Jot-Aro Kujo

Defenestrate.

...With all due respect, I would... Possibly avoid trying to give advice on how to write bi aros if you've never felt attraction. I know you mean well, but I would say that's not really accurate to the experience. That being said, here are some ways my bisexuality and my aromanticism affect each other: -Because I don't experience romantic attraction, I often struggle to relate to other bi folks, and avoid larger LGBTQ events or resources unless they make it very, explicitly clear that they're welcoming to aros, which few do. However, because I do experience sexual attraction, I often feel disconnected from the aro community as well, as there is a large emphasis on aroaces + lack of attraciton in general. Still, there's a lot I do relate to in both communities, and both are important aspects of my identity. -Weirdly enough, I find I'm actually more selective about personality when it comes to interest in folks? Like... I've noticed that alloromantic folks tend to develop crushes and then just kind of, go with it even if the person isn't terribly compatible with them, for some reason. With me I'm like, yeah he's hot, but his taste in anime? Horrible. 0/10 would not bang -I tend to be affected very negatively by the intersection of aro and bi stereotypes. "Heartless, manipulative player who doesn't care about anyone and uses people for sex" is a stereotype that's very commonly associated with both bisexuals and aromantics, and pushback against these stereotypes from both communities can, unfortunately, often result in throwing actual bi aros under the bus. It's very easy to feel like you're a traitor to your orientation by just being yourself, which can be hard to deal with. -Despite the stereotype that allo aros have lots of sex, and the stereotype that bis have "more to choose from" or whatever, for a lot of allo aros it's actually very difficult to access sex. If you're romance repulsed, not the sort of person who likes parties or bars, and don't use hookup apps, there's really very little opportunity for sexual encounters, and a lot of allo aros have never had sex at all even at ages when most other allosexual folks would have. Many allo aros also are extremely selective about who they hook up with, for fear of the possibility of their partner """""catching feelings""""" and then blaming them for not reciprocating- Even when a relationship is explicitly agreed to be only sexual, not romantic, there's still sort of a societal expectation that if one party changes their mind, the other party has some obligation to accept this. -Sexual attraction to men and women can feel different, and some bi folks may be attracted to one gender more than the other. Without romantic attraction, aesthetics may play a larger role- And I don't mean if someone's "ugly" or "hot", I literally mean aesthetics. I tend to be attracted more to women because women are generally more creative in how they express themselves aesthetically, whereas dudes in general kind of fluctuate between "t-shirt and jeans" and "blazer and button-up" which is a pretty boring range of looks, and I'm just too dramatic for that. I don't care what your face looks like but if you have the same haircut as 70 other guys at my school I'm probably not all that interested, hon -The constant struggle between bi purple and aro green vs. the knowledge that people see purple and green paired in a pride context and assume it means aroace... -Fictional characters are often more attractive than real people, because there's just so much less trouble involved. A cute girl might fall in love with me, or ditch me for a romantic partner, but Mai Valentine and her hot motorcycle have never and will never do me wrong ? -When you're young it can be easy to mistake sexual attraction for romantic attraction, or to start dating someone because you feel like it's what you're "supposed" to do. This can lead to a lot of discomfort if romance repulsion arises, and, eventually, possibly messy breakups. There may be a long period of time between realizing you don't love someone and actually breaking up with them, either due to fear of negative consequences for not doing the "socially correct" thing by having a partner, or due to hope that you might develop romantic feelings eventually.

Ah, that makes sense. I'm kind of the other way around, because if I made a lot of cash from a card game tournament, I 100% would use it to buy clothes. But like I said, I don't dress for men; I buy clothes because I like them, not because of social pressures. When I say "I want to buy clothes" usually what I mean is "I want to buy a $100 gothic lolita JSK".

I actually relate to Mai a lot! She's great. Absolutely everything I wanted to be when I was like 5 years old. I love her so much. Imo though her motivations were more complex, I think the buying clothes thing was mostly just what she told people, not necessarily the real reason she was entering.

Yeah, I definitely do feel like even as a cis woman, even as someone who is very feminine, I think my experience with womanhood is very different from what an allo woman's would be. Women are so deeply linked with romance, both in that we're seen as objects for men's affections, and also in that we're expected to want it for ourselves. Little boys are taught to dream of being astronauts and firefighters and sports stars; Little girls are taught to dream of marrying a handsome prince. Teenage girls are expected to be boy crazy. When you're someone who doesn't want/do any of those things... It's strange, and a little isolating. One area where this particularly bothers me is media. Stories centered on women are almost always romance stories, and in stories that aren't romance-heavy, what few women are present usually wind up being love interests for a male character. Growing up I worried a lot that I must have been secretly a misogynist, because no matter how hard I tried I could never really like stories like Sailor Moon or characters like Winry or Padme, so surely it must have been because I hated women, right? Now of course I know that it's because they're all too deeply tied to romance, so I don't blame myself for it, but I still wish there were more stories for women like me. It's so disheartening looking at my top favorite characters and thinking about the fact that the vast majority of them are guys, or looking at my favorite stories and thinking about the fact that most of them have very few women. As a side note, have you heard of the term arogender? My friend @arokaladin coined it a while back to describe that concept of gender identity being heavily affected by aromanticism. It might be interesting for you to read about.

That's not sexual attraction. Sexual attraction would be wanting to have sex with a specific person. Attraction requires a target; Being curious about sex with any random stranger is just being curious about sex.

I'm allo aro. Not demi, so idk how much help I'll be, though. What's your question?

I don't know if this really counts as a gender thing, I'm pretty firmly cis, but I do tend to dress in more unconventional (usually very feminine, but in a very irregular way) styles and I never care about dressing in ways that men would find appealing. I would be quite happy if my style reads as queer, especially to other queer women, but ultimately I dress exclusively for myself. I dress pretty strangely, and I don't really care if anyone else is bothered by it, because I'm not looking for anyone's approval but my own. Unfortunately this tends to attract weird nerd dudes who think I'm a manic pixie dream girl.

Just ask her? You say you want a QPR with her but you’re not sure if she’ll feel the same way. Then... Ask. Say, “Hey, do you want to have a QPR with me?” No one else can answer that question for her, and she can’t answer if you don’t ask, so it’s best to be direct. Also, something I would like to point out, as an aro myself- I was once in a relationship with someone and we also referred to each other as our “wife” for silly reasons, but eventually I grew to hate this term because it really set off my romance repulsion. Are you sure that’s not the reason why she’s “divorcing” you? Many aros are uncomfortable with romance or romance-coded acts. If she recently came out, she may have been trying to convey this. Ask her what she’s comfortable with and what she isn’t. Remember, just because she claimed to enjoy something while closeted doesn’t necessarily mean she still does.

From one bi aro to another, I'm really sorry you had to experience that. I've had similar experiences, though not quite to this degree. My mom eventually came around; I can only hope yours does too. I don't really have a ton of advice, but I can at least say that you're not alone. If you ever need to talk, I'm open. (You're also welcome to add me on Discord or Tumblr if you prefer.) Good luck, stay strong ❤️??

Yeah, feel free to send it my way, I'd be happy to do what I can.

Alright, I do see what you guys mean now about the meme being the problem and not the tags. That makes sense. Thanks, everyone. On that note, though, I have another question. And I do apologize if it seems like I'm making this all about allo aros- I'm not asking these things to be all "me me me", I'm asking because I recognize that yeah, allo aros do have to be careful about acephobia, and I genuinely do want to learn how to be more respectful of aces in my allo aro activism. What's the best way to approach the topic of actual homophobia/sex shaming within the aro community without instantly putting aroaces on the defensive? I know "waaaaah but aceys are hoOoOmophOoObiIiIIic one time I said a guy is cute and a ace said I should be burned at the stake" etc. etc. is classic acephobic rhetoric, and I don't want to repeat that, but like... Yeah, sometimes people legitimately do say things that are homophobic or sex-shamey, and that needs to be addressed. So, how can this be addressed in a respectful way, and in a way that won't instantly make aces feel nervous due to past experiences with aphobes?

No, I'm not. That's why I'm asking. If I had some overly specific demands for how things should be tagged, I would not be coming into this thread to ask other people how they should be tagged. That was my point.

Regarding "tag policing". Y'all are definitely right that it's not fair to leave no room for overlap between aro identities and ace identities, arospec identities, etc. That being said, I do have a question- What would you say should be done regarding things such as the aforementioned "Attraction is cancelled" meme? Because while it's not... Not an aro meme, I guess, what really bothered me about it was that the OP tagged it as simply "#aro" "#aromantic" "#aromantic memes", implying that it was an experience that would be relatable to all aros. So while I can understand the sentiment, seeing outright homophobia in the aro tag, as an allo aro, was really upsetting. How should examples like this generally be handled?

Alright, then that's on you. I have expressed that myself and others think it's really not fair to bring up someone's post as an example of Bad Content without attempting to communicate with them directly first, and that this kind of behavior ultimately leads to people not wanting to listen to you. If you're outright saying that no, you will not attempt to communicate with them... Well, uh... I don't really know what to say to that..?

Why would I not be..? You're complaining about posts made on Tumblr. Thus, the solution would be to attempt to communicate with the posters, on Tumblr. I don't understand what you're getting at.

For me, personally? Sure, I guess? I don't really have a preferred method of communication. Anywhere you can reach me is fine. For other people, I assume it would depend on the platform. In general, I don't think the method of communication matters so much as the actual communicating. Send them an ask on Tumblr, reblog their post and add a comment, @ them on the forums, whatever- Doesn't really matter how you do it, the important thing is that you talk to them before going and accusing them of things.

If it’s all the same to you, I would very much prefer not to. There’s 500 bazillion issues going on in that thread and I’m tired of all of them. The reason I brought it up was not to dig up old drama, but to explain how things you’ve done in the past/did again in this thread are counterproductive to getting people to listen to you, in the hopes that you could learn from this explanation. That’s all.

Honestly? This might sound kind of dumb, but my suggestion is to just... Try anyway. Go on anon, if it's on Tumblr. I don't think that anyone has to try to educate every person they see make some sort of microaggression, but if you're going to use a person specifically as an example, you do have a responsibility to at least try to talk to them directly if possible, to give them a fair chance to talk things out rather than just going This Person Is Bad Here's Why No I Will Not Tell Them This Directly I'm Gonna Steal Their Dirty Laundry And Air It In Someone Else's Yard. In general, I think if you're going to use someone's words as a specific example of what not to do, you should ask yourself three questions: 1. Do I have the full context for this comment and why they made it? 2. Have I spoken to them directly about it? 3. Have I seen someone else bring up my concerns to this person? If the answer to all of these is "No", then talk to them. If they're receptive to you, you can say "Here's a thing that happened, I talked to the person and everything's good now but this thing still happened, so here's an example of mistakes people make and how they can learn from them" (e.g. my conversation with @Lokiana about the use of the phrase "dirty allosexuals", which I did not understand the full connotations of until she was kind enough to talk it out with me). If they ignore you or are hostile to you, you can say "Here's a thing that happened, this person was really rude to me and not willing to listen, so here's an example of how nasty people can be" (e.g. the "Attraction is cancelled" meme, which I explained the horrific connotations of and received no response from the OP). But the bottom line is, you have to at least give them a chance. Nobody should go around flaunting people's words without giving them a chance to explain themselves. If you've given them the chance, and you have the full picture, then you can talk about it, but always give them the chance first.

Not exclusively, no. In the end it did just devolve into a hot mess as all forum threads do. But I can say for myself and others I know who were involved, that’s what was the initial catalyst. I was certainly far more concerned with the fact that I had just seen someone take my beloved friend’s words out of context and prop it up as an example of Bad Behavior on another platform without telling him than I was with anything else. I knew that you had not attempted to discuss your claims with Annest directly, just as I know that you did not attempt to address your issues with my wording just now directly either. This led to a lot of hostility and a thought of, “Wow, this person was really rude to my friend. I don’t like that. They didn’t even try to talk it out! Do they actually want to solve the problem or are they just here to accuse people and stir up drama? Why would anyone go around talking about other people’s bad behavior without trying to address it with them first?” and these feelings of distrust and anger made me feel a lot less willing to listen to what you had to say. Yes, I do want to listen to what people have to say on important issues. But if you want someone to listen, you must first speak to them. You can’t stand there silently and then walk into another room and yell “SO-AND-SO DIDN’T LISTEN TO WHAT I HAD TO SAY!” because then so-and-so is going to be like, “What the fuck are you taking about? You didn’t say anything. Why are you trying to get me in trouble?”

Nah you're good, don't worry! I was mostly talking about @Coyote. To actually clarify: What I meant when I said that aros were "at the bottom of the barrel in the aspec community" (which, yes, is maybe not the greatest phrasing, I will admit) was NOT "aros are more oppressed than everyone else". I apologize that it came off that way. What I meant was that in terms of aspec community activity, the greatest emphasis is generally placed on alloromantic asexuals (note my reference to the classic "but aces can still love!" rhetoric), then after that comes aroaces, and then allo aros kind of fall to the wayside, if we're mentioned at all. I do not, and have never believed that allo aros are "more oppressed" than allo aces, aroaces, etc., I was referring to who gets the most support within the aspec community as a whole. Hence, my mixed feelings allo aces using the aro flag, something I created to raise awareness for allo aros (since our voices so often go unheard within the aspec community) as the basis for their own flag. My comment was not about which group is "more oppressed", because the whole oppression olympics is fucking stupid and we all deal with different issues at different levels. You may also note, @Coyote, the following paragraph in the same post: Even if I may have admittedly not fully succeeded, I did try my best to be as polite as possible and avoid ace antagonism, and I expressed this intention clearly. Had you simply gone directly to me and said "Hey, that phrasing isn't very good, here's why" I would have listened and rephrased it in a better way. I'll be honest, this is why the QPR thread turned out the way it did. It's not because people weren't willing to listen. It's because you saw people who made mistakes- Including people who likely did so by accident- And instead of attempting to resolve the situation by speaking to them directly, you took their words out of context and used them on a different platform as an example of People In The Aro Community Doing Bad Things™ without even notifying them that you were doing so, despite many of those people being actual users on this site. That's... Pretty uncool. It's one thing to say "Yeah, this person said this thing and I talked to them about it and they ignored me", it's another thing entirely to just go "This person said this thing" and leave it at that without trying to talk to them first. It's like if someone said something that unintentionally hurt your feelings, and instead of saying "Hey, that hurt my feelings, could you not do that?" you stood up in front of the whole room and yelled "HEY, SO-AND-SO HURT MY FEELINGS!"; Now so-and-so, who wasn't initially aware that they had done anything wrong, feels put on the spot, and their first instinct is likely to defend themselves to this room that is lacking in context, rather than to ask what they can do better. That doesn't really foster open conversations and a willingness to learn from each other, it fosters distrust.

Just as a reminder, um, I am here. You can, like, you know... Ask me for clarification about things I say on Tumblr instead of discussing my posts in the hypothetical. Just sayin.

Yeah posts like that confuse me too, what is up with those? I'll see a post that's a politely worded statement like "Aroaces tend to assume that all aros share their experiences, and this can be really harmful to allo aros when they make sex-antagonistic statements and expect everyone to agree" and I'm like yeah you're right! Good explanation! And then they have a banner that says, like "Allo aro only post, non-allo-aros don't interact" and I'm like... ???? So it's... So you're talking exclusively to allo aros, to tell us things that we already know because we experience them? Ok... Why..? (Not to mention that banner DNI's are useless if someone can't actually see the image, e.g. visually impaired folks using screen readers or even just people with shitty wifi who can't even tell that there's an image because it won't load. But I digress)

Well, yeah. But not everyone is constantly looking to do Activism™ every time they talk about their identities. Definitely if someone is setting out to say something with the intention of getting people to listen and think, then yes, it's probably in their best interests to not simply scream about things, but sometimes people just... Are venting, on their own blogs? Allo aros are allowed to be angry. We don't have to "get things done" every time we speak. Again, we do need to be really, really careful that our anger does not dip into outright acephobia- But so long as it doesn't cross that line, there's no real reason we shouldn't be able to just talk about our emotions sometimes. Being polite while explaining is good, definitely! But when not explaining, the language allo aros use to make personal posts on our own blogs- Again, so long as that language is not straight up acephobic rhetoric- Is our business, imo.

That person would be me. Hello! I definitely do recognize that allo aros need to be careful not to repeat acephobic rhetoric, and some people are... worse about that than others. ? It's something I've been trying to keep in mind lately. That being said, I definitely agree that aces also need to recognize the line between "this is genuine acephobia and I should ask this person not to talk like that" and "This person is angry about legitimate injustices done to them and I Am Feel Uncomfortable When We Are Not About Me so I'm gonna tone police them". It definitely is a very difficult line to identify though. Allo aros need to be allowed to express frustration with the way the ace community treats us, and we need our frustration to be respected regardless of if we're being "polite"- But we also need to be very, VERY careful that we do not express this frustration via straight up repeating acephobic rhetoric, in the same way that aces need to be careful that they don't express their frustration via repeating homophobic rhetoric. It's a very difficult line to navigate for both parties. But it absolutely needs to be navigated.