Coyote

41 minutes ago, Ace_of_Spades7 said:

Like, for example, a relationship between two aces where they're both romantically attracted to one another, dedicated to one another, in love with one another, but there's no physical element involved at all. One couple in this relationship will describe itself as an aro-ace QPR, because no physical element is involved.

o.O aro ace is a term for people, not relationships.

Anyway, I've.... seen one example where someone described "queerplatonic" as like basically "a partnership without sex" (paraphrasing), which is a problem, but I wasn't under the impression that that was a widespread way that people were using it. Do you have linkable examples of the thing you described here?

41 minutes ago, Ace_of_Spades7 said:

Then say you have an ace relationship similar to what I described above, but add cuddling -- one couple will call itself a QPR because there's no kissing. The other couple in the same relationship will call it a romantic relationship, because there's a physical element involved.

 

Or add kissing. The couple may feel romantically desire one another, but aren't romantically attracted to one another per se, so they call it an aro-ace QPR instead.

Aside from the weirdness of using "aro ace" for something other than a person, that all seems fine to me. It's supposed to be a flexible umbrella term, after all.

24 minutes ago, Jot-Aro Kujo said:

Tumblr is always a mess.

True.

13 minutes ago, Ace_of_Spades7 said:

So now a relationship between romantic aces, which at the beginning the aces themselves would've described as romantic, tends to just be called a QPR now, while "romantic" is used for "something more."

I'm... not sure I've seen that? I don't recognize what you're talking about here.

15 minutes ago, Ace_of_Spades7 said:

Sorry, I realize I didn't explain what I meant by this very well. I understand that these conflicts are different. But I mean because the split attraction model only very vaguely defines types of attraction, plus all the other new terms, tends to create very different understandings of what constitutes a romantic relationship vs. a queerplatonic relationship within both communities. So a relationship that, at the beginning of the ace community, would have been seen as "two romantic aces in a QPR" now is viewed as "an aro-ace QPR", while the relationships of romantic aces are viewed as "more" than that. And many people in the ace community tend to believe that being "aro-ace" means wanting a QPR. So I think that's where some of the misunderstanding on the origin of QPR came from. Does that make sense?

Well, that can't entirely work as a lineage, because as I explained at the link above, the term "split attraction model" emerged on Tumblr in 2015 among people who were up in arms about ace community language proliferating (in some cases objecting to it being too universalized, in some cases just objecting to the concepts existing at all), and "queerplatonic" was coined in 2010, so that predates "split attraction model."

The original language within the ace community itself was just "romantic orientation," "romantic attraction," other specific attraction subtypes, etc. -- and ace communities were talking about these things as early as 2003 or so, before a bunch of non-aces decided that our language needed to be supplanted by theirs because ours is evil.

And in any case, queerplatonic relationships don't have to be based on a particular type of attraction, anyway.

What is possible is that different definitions of "romantic" (itself) and "aromantic" (as an identity term) are putting people in tension, but that doesn't entirely explain why people get invested in this whole narrative of the ace community as thieves who wrongfully co-opted the concept of the QPR.

1 hour ago, Ace_of_Spades7 said:

In part, from the perspective of an aro-ace who's also active on AVEN, I think a lot of the misinformation stems from the ace community's hesitance, especially AVEN in particular, to clearly define romantic vs. sexual attraction in the split attraction model.

I... don't see any connection there, actually. The term "split attraction model" emerged from a completely different set of conflicts.

1 hour ago, Ace_of_Spades7 said:

Which was in part why I joined Arocalypse; I felt out of place, realizing "wow, even aro aces want a partner... is something actually wrong with me then??"

Not at all. There's been a lot of conflict around that too, unfortunately. Aro narratives are diverse, and not wanting any kind of partner is one of them.

1 hour ago, Ace_of_Spades7 said:

I think correcting people when they're wrong, and also maybe trying to more clearly define terms, will help a lot of the confusion.

With all due respect, this response makes me think you probably read the first post and then commented without reading all four pages here -- which is an understandable choice. I mean, I probably wouldn't have the patience to read this whole thing myself if I hadn't been involved all through it to begin with.

For the record, though, what I've experienced and witnessed so far has been:

• I try to correct someone directly, and we spend like three straight days messaging back and forth before I can get them to begrudgingly accept the correction.
• I point out a correction indirectly, and I get told I'm irritating to deal with, and then that person just jumps ship rather than apologize for any of it.
• Someone else makes a correction directly, and they get completely ignored.
• Someone else makes a correction directly, and they get told that it doesn't matter.
• Someone else makes a correction indirectly, and another person comes back at them reiterating the incorrect version.

So I mean, sure, keep correcting people, I guess, but what do you do when this is the result? There's a lot of politics involved here that seem to be less about the information itself and more about who it comes from and what that narrative is interpreted to stand for.

For those interested: here's some perspective on this from a gray-a who's collaborated with AVEN mods before. Short post, but here's an excerpt--

Quote

If AVEN can provide some logistical support to Arocalypse, that would be a great thing.  But what I would be concerned about is if any of this "stable leadership" is provided by people who are directly elected by the AVEN community.  Just say no.

 

The second thing I would be concerned about, is that even if the AVEN leadership is competent, I don't trust the larger AVEN community to react appropriately.  You don't want to be exposed to the vagaries of AVEN internal community politics.  You might think ace tumblr has a lot of bullshit going on but imagine dealing with another strain of bullshit you never knew existed.  If it were me, I would only accept an Arocalypse/AVEN affiliation on the condition that AVEN does not advertise the affiliation to its community.

This is physically paining me here. @WrenIsNotMyRealName!! please just PM me any more questions you have and I'll answer them for you.

That's fair. I don't expect everyone would be in a place to know.

Anyone else?

12 minutes ago, bydontost said:

My point is that there hasn't been deafening silence

Oh! Okay. Thank you for clarifying. I meant deafening silence in response to this:

On 1/11/2020 at 11:19 AM, Coyote said:

Can y'all offer any insight on who's networked to who?

38 minutes ago, bydontost said:

I mean, this post https://shades-of-grayro.tumblr.com/post/611142713511936000/shades-of-grayro-queerplatonic-relationships-an already has 9k notes...??

It does, and I'm glad. Laura reached their goal to surpass the notes of the Twenty post even faster than I would've expected.

What's your point?

Deafening silence over here, I see.

Figured I'd add, for anyone who doesn't want to address this topic on this particular forum thread -- especially since our time here might be limited anyway -- there's still the Wordpress post comment section (no account needed).

2 hours ago, Mark said:

It's, unfortunately, only a start.

Yes, of course.

Some additional context (for those who don't feel like clicking through or just in general):

• In the humanities, there's some different fields/areas of scholarship like women's & gender studies, queer theory, gay & lesbian studies, critical disability studies, etc.
  • There is not, currently, afaik, any particular "aromanticism studies" or equivalent.
  • Note here I don't just mean "research studies about aromanticism." There's already some stuff like that, in the vein of like... surveys and stuff.
  • I mean more like an aro parallel to queer theory, as a whole body of scholarship on critiquing social norms.

So I guess I'll put this in the form of some questions:

• Is there any interest in making "aromanticism studies" a thing?
• Are there any aros in the humanities looking to get started on that?
  • If so, are you interested in drawing on queer theory as a starting point?
  • Does that count toward aro representation in LGBT places?

2 hours ago, Mark said:

There's a lack of vocabulary for nonromantic sexual relationships (and attraction).

Wh... Is there? ...I mean, there's room for improvement, I'd agree, but there is some vocabulary in the texts quoted that.... I, at least, interpreted as meaning nonromantic sexual relationships. Are you objecting that that vocabulary isn't good enough (disrespectful or too specific)? Or are you disagreeing with that interpretation as a whole?

Or, wait, did you just mean in general, not specifically in regards to queer theory?

2 hours ago, Mark said:

The sex is a keyword whilst romance issue is one of the many ways in which sex and romance are treated differently. Hence conflating asexuality and aromanticism

That's not so much an issue in queer theory because neither asexuality nor aromanticism is really on the radar in the first place.

In any case, queer theory's interest in sexuality as a primary category means that there's a lot of discussion contrasting legimitized/normalized sexual relationships against nonnormative ones, which... seems like the perfect opportunity for talking about romantic vs. nonromantic sexuality as a part of that framework, yeah?

Just popping in with a couple of sidenotes:

1) Kinda disappointing to see FYA named here, since I'm unimpressed with them too, for additional reasons entirely separate from the aro angle. As an alternative, I'd have named The Asexual Agenda as an ace-focused blog that might be a more productive example here and that deserves more recognition. Not trying to sidetrack the conversation though, so I'll leave it at that.

2) More on-topic, maybe.... Dunno how germane this is, but for those of you invested in the academic side of things:

If queer theory counts as a "LGBT place," and if you'd like to see aromanticism introduced explicitly into queer theory scholarship, you might be interested to read about some existing perspectives on romance in queer theory. Short version: while "romance" isn't really a key word in the field, I'd say queer theory is overall pretty friendly and supportive of nonromantic sexual relationships, which could be a promising start for introducing more of an explicitly aromantic perspective.

....Granted I figure this thread is more about in-person community centers and activist orgs and such, but putting that out there just in case.

@Didisansmagie I'm not sure what you mean by "split attraction model" in this case, but setting that aside...

Yes, people have been using the concept of sensual attraction here and there since at least as early as 2006, probably before that as well. I've also seen at least one person apply the concept of aesthetic/sensual attraction to attraction to voices, as one example.

1 hour ago, LBMango said:

when you realize that you're touch attracted to someone, it's probably a little into the relationship

Not my experience.

Just in case anyone goes searching Arocalypse for quoi stuff, and to introduce anyone who's not familiar, here's a handy roundup of quoi things:

Origins

Here's a really detailed timeline of where the term came from, and here's a summary:

• Wtfromantic (as in what-the-fuck-romantic) started getting used (jokingly, at first) in 2011
• Quoiromantic, as an alternative way to say wtfromantic, was suggested in 2012
• It's based on "quoi" (kwa), the French word for "what"
• It can be used to describe:
  • a ??? response to the concept of romance
  • not using or not getting the concept of romantic orientation
  • actively disidentifying with romantic orientation as a sensible/applicable category
  • finding the romantic vs. nonromantic distinction inaccessible, inapplicable, non-sensical, etc.

Related & Similar Terms

• You can find a bundle over at Effi's list of words for those who struggle with the concept of romantic attraction
• Schroromantic is an adaptation of the term Schroedinger's dating
• Mehmantic is another variant, with more of a shrugging tone
• Idemromantic can be considered a subtype of quoiromantic
• Nebularomantic can be considered another subtype, except with a more specifically neurodivergent emphasis
  • (kudos to @Momo for reminding me about this one)
• I consider terms like these to fall under a kind of quoiromantic umbrella

Are quoiromantics on the aro spectrum?

Short answer: Some are, some aren't.

Long answer: Individual quoiromantics will have different answers to this question. Last year I conducted an informal survey and found that -- at least out of my respondent sample, which was noticeably skewed toward aces and aros -- a majority of wtf/quoiromantics answer "Do you identify on the aromantic spectrum?" with "Yes," but there was also a not-insignificant number who answered "No," "My answer is not yes or no," and "Unsure" (all together, these answers add up to more than a quarter for those who identify strongest with wtf/quoiromanticism out of a predetermined list). A number of these respondents like the word "aromantic," too, so any time you say something is for "aromantics," you should anticipate that you might have some quoiros show up.

So while quoiromanticism is not just a subset of the aro spectrum, there's an important amount of overlap, as well.

Arocalypse is an aro forum; are there any quoiro forums?

Not currently! Online, you're most likely to find us hanging around places with a high density of aros and/or aces, like AVEN, Arocalypse, and parts of Tumblr and Pillowfort -- dedicated quoiro spaces aren't really a thing right now

Are there other kinds of quoi identities?

Yep! The quoi- prefix can be used on just about anything, which is how people have derived terms like quoigender, quoigenic, and quoisexual.

Just as examples, here are a few personal narratives from aro quoisexuals:

• "I’m not aroace. I’m not alloaro. I’m both, in a weird sorta way"
• "I don’t have a sexual orientation. I’m not allosexual, I’m not asexual, I’m just opting out"
• "I’m comfortable saying N/A for myself"

16 minutes ago, Blue Phoenix Ace said:

Do you blame the one who threw the gasoline on the house, or the one who lit it with the match?

The one who lit it with the match.

What about you? You're the staff member here. If I use myself as the sacrificial goat and to go and play out the scenario I raised -- throwing gasoline, as you put it -- then should I expect you to tell me that whatever happens next doesn't count because we had this conversation first?

I'd like to discuss the policies you're setting here, but first I need to understand exactly what they are and how the rulings work.

19 minutes ago, Blue Phoenix Ace said:

I'm curious, can folks post in this thread?

On my end, the link preview displays as "Sorry, we can't show this content because you do not have permission to see it."

29 minutes ago, Blue Phoenix Ace said:

There's a difference between these two statements:

• I think grey-romantic people don't exist, they are just alloromantic
• You are not grey-romantic, you're feelings are invalid, you're alloromantic

So, just to get this straight--

Hypothetically, if a specific, individual, not-aromantic-but-not-alloromantic person threw themselves before TripleA and said "Does what you're saying generally apply to me personally?" or "What do you think of my romantic orientation?" and if he answered that by saying what we can pretty well figure he'd say,

then

you would say there's been a violation of the rules?

10 hours ago, gardensnake said:

More schroromantics here?

Hi! *waves* I'm quoiromantic. Not the same label, but I consider a lot of these similar/related labels/descriptions to fall under a kind of shared umbrella. It was actually just the other day that I posted about looking for more quoi bridge-building w/ allosexuals.

For the curious: I first encountered "schromantic" (as a term) in Effi's list of words for those who struggle with the concept of romantic attraction. The term "Schroedinger's dating" was introduced on Aroplane by Sciatrix, who's the coiner of wtfromantic, which was the precursor to quoiromantic. So there's a lot of overlapping family history there.

This stuff is basically indistinguishable from what the same tired old anti-gray arguments in the ace community have looked like, and I want to thank @sennkestra and @Jot-Aro Kujo for refusing to stand for it.

@Blue Phoenix Ace, since you are taking the position that TripleA's anti-gray posting is not against the rules here, I'd like to request that either you reconsider that position or you see to it that those rules are updated and clarified, because currently my interpretation of the rules is not compatible with your decision here. 

In the Arocalypse Terms of Service, you wrote:

• "b. Personal insults: Personally insulting other users in any way is unacceptable. This includes, but is not limited to, using a person's race, sex, gender identity or expression, creed, disability, nationality, or sexual orientation as a way to insult any member."
• "f. Judgements of other users: Making judgments about other users, especially about the validity of their sexual or romantic orientation, is strongly discouraged. We are here to figure ourselves out, not to put each other in boxes."

It seems like leaving "romantic orientation" out of the Personal Insults rule is an oversight, but in any case--

Based on a first viewing of these rules, I had the impression that anti-gray posting -- such as treating greyromanticism as not a part of the aro spectrum, telling some aros that they're not really aro, and fretting over the inclusion of greyros in the aro flag -- would not be allowed here. As it stands, I still think it makes sense to read the rules that way, since anti-grayro posting is a form of making judgements about the validity of someone's romantic orientation.

What you're saying here is that this impression of the rules is incorrect, and that actually, some amount of making negative judgements about greyromanticism is allowed.

In that case, please update and clarify the rules.

@LBMango I'm one of the people who finds "sensual attraction" a useful concept, so I might be able to clear things up -- possibly. I could go into some personal examples of my own, for instance, but I'm wary of getting told "well to me that sounds like sexual attraction though." So I'll try a different route first. 

It could be, for all I know, that some people do completely and unambiguously sort all the people they encounter between the categories of "sexy" and "would never feel like making physical contact with at all," with absolutely no in between ... but if so, it's not universal. There's definitely a number of people -- and I don't know how common this is exactly, just that I know that it's not just me -- who are sometimes physically attracted to people they don't exactly find "sexy" per se. 

There's an element to this that's especially subjective, as well, considering that what different people consider to be "sexual touch" vs. "nonsexual touch" varies by a lot. In this post about intimacy scales, for example, the three different people differ a lot on how they categorize each thing. I don't think there necessarily needs to be a "right answer" to something like that. Especially since each thing -- like "kissing" -- can be done in a lot of different ways. So with all that in mind, I don't think "sensual attraction" can be pinned down as an impulse toward any one specific type of activity, if that makes sense.

It's more that, if someone's distinguishing between that and sexual attraction, I assume it's because there's some physical attraction of theirs they want to be understood as nonsexual (or not-necessarily-sexual). People's reasons for that vary, but in any case... Presumably, you can understand not wanting to accidentally communicate "I think they're sexy" about someone you don't think is sexy. It's just awkward to send the wrong signals about that kind of thing.

14 hours ago, LauraG said:

Perhaps a second infographic aimed more at an aro audience that's about the history of the word queerplatonic would work better for that.

Oh, that reminds me (I knew I was forgetting something) -- besides the things I listed above, I'm also wondering about which blogs might be the most influential in aro tumblr. Or maybe not "influential," but, among the users who have been making misinformed remarks, are there any particular aro bloggers that they listen to on aro issues? And, among those lists, is there any overlap? Someone who could reach more than one at once? If one of those bloggers were willing to reblog something on this, whether it's an infographic like Laura is suggesting or some other myth-debunking post, that might help put this matter to rest as well.

I'm not very familiar with that landscape, though. Can y'all offer any insight on who's networked to who?

On 1/6/2020 at 3:49 PM, bydontost said:

i decided to put it there, bc it's sth that aros don't know about and often think aros coined it, this is the reason for this whole thread. the goal is to put accurate info out there in a form that people like, read and reblog (if we're talking about tumblr)

On 1/7/2020 at 6:49 AM, Mark said:

I think it's important that people know the origins so as to avoid the misinformation, misassumptions and misunderstandings surrounding the word.

I appreciate the shared priorities.

Currently, (in relation to this thread) I'm thinking of the goal of QPR infographics in terms of this:

On 12/19/2019 at 11:12 PM, LauraG said:

To move a bit away from the context of coinage and towards another common greivances relating to qprs - that alloromantic aces use the word to mean non-sexual romantic relationships. Personally, I haven't seen evidence to suggest that this is as pervasive a problem as it is sometimes framed as, but what I have noticed is that the one post I've seen that does this is one of the first results when you search queerplatonic on Tumblr. Which is a problem.

 

Seeing as the op has not responded to any of the corrections, I was thinking of ways of trying to combat that, and I think the best course of action there is to create a competing post (that's equally pretty, since I think that's a factor in why it spread). It wouldn't take down the other post, but it would hopefully provide enough conflicting information that people stop to think about which is correct.

So I'm thinking of a second infographic's goal as mainly just "knock the bad one off its throne of notes." 

The problem with the bad one, besides being bad, is that it also happened to combine the ace-origin narrative with a very skewed understanding of what queerplatonic can mean. This makes bad QPR definitions & the ace-origin narrative seem like they're intertwined, which then makes people feel extra suspicious of the ace-origin narrative when they see it again in the future. A couple of different posts I've linked here have shown some of the reactions that result re: presenting the ace-origin narrative without getting into detailed proof, and if it were me, I'd want to try and anticipate how to respond to those reactions, should they happen again.

Hypothetically -- and this might not be what would happen, but hypothetically -- if even one blogger reblogged the infographic to add "No, this is false, it's actually an aro term" and then several more bloggers shared it from there, then even if the original poster responded, "Common misconception actually, here's proof," then you've still got people who maybe only saw the post in its earlier form, ending on, "No, it's an aro term." In that scenario, the post ends up with a reblog-tree where one version of the post leaves off on the aro-origin narrative. That's a version that more people might see and get the wrong idea from, which continues the cycle.

So when people present the ace-origin narrative in that context, at this point, I think it's risky to simply mention it in passing instead of getting into the proof.

For the goal of "addressing the aro-origin misinfo," there are three general things that I figure people can do:

• Directly correct people who state/spread the misinfo, ideally angling for a retraction. Just telling them isn't enough, since their mistaken posts are also seen by other people, and those people need to be reached, too. 
• Spread the corrections independently, as an original post/reblog, specifically about the misinfo issue and its causes. 
• More generally, encourage/participate in broader conversation about the issues this one is intertwined with, in order to try and address some of those root causes.

23 hours ago, bydontost said:

anyway if someone wants to make a post to tumblr, here's a draft graphic that could be used https://drive.google.com/open?id=18wNTeK4GF1szk0lVKDTTjttvGr0ht09q

suggestions for some tweaks are okay

Interesting. I see the structure here is patterned after the bad one.

Frankly, I don't think mentioning the origins is necessary, if the goal is just to put out a better infographic that doesn't reflect the same problems as Twenty's.

More importantly... I don't actually think the original structure (with its blocks on Love, Commitment, etc.) was the best choice on her part to begin with. This could just be me swinging too far in the other direction, but I associate this kind of breakdown of features with the attempts to define queerplatonic too narrowly as a particular kind of relationship style, rather than an umbrella term.

I see your approach was to take some similar blocks and mostly talk through how variable they each are, which is good. I also have to assume, though, that some people will just glance over the headers w/o reading the smaller text and possibly get the impression that it's intended as a trait list. Do you see what I mean?

@LauraG -- you mentioned an infographic project too, right?

Here's an essay I know of about gay bisexuality, for reference.

I don't have a dog in this particular hunt, besides a general opposition to too much essentialism, but from what you described, @Alexisaromantic, it sounds like you're mired in a case of people trying to sort other people into Ally or Enemy factions, rather than working together to solve a problem, and that's never a good situation. You might end up burning some bridges no matter what you do. Faced with conflicting demands like that, I think the only thing really left to do is figure out how to maintain your own sense of integrity.

Are you looking for input about the particular issue itself, or more on how to handle the DMs?

Update: title changed from "QPR Revisionism is Not An Appropriate Proxy for Aro Reparations" to "QPR Misinformation Is Not an Appropriate Vehicle for Aro Community Building," per feedback that the original phrasing sounded accusatory. 

So now that that's changed, would anyone like to address any of the other accusatory language used in this thread?

Hey @asexualpanda27 -- this isn't my area, but I do have an aromantic friend (who doesn't have an Arocalypse account) who would be happy to talk more about this stuff with you, if you want. Let me know and I can PM you her discord, instagram, or email address.