Interesting article

[ixi]

Hi everyone,

I don't know if that article has been posted yet,but I think it is interesting.

 

https://thebodyisnotanapology.com/magazine/romantic-love-is-killing-us/

[arokaladin]

wow, that really hit home. I'm not sure the writer put into it what I took out but this line: 'I am sick of reminding them of the simple fact that who we choose to love and, by extension, invest in is political.' ...damn

[Eklinaar]

Yeah I read this author as not aro at all, but I can relate to a lot of what she says.  I think a lot of this affects us, too.  As I've gotten older, most my friends have entirely stopped putting any effort into our friendship, and I'm often lonely.  The few friends who have stuck around have significantly changed our boundaries.  None of them will take road trips with me any more or cuddle with me, because apparently doing so violates their monogamous marriages.  I have showed up to take care of single friends when they were too ill to take care of themselves, but then later when I was similarly ill, none of them would reciprocate because they were in committed relationships and it wasn't "appropriate".  The idea that only romantic partners should do this is dangerous and harmful, even for allos.

[arokaladin]

4 hours ago, Eklinaar said:

Yeah I read this author as not aro at all, but I can relate to a lot of what she says.  I think a lot of this affects us, too.  As I've gotten older, most my friends have entirely stopped putting any effort into our friendship, and I'm often lonely.  The few friends who have stuck around have significantly changed our boundaries.  None of them will take road trips with me any more or cuddle with me, because apparently doing so violates their monogamous marriages.  I have showed up to take care of single friends when they were too ill to take care of themselves, but then later when I was similarly ill, none of them would reciprocate because they were in committed relationships and it wasn't "appropriate".  The idea that only romantic partners should do this is dangerous and harmful, even for allos.

Eurgh that’s awful, poor you ?

Friends being somehow restricted from being affectionate toward each other just because one is in a ‘more important’ type of relationship should never happen

[Guest]

.

[Apathetic Echidna]

Quote

There have been various moments in my life when it is structured such that there will be no great upset in anyone’s life if I am not there. Some people would not have someone to text occasionally, but there do not appear to be gaps that couldn’t and wouldn’t be filled by others. No one’s daily, material life would be changed by my absence. This is to say: no one has invested in incorporating me into their life, in distributing their care, in any meaningful way such that my absence will create a gulf. This construction of love actually terrifies me. While, as a subject who is both personally and culturally historically disregarded and uncared for, I have a desire to be cared for and prioritized, the expectation to do this to another horrifies me. Not in a sense of a restriction of love, but I do not want to feel obligated to reserve the love and care I have for a single person, because this not just loving and caring for one person, but doing so at the expense of loving and caring for everyone else. 

fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck

I got bad feels, and a sort of distant doom feeling for the future.... maybe not so distant. I know this may be the whole 'we are threads and can't see the pattern we weave' thing but I think that if I was suddenly gone I would be fairly replaceable in basically all my friend's lives. I guess this is the point that makes me read the author as a romantic as I certainly don't want to be cared for and prioritised above others by someone (sure, definitely expect to be prioritised by a pet but for me that comes under some complex possessive-ownership-love-stuff I seem to do). To be someone's 'everything' is a scary thing I agree with the author, but it is not something I desire (phew!).