In a promotional video for the movie Vivir y otros ficciones (2017), titled ‘ I masturbate’ , different people appear recognizing that they masturbate and saying phrases like: “Nobody knows my body better than I do”; “I am the owner of my orgasms”; “It’s another way of loving myself and taking care of myself.” Finally, a woman with reduced mobility and in a wheelchair appears who affirms: “I don’t masturbate; without supports, my body is not mine ”.
Sexual assistance aims to help resolve this situation; be a support so that all people can live their sexuality. Hence, those who defend the need for this resource limit it, as indicated in Asistenciasexual.org, to “people who cannot explore their body, masturbate and perform some sexual practices with another person without the support of someone; therefore, not all people with functional diversity need sexual assistance ”.
Currently, the figure of the Personal Assistant is recognized, a person who performs or helps to perform the tasks of daily life to another person who, due to their situation, functional diversity or for other reasons, cannot perform them on their own, as described the Association of Personal Assistance Professionals. They are responsible for supporting tasks such as grooming, dressing, getting out of bed, doing physiological needs, eating, drinking, taking notes, turning pages or using electrical appliances, as well as accompanying the person at home, at work or at home. leisure activities and interpreting different alternative communication systems. Many tasks, but none related to sexuality.
Natalia Rubio, president of the Sexuality and Disability Association, points out that “the person who provides personal assistance must act as a tool, must not steal the role of the person.” And he adds that “the will of the person receiving the support must prevail. It is she who decides ”. Antonio Centeno, a member of the Forum for Independent Living and Fun, defines it in a more graphic way: “Other hands, but my decisions.”
They both agree that “if an independent life is a chosen life, a life without sexuality is not a complete life.” A person with functional diversity or disability is as sexual as other people and must have the same right as others to learn to know themselves, to accept themselves and to be able to express their eroticism in a satisfactory way. That is why sexual education will always be necessary, but in some cases, in addition, sexual assistance or some other type of resource or technological support will be necessary.
However, around the term ‘sexual assistance’ many controversies have been generated. In fact, as Andrea García-Santesmases pointed out in 2016, “there is no consensus on what is (is not) sexual assistance and who should be its providers and beneficiaries.” Proof of this is that the same term is used with three different meanings:
- Support to access one’s own body sexually and supports before, during or after sexual practices with another person.
- Osurrogate sex surrogate. A resource for sexology professionals, a tool to treat some difficulties that is part of a therapeutic process, for example, in the absence of a partner of the patient.
- Specific sexual service to meet the demands of people with functional diversity. That is, a specialized sex work.
From the groups of people with functional diversity or disability –Movement de Vida Independiente, Plena Inclusión and others– the figure of the sexual assistant is demanded to be able to reach where the personal assistant does not arrive. Knowing that it is not unsurrogate, because it is not part of a problem, nor is it a sexual service. It is the right to a full life. It is making the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities a reality, which includes the right of all persons with disabilities to carry out their independent life project and to receive the necessary support to achieve it.
Natalia Rubio insists that assistance is support: “The person who performs sexual assistance is the instrument, it is not the hand that caresses, nor is it the object of desire (…). There is no erotic interaction between the two people (…). There is no kissing, intercourse, caressing or oral sex (…). Sexual assistance does not satisfy erotic desires, but rather facilitates them ”.
However, the term ‘sexual assistance’ is not to everyone’s liking and there are those who prefer “intimate and erotic companion” (AIE). One of them is Francesc Granja, from Tandem Team, who understands that “a person’s sexuality cannot be assisted, we are all capable of giving and receiving pleasure, and the only thing that is assisted, in an intimate encounter, is the logistical part –Transfers, clothing, probes– or communicative with adapted systems ”.
The person with functional diversity needs to access their own body from desire and pleasure. That is also empowering yourself and participating in the same rules as the rest of society.
