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We Should have more Sign/Symbol/Sayings


Berry

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This topic basically was discussed here already, but there wasn't really an answer. In my opinion, the flag and a green colors are sufficient for most purposes as basically nobody outside of the LGBT community knows it. If I had to choose a symbol, I would vote for a green and black arrow on a white background. This would be even less obvious than a flag but would still represent the aro colors and use the widely known arrow as a symbol.

My problem with rings and a green heart, which also was a suggested symbol, is that as a male I can't really wear them as it would be uncommon to wear them in general, independent of the color. Another problem of a green heart is that it is either to common (completely green) or basically like the flag and really obvious (in flag colors).

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But I think the reason why aromantic symbols aren't really widespread is, besides only being recognized relatively recent, that aromantics don't really need to find each other. Homosexuals and to a lesser extent aces want to enter into a romantic relationship and thus are looking for somebody like them.

For aros on the other hand, half of them aren't interested in some form of cohabiting as they are aroace and (from what I've heard) friends just are enough for them. For allosexual aros, in my opinion, it is just easier to look for close friends who share your interests and then introduce them to aromanticism than to try finding another allosexual aro and hope that he or she shares your interests. The chance of meeting such a person in the real world by accident just is really tiny.

 

 

Disclaimer: I don't have any real experience with dating and thing like this, this is just what I thought reading through this forum.

And I know many of us would like to meet another aro in the real world just to talk a bit, but at least for me this is just like "yeah, it would be cool to meet someone", but it doesn't have a high priority as exchanging experiences online is possible and way more convenient than talking to someone in person.

 

 

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9 hours ago, Tagor said:

But I think the reason why aromantic symbols aren't really widespread is, besides only being recognized relatively recent, that aromantics don't really need to find each other. Homosexuals and to a lesser extent aces want to enter into a romantic relationship and thus are looking for somebody like them.

For aros on the other hand, half of them aren't interested in some form of cohabiting as they are aroace and (from what I've heard) friends just are enough for them. For allosexual aros, in my opinion, it is just easier to look for close friends who share your interests and then introduce them to aromanticism than to try finding another allosexual aro and hope that he or she shares your interests. The chance of meeting such a person in the real world by accident just is really tiny.

 

 

Disclaimer: I don't have any real experience with dating and thing like this, this is just what I thought reading through this forum.

And I know many of us would like to meet another aro in the real world just to talk a bit, but at least for me this is just like "yeah, it would be cool to meet someone", but it doesn't have a high priority as exchanging experiences online is possible and way more convenient than talking to someone in person.

 

 

 

Speak for yourself, I literally lie awake at night wishing I had a way to find aros in real life. I think if I ever met another aro face-to-face I would probably cry out of relief.

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18 hours ago, Tagor said:

But I think the reason why aromantic symbols aren't really widespread is, besides only being recognized relatively recent, that aromantics don't really need to find each other. Homosexuals and to a lesser extent aces want to enter into a romantic relationship and thus are looking for somebody like them.

There is a lot more to relationships than just romantic relationships. Even though amantonormative culture tends to invalidate and erase all except "romantic (and sexual)" and "strictly platonic".
Allos tend to struggle with relationships such as sexual friendships. (Even if these are monogamous.)
 

18 hours ago, Tagor said:

For aros on the other hand, half of them aren't interested in some form of cohabiting as they are aroace

This is a non sequitur. Even in romantic relationships cohabitation is not required.
Aros are not intrinsically a-relational loners. For that matter there are plenty of allos who are.
 

18 hours ago, Tagor said:

(from what I've heard) friends just are enough for them.

The opposite side of this coin is romance being "more than" friendship. It's a very allo (and normative) worldview.

 

19 hours ago, Tagor said:

For allosexual aros, in my opinion, it is just easier to look for close friends who share your interests and then introduce them to aromanticism than to try finding another allosexual aro and hope that he or she shares your interests.

I think you are failing to understand how hard it is to explain aromanticism to alloromantics. Even in a fairly abstract way.
Trying to transition a platonic friendship into any kind of non-romantic sexual relationship being an even harder task. Then you'd have to maintain that relationship without them trying to turn it into a romantic relationship. 
The "interests in common" also appears most likely to be an issue if you are trying to do things like a romantic relationship in terms of spending every waking minute doing things together.
There's no reason to assume that a non romantic relationship should look much like a romantic relationship. In the same way there's no reason to expect an aircraft to look like a ship.

 

19 hours ago, Tagor said:

The chance of meeting such a person in the real world by accident just is really tiny.

Often aros are an "invisible minority". Hence the need for more identification and symbols. Possibly also social spaces which are not arophobic (including indirectly or structurally).
 

9 hours ago, Jot-Aro Kujo said:

Speak for yourself, I literally lie awake at night wishing I had a way to find aros in real life. I think if I ever met another aro face-to-face I would probably cry out of relief.

Agreed.
Though undoubtedly it's knowingly  meeting another aro. Given that there's some evidence that aros might be as common as 1.5% of people.

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5 hours ago, Mark said:

Often aros are an "invisible minority". Hence the need for more identification and symbols. Possibly also social spaces which are not arophobic (including indirectly or structurally).


I agree! The problem is also that lot of people might be aro without knowing it. So the best symbols would probably be really obvious ones like t-shirts with anti-romantic quotes on them or something :D

It can also be helpful to "come out" to people whenever given the opportunity. I told an acquaintance I was aro and he revealed that he also thought he might be and we had a really nice discussion about it and from there became friends. Now he's in a romantic relationship which takes a lot of his time unfortunately, so having aro friends is no guarantee they wont prioritize a romantic relationship over you.

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On 10/2/2018 at 8:32 PM, Tagor said:

For aros on the other hand, half of them aren't interested in some form of cohabiting as they are aroace and (from what I've heard) friends just are enough for them. For allosexual aros, in my opinion, it is just easier to look for close friends who share your interests and then introduce them to aromanticism than to try finding another allosexual aro and hope that he or she shares your interests.

Or would be true if friendship was the only relationship we look for.

As Mark said, for aro allos, it can be difficult to find a "friend with benefits" relationship that work with an aro, because the alloromantic will tend to turn that into a romantic relationship. I remember the story of someone that now I think is aro, and who felt broken because all her sexual partners became romantic and then said she had a problem and other "nice" things like that.

 

And even for aroaces there can be some problems. In QPR for instance; an allo could turn that into a romantic relationship. When you see all the people who struggle to explain that they are not in a romantic couple thought in a QPR; imagine if your partners do the same... My définition of a QPR include things that are seen romantic, and explaining why it's not can be hell.

 

 

 

Of course it doesn't mean that sch relationship can't work with an allo, sometimes it does. But for some people it would be safer to have that with another aro, who knows the concept, knows you won't change, and will always be fine with it.

 

EDIT : to answer the original question, it would be good to have more signs,  just to know when we met another aro. How common are the rings? I didn't know about them before you mention them.

I have the same problem than with the ace ring : to much common (I always thought that a ring with an ace of shades would have been more specific).

Maybe something with an arrow? People who like that could wear it on a necklace or a ring.

Or a shirt with the flag. Nobody knows it's our colors any way, so only other LGBT people would notice (my parents didn't know what the rainbow flag is, let alone an aro flag).

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7 hours ago, nonmerci said:

Or would be true if friendship was the only relationship we look for.

In this context meaning "strictly platonic friendship".

 

7 hours ago, nonmerci said:

As Mark said, for aro allos, it can be difficult to find a "friend with benefits" relationship that work with an aro, because the alloromantic will tend to turn that into a romantic relationship. I remember the story of someone that now I think is aro, and who felt broken because all her sexual partners became romantic and then said she had a problem and other "nice" things like that.

Allos and aros tend to interpret "friend with benefits" differently.
Allos as either "Short term, primarily sexual relationship, until a romantic partner turns up" thus they may end things to start a romantic relationship with someone else or "precursor to romantic relationship".
Aros as "Sexual friendship, possibly long term".
To an allo transitioning to a romantic relationship is an "upgrade". To an aro (even if they are not romantic repulsed) is a "downgrade".
It's possible in such a situation that the allo person might end the relationship because they can't do this whereas the aro partner might end things because they keep trying.

 

7 hours ago, nonmerci said:

And even for aroaces there can be some problems. In QPR for instance; an allo could turn that into a romantic relationship. When you see all the people who struggle to explain that they are not in a romantic couple thought in a QPR; imagine if your partners do the same... My définition of a QPR include things that are seen romantic, and explaining why it's not can be hell.

That's not aro ace specific. It's hard for allos to understand the concept of romantic coded activities happening outside of a romantic relationship. Regardless of if these include sex, kissing, hand holding, dating, candle lit dinners, shared hobbies, moon lit walks, public displays of affection, pet names, etc, etc.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I wear an aro ring (white ring on the left middle finger) and I regularly draw arrows onto my fingers so that I can say "straight as an aro" and then bend my finger (hilarious I know)

 

I would like something more recognizable, though, because I've talked to a lot of people and not that many people know about the rings. I might buy myself some aromantic merch so that's it's blunt to anybody who knows what it means.

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