‘Sapiosexual’ Deemed New ‘Uber-Trendy Sexual Orientation’ by Katherine Timpf (????!!!!)
Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/417246/sapiosexual-deemed-new-uber-trendy-sexual-orientation-katherine-timpf?target=topic&tid=3269
Do we really need to create whole separate identity classes to describe which personality traits we like? The women’s blog Bustle is offering advice for anyone who may want to date a “sapiosexual” — which it describes as an “uber-trendy ‘sexual orientation’” in which people are more attracted to intelligence than other characteristics.
“Identity politics reign supreme, so it’s fitting that we constantly conceive new categories to label and define our niche sensibilities and predilections, however ridiculous or annoying or unnecessary they may seem,” writes self-described “recovering sapiosexual” Kristen Sollee, taking the words “ridiculous” and “annoying” right out of my mouth. See — I had thought that simply saying you find intelligence attractive was a good enough way to convey that you find intelligence attractive, and that the phrase “sexual orientation” was reserved for describing something a little more integral to your identity than what you could flippantly mention as “recovering” from. But apparently not.
After all, this term was not invented by the blogger who wrote about it. If you search it on Google, it produces nearly 2 million results. And although Sollee treats it in a pretty lighthearted way — such as putting “sexual orientation” in quotes when she refers to sapiosexuality as being an example of one — many other people take their “sapiosexual orientation” very, very seriously: Talking dramatically about how they “discovered [they were] sapiosexual” and finally felt whole. Complaining about how totally unfair it is that there’s no sapiosexual pride flag. “Sapiosexual” is even one of the eleven orientation options you can “identify” as on the mainstream dating website OKCupid, alongside more traditional ones such as “gay” and lesbian” as well as lesser-known ones like “demisexual,” which is defined as having “no sexual attraction toward any person unless they become deeply emotionally or romantically connected to someone,” and taken so seriously as an orientation that it does have a flag.
Come on, people. Do we really need to create whole separate identity classes to describe which personality traits we like? If you want to use a word like “sapiosexual” as a fun way to say that you’re into “smart” people, then that’s one thing. But describing it as a “sexual orientation” seems like a bit much, right?
To me, it makes no sense. After all, how do you even define “intelligence?” And, however you define it, and whether or not you consider however you define it to be the most important factor in attraction, valuing it highly seems more typical than special-snowflake, doesn’t it? I mean, call me crazy, but I’m pretty sure there aren’t many people out there who get turned on by how stupid someone is. By the way, in case you were interested, Sollee’s advice for snagging sapiosexuals included things such as correctly pronouncing commonly mispronounced words in front of them and giving them “a selection of Anais Nin’s Delta of Venus in a 50 Shades dust jacket.”
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