Mark

18 hours ago, Ch0c0 said:

IMHO the word platonic itself is a minefield. When looking at Merriam Webster there is an obvious confusion between the lack of romance and the lack of sex in the relationship. 

Merriam Webster is the only definition which mentions absence of romance.
Oxford says not sexual.
Cambridge is much the same.
Urban dictionary ditto.
vocabulary.com says not sexual or physical.
 

19 hours ago, Ch0c0 said:

Before I discovered aromanticism in this forum I was confusing platonic love and asexual love, also in my own language. 

Even in  the US that is the regular definition. With using it to primarily mean "not romantic" appearing to originate from the ace community.

1 hour ago, nonmerci said:

First, there are two kind of kind of definitions : some that define the term about attraction, some that define it about relationship. But most of all, it is used to talk about platonic AND queerplatonic relationship. Which are not the same for me. I think it shows something : as we didn't have any term to speak about lack of interest in QPR, we use a term that already exist, aplatonic, that was a bout platonic relationship.

To add to this mess the term "queerplatonic attractioon" may also be used.
It's odd that there should be a need for a term to describe "lack of interest in QPR" rather than "interest in QPR". Similarly for "squish"

1 hour ago, nonmerci said:

'm not saying we should not use aplatonic that way (to be honest, I do identify to the term because of that, though I guess now that "nonamory" fits more... in terms of platonic attraction only, I guess I'm in the grey area,

The definition of "nonamory" is also rather troublesome.
This part "a lifestyle choice or relationship style that does not include intimate, long-term partnerships, whether romantic or platonic." contains the false dichotomy of "romantic or platonic".
Consider that terms like "lifestyle (choice)" have in the past been used to erase LGBTQ+ orientations.
The next sentence "A nonamorous person does not need or want a boyfriend, girlfriend or partner. They do not need or want a queerplatonic partner, or platonic life-partner, either." implies that this may not involve any "choice" at all. 

19 hours ago, DeltaV said:

Bad if those two meanings get confused:

Looked more like, at least, six...

19 hours ago, DeltaV said:

That word is a minefield.

It's far from the only such word.
 

11 hours ago, Holmbo said:

I personally feel it makes more sense to use aplatonic for someone who does not experience platonic attraction. Cause I don't really see a point of having a word for not having squishes. I've never had any and "aro" works fine for me. Maybe it would make more sense to have some term for aros who desire a qpr.

Maybe different words for "experiences platonic attraction", "has squishes" and "desires a QPR".
All of these being different things.

7 hours ago, nonmerci said:

Wait, "platonic attraction" and "squish" are different things? I thought it was synonymous.

If "squish" is an analogy with "crush" then there's an implied "intense" adjective.

On 7/1/2020 at 1:42 AM, Blake said:

Having fantasies of being in a relationship and actually being in a relationship are two different things.

The same applies to enjoying romantic relationships depicted in fiction.

On 7/1/2020 at 1:42 AM, Blake said:

It is ok if you don't want to be in a relationship, or some if you do not want some of the elements of the relationship. Think in all the things that you would want to do with that other person. If you feel that you want that, then go ahead and experiment. There is nothing wrong with that, just give that other person the heads up that you are experimenting and that maybe it will work out or maybe not, but you are giving it a try.

Also worth asking them what they mean by "a relationship", especially anything they think is "obvious".

On 6/29/2020 at 5:57 PM, Guest I am confusion said:

Could I have lost the ability to feel romantic attraction and “turn” aro/cupio because sexuality is fluid? 

The idea that aros have somehow lost the ability to experience romantic attraction or are, otherwise, "broken allos" is rather toxic.
It's effectively a form of arophobia which avoids challenging amantonormativity and romonormativity.
With this kind of meme being directed at LGBTQ+ people in general. (As well as other minority groups.)

On 6/21/2020 at 12:58 AM, DeltaV said:

Theologians of the middle ages could write a big tome on marriage and not mention love once. It was all about sex and children.

The only kind of love that Medieval scholars could plausibly link to marriage would be "eros" or "pragma".
There is literally no word they could have used to describe "romantic love" anyway. Regardless of if they were using Vulgar Latin, Classical Latin, Koine Greek, Classical Greek, Aramaic, Classical Hebrew or Classical Arabic.

The most obvious cultural link between "love"and "marriage" being an American song from 1955. About the time of "peak marriage".

On 6/21/2020 at 12:58 AM, DeltaV said:

The problem I have with this argument though is that marriages not based on romantic love were bad practices. They shouldn't be seen with rose tinted aro glasses. Not because of the lack of romantic love but because there was coercion involved to different degrees.

Arranged marriages have been around a long time. To the point that their origin  is unclear.
Even ostensibly romantic marriage cultures can include coercion from parents and peers.
One way in which romantic marriage cultures may be more coercive is an expectation that everyone, regardless of social class or profession, should marry. Something especially notable in contemporary Western cultures where married adults are in the minority. If anything matrimania within popular entertainment is inversely correlated with the proportion of married people.

On 6/21/2020 at 12:58 AM, DeltaV said:

They exist on a continuum of harm. Usually harm for the woman or more so for her. The most "egalitarian" practice is also the worst and modern: The forced marriages of the Khmer Rouge. People were assigned to marry random strangers without having any choice in it. If the woman refused to have sex with her "husband", she was raped. If the man refused to rape his "wife", he was killed.

If anything that specific example would appear to show women getting the lesser-evil. Though so called Honour killing does appear to have a, strong, connection with arranged marriage culture.

On 6/21/2020 at 12:58 AM, DeltaV said:

I find the story of Joanna of Castile one of the most absurd ones. Historically proven is that she managed to get into a marriage based on passionate romantic love; with Philip the Handsome. That was quite rare for high nobility. Sadly he died only two years later.

Her marriage to Philip the Handsome was definitely arranged. Arranged, even forced, marriages, can consider compatibility. Especially in the cases where a failed marriage could mean a major diplomatic incident (as happened in the 1530s) or even a war. (However nobody, at the time, would have considered "romance" to a factor.)  They married in 1496 and he died in 1506. Thus were married for ten, rather than two, years.

On 6/21/2020 at 12:58 AM, DeltaV said:

There are accounts (since it's not Halloween, I keep it short) that she couldn't accept this loss; exhumed her dead husband's corpse and even traveled around with his coffin and let it open from time to time, to kiss him etc.

She was called Juana la Loca and declared insane, unable to govern and put into the care of nuns. Probably nothing of that Halloween story ever happened and it's just propaganda for political reasons. The point is, at those times people generally accepted this to be highly pathological behavior (if it was propaganda, it was done for exactly this reason).

A large part of the propaganda appears to have been down to her father wanting her out of the way so he could continue to rule Castile.
Possibly the story derives from a Castilian (Spanish) novel. Which would, technically, make it "romantic".

19 hours ago, John Rando said:

To play devil's satan*, first you don't need platonic attraction to have friends.

It's possible for friendship to be based around sexual, sensual, aesthetic, romantic, etc attraction.
Attraction and love are different things. Someone who "loves their friends" could mean in terms of philia, eros, ludus, romance, etc.

19 hours ago, John Rando said:

Second, It would makes total sense to me to say "more than friends" when you mean "the relationship I have with them is based on romantic attraction in addition to the platonic one" (not all romantic relationship are like that). But most people would understand it as "this relationship counts more in the absolute relationship hierarchy because ... amatonormativity !", and that doesn't make any iherent sense, regardless of your orientation.

Allos can use the phrase "more that friends" where there is just romance involved.
There is also the way in which QPRs are often placed in this hierarchy.
Without considering that at least some aros find non-romantic, including platonic, relationships to be "more than romance". Effectively inverting the hierarchy. Others may question the hierarchy concept.

21 hours ago, nonmerci said:

I say later that why I reacted that way was because for me, aplatonic, aromantic and asexual problem are similar, and that's why it makes sense to group together, to fight against the issue and discuss about their experiences. Of course a-spec is not the only way to acknowledge struggles matter and the purpose is not to make a list of people who has problems, or everyone would fit in the label and it will make no sense at all.

It's worth asking "how similar" as well as if the False Equivalence fallacy might apply here.

The aromantic spectrum is quite diverse as are the asexual and aplatonic spectra.
An "aros and aces" a-spectrum is more diverse. With the possibility of conflicting needs between allosexual aromantics and asexual alloromantics.
An "aros, aces and aplos" being even more diverse. With more possible conflicting needs.

On 6/11/2020 at 10:26 AM, nonmerci said:

So, to answer the original question ("what does an allo allo person who doesn't love their friends has to do with me?"), I would say that : the problem face are similar.

I'm thinking that similar problems from different causes might require different solutions.
 

On 6/11/2020 at 10:26 AM, nonmerci said:

People are supposed to need each other company. For instance, in the aro community, loving our friends is seen as something that humanizes us, because "we don't love romantically, but platonically". And to take the same example as @John Rando did, if you tell someone "I didn't miss my friends during the confinment", you will be seen as weird because you are suppose to love them and so miss them.

I do miss friends.
However I associate love for friends more with "philia" ...

15 hours ago, Ch0c0 said:

I don't look for a partner but for more intimate friends. That is already too difficult to find.

This is fairly close to what I've always wanted. Though in my case it would be a mix of platonic and intimate friends.
Whilst many other things on this thread, especially cohabitation, are a definite NO for me.
I'm very much more people to go out with rather than come home to.
I can see quite a lot in common with Solo Polyamory. Subject to the caveats of my not understanding allos.
Definitely I want a clear division between residential/domestic and social spaces.

15 hours ago, Ch0c0 said:

If I find somebody who wants a serious relationship and can respect my boundaries I may actually consider it. Yes I feel quite desperate.

When I was younger I might have been more prepared to tolerate such a setup, though preferably non monoganmous.
However in the last 10-15 years, no matter how lonely or socially isolated I have felt, even the idea of this has looked like far too much hard work and emotional labour to failo to get my needs met anyway.

On 6/10/2020 at 4:59 PM, Guest #PATH+ said:

H-Homo. It's very sexist for there to be separate term for homosexuals based on gender. Bi and Pan are shortened to their prefixes and are androgynous.(From what I heard, it was intended to be sexist because the acronym LGBT was created by a TERF.)

The complication is that TERF was coined around 2008 whilst LGBT dates from the 1990's and LGB dates from the 1980's. Thus they would have been called or identify as something else when this happened.

On 6/10/2020 at 4:46 PM, Coyote said:

I don't use emotional attraction as a concept, personally. As a quoiromantic I don't care for the romantic/nonromantic division in the first place, and I don't personally apply the concept of "attraction" to nonphysical things. So I wouldn't say I "experience platonic attraction," either, because that's not how I talk and it's not a model I use. I greatly hope that nobody is implicitly thinking of me as an "alloplatonic" here.

I find "romantic", "sexual", "sensual", "aesthetic", "intellectual", "protective" or "social" to be useful and meaningful attraction concepts.
Whilst for "platonic", "alterous", "queerplatonic". They make little sense used in that way. With the term "quoi" being a good description of how I feel about them applied to attraction.(With "emotional attraction" my feelings are more "too vague".)
Something I can often struggle with is understanding how QPRs are non-romantic when they are described. Especially when they involve monogamy, co-habitation, financial entanglement, etc.
I seems as though there can be a mis-assumption that everyone is using the same set of attraction concepts. As well as conflation between the "quoi" and "a" prefixes.

On 5/17/2020 at 12:34 AM, boba said:

I was having a convo with a friend about how a local orgs stopped using LGBTQ+ and started using LGBTQIAA+ instead. I always assumed the AA meant ace and aro. And she said that she googled it to find the internet split on a-spectrum and ally. 

There's this AVEN thread from 2003 where A meaning ally is mentioned.
The term aspec dates, IIRC, from 2015. 

On 3/27/2020 at 4:05 AM, Tarantulapaws said:

The problem isn't even that ace or aspec alone in a post in non aro inclusive, it's that for a community with a history of getting covered up or equated to another, I wish people would be more careful about how they handle that. There would be no problem if most people didn't equate aromanticism to asexuality. But I can confirm that anyone I've ever met and came out to had assumed I was ace- and or asserted I was ace after I corrected them. Tag policing isn't about trying to put down aroaces for feeling a connection with their asexuality but pointing out that something is perpetuating a common myth.

Conflation between aromantic and asexual, along with the more general conflation between romantic and sexual orientations, predates any asexual, aromantic or aspec community.
The current situation is the ace implies aro meme has been weakened the aro implies ace meme is still going strong. 
There's far more awareness that asexuals can be of any romantic orientation than there is that aromantics can be of any sexual orientation.

This conflation is far more than just about tagging posts on one social media platform.
 

On 3/27/2020 at 4:05 AM, Tarantulapaws said:

Edit: I understand that we share a history and community. Hell, as far as many people are concerned aromantic may as well mean the same thing as ace. What I'm getting at is that this is making it difficult for aros to try making aro specific spaces for the aros that do see a distinction. And saying this very concept alienates aroaces is unhelpful.

I think that shared history is part of the problem here. Including in relation to vocabulary. as well as "aspec community" idea.

On 6/7/2020 at 12:01 AM, John Rando said:

You can be aplatonic and have some platonic relationships. Not all friendships are based on platonic attraction but alloplatonics usually have some relationship that are based on platonic attraction. I don't.

There's this survey I put up last year about squishes and platonic attraction., (Which is also about the only other example of "alloplatonic"...)

Like far too many terms "platonic attraction" often seems to lack clear definition.
There's this AVEN thread.
This LGBTA Wiki page which has, at least, three different definitions and treats it as an umbrella term.
This Carnival of Aces piece which questions the linking to friendship.
This Typography Central thread.

The term "platonic" is likewise, somewhat, ambiguous.
Dictionary.com references Plato, "platonic love",  spiritual and non sensual.
Vocabulary.com also references Plato, spiritual and non physical.
Urban Dictionary non sexual.
yourdictionaly.com non sexual.
Cambridge English Dictionary non sexual.
Oxford Learner's Dictionary non sexual.
Collins English Dictionary non sexual or related to Plato.
Merriam-Webster Dictionary non romantic or non sexual.

It's notable that mainstream society uses  terms like "platonic friend", "platonic relationship" or "platonic love" without using "platonic attraction" much at all.

The term "aplatonic" isn't exactly an antonym to "platonic" or "platonic attraction".
LGBTA Wiki
Urban Dictionary
AVEN

On 6/9/2020 at 6:14 AM, sennkestra said:

Sorry, was there a typo here? I'm not clear on how an asexual person who was questioning their aromanticism is at all close to an allosexual aromantic..

There's a possibility that they could be greysexual or demisexual. Thus have, limited, ability to experience sexual attraction.
Though they are also the aromantic in the study.
Page 61 (76) of the thesis.

On 6/7/2020 at 12:42 AM, Neir said:

@Mark This was the research I conducted, so thanks for this comment! The distinctions between sex are actually really interesting - I wonder if we could capture those in a later survey (perhaps through the AUREA census in a couple of years when we re-open). 
As for repulsion x orientation, the numbers were not large enough to do a repulsion correlation with orientation that would in any way be useful or representative statistically.

Reading the whole thing I note that you said 

Quote

I did, at one point, had a question asking whether or not respondents were on the ace-spectrum, and the vast majority of respondents were. I retracted this question at +- 300 respondents, meaning that I can probably conclude that even with the final numbers, allosexual aros are probably underrepresented in this survey.

Which means you probably should have split the analysis into both "version A" and "version B" sections.
It is, however, impressive to get 527 responses.
 

19 hours ago, sennkestra said:

Unfortunately, there's not a lot of aromantic-focused research - probably the closest I can get is like, a couple of papers that compare aromantic to non-aromantic asexual participants (can't think of any formal papers off the top of my head that collected info on non-asexual aromantic participants; I think right now there's mostly only informal community based research).

Regardless of intent this perpetuates the myth of aro being a subset of ace,

About the only one which comes remotely close to having any any allosexual aromantics involved is Stucki's "Compulsory Sexuality and Amatonormativity in Higher Education: A Photovoice Study with Asexual and Aromantic Students."
Where one of the subjects identifies as "Asexual, but questioning Aromantic"

I notice things like there is a "Pathologizing Asexuality" section, but not "Pathologizing Aromanticism"
There's "Asexual Identity Disclosure and Discrimination", but not "Aromantic Identity Disclosure and Discrimination". Which starts "Several researchers have looked at the coming out process for asexual and aromantic people..." (In several places where the heading says "asexual" the text says "asexual and aromantic". It's easier to find examples where "asexual" is used on it's own than where "aromantic" is.too.)
"Sexual Coercion" is mentioned, but not "Romantic Coercion".

On 6/5/2020 at 1:30 PM, John Rando said:

Let me explain, as a person that dont feel gender as a thing on the emotional level, there is a big corelation for me between this experience and my apl, aro and ace ones. It feels kind of the same. It is such comon feeling for aro people to feel that way that we even have a word for it, arogender.

Romance is highly gender coded. It also forms a significant of expected gender roles, including those of children. Thus it wouldn't be that surprising if all aros can experience social dysphoria in connection with it.

On 4/1/2020 at 1:12 AM, Coyote said:

I've seen it only very infrequently, but for instance, it's in the description for the PF community A-SpecUsers: "A place for support and friendship for asexual, aromantic, and agender pillowfort users." I asked the comm creator... why that grouping, and their response was basically "we all get the same crap." I don't really get that reasoning, but there you go.

This is a three way conflation. With seven demographics involved here. Unlikely that this will be helpful to more than one of those groups of people. Quite likely to help none of them.
 

On 4/1/2020 at 1:12 AM, Coyote said:

The origin story, apparently, is that "a-spectrum" was originally created on Tumblr in 2015 to mean "the ace spectrum and the aro spectrum" together in one word. This is something that strategicgoat, warriorsdebt, and whes did specifically because anti-ace & anti-aro bloggers on Tumblr kept conflating the two concepts. So their response... was to create a word for both concepts? ...And now we have the problem of that term, itself, inspiring a lot of conflation of the two concepts (where people will use "aspec" when what they actually mean is just "ace"). Great going, everyone. 

This conflation originate from Tumblr. It's likely that conflation between sexual and romantic orientations has existed for as long as the concept of sexual orientation (maybe around 120 years).Doing this seems very much an act of self harm. It undermines the work the asexual community has done in debunking the assumption that asesxuals are also aromantic. It makes debunking the assumption that aromantics are also asexual even harder.More generally it contributes to the invisibility of varioriented people. Who may be, at least, one in nine of the population. An indirect effect of this conflation being to deny that perioriented allo allos can experience only sexual or only romantic attraction. 

On 4/1/2020 at 3:33 AM, Lokiana said:

Given that start, I wonder when and how agender began to be grouped into the asexual and aromantic spectra(ums? I have no idea how English works and this is my native language.)

The "a prefix" being used for negation is of Classical Greek origin.
It's use in Modern English may be somewhat indirect from Latin and Romance languages.

7 hours ago, John Rando said:

This test is so frustrating. You are supposed to pick answers to questions and the answers are not mutually exclusives most of the time. You can't answer "None" or "Both" you are just conflated with "neutral about it".

This is the most obvious flaw with the entire test. There are few parts of it which don't involve a false dichotomy.

On 6/6/2020 at 1:47 AM, TripleA said:

For a while, I've been working on a spreadsheet to compile research and experiences of asexuality, and I've just started one for aromanticism as well. If there is anything I could add to any of these, let me know and I'll take a look. 

Whilst it's good that you have been able to compile this list I can see some issues:
This is a very short list. Only nine items.
None of these are professional or academic research. Which means they are not citable for Wikipedia (or similar).
 
Going through them:
Aromantic Gender Experiences: The survey demographics seems very skewed. With cis people, especially men, underrepresented. 
Allosexual Aromantic Survey Results: There's a specific bias of only including allosexual people. Again the demographics seem skewed. Both in terms of gender and sexual orientation.
Aromantic Friendship Survey: The person performing the survey themselves appears concerned about the age demographic.
Aspec PDA Survey: This is specific to "LGBT+ spaces" which could introduce several, indirect, biases. There's nothing in the results to separate the views of aros and allos.
Survey on Romantic Attraction: In terms of demographics of sexual orientation and gender this seems very skewed.
The Aromantic Spectrum in the Ace Community Survey: This is specifically biased towards asexuals, though did pick up a small proportion of allosexuals. There looks to be some good analysis within those limitations.
Romance and Sex Repulsion in the Aro-Spec Community Survey: Results: There's a breakdown by romantic orientation, but not by sexual orientation. There seems little attempt to correlate repulsion with orientation. Or to compare repulsion between the situations of romantic sex, romance free sex or sex free romance.
Romantic Ambivalence: This is about about identity labels. Specifically for people such as quoiromantics who may not fit "cleanly" into an "aromantic spectrum".
How Many People Are Aromantic?: This is specifically biased towards asexuals. With it being specifically noted that any allosexuals involved are unrepresentative. They conclude that aros are quite common. At one in every twenty three people more common than many recognised minority groups, including any of LGBTQ+.

On 1/12/2020 at 3:09 PM, nonmerci said:

I was wondering if anybody here watch You on Netflix? That's about a crazy guy who is ready to do anything for love… literally. He does horrible things through the show and justifies it because of *love*. Because of the plot, there is of course kisses, "romance", and all; but it's interesting to enter into his head and see how his need of romance leads him to crime. Or, how I say it, how romance tropes create a psychopath who is convinced he is a "good guy".

I've not seen it. Though it is concerning how, according to Wikipedia, "According to many reporters and critics, concerns were expressed regarding the viewers who have positively identified and connected with Penn Badgley's character on multiple social media platforms, despite the transgressive acts that the protagonist displayed and committed over the course of the season"

1 hour ago, nonmerci said:

I suppose it comes from latin? Makes me think of the verb amare that means to love. But I'm not an expert so I'm not sure.

IIRC it means beloved 
Mentioned in this article. Which starts by referencing Plato.

The opposite of any normativity is diversity.

16 hours ago, Emerald Cheetah said:

I haven't heard of any place in the world evolving to such a thought process so as to throw out marriage.

There are the Mosuo. Who have something called "walking marriage" which is radically different from either arranged or romantic marriage. Though they may have acquired monogamy from other Chinese cultures recently.

16 hours ago, Emerald Cheetah said:

I mean I've heard that there is this new movement in Japan of Hikikomoris (I hope I spelt that right) and they often don't get married ,but it's not necessarily because they don't want to. It's simply because Japan's society can be a very stressful one to live in and so marriage isn't going to happen when many people can't even keep themselves together mentally. And there are even people in Japan who just go off the grid completely, sometimes leaving the families they've built behind. I don't think the Japanese people would rather avoid marriage.

Decline in marriage is't specific to Japan. Here's articles about it happening in China, The UK, Australia and The US.

On 5/24/2020 at 3:39 AM, Qim said:

Interesting. Where can I find this book?

It's on Amazon, but only in paper and audio versions.