DeltaAro

I think that diamonds are really great... for industrial purposes (offshore drilling) and for filtrating vodka (like THREE-SIXTY vodka). As an investment they're ridiculous, you probably get only 20% back if you sell them. Really, why do even the details of romance have to be so crazy? (also Kate did much damage to De Beers).

What are causes? If we go back to medieval philosophers, free will wasn't conceived of being free of causes, it was just dependent on different causes than of the sort used in modern science (which are most closely related to Aristotle's efficient causes, though Aristotle is talking about agents not events). For example, for Thomas Aquinas the will always chooses what the intellect perceives as the highest good. So it is determined by final causality, though it is free from efficient causality. For John Duns Scotus the will is also directed at the good (one's own good and then also the good of others): it cannot will pure misery for its own sake. But it is also relatively free from final causality because it can fail to will what is perceived as good or choose what is perceived as the lesser good. The will is the only thing in the world whose nature doesn't determine its operations under identical circumstances. It goes so far that though in the present instant of time, what is the case (Duns Scotus believes) is necessarily the case (it is necessary that at exactly this instant of time the color of the Golden Gate Bridge is orange. Since it is orange now, it couldn't be black now), this is not true for the will. I would agree that the concept of free will is thoroughly confused, but is this a decisive argument against its existence? As mentioned before, the concept of probability is pretty confused, too. All the interpretations (classical, Bayesian, frequentist, propensity, ...) have serious issues and one could even use other axioms than Kolmogorov's for a useful probability theory. But does the fact that nobody really knows what probability is, justify to think that all talk of probabilities is completely flawed?

Ghost in the Shell (1995): Does it have romance? I didn't notice any, maybe I'm too naive and Batou is romantically attracted to Motoko but in the “friendzone” (argh). Ghost in the Shell (2017): Have you seen it? I found it unintentionally funny quite often. In the 2017 plot (which deviates much from the 1995 plot and takes elements from the other GiS movies) there is a tiny bit of romance inserted, but it's not a romantic plot.

Yes, the pretty woman syndrome. I sometimes have difficulties to find out how I really feel about a thing... what I've wrote here about kissing seems pretty drastic, but this might be just because it was connected with other very negative feelings. Behaving romantically in an ONS situation, because it's obviously clear that this just for entertainment and nothing serious, takes off the pressure. The worst thing that can happen is embarrassing myself and I can deal with that. It's very different than when I was in a RR where I got kissed all the time (in the most innocent situations), felt nothing (and therefore guilty), didn't know anything about aromanticism (made me feel broken) and still kind of desperately wanted to make this relationship work (because you're supposed to). Sorry that I repeat myself again! It's the same with me. Also, I want to find out how awkward I really am. I think that maybe in an ONS situation this is possible, the problem is perhaps that the time interval until *cough* sexual arousal sets in might be short.

That's just funny, but you can also achieve confusions that seriously mess up your head.

I find this very, very strange myself, though it has gotten much better since I try to approach romance more calmly and rationally and know why I really feel this way. And even alloromantics sometimes have “kiss repulsion” if they have sex non-romantically. Also “no kissing” is not unheard of as a rule in fwb relationships, as a precaution against developing romantic feelings. I don't know how just sensual kissing “untainted” by romance (especially of the kind I experienced, which just burned me ) would feel like. Maybe I would like it then... at least in my imagination it seems so. At least in English (similarly as in Dutch) you can say “I love you” (“ik hou van jou”) and it's not necessarily romantic (aside from the context, only the tone of voice makes it romantic). In many other languages this is not the case: “te amo”, “je t'aime” (okay, I guess in Belgium you could use this non-romantically, but not in France), “ich liebe dich” etc. are all clear-cut romantic (the non-romantic versions would be “te quiero”, “je t'aime bien”, “ich habe dich lieb”), this makes it even more difficult, lol. Same thing with me. At best I can feel about this phrase like “saying something strange that makes somebody insanely happy” (like if I was in a romantic relationship where I laid my cards on the table ). At worst I find it like cringe-level 9000.

Well, as Norbert Wiener said: “Tyche is as relentless a mistress as Ananke.” But there are also many other important concepts which cannot be defined rigorously, what is “probability” for example? I'm the same until I grow so sick of this tendency that I just impulsively make a decision. Does this count as free will?

I started as neutral regarding romance. There was nothing repulsive about it, just a strange aura surrounded it. Contrary to any other human interaction – with all their subtleties and nuances – what's special about it (the parts where it doesn't intersect with friendship or sex) didn't make any sense at all. Having romantic attraction directed at me and forcing myself to reciprocate it (didn't know better) made me feel very guilty (correctly) and very broken (like a psychopath). I strongly suspect it's conditioned behavior for me (don't claim it's like this for any other aro), though if I put, for example, my aversion against kissing (at some point it dawned on me that it was really a way to communicate strong and very real feelings) into words I sound like the worst germaphobe (but I am not anywhere else). I've recently started to always tell myself that I'm only different in this one area, and it helps very much. I notice that when calmly approached, romantic love begins to feel again as only strange to me.

My index finger is 3 mm longer than my ring finger. Cis-male, hetero (full disclosure: it took some time to turn around).

Sorry, off-topic, but I wonder what this “spark” actually feels like? It's not a crush yet, but some kind of precursor, right? I confused it with appreciation of someone's beauty, but it can't be that easy. There wouldn't be a special word for it. Oh, yes. And I also didn't understand the converse of it: the sheer nastiness of many breakups. How can you feel contempt or even hate for somebody after sharing your life with them for ten years, if they didn't do something really bad?

Let's take this comic from an asexual lady, picture 03: “Let me go ahead and assure you that I am all in favor of cuddling ... kissing ... and making out ...” In this case, it's the more parsimonious explanation that people can enjoy open-mouth kissing if they experience romantic attraction. Sexual attraction is not needed!

Interesting old threads surface here from time to time. French kissing is okay for me in a sexual context, and by this I mean that I experience sexual arousal. Without it it's like “What are you doing? I'm not interested in your saliva thank you very much.”. It just feels nasty. Why not put your tongue in somebody's nose or ears? That sounds pretty much the same to me. In a sexual context I find open mouth and french kissing okay. Similarly to @Cassiopeia, the difference is really dramatic and it certainly feels much, much more natural. Still, it's not something I would miss very much if it doesn't happen. Going down on on a woman is so much more exciting to me. It seems there is a level of intimate affection much beyond “baseline” (which would be hugging, cuddling, etc., all the stuff that happens between close friends or family members) but below obvious sexual acts, which alloromantics really enjoy if they experience romantic attraction. They don't have to be sexually aroused for it. Therefore, in the infatuation phase it can go on for more than a hour and multiple times a day. If it were sexual, that couldn't happen because probably nobody manages to be sexually aroused for such a long time. Personally, I'd rather do any chore rather than engaging in a long making-out session. Brrrhhh. I'm really torn if cleaning a public toilet is worse than that.

rer. Worr, let14 disniz riko zo vfm kiffolisk, dit nud baxal velo simpro. Juch skibtick ovolupp rottol axareck din zo axarphaxafot. Zo kiffolisk slaxansraxatel dis ceerol focaxauso dit kivos ug up eutput hist ug caxan pleneunco pi peosniz plosolvo zo weld sizo. Act dit seucts riko pit cloero eb Kloot pi Binnisk. Slupp te pociphol dit! Dit nud jet riko zis dis zo Meynist vaxanuscliss.

@Space Triangle Goddess Je, Pum waxas usick let14. Pum zeudd zis weurd fo velo worr-gnewn zaxan zo vfm kiffolisk slaxansraxatel.

There also is no romance in The Expanse (TV series).

Nobody? You suck!

Pbatenghyngvbaf, lbh xabj jung ebg13 vf! Irel areql. Jung'f lbhe snibevgr rapelcgvba nytbevguz? Zvar vf FRECRAG.

This conversation really happened: Mom: “Don't you want to be in a real relationship someday?” Me: “No I don't want to. This wouldn't work. I'm aromantic.” Mom: “Oh, I don't see why this should be a problem, most men are like this.” well... I just couldn't be bothered to explain what aromantic really means.

The soundtrack was good, the romance less so.

as I wrote:

Oh no, you misunderstood me. With “incompatible attractions” I mean that the characters are alloromantic but their romantic orientations are incompatible. I picked up the term here because ... I thought it was something you all knew. The romantic orientations are in such a way that there is no pairing available which would make romance possible. Like the stereotypical “lesbian woman and gay man”. Can't happen (in this case it would be even double-sure). The drawback is that the number of main characters has to be kept very small for this to work. And I never believe in any allo myth. NEVER! It's just an example of an explanation that most allos (excluding total douchebags) would accept.

Also an interesting way to quickly finish off a developing romantic story arc comes from "Mr. Robot", season 1, episode 8: Only works if your character is suffering from dissociative identity disorder. So can't be used that often, sadly.

Have you tried to make the characters have incompatible attractions? Might still be realistic if you keep the number of characters small. Or is this one of the excuses you've already tried? In this case maybe use aliens who don't understand the concept of romance.

Interesting. So it seems she didn't think you were just “normal” and didn't really love her, she felt you were “different” and fixable. If I can read correctly your sexual orientation says “homo” ... now I'm a bit puzzled.

How did you manage to get that far? Didn't you exhibit some serious cluelessness about romance? And didn't your partner notice your lack of romantic attraction?