aro-fae

I technically had 2 high school relationships, but they both lasted a week and ended because they would try to hug me or take me on a date (you know, ~dating stuff~) and I would freak out and dump them. For the most part I would say I've never had a relationship and I've never done ~relationship stuff~. Mainly because I don't want to lol. 

7 hours ago, running.tally said:

I've heard very well-meaning individuals who are genuinely afraid that aros will take away resources from everyone else "just because they don't feel romantic attraction," saying that queer people need resources for "having queer experiences, not for lacking them." (This is a misunderstanding of the "not feeling romantic attraction" definition, i.e., that not having romantic feelings is not in and of itself a queer experience, but the 'lacking' narrative is pretty common in my spheres.) It's difficult to explain to these people that, no, aromanticism is inherently queer and aros face oppression, and aros won't steal everyone's resources (especially since the resources we need are probably different from those other queer folks need, but that is a fact conveniently forgotten by many of these people I encounter).

That's also something I've come across a lot, and to this I would reply with something along the lines of "isn't having a queer experience tied directly to lacking a straight/cisheteronormative experience? In that case, aros do have a queer experience, as they lack that straight/cisheteronormative experience". That wording is messy, but I mean that as long as aros are excluded from the 'mainstream' narrative, they are sharing a key experience with the queer community. That mainstream narrative appears to me as something that is hetromantic + heterosexual  + cisgender (and possibly + amatonormative?), and any queer example I can think of off the top of my head is removed from at least one of those concepts. Aromantics obviously missing the hetromantic (and amatonormative) part(s). 

7 hours ago, running.tally said:

I also like the idea of having specific stories. We want to include interviews with people (or have those people guest-write themselves) about the nuances of their experiences.

I also think this is a great idea, as this allows people (both aro and non-aro) a way to conceptualize and maybe empathize with the ~aro experience~. 

We're all just a bunch of Care Bears. 

Care 100%

Loyalty 39%

Fairness 72%

Authority 8%

Purity 69%

Liberty 50%

Your strongest moral foundation is Care.

Your morality is closest to that of a Left-Liberal.

I find it hilarious that my Care is at 100% (I knew I was a sap but c'mon) and my Purity is at 69%.

I think there's also a lot of individual variation to that. Where all aromantics lack romantic attraction, I think most of us can say "I prioritize x over romance" or "My long term plans involve x rather than romance". What x is will be different to different people, and can be friendship, a successful career, learning to play the cello, etc. (also I'm now imagining the hilarity of the expressions of alloromantics if you tell them that cello playing is more important to you than marriage?)

21 hours ago, Coyote said:

...I think you may have this backwards. Certainly Simon's (ridiculously amatonormative) terminology suggestions (that delineate between more distant friendlike qprs and closer romancelike qprs, wtf) relate back to some real emotional experiences that resonate with people -- otherwise there wouldn't be people thanking him and saying things in the notes like " Aaaa I really like this a lot. ... And this. Actually makes me feel a lot better. Because I felt left out of even the aro community bc I don’t rlly want a QPR at all."

It feels like we're saying the same things but in different ways lol. I meant that to me, it seems like people continuously create more specific words because they want all of their experience encapsulated in a few key terms, but this isn't helpful when the original "umbrella" term could just be understood as more diverse. 

2 hours ago, nonmerci said:

I Don't know for others, but the first time I encounter the word aromantic and do some researches, I find a lot of website saying things like "not feeling romantic attraction doesn't mean aros don't form couples", and then explaining the concept of QPR.

I think we may be on to something here - it does seem like any time I try to find aromantic resources, there's a lot of "but don't worry! we can still do this!" This may be an issue of people trying to make aromanticism more palatable/acceptable to non-aros? And I can definitely see how those voices would become the loudest, as people who aren't worried about "outsider" approval wouldn't be interested in making a loud fuss over this stuff. 

From what I've seen, it seems like people of all genders can vary on a spectrum from nonchalant to impassioned about their gender. 

It may also be that, as a cis person who has never dealt with gender-transitioning, your gender simply doesn't feel all that tangible in your daily life. It's different for people who risk being called by the wrong pronouns, may have to deal with outright transphobia, etc etc. For myself, as a nonbinary person, I'm not walking around all the time shouting that I'm nonbinary and I often don't really think about it, but it becomes very 'real' when I see hate crimes in the news or something. 

TLDR : I didn't see any transphobic sentiments in your post and your viewpoint makes a fair bit of sense. 

So if more real-world community building is a solution, how can we go about this? What would we be interested in seeing from LGBT+ organizations that would aid in creating a connected, diverse, and visible aromantic community? It's one thing to ask for inclusion but as someone who is involved with an LGBT+ organization, it would be nice if people could offer ideas that can be budgeted and planned for. Awareness Weeks at best involve some posters and flyers. 

Especially as I feel like we're at a point where most of the community knows what aromanticism is, in terms of dictionary definition, but most people don't understand or even discuss the experience, aka "what being aromantic means". And, as we've seen from this topic and the need to create it, communities can't form around overly specific terminology - there needs to be an emotional experience that resonates with the people who identify as such. 

It has been a bit weird reading through this thread because I always assumed platonic attraction was connected to QPRs. I did a bit of digging and was able to find a few instances of alterous attraction (also here, and here) being used to mean an interest that is neither fully platonic nor fully romantic, which to me sounds similar to a QPR but apparently does not necessarily mean that. I also still see aplatonic used to mean lack of interest in QPRs. 

I don't think this makes the concept any less vague lol, I just wanted to share what I found. 

Hi bri53, parts of you experience sound similar to what I've heard other aros/aro-spec people say (the aromantic spectrum being things closer to aromanticism than not, for example demiromantic or greyromantic). I myself relate to finding romance boring/not worth chasing after.

I'd recommend spending some more time around forums like this and seeing what else aromantics have to say and see if this community feels "right". And if it does, welcome! And if it doesn't, we wish you the best as you continue figuring things out. 

It may also help to find out how alloromantics would describe their romantic attractions? I don't have any ideas for resources like that but I imagine there's a lot of "How To Know If You've Found ~The One~" kind of articles out there. 

Yes to a lot of things said in this thread - I'm so tired of having to keep track of a batch of different flags/terms every few weeks because someone decided to take a dictionary definition literally and decided that their experience could not be captured by such simple words ? I do think having more irl interaction/community building would be helpful, as it would help in removing oneself from the echochamber that the online community often becomes (especially on sites like Tumblr where certain large blogs get a lot more attention and are often held as representative of the community). I don't have any other answers though, because I'm not interested in telling people how they should/shouldn't identify and I also don't know how to create a vast well of aro-representation that would help people of varying aro experiences feel comfortable in the community. 

I would say I occasionally have squishes because I occasionally feel pulled towards people, but, as most people seem to agree, what a "squish" or platonic/queerplatonic attraction might be is confusing. 

I do like the new suggested definition. Idk, the "usual" definition tends not to bother me because 1 - I'm obviously biased towards it, as it works for me personally, and 2 - most non-aro people seem to understand it. My understanding is that the average alloromantic/zedromantic is experiencing romantic attraction frequently, with a variety of people over the course of their lives, and with a certain level of intensity, and having a definition that is basically "none of that, or only a small part of it" seems to cover most points in surface-level conversations. 

33% aro, 25% aroace, 25% demisexual. Honestly about what I expected. 

7 hours ago, Chandrakirti said:

Can't highlight the passage, but if you're running through the sheets....I'd love to bring my camera!??

Ahhh that's a very aesthetic image lol

5 hours ago, Mark said:

 

6 hours ago, LizBri said:

and definitely the awareness of split attraction is definitely not made aware in these circles, be it aromantic allosexual, alloromantic asexual or another combination (my QP is homoromantic heterosexual for example). 

Even where there is some awareness there can be ideas like exclusively varioriented people don't exist.
There's also seeing heterosexual aromantics (and asexual heteroromantics) as "non queer enough".

I think this last bit is also what worries me about people coming out "for visibility" - people offering themselves as representation tokens is going to risk a lot of emotional turmoil in terms of others not understanding (or not wanting to understand) things like split attraction, het-aces, het-aros, etc. So while it's great for an individual to bring awareness, I'd hate to even suggest that burden to one person. 

In general, I feel like visibility should be more of a goal for the greater community than individuals. Let larger LGBT organizations and activists do that kind of work, rather than relying on individuals. 

I frequently come out as aro, particularly because I'm heavily involved in an organization and for the sake of event planning I like to make sure we bring the aromantic flag along with all the others  Of course, that is a very easy environment to come out in. Am I running through the sheets shouting that I'm aro and handing out flyers? No. I'm just planting little reminders among people that already know. 

And I agree with Coyote, visibility is not the best goal. Education and acceptance should be the focus, visibility just happens to follow it. 

Yeah I've had a similar shift as well. I guess because I would still consider myself ace, but not sex repulsed, so aromantic is a better descriptor of how I go about my life anyways. 

I've seen Neu Aro suggested as a term, which I quite like since its about aromantic being the priority and sexuality being in a neutral state. 

Do you ever get that "betrayal" feeling though? Like, I feel bad for not calling myself aroace for some reason. I'm just really used to using the split attraction model I guess, even though I've always hated it.

So I'm Max, they/them. I've identified as aromantic for about 5 years but only discovered this site recently?? Lately my asexuality has been questionable, but my aromanticism and non binary-ness have always been solid. I'm 20 years old and currently on a college break so my posting may be sporadic while I'm in school.