Sexuality is often removed from, or presumed not to even exist in, disabled people. When that happens, it’s called desexualisation.
It’s a logical extension to the common — and false — view that disabled people are not the main expertsexternal link, opens in a new tab in our lives. This can show up in many ways, like grabbing a wheelchair user’s wheelchair handles without consent. Or like a medical professional disregarding someone’s chronic pain self-evaluation. Or taking a visually-impaired person by the hand to guide them without their input.
What these all have in common is another person – almost always nondisabled – imposing their will on our agency. This experience can extend to sex, and commonly does. When people hold the view that an impairment in one domain extends to our whole person, the logical step is to assume that we’re also sexually impaired. The response to that is often to try and separate sexuality from disabled people either because people assume we are not interested, or to protect us from a perceived vulnerability.
But that’s not the whole answer, is it? Not all disabilities impair a person’s ability to want sex, to consent to it, or to actively engage in it. A wide and inclusive model of understanding disability acknowledges impairments in every domain of a person’s life, but doesn’t make assumptions about what that means for any given person.
The traditional idea of a disabled person is one who is physically, and visibly, impaired. Efforts to promote disability awareness have extended that recognition to non-visible or intermittently visible disabilities like celiac disease, endometriosis, and numerous chronic pain conditions. My main physical impairment, for example, is residual lung damage that is invisible until it flares up.
The last and most-recent frontier is a push to view mental health conditions as disabilities. That matches the experiences of those of us who have or have had such conditions. I’ve lived through severe depression and lung surgery that both left me permanently impaired. The effect depression has on me terrifies me far more than whatever goes on in my chest cavity. Those of us who’ve experienced debilitating anxiety and depression know full-well that not only can mental health be disabling, mental health is also physical health: the two are not separate entities.
But sit with me for a moment and let’s look at some examples: spina bifida, blindness, celiac disease, endometriosis, chronic pain, respiratory damage, anxiety, and depression. All of these conditions can greatly impair someone, but do they impair the ability to give sexual consent, show sexual interest or engage in and experience expressions of sexuality?
When might a disability interact with someone’s interest in sex and capacity for consent, like when depression or chronic pain affects someone’s desire for sex, and when it does, does that mean someone isn’t or can’t be sexual? (The answer is no. No, it doesn’t.)
Any disability has the potential to impact sexual interest or the ability to give sexual consent to some degree. But I don’t think any of them remove that ability. Let’s not forget that nondisabled people can and do also have experiences that affect their sexual interest or capacity for consent all the time, such as when someone is under the influence.
Inspiration or infantilisation?
When someone’s disability is made visible – whether by necessity or their own volition – many people’s responses involve inspiration or infantilisation. Inspiration compliments the very ordinary capabilities we share with nondisabled people, such as holding down a 9-5 job or exercising. It’s a backhanded compliment about how well we’re doing despite our unfortunate selves and circumstances, or astonishment that we can perform ordinary tasks. Infantilization positions us as weaker and unable to care for ourselves.
Desexualisation is part of infantilisation. It presumes that we’re vulnerable and should be protected from sexuality. It shows up in large and small ways. Friends may avoid discussing sexual topics around a disabled peer. People may find it cringey when a disabled person expresses sexual interest that would be ordinary in someone else. Legal conservatorship a la Britney Spearsexternal link, opens in a new tab often extends to prohibitions on a person’s sexual and reproductive rights.
Perhaps the sharpest form of desexualisation was the 20th century practice of sterilising disabled people. This was a eugenicist policy to prevent reproduction. It also assumed that disabled people couldn’t take on the responsibility of having and caring for children. Some people also argued that sterilisation protected people from potentially having children after sexual assault, positioning disabled people as potential victims, rather than people with agency — and not addressing the real issue here, which is the need to prevent sexual assault. Down Syndrome became a figurehead for this practice since it can influence people’s capacity for sexual consent, especially when that infantalisation prevents people from receiving sex education and information to help them exercise control over their lives, including their sex lives. The resulting irony is that this exact lack of sex education leaves people in a state of childlike ignorance.
Lastly, there is also a thread of desexualisation that gets passed through inspiration discourse. Purity culture sometimes holds disabled people up as inspirationally non-sexual. Whether we’re willingly seen that way or not, we become an idealised figure: someone who is ‘immune’ to sex by our condition. And it’s framed as a virtue.
People who hold that view are understandably horrified when they learn that I’m disabled (in physical and mental health domains), but I’m also a sex worker with a very active interest in sex. In fact, I’m patently disinterested in being ‘protected’ from sex, or anything else for that matter.
How does desexualisation harm people?
Desexualization takes away agency
The biggest harm of desexualisation is that it deprives us of our bodily, sexual, and reproductive agency. We’re especially vulnerable to being shut away from life in society. This happens in key areas like public life, access to education, and employment. It also applies to shutting us away from sexuality.
In subscribing to the social model of disabilityexternal link, opens in a new tab, I maintain that disabled people have impairments, but we are largely disabled by society because society doesn’t respect our right to dignity and equal treatment. Desexualisation is an example of this in action because most people’s disabilities do not impede sexual agency, but we’re nonetheless treated differently (often worse) for it by society.
Desexualization harms health and connections with others
Desexualisation shows up quite often in healthcare experience studiesexternal link, opens in a new tab. Medical professionals often assume that we don’t have sexual lives or experiences or judge us harshly for being sexually active while disabled. As a result, they’ll omit discussions of safer sex, birth control, and good relationship practices when they see us. This contributes to healthcare anxiety and mistrust of healthcare professionals. That’s deeply unhelpful as disabled people are often more reliant on medical professionals and should be able to trust them.
It can also harm our dating experience. I’m always on edge about how and when to disclose my disabilities to new sexual partners. Should I tell a casual partner to not be too rough with me even though that may be what I like and want? Would it make things weird or change how they perceive me? How can I approach the topic without partners thinking I’m a delicate flower? When do I explain to someone that my lung damage can act up during sex, but we can still continue? Will a potential partner reject me once they learn about my disabilities? Does my disabled status or physical impairment make me an easier target for abuse? These are the questions on my mind when sex is something I have to navigate rather than just haveexternal link, opens in a new tab.
Desexualization reinforces stereotypes
Lastly, desexualisation is largely rooted in harmful stereotypes about disabled people. Its core premise is that disabled people need unsolicited special care beyond what’s necessary to overcome our impairments. And that special care can extend to protecting us from ‘bad’ things like sex. At a societal level, this affects how legislators, medical professionals, and people view us and make decisions for us. At an interpersonal level, it can run from annoying to deeply abusiveexternal link, opens in a new tab.
How can people be better partners to each other?
Trust our expertise
Living in our bodies makes us the experts of what we need and how we feel. Being a good sexual partner starts with trusting us and asking us about our needs, instead of assuming. Like all people, we’re deeply adaptable to our circumstances and know ourselves well. That includes how our impairments can affect sex and our approach to communication and consent. If we don’t specify any support or accommodations for sex proactively or after you have asked as we talk about our relationship, it’s okay to assume we don’t need any.
Trusting us doesn’t just benefit us. It benefits nondisabled people by taking off some of the guesswork and stress of how to treat us. We’re used to advocating for ourselves. We simply wish to be heard when we do.
Acknowledge our sexuality
This falls into the often-repeated category of unless stated otherwise, just treat us like others. Treat us like any other person who might have sexual interests. Follow the same social rules with us as you would with others. If a disabled person in the group makes a raunchy joke or discusses their sex life at an appropriate time, don’t be surprised. Don’t make a big deal of it unless you would for anyone else.
Recognising us as sexual beings and treating us as equals is also part of including us in daily life. It makes you a safer friend and partner, too, by letting us know you see us as an equal.
Learn about our impairments and how they might impact sex and consent
If your partner is disabled, it’s okay – and often appreciated – to have a conversation about how their disability can affect sex. This can be part of early conversations about consent and boundaries, or it might be revealed as you get closer. Everyone is different, but it never hurts to know our partners’ needs. The key here is to have a well-reasoned discussion about their impairments and to stay on the topic of those impairments unless they direct it elsewhere.
Some impairments have no meaningful effect on sex. Other impairments can drastically complicate sex. Every body, like every person, is different and calls for the same attention and respect, disabled or not. You may learn that some positions or sexual activities are out of the question. Bad days or flare-ups can make some or even all kinds of sex impossible. These are things we can learn through conversation with our partners.
Remember that disability can extend to mental health, too. Someone who is deeply anxious about their body has very different needs than someone with muscular atrophy. Distress like addiction, trauma, and depression can completely change a person’s sexual needs or even make it difficult for them to give consent. If a new partner has a known disability, it’s pertinent to touch on it during consent discussions and find a consensus before sex. Some conditions can completely change the nature of consent or require consistent check-ins even between experienced partners.
Give us the care you’d want for yourself without condescension and they will appreciate you for it.
Accommodate us as best you can when we ask
Lastly, when we ask for an accommodation or support during sex, please pay attention and do your best to make it. If it sounds unusual or unreasonable, ask for our reasons and let that guide our collaboration. If it’s not something you yourself are able to do, talk with us about it so we can find middle ground.
My lung damage excludes me from physically demanding activities and I can’t have pressure on my chest. I have sensory processing difficulties related to autism that call for specific routines and preparation before I’m okay with sex. A wheelchair user may need a helping hand to get into certain positions. Someone working through wounded self-esteem may request for sex with the lights off.
Accommodations are as diverse as disability itself, but they’re always worth hearing. The only universal rule I can give is to listen and consider. We can wing it otherwise.
This matters because disabled people, like all people, matter. Ensuring the comfort of disabled people in our lives also matters because it builds an equitable society for all. While day-to-day public measures like improved accessibility and workplace equity are appreciated, we also have lives outside of the public eye. In fact, we’re more likely to spend time in private because of our impairments and how society presses us into its crevices.
That private domain – including the sexual – is just as important as the side of us that’s seen publicly.
Building a more equitable society should be reason enough to treat disabled people and disabled sex partners better. But we’re human and I know that self-interest is also important. Accommodating disabled people and sex partners is for everyone.
I became disabled at 20. After a stunningly awful week, I’d never be able to run or do strenuous exercise ever again. I live with a functional lung and a sort-of functional lung. People react with understandable sympathy to what they perceive as the loss of potential in my life, but I’m not fearful of it. I don’t feel like I lost much of my life. I feel like I arrived at everyone else’s eventual destination early.
Nondisabledness is most often a temporary state. Everyone who lives a long life will experience disability in time. Even a temporary malaise can be disabling: bone fractures, a rough illness, grief. As we age, remaining nondisabled becomes less realistic. Hormone fluctuations take hold. Joints wear out. Our senses become dull. The downsides of our unique genetics catch up with us. Disability isn’t a potential horror. It’s just the cumulative result of a life well-lived. It’s inevitable. Some of us just get there sooner.
Working to include disabled people in small, sensible ways isn’t just an investment in our happiness. It’s an investment in everyone’s future because any able-bodied person who lives a long life will join us on the disabled side. Might as well start early and get to know the nice people you’ll one day be part of.
