El011

Fraysexual, but you could also just need therapy if it's causing distress (you used the word disgusted).

Gender, sexuality, and disability are different things. But how can you be oppressed for the exact same thing you're privileged for? Even in the case of cis women or non-cis men, one axis of privilege and oppression is trans status and the other is alignment under patriarchy so it's not the same thing. As a gray aro, I am stigmatized for my ability to romantically love people of my same gender as well as for how rarely I experience romantic attraction. I'm also targeted for my sexual attraction, which I'm not privileged for. You're invalidating my experiences, posting bigoted propaganda, and being homophobic. But only two of those things, my romantic and sexual attraction not my gray romanticism, will ever lead people on their own to fire me from a job, deny me housing, assume that I'm an abusive parent, assume that I'm a sexual predator, physically beat me, rape me, stalk me, or try to coerce me into conversion therapy. And when I AM stigmatized for being aro, it's almost always because of misogyny and homophobia. Straight cis aro men aren't targeted by vitriol against casual sex and not wanting a relationship to anywhere near the same degree I, a gray aro socially perceived as a bi woman, am. If misogyny and homophobia didn't exist, neither would arophobia, but obviously not all aros are oppressed under misogyny or homophobia. I'm not being targeted for being aro and you're abusing mod power and invalidating me by saying I am or that I have privilege over you for being bi. Gay people don't have privilege regarding acephobia or arophobia. They are oppressed for experiencing attraction, they aren't a ruling class when it comes to sexuality, and what you're saying is homophobic. You're breaking the rules of the forum. How does a group that has been targeted systematically with state sanctioned genocide have privilege? Being called cis is not a problem because no one is oppressed for being cis. They can be oppressed for being a woman but that's, again, about alignment under patriarchy not about trans status. This is such a huge false equivalence.

Can't it also be argued that saying this is a homophobic talking point used to silence gay and bi people who have a problem with the word? Being stigmatized isn't the same thing as being oppressed and this isn't contradictory at all. In order for one group to be oppressed, there has to be a ruling class that can and does benefit from that oppression and in the case of aphobia, there's not. Gay and bi people are not a ruling class in terms of sexuality. I'm sensing some cognitive dissonance here. You say that having privilege doesn't mean you're not also stigmatized but don't seem to apply this to aros. Don't cis het aros and cis aroaces have privilege related to sexuality by virtue of not experiencing homophobia?

I'm not gray ace but I assume gray aro experiences would translate pretty well into gray ace ones so maybe this will help. Just take my answers and replace aro with ace. It varies a lot. We're probably less likely to be repulsed than full aro people because we still feel romantic attraction, and I don't talk to a ton of other gray aros so I wouldn't know their thoughts on it. But personally I don't really use the repulsed/favorable/indifferent terminology because I don't feel like it works very well with my experiences. Sometimes I'm romance favorable, sometimes I'm indifferent, sometimes I'm repulsed. It's gonna be different for everyone but for me it does. Not necessarily consistently with my romantic attraction, like I haven't had a crush in a few years but i still get random days when i think a romantic relationship sounds amazing even though there's no one I'd actually want to do it with right now or in the immediate future. I've gotta be honest, I think some people just make very overblown assumptions of how non aros/aces experience attraction. Like I've seen "allosexual" defined as "you regularly feel strong sexual attraction to people you don't know" and that's ridiculous, nobody just wants to bone five strangers a day unless there's a health issue going on. Nobody feels attraction 24/7 the exact same every day esp considering there are so many different factors that can affect one's attraction. Sometimes, even for people who are fully alloromantic allosexual, there are days when they're just not particularly feeling attraction and that's totally normal. And this description...just sounds like a typical allosexual person to me.

I would love that!

Nonbinary people don't have to be totally neutral and plenty of us lean more to one side of the binary. We also all present differently and use different pronouns so there are many different nonbinary experiences. You can absolutely identify as nonbinary if you want but you don't have to. I've even seen people identifying as both nonbinary and cis.

That's still attraction to all genders. You can still id as bisexual. If not that does queer work? Or sapphic if you're woman aligned?

I like romantically coded things! I don't see any reason why things like chocolates and flowers and candlelit dinners have to always be romantic, but I can understand why some people consider them that way. I also date nonromantically.

My fellow grays (sexual or romantic), why do you identify the way you do? I'm gray-aro and a non-ace bisexual. I identify as gray aro because, so far, I have only experienced romantic attraction to two people that I'm aware of. If you go back to the beginning of the adolescent stage, so around 10, that means I only get crushes about once every six years. I dated and had sex with a few people casually from 20-21 years old, which was fun, but before that I preferred to prioritize other things. I got in my first romantic relationship when I was almost 22. I do like dating and doing romantically coded things. But I don't normally like the idea of being in a romantic relationship and am generally indifferent to romance on a personal level and when I was actually in a romantic relationship the romantic aspect of it stressed me out at times. I also have a hard time figuring out when I am feeling romantic attraction. I do like the idea of romance, though, and I feel like I have the potential to be in a romantic relationship and enjoy it. What about other grays? Why do you identify as gray-ace? Why do you identify as gray-aro?

What's your opinion on the term allo? Why do you feel that way? I have mixed feelings about that. On the one hand I don't like it because it's so frequently used in homophobic or otherwise oppressive and immoral ways to say that non-aro or non-ace people are inherently privileged and that allosexism and allonormativity are real things, to make invasive assumptions about other people's attraction, and to group gay and bi people with straight people on the basis of sexuality. It's also forcibly applied to people who aren't comfortable with it. On the other, I feel like it wouldn't be a bad term if it were used: -to encompass gray-ace and gray-aro people while also acknowledging our place in the aro and ace communities. -as a neutral descriptor that doesn't denote privilege, that acknowledges the stigma and oppression even many straight people experience related to their attraction and sexual/romantic lives (ie reproductive rights for women, criminalization of sex work, eugenics, nonconsensual surgeries on intersex people, trans people experiencing violence for having sex, racist stereotypes about people of color's sexuality, etc.) -in a way that doesn't imply wlw/mlm attraction is privileged and acknowledges the privilege that comes with not being attracted to one's same and similar genders. -in a way that doesn't push an "us vs. them" mentality that I see often in the ace and aro communities -in a way that doesn't pretend asexuality or aromanticism are oppressed identities (stigmatized yes, oppressed no) -in a way that doesn't pretend asexuality and aromanticism are part of the lgbt community -in a way that doesn't shame or alienate people for having sex or romantic feelings

If you are gray-aro and/or gray-ace how do you identify?

I have a date tomorrow and we're getting coffee at Starbucks. I like casual dating with sexual partners but it can get stressful af for me when the romance kicks in for them bc I don't feel anything, so I'm very upfront about the fact that I generally don't want anything romantic. I like doing romantic things but not for romantic reasons.