision, which is “don't have sex.” Live above reproach, right? That was the vague instruction with all of this.
I've heard from across the asexual spectrum of people not finding out that they're asexual for a long time with this initially weird sense of undeserved pride. “I am so righteous; I don't struggle.” That was my experience, too. So, you're touching on asexuality as a new self-conception. When were some crystallizing moments or suspicions that led to your discovering that? How do you experience and define asexuality for yourself?
In retrospect, a lot of moments remind me of autistic friends realizing they're autistic. There's a single question that put everything else in line from their past where they're like, “Oh, this all adds up now.” Some of those moments for me were never having any desire to check men out. No moment growing up where I was looking at porn. Conventional things that a lot of teens do to discover their sexuality. I always assumed that was because I had strong convictions or good self-control. But there came moments in late high school where, after I read Game of Thrones, I started watching the series. And there are so many sex scenes in the first few seasons. I remember someone asking me, “Doesn't this make you stumble?” And I genuinely said, “No. Not at all.” I was thrown by those kinds of questions to the point where I thought I I was probably deceiving myself. Like, maybe I am really into this and just am not willing to admit it, even though it wasn't turning me on at all. That probably reflects my level of sex education at that point. I would see Desiring God articles about Game of Thrones or other types of media that were avidly against it, and I couldn't fathom the reasons for why.
Another moment was after my book came out. Someone messaged me and told me that I'm asexual. And I think their reason from what I remember was that I mentioned in the book that I had never looked at porn. There've been moments where I've let myself, just with curiosity, look at a body and be like, “I see this as beautiful in art, but there's nothing that I've come across so far that’s turning me on in a physical or chemical way. Even to this day, I'm still open to sexuality, but it's still a no-go for me.
How would you describe attraction toward man as gay and asexual?
My theory is a lot more people are ace than we realize, but most don’t really have to go on that journey to figure it out, which is fine. There's nothing about sex that's repulsive to me. The chemical response — the physiological response towards men — always has to do with the social parts of it, like getting attention from them, affirming each other, the trust, the physical affection. I'm homoromantic and asexual, so there's still a draw for me towards men in a romantic way, and I think that includes physical affection and a lot of things that we consider sexual. But for me, the fantasy, the experience, never goes to the level of sex, nor do I want it to.
Have you ever experienced any prejudice or insensitivity, whether directly or indirectly, toward being asexual? What are some common misconceptions that people may have about asexual people?
I think you touched on one, which is the negation of romance with asexuals. That's not the case for me. That's something that I am really drawn to; that level of intimacy is really good. On the more fundamentalist side, there’s the view that we were made to procreate, and to resist that is sin, or it’s not in line with God's design. I think there’s an idea of people who have children being worth more in the church; they deserve more attention and care. I don't have as much data to back that up, but many people would agree that “married with children” is the goal. You go to your singles group, then you go to your married group, then you go to your family group in church. And then you ignore people who are widowed and retired. You ride that wave as long as possible.
It’s an attitude more than a theological or moral claim. I would still push back against that — and so does the Bible. I think the life of Jesus is an example, who was not married and childless. Another would be Paul. For those who tend to be hard on single people, they're the ones reading it very literalistic, which is, “Don't get married and focus on other things that are more important.”
Has asexuality changed the way that you view things from a theological/Christian perspective?
I think it's really hard for me to tease that apart from being gay. But in both cases, I feel like the answer just goes back to so many sentiments in Western Christianity that don't apply to me. And not in a superior sort of way, but … this doesn't work. Whatever the conference or sermon series is, it isn’t helpful because they're assuming all of our experiences are the same. My mind goes to Melba Maggay's book The Gospel in Culture: Contextualization Issues Through Asian Eyes. It’s all about just how American missionaries colonized the Philippines. In order to access Christianity for the Filipinos there, they had to essentially convert to an American way of thinking because the way that they were being taught the gospel didn't work for their context. So Americans said, “You need to almost code switch over to our culture and then it'll make sense, and then you can accept Jesus.”
Another book is similarly titled, The Bible Through Hispanic Eyes by Justo Gonzalez. One example that stuck out to me was how we — especially as white middle-class Americans — use scripture to talk about mandated rest and justified a five-day work week for that reason; we have a right to rest and we need that weekend. And that's good, but Hispanics were saying, “Okay, we have a right to work. We need work to pay for our living expenses and we don't do that.” All of this is a way of looking at the gem from the other side. It’s still the same beautiful scripture, but it's helpful in a different way for different people.
That has grounded me to see a lot of the scripture and a lot of the ideals, and still be able to say, “That doesn't work for me, but what I do see here is that I still deserve dignity.” I'm not praying for my partner that I'm gonna one day meet because I'm promised a partner. No, I'm promised joy, and I'm promised dignity. I have a body and ways to advocate for people to do all these amazing, godly things and enjoy creation. There's a lot of rich theology people have boiled down to their own interests. And whenever those interests don't align with ace or gay people, instead of casting them out or telling them to comply, another answer might be to contextualize it for their situation, like the Bible has always done for other people. It’s made me think with more nuance and empathy.
I recently read Refusing Compulsory Sexuality by Sherronda Brown, and there's a part where she ties Western norms with colonizer’s negative outlooks on innocuous indigenous practices. This three-part meal of breakfast, lunch, and dinner is a social construct we have, but when colonizers saw indigenous people not doing that, they saw them as lesser or savage. It happens with queer people, too. What do you think that Western Christians are getting wrong about sexuality. How might biblical contextualization come into play?
It’s not just purity culture, but Western Christianity often teaches that the only good thing about me is God. If I let myself slip, then I'm capable of so much evil. But that's resonated with me less and less as I'm relearning (or retheorizing) what I was created for. The image I was created in is something divine and good. I think that's where we need to start with this conversation — kindness and goodness within ourselves. There's probably more nuanced ways to say it, but God wants me to love myself, too. And I don’t want to scare people away with that kind of talk. It’s not ignoring things I need to work on or apologize for and whatnot. But it's starting in the right spot.
With that and contextualization in mind, we have to be aware how we’ve been handed this theology, these frameworks, from broken people. So, it's okay to be wrong sometimes. There's grace for that. It's okay to accept people who see things differently. Still I pause because there’s a level of gatekeeping that needs to happen. We need to make sure that predators aren't alone with our children. We need to make sure we're not harming people.
But contextualization especially matters here. Where our population's at, and where sexuality is in the West. It still doesn't feel widely accepted at some points, and with homosexuality, the framework isn’t in the Bible; we don't have that concept of consensual same-sex love in the Bible, related to sex, specifically. What I'm getting at is that it’s okay how the Bible doesn't have all the answers. Christians should let that wash over and humble them a little bit, realizing that love is a better place to start than anywhere else.
I love this idea of the Bible as infallible, in that it doesn't fail to do its purpose. But we need to recognize what that purpose is and what it isn't. Just like a hammer is good at doing its purpose, that doesn't mean it's good at doing everything. A lot of sects of Christianity are scared in recognizing the Bible has limits. But the Bible was created to do something, not everything.
Has asexuality played a part in your relationship to or understanding of celibacy? One thing that I don't want to imply is conflating asexuality with celibacy. But how can they be related to each other?
I will never prescribe celibacy to anyone. I think that's assumed because I've been in the Side B space since I've come out. There’s an assumption there that celibacy is good for everyone, and I wouldn't say that. I don’t have the context for everyone to be able to say, “This is what God wants for you.” As some singer-songwriter said, in a song I heard recently, “I'll change my mind; that's what it's for.” Minds can’t be static. They evolve and engage in all kinds of neuroplasticity, and that's great. In the same way, this could evolve tomorrow for me. For now, my asexuality has made me cautious to make any claims about celibacy for other people. I’m open to things changing because I believe God is dynamic, and that my relationship with him is meant to be evolving and changing. Over time, our contexts are changing. Our needs are changing.
If I said something like, “This is my lifelong calling,” I would take it back at this point. And not because I feel differently necessarily, but just because I don't know what tomorrow holds. There are nuances I haven't discovered yet. My journey is a great example, where I'm like, “Oh, maybe this was easy for me because I was just built this way, and not because of a conviction, or because I'm very righteous, or because I have great self-control.” But it's just what I wanted naturally. That's just how I experience relationships and connection, and what I want out of same-sex relationships.
What do you think asexuality can tell us about God?
I wanna word this carefully because asexuals are as capable of abuse as anyone else, but I’ve been a safe place for many people who were abused in specific ways. I’ve been told my presence is a breath of fresh air because, in the back of some people’s minds, there was no tension that I’d escalate things or even attempt something consensual. So, it’s really hard for me to tease that out from being gay. I think … there's an ability to humanize people initially that a lot of allosexual people have a harder time with objectifying and sexualizing people. It empowers us to create a safer space in being an objective third party in a lot of ways, mediating things that are sexual in nature. It’s helped me provide input devoid of bias in a sexual way. Anyways, I think asexuals can express an innocence that allosexuals experience as safety.
Some of the things you're saying could be taken poorly by allosexuals saying, “What? You think I'm dehumanizing people all the time?” It can make asexual people sound more inherently holy. That's not what you're saying, but still, this ideal of making people more aware of how we dehumanize others — it reminds me of a question: how can people of faith uniquely learn from asexual people?
What I’ve already see in the discussion is, “Hey, ace people belong in pride as well, and we're not just allies.” Maybe it's the PhD student in me, but anecdotally, a lot of these claims of childlikeness with ace people is not about immaturity necessarily, but in a way that's really optimistic, and humanizing, and forgiving. I see that a lot with ace people. There’s a high amount or a disproportionate amount of asexuality within the autistic community, and there's something really beautiful about that, too. People perceive the way that they connect has much less ulterior motive. I'm not making sweeping generalizations about allosexual people, but that motive for connecting with people really is [rare], especially within the purity culture circles, which were so sexual. [Making friends was about] finding a partner.
When it comes to disabilities, there’s the stigma with asexuality as a disability, especially since it’s a common diagnosis from the medical community as a “distressing” condition. There's a distinction between that and hypoactive sexual disorder, where an allosexual demonstrates asexual behavior because of a condition. And they want to experience sexual attraction again, so that’s where the distress comes from. But asexuals embrace and rejoice in their identity in a lot of ways. So, with Christians in particular, we say disability can bring about good; it can be a part of a Christian’s identity in how God made them. Have you seen perspectives like this with asexuality? Would you classify asexuality as a disability or not?
That's really interesting. I've never heard it framed as a disability. I guess because, from a rehab therapist perspective, sex is an activity of daily living that I can address as a therapist. I guess you can justify it as like an aversion to ADL: an Activity of Daily Living, but I would argue against that being a disability. You need to figure out how you're defining disability. Asexuality is not causing distress for me. It almost makes me wonder if the reason for that is because our side of the world is so sexually minded that asexuality has to be a disability if you can't engage in sex. This is the thing with gender dysphoria, which doesn't necessarily cause distress. When I'm misgendered on the phone or something, that's not something that’s causing me any sort of distress. That's a me-centric example, and scientific textbooks go back to terminology for experience and the effects. What causes distress that is dangerous and needs health intervention?
As a scientist and clinician, I think we just have to go back to what qualifies as disability and what doesn't. Then, maybe we can go into the sociological part of it. Does classifying something as a disability stigmatize it in a way that's a net-negative? I would think yes, but I’m not sure. The reason you want a disability label is so [one can be provided for] with insurance to pay for services needed around that, which is why autism needs to be a disability in the diagnoses handbooks.
How would you define disability? And with that in view, why is asexuality not a disability, even though it is atypical?
I'm not researching disabilities right now, so it's a bit on the back burner, but I wonder … it's like the “What is a woman?” question. I feel like any definition is going to exclude someone who fits the category, but my mind goes to anyone who needs accommodations of some kind to complete an ADL — some type of daily task, even if that accommodation is just extra time; it doesn't have to be a device or something external. Or it could be needing glasses or repeating yourself.
And that changes with context too, depending on your social location. Something may be classified as a disability in one place and not in another because some accommodations may be preexisting. Like, a city may have perfect infrastructure for somebody to navigate without other assistance. It wouldn't necessarily be a disability in that context, whereas in others, it might be. Would that be fair to say?
Yeah, we had that conversation during clinical training. I've evaluated people who have severe expressive aphasia. They can't engage in conversation anymore because they can't remember their language, or they can't read anymore and understand what's on a page. And it doesn't bother them; it does not affect their life in any way. And I could argue that, someday, you might need to call 911 and you're not gonna be able to. There's ways to talk about disability that might convince someone to do some therapy, but is that a severe disability? Not really in day-to-day life. Whereas someone who's super social and lives with 10 people and is a public speaker — that might completely turn their life upside down. Context is everything when talking about disability.
I learned recently that sex is at the foundation of Maslov’s Hierarchy of Needs. It’s a survival need, and from a heteronormative, allosexual perspective, asexuality can be seen as a disability. But they often assume it’s a problem when they don’t even ask the asexual if it’s one for them.
Sex is not gonna be an option for people’s whole lives, probably. The longer we're living, the less likely that's gonna be for the last 10-20 years of one’s life. I almost wonder if Maslov because of the time period with the importance of the family unit. Parents were very reliant on kids for survival and to increase the population. I wonder what the reasoning was there and if it was purely just gratification.
I hesitate to say it because I don't think it's essential for survival, but I feel like relationship is much more fundamental to human need and survival. Like, someone can exist in isolation on an island by themselves.
Without interaction, your brain atrophies. It's not a muscle, but there's so much that you lose when relationships are not there. You essentially go crazy. Clinically.
That reminds me of sensory deprivation. Solitary confinement, where you have no interaction with people whatsoever. Anyways, we went on a trail with that. One more question for you: As a gay asexual person, what is something that has been spiritually edifying for you?
This isn't even inherently a queer thing, but I think queer people are really good at embracing diversity. The more [I’m around others, the more] that I’m around people who are different than me in many ways. Being part of the LGBT community makes it easier to access those types of relationships, [which] have been really eye-opening. I really pity people who can't break into more diverse spaces because they’ve made me a more understanding and empathetic person. They’ve made me feel seen in ways that I didn't even know that I needed to feel seen in.
Once you see the stats on LGBT suicides and how religion plays into that so often, I think it’s really important to reclaim faith in ways that you feel safe to do, and for more than one reason. When I do that with prayer and meditation in my own ways, there's no part of my body that's telling me that I'm in danger because of it, which a lot of queer people deal with. “This song reminds me of being discriminated against,” or “This version of the Bible” even, or “This book of the Bible was used against me or was used to dehumanize me.” All these things that are just unfortunate realities. But yeah, I think meditation has been a way for me to heal from that and to continue to see the Lord as a safe thing to approach. And that felt more like a band-aid just because it was still Western and homophobic in a lot of ways. But it was a way for me to have a ritual on Sunday where I was contemplative about the Lord.
You can follow Collin on Instagram. Check out his book here.