I’ve appeared in Digital Journal now, hot on the heels of the Daily Mail article, and I’m afraid it’s full of misleading information and mistakes. It’s pulled heavily from the Daily Mail article from earlier today, but then it adds embellishments and outright factual inaccuracies. I wasn’t asked or told about appearing in this. A friend found it and posted it on my Facebook.
“An asexual activist speaks out”
Problems with it:
- The full title is “‘I don’t need to be raped’ an Asexual activist speaks out.” (Capitalization and punctuation intact.) I don’t understand the media’s fascination with sticking “rape” in the headline. Would someone say they do “need to be raped”?
- I’m repeatedly called “Julia” in the article. My name is Julie. It’s not short for Julia.
- A quote: “Anthony F. Bogaert of Brock University states that he believes one percent of the world population is bisexual.” I don’t know where “bisexual” came from. This article is on asexuality. So is Bogaert’s work. And the next part of the sentence says “and according to Julie Sondra Decker of Tampa, Florida she is one of them.” So according to this article, I’m bisexual.
- They claim I never had an intimate relationship with a man or a woman, but I dated in high school. It’s part of how I found out I didn’t like it. The fact that I dated in high school is public in my body of work.
- None of my family members ever dragged me to a doctor like this article implies. My mother did ask about it during an examination she asked me to get before going to college. The suggestion that this was an attempted intervention is exaggerated.
- The article claims I have a psychology degree. This built on the misconception in The Daily Mail and gave me an imaginary degree. I majored in education. I studied psychology. I don’t have a psychology degree and have never claimed to.
- “While asexual’s [sic] never pursue a sexual relationship, some do have romantic relationships.”–Untrue. The author should watch the video embedded in this article, because I debunk that assumption. Some asexual people do pursue sexual relationships despite lack of sexual attraction.
It’s full of really egregious typos too. I’m sorry to see this–something with this many errors and misleading statements does more harm than good.
Copycat articles are appearing in magazines whose languages I don’t speak: “Elle n’a jamais fait l’amour et ne le fera sans doute jamais” in French magazine 7sur7 and “Aseksuaalne naine: meeste arvates tuleks mind ära vägistada” in Estonian magazine Elu24. Copycat articles also appeared in Nigeria News (“I Have Never, and Will Never Have Sex“) Joint Arena (“I have never had sex and I never will“) and The Hollywood Gossip: (“Julie Sondra Decker Discusses Being Asexual“).