Demisexual

 is an aspec (specifically acespec) orientation where one experiences sexual attraction to a person after they have developed an emotional connection to them. The connection can be romantic, platonic, or some other form of connection. What counts as a "close connection" can vary between demisexuals. Forming an emotional bond with someone does not mean that one is automatically attracted to said person, as it just means there's now a possibility for one to feel attraction.

Some demisexuals may choose to further define their orientation in terms of genders they are attracted to (demiheterosexual, demibisexual). Others do not find this necessary, or feel that they have enough experiences of sexual attraction to figure out who they’re attracted to.

Etymology
The prefix demi- means "half" or "partial". The prefix is also used in words such as demigod.

Definition
"An Ace-spec orientation where one only experiences sexual attraction to someone until they have formed an emotional connection to them. With what counts as a "close connection" varying between various demisexuals."

- Unknown. 2021

"A demisexual is, in my book at least, someone who does not experience sexual attraction to people in general. In that respect, I can and do identify as asexual. However, with someone I'm in love with, it's completely different, and I might as well be a "full fledged" sexual, but only with that one person. Full fledged meaning actually desiring sex, both for the physical and emotional aspect, being attracted to that special someone, and feeling sexual arousal in terms of wanting to do something on multiple levels instead of simply the biological reflex or "ugh not again""

- OwlSaint, Popularizer of Demisexual. 2008

"A term for people who only have "secondary" sexual attraction but not any "primary"."

- sonofzeal, Coiner. 2006

History
The term demisexual was coined on February 9, 2006 on the AVEN forms by user sonofzeal, who described the experience of not having "primary" sexual attraction but being capable of "secondary". Primary in this as meaning sexual attraction mostly based on physical attributes and secondary as sexual attraction that only develops in contingent upon emotional attraction developing first. Sonofzeal felt neither asexual nor allosexual and created the term to more accurately describe needing an emotional bond as a prerequisite to sexual attraction. The term started to gain widespread popularity in 2008 because of AVEN user OwlSaint.

Flags
It is unknown when the most widely-known Demisexual flag was created or by whom, but it was presumably created after the asexual flag was created in 2010, as it uses the same colors, which were based off the AVEN logo. In both the asexual and demisexual flags, black represents a lack of sexual attraction, and purple represents the acespec community. The grey represents greysexuality, which demisexuality is included under. On the demisexual flag, white represents sexual attraction.

Coining
"[~Forbidden Fury said~: I have developed more detailed terms, though I'm still working on them. Primary sexual attraction is sexual attraction mostly based on physical attributes. An on-sight type of thing. Secondary sexual attraction is sexual attraction that only develops after in contingent upon emotional attraction developing first.]

That actually sounds pretty accurate to me. So I'd have secondary sexual attraction, but hardly any primary. If "sexual" is for both and "asexual" is for neither, maybe we need a new term for people who only have one but not the other?

I propose "demisexuals". ^^"

- sonofzeal