Mult

I think people should consider which came first: entertainment media "addiction" or social isolation. Think about your commute (if you commute to work) and what you do on your time off of work. How many people to you converse with and hang out with ? How easy is it for you to get together with other people? Do you have to coordinate time off work or travel a long distance just to meet up? When I was in university, I was studying music in a small department, so we all really got to know each other and we would all be frequenting the same small university building for out classes. I talked with all sorts of people daily, but now? Haven't seen anyone since I graduated. Everyone is so far out of the way, the university is 3 hours from where I live now, and I work full time. So how correct is it to say that people are not being social because they are addicted to media and fantasy? Or perhaps our society makes it difficult for people to get together and just hang out? When someone cancels plans with you are just simply cannot visit you, what do you do? Go out somewhere to find someone to talk to or put on a movie? Scroll the internet? Social media and other online stuff is definitely addictive but people generally gravitate to the path of least resistance. Seeing someone face to face is difficult because of work, travel, money. Scrolling through the internet is easy and you're paying for your device and internet bill anyway. Imagine having to travel to a library just to watch a YouTube video? You wouldn't be doing that as easily or as often as you would with a smartphone in your hand connected to a cell tower. Cars play a large part of making life quite isolating where millions of people each day spend some time of their day stuck in traffic, alone in a car. One could live alone, commute alone, talk at work, return alone, and spend their evening alone. If that person has work early the next day, would they go out to socialize or just turn on some music and scroll through the internet until they go to bed? Besides how expensive it is to live in developed places around the world, I also believe that our very society is reinforcing lonely behaviors. Online communication is where a lot of people spend a lot of their socializing time which isn't inherently bad, imo, but if you want people to meet face to face, then they need more opportunities to casually run into people they know or to get to know people around them which has quite a bit of resistance against it due to the way our communities are structured and the way labour is structured.

The largest drive of a reduction of births in developed countries is the cost of living and lack of available child care. Japan especially has notoriously long waiting lists for daycares. This means that a parent has to stay out of work to raise a young child which is why Japanese children are raised quite young to be independent since Japan is an expensive place to live. Japan is also known for a high suicide rate in men and very toxic working conditions. A lot of people do want children but don't have them because they don't have the means to afford it. Rental units are also expensive especially those with multiple bedrooms. So many people are quick to blame selfishness of individuals rather than address the obstacles that are impacting when or if people decide to raise kids. Lack of job opportunities also make an impact as young adults may leave to find better opportunities rather than raise children in their home country.

If you feel this way believing that romantic attraction is a wonderful thing, then it is likely worth it not to fret so much and just be open to romantic relationships. Media greatly exaggerates romance as well, so I don't think you should consider it as a baseline for how you should feel. My parents met on a blind date set up by their friends/family and they're a great match who've been together 30 years, so if you want a romantic relationship, just look out for someone who fits with your interests and life style rather than trying to find the mythical "spark" the movies always showcase. You don't need to get butterflies to be in a romantic relationship, so don't let that hold you back if you want a romantic relationship. You might just psych yourself out expecting something spectacular when life is often much more chill than the movies.

Um, wow. That's just...literally horrible. I'm an atheist, so I can't give advice, but this part just stuck out to me because my aunt died last year and I wrote and presented her eulogy in place of my father because he would not be able to do it and cried a lot at his sister's funeral. To bar women from attending funerals for being "too emotional" is just... absolutely horrible. I assume the men who enforce that just don't want women to see them cry. Men who suppress women because of their own superiority complex bother me to no end.

Are you concerned this has something to do with him being aromantic? Although you say the only issue is your sexual relationship, so that's suggests to me that your romantic relationship is not a problem, is that right? If you are looking for advice about how he could last long in a sexual encounter then you've come to the wrong place. This forum is about aromantic relationships rather than sexual relationships.

Ngl I wish this were true about me. 😶

I'm glad someone on the Reddit mod team has some sense to see that the ban was ridiculous

There's a bit of a thing where some people suggest that being romantic but not sexual in a relationship is more "pure" or "genuine" and there's definitely an emphasis on having relationships which doesn't align with who I am. Some people get a little defensive when I suggest that I don't see much of a difference between sexual and romantic attractions and they are equally unimportant to me. There's definitely belittling going around based on age too where certain people insist that young people can't call themselves ace or aro unless they've have "experience" while being vague about what that is supposed to entail, and it just ends up being about their age and the commenter projecting their own experience onto others.

Blame the utter stupidity coming from those who say that. Imagine saying the same thing to a straight person: "maybe you just haven't met 'the one' who's of your gender." A lot of things people say to non romantic and non sexual people wouldn't be said to anyone else because too many people hold the belief that everyone wants a relationship and would be happier in one. Personally I believe that there isn't a point in humouring that idea as long as you are happy the way you are. Why waste time thinking about it when it doesn't matter? There's nothing wrong with not being interested in a relationship. The only issue is with those who feel upset over not having a relationship. Personally I don't believe those people should wallow in self pity for believing that they are aromantic because they're likely just psyching themselves out and convinced by media that portrays romance as some supernatural mind blowing experience. They're expecting all these fantastical feelings and believe they'll die alone and sad because they don't have that. In that case, exploring the idea that they may not be aromantic is worth it because they are clearly unhappy and I don't think people simply saying "it's okay to be aro" helps their situation. You're the only person who knows how you feel and what you think, so if you are comfortable the way you are, there's no reason to wonder so much about whether you are "actually" aromantic. For some of us, it is easy to know because our wants in life and our innate feelings of self match up very clearly. I don't experience attraction and I have no interest in engaging in any relationships that are not platonic or familial. This is how I am and I am comfortable that way. Having to reject people and get them to understand that I am not and would not be interested in a romantic relationship with them is not a necessary step in identifying who I am. Consider what you want in life and how you feel now, and you can address this at any time in the future. If there is no conflict with how you feel and what you want, why bother thinking about something that hasn't happened like catching feelings for someone?

So they punish everyone who tries to express that they experience zero romantic attraction since declaring aromantic as an "umbrella term". 🙄 I shouldn't be surprised. Sounds like they've effectively censored anyone who specifies that they don't experience romantic attraction at all. There's similar issues in the Asexual community. Strangely some people act like experiencing no attraction at all is either not possible or somehow offensive to those who experience some attraction. I've been told by certain people in the Ace community that I shouldn't say that I will never fall in love because I'm "not a fortune teller". They act like we have to be open to being in a relationship because some people realize they actually do experience attraction later in life and they say that I have to avoid saying "never" or else I'll be "embarrassed" in the future. I have to wonder why they feel like that's their business.

I can't really think of any either but I also never really looked to characters as reflections of myself.

Uh...what the what... They want aromantic to be an umbrella but don't want people who experience no attraction to have any specific identity? Do they think saying you're "fully aromantic" or "totally aromantic" is not "divisive" or do they want you to just use the "umbrella"? Ugh 🤦

This is a good point about how being single does not equal being aromantic, and I think equating being aromantic to simply being single would be a mistake.

Oh yeah. Actually this does make me think of the "4B" movement. It's, uh, I think it straight women who choose to not have relationships or children. Something like no boys, no babies...and two other things starting with a B.... I'm not certain about what exactly it is but I've seen people talking about it. Anyway, apparently this started in South Korea from what I heard because of domestic violence and lack of opportunities for women among other things. So while a straight woman who is choosing to be single and live a single life would appear similar to myself on the surface, we are still very different. I'm not interested in guys or girls equally and I am just living the way I am while they are single because they want to make a statement about how single women's lives are better compared to being married and dealing with a lot of uncompensated labour and being mistreated. I do respect them for making that choice for themselves, but I don't relate to their motivations because I am single simply because I am not interested in relationships at all and am happy this way. Ignoring the differences between being aromantic and practicing the "four Bs" ignores that there are external pressures resulting in these people choosing a single lifestyle. That reason is the entire point of their lifestyle. These women are making a statement, so lumping them in with aromantics who are just simply living the way they are just undermines the whole reason they are living a single life. I also would not like people believing that I would get into a relationship with "the right man" because even if there was a guy or girl for that matter who is everyone's ideal and it super helpful, emotionally available and attractive, I still wouldn't want to be in a relationship with them. Me being single has literally nothing to do with the actions or personality or attractions of another person; they don't factor into the equation at all. [Edit] just looked it up and the reason why I couldn't come up with 4 words that start with B is because obviously the words it refers to are in Korean. So yeah, me and a 4B woman would both be single but we wouldn't have any similarities past that

I'm neither romantic or sexual and I don't crush on characters, so I can't answer this question, but growing up I found this confusing as well. I really could not understand why kids would get possessive over and be so interested in fictional characters. I could never understand the existence of character/person content like people drawing their personas with the characters in a romantic way or people writing fanfiction about characters where the person reading it is involved in the story and involved with a character romantically. It was just very bizarre to me. I could understand people "shipping" characters with each other as there's a competitive aspect to that where people would get very defensive over fictional relationships, but inserting oneself into fiction wasn't something that I understood. Now I think it's about fantasizing about a relationship for oneself. They like that character and they want a relationship, so they fantasize about themselves being in a relationship with that character. I'm probably the one people would consider weird because I actually really enjoy characters rejecting me in videogames and I want more of that. I just really enjoy a character telling me that they just want to be my friend because personally platonic relationships are much more meaningful and important to me, so someone telling me that they don't want romance and just want to be friends is literally the best thing ever. This is most likely tied to how I hated being confessed to and still hate dealing with someone's unrequited romantic/sexual feelings for me. The whole reason I played Undertale was because my twin was playing it and she chose the flirt option with Papyrus as a joke which resulted in an adorable set of events where he clearly didn't understand romance either but determined that he just wanted friendship. I've only seen a similar scenario in the video game Hades where you can romance Dusa as Zagreus but she also determines that she only wants to be friends and she realized that she was idolizing Zagreus rather than actually being in love with him romantically. I haven't actually been able to get to that point in the game but eventually I want to play through that scenario. So I will pursue romantic options with fictional characters in videogames to get rejected. So I suppose romantic interest in fictional character is like a role-play of sorts. An avenue for fantasizing about something one wants.

Personally I don't consider who I am as any sort of conscious choice. I am who I am and I am happy without any sort of sexual/romantic relationship and I do not want to be involved in any of that at all. There was no external pressure or environment that lead me to be that way so it is just what I happen to naturally be. I don't particularly feel very connected to a nun or monk who are part of a religion that demands that they maintain a celebrate and unmarried position—I even had relatives in Italy who were nuns, monks, priests like this. I just don't really consider who I am as a lifestyle or some sort of sacrifice for religious reasons. I am simply not attracted to nor at all interested in any sort of relationship outside of a platonic or familial relationship. Even when people choose not to or cannot enter a relationship, I don't have much to talk about with them when discussing their attraction or romantic interests. Personally I just want something that describes a person who is void of both sexual and romantic attraction and interest. I'm just not someone who separates the two and there's nothing in use right now that actually describes that, so I'm actually more interested in words that are more specific rather than less.

Not having my self worth based on the attention or affections of another person. After rejecting someone who cried and wanted me to just pretend to be in a relationship with her to make her feel better about herself, I am really not missing anything honestly.

I absolutely love this.

It's crazy how being rude or distant is something that some people will only accept when being rejected and how simply being friendly is considered flirty or open to a relationship. Tired of "no" being treated like a "not right now but ask again later"

I think men and women can and should be friends (I hate that movie How Harry Met Sally that just enforces the idea that they can't), but I will say it is difficult for me to stay friends in the same way after someone has confessed to me. I've dealt with people not respecting rejection and still trying to get me to date them after I've said no that it has made me kind of paranoid. Now whenever someone whom I know was attracted to me asks for something like to hang out or for a hug or something, I get worried about whether they're trying to subtly convey their romantic interest and whether I am "leading them on". This isn't just between men and women though because I had this experience with a girl I've known since childhood who cried over me rejecting her, said she accepted it but then kept asking me if feelings were blossoming between us. As for dudes, I've had a coworker text me about how he finds me sexy and it's just hard to forget about that the next time I see him after rejecting him—he seemed to take it well, but then I found out from someone else that he's married with a kid? Like, bro? What?—I feel I need to worry so much about my body language or what I say to avoid giving people the wrong idea. And I also met and talked with a guy online who is an apprentice plumber like myself and we bonded over plumbing, but he still decided to send me a message out of the blue saying "I want you to sit on my face." How can things be the same after that? It's like trying to put toothpaste back into the tube. It's a lot of stress to worry about other people's attraction or romantic/sexual interest in me that it makes a friendship more difficult or complicated. I can't control other people's romantic/sexual thoughts or feelings but I don't really want to hear about them in regards to myself. I want people to know that I would say no to any relationship romantic or sexual and that I am not someone who can be persuaded on won over in that regard. It doesn't matter what their gender is, I am equally uninterested in a relationship. I like friendships regardless of the person's gender. I like bonding over things like The Legend of Zelda or my work just as long as the relationship stays platonic.

Stories are just stories. We read them for entertainment, so whatever genre you enjoy doesn't mean you want something like that for yourself. Most people wouldn't want to be chased by a murderer or tortured, but horror and thrillers are very popular genres anyway. Personally romance is a hit or miss for me. I can find them entertaining or annoying depending on the characters and themes. A lot of romance stories are far removed from reality anyway with fantastical or unlikely situations or circumstances. I actually really enjoy stories where the romance doesn't happen. I liked the side story in the video game Hades where you, as Zagreus, can pursue a romance with a character named Dusa but she ends up realizing that her crush on him wasn't actually of a romantic nature and she would rather be friends. This storyline can only happen if you choose to pursue Dusa romantically, so I will choose romance scenarios to get a story that I like or prefer. Similar situation in Undertale with Papyrus where I will always choose the date option because Papyrus ultimately just wants to be friends. I really love this and I would like more stories like that.

I'm going to say a misconception that I have come across is that some people think that we are do not want but are willing to give. Like, I do not want to engage in romantic relationships, but some people think that "love" triumphs over that, so if I "loved" them enough, I would give them what they want and date them and all that without expecting they "return the favour". A rejection from me is simply a rejection. I am not willing to "compromise" within a relationship because I am not willing to be in a relationship in the first place. I also will not be someone's doll to hang around make someone feel better about themselves by identifying as their significant other. I had a girl I knew since we were kids beg me to be in a relationship with her even if I didn't feel attraction towards her. There were tears involved. I don't really understand and I don't think she understood what she was asking. Being in a relationship with someone to make them feel better while lying to everyone and saying that we are dating—it makes me feel ill. Some people act like being single means someone is "available" for a relationship and that as long as that person is single, there is time to convince or change someone's mind about rejection, so I suppose people assume that saying one is aromantic is just a convenient excuse to reject someone rather than a real orientation.

I've never had to fill out any "ideal partner" list in school or anything, but peers having celebrity crushes was always strange to me. I could not understand where they were coming from and what they felt towards these people whom they would likely never meet. I do understand admiring someone for their talent or looking up to them for their style, but fantasizing or wanting a romance with them is just completely unrelated to me. Even answering questions at school of who my roll model is wasn't something I felt I could answer. I ended up writing a presentation on Captain Cluny Macpherson as someone I looked up to for inventing a gas mask used in the first World War—an example of how completely out of touch I was with celebrity figures even as a kid. I just do not feel attached to people like that in my life. I feel familial or platonic connection to people in my life, but it is really hard for me to answer whom I feel "inspired" by. Even for regular people whom I have met, I cannot fathom fantasizing or wanting a relationship with them. Wanting to be in a relationship, do romantic stuff, be seen as a couple is just very foreign to me and not something I want.

I personally don't care how people want to interact with fictional characters regardless of the fictional character's canon personality or sexuality or whatever, but I've been kind of put off recently by the way people discuss and interact with asexual and/or aromantic characters especially aromantic. A very popular character from a new adult animated show was confirmed aromantic asexual recently, and the conversation around the character and shipping is quite aro-phobic even unintentionally.... For instance, I've seen more than one comment about how aromantics and asexuals are "not loveless robots" refering to the spectrum and how people can still date or whatever. Also the repeated idea that the character could be anything other than averse to romance when it really shouldn't matter. There's a lot of excuses thrown around about why this character could date or have sex in the canon of the show rather than an understanding that a completely averse character is absolutely acceptable. Fan fantasies do not need to follow the canonicity of the show whatsoever, so a character simply not canonically interested in dating or sex whatsoever can and should exist just fine. If a character is averse to romance, just make an AU where the character is any other sexuality or whatever, it's fine. Same with the aversion to sex. Just please can people not inadvertently call aromantics who would not date or engage in romance robots or stereotypes even.

I made this account a while ago, forgot to introduce myself, forgot my password and had to reset it, so I suppose better late than never. I'm neither sexual nor romantic and kind of struggling with being believed or accepted. I'm 26 years old and just want to enjoy my single life. The "when you'll do this" or "you can't say you won't do that" is getting on my nerves lately. Especially when people try to tell me I'm too young to say I won't "find love"—I'm not interested at all, I don't want children and I have been the way I am for almost 10 years now. Hoping people over here will understand what I feel. On a lighter note, I am a Zelda fan, so hello to any Zelda fans as well.