Ask an Ace of Spades

Before I realized how obsessed the world was with sex, still believing it to be operating on the lines of my own asexual libidoist nature, the idea of matchmaking was really cute. It was some time after I realized that, for a great many people, sex is the primary aspect of a relationship, that I was hit my some unflattering fridge logic . Matchmaking is all about choosing two people and trying to get them to have sex. Based on random internet research, it seems that most people begin having sex within a few weeks of their first date. Very commonly, it seems that people have sex long before they say, "I love you," to the other person. So it's certainly not some distant eventuality. The only "date" I've ever been on was a semi-blind date set up by a friend of mine at the request of her other friend. (I eventually accepted, only to be polite, though told her in no uncertain terms that her friend shouldn't expect anything but the friend zone.) ...

There's a certain reviewer online that I follow. His mix of sarcasm and insight have seen me through many ennui ruts. One comment he once made, though, had always confused me. He was discussing how, in China, a contest had been set up. In this contest, people could have their faces scanned, and facial recognition would determine how beautiful they were, with prizes of some sort distributed on this basis. His concluding comment on the subject was something on the topic of "whether or not a robot wanted to fuck them." For a long time this confused me. Although people seemed to want to have sex with attractive people, it seemed strange to ascribe such motive to an inanimate processor. It was only recently that I realized that he said this because, for him, (human) beauty and sexual attraction were one in the same. This understanding made me sad: sad that he was so limited in his aesthetic, sad that he would apparently never appreciate the natural lines and forms...