How do I reduce the amount of labels I identify with

[Guest pan_the_panther]

Hi all, I'm a cis male that has a very specific question regarding my sexual identity. I have it kind of figured out and I'm really precise in things like this, and as a result it's becoming a bit long... So basically, consider all of the following:

- I experience sexual and aesthetic attraction to any feminine-looking person (I chose neptunic as most fitting here)

- I rarely consider a panplatonic relationship and am considering panplatonicflux for that (though it's a new combination, so maybe just panplatonic would work...)

- I do not experience ANY of the other types of attraction (e.g. aromantic & asensual & nonalterous)

I would like to combine them into something that I can identify with, that combines all the elements. I especially feel like the last bullet point in the list should have a label I'm not familiar with. My current labels are like so spelled out in full:

"aromantic asensual nonalterous panplatonicflux neptunic-aesthetic neptunic-sexual cis male"

In short, please help me shorten and cleanup the above if at all possible, I only have half a clue what I'm doing and would really appreciate any kind of help with this. Thanks in advance.

[Jedi]

All those labels, while true, are not relevant in every situation. Many of these terms are useful once you get into details, but less so when talking to people out in the wild, who don't know what these terms mean anyway. I have not heard 'neptunic' before, but from your context I take it to mean that the gender of the person isn't as relevant as if they are feminine presenting? If that is the case, I'd reduce the list to aromantic heterosexual (and consider that to be trans-and-enby-inclusive), or aromantic pansexual (and think of the 'neptunic' part as being your type). Start with just the broad strokes, even if it isn't the full story. Otherwise, you just say these things with words when they become relevant. "I like sex, but I don't like hugs and kisses, and I am attracted to feminine people" is a lot easier to understand for a regular people than "aro asen neptunic-aesthetic neptunic-sexual." Those labels are still true, so you can still use them when they are relevant, but to some extent I think it is better to think of the detailed labels as useful for you to understand yourself, and useful shorthands in places like this where most of us understand the terminology. But they're not really useful for introducing yourself, in my opinion.

[roboticanary]

To be honest I'm not sure what the need is to reduce those labels. Does it really matter if you split how you feel into many labels?

Maybe just pick the labels you find most important? That seems to be what some people do.

If you want to put all the detail of all those words into 1 short label you will probably have to make up a new word.

[mewix]

Depends what's ur goal.

If you think they are useful then use them. Strip away the ones u dont.

Labels are only there to help if you don't need them you don't even need to use them. You can experiment and that see what works and look at things from different perspectives.

If you want some perfect label to encompass everything, at the end of the day u r urself and a unique individual no one label is gonna describe you perfectly thats the thing u aren't a label, ur a person. What is it that you are trying to achieve here, is this label for personal use or something you want to convey to others?

[Guest pan_the_panther]

Mostly just for being able to express to others more easily without having to read out a sentence. I do consider most of these labels essential, though I have by now been able to reduce it to:

aro asen panplatonicflux neptunic-aesthetic neptunic-sexual male

What I'm mostly wondering is if there is a way of expressing aesthetic and sexual attraction (so two types of physical attraction), while not experiencing sensual attraction? Because I currently use 3 labels to express that concept (asen + the last two). Even though all I want to convey with it is that I don't like hugs or kisses etc., but do consider sex and looks to be important.

I'm not looking for 1 single label that fits me like a glove, but if I could just more easily explain the concept above with a shorter label that would be awesome. Though if both of you consider my request to be asking for the impossible, I might need to read up more and learn before asking terrible questions like this one.

[nonmerci]

If the goal is to communicate quicker what your orientation is, I don't think that finding a label that encompass all of this will be useful : you'll have to explain what it means anyway (or you can do a lot of work until people know the term, but considering how people still don't know what aromantic means most of the time, I think it is possible the new label get mire known if others use it in aro or ace places, but not the rest of the world).

I would stick with the labels you have now if I were you, or explain them quickly with a sentence.

[ScarfOfSexualPreference]

Okay what I’ve always gone with is just “queer.”

If someone I don’t know that we’ll asks me, I just say queer, and basically that eliminates the straight part. If they ask to elaborate, pull out those labels you feel comfortable with and feel ready to explain them, because I myself am unfamiliar with most of them.

It’ll get the point across to people who just want to know if you’re straight or not. 

[Pyr]

Woah, that's a rather impressive collection of labels! (This is coming from me, who can't find any labels to fit herself ?)

Anyways, maybe look into the term aroqueer?

Here's a definition from the LGBTQIA wiki: "An identity for anyone on the Aromantic Spectrum whose aromanticism is the most prominent or most well understood part their orientation." 

[Arsenic]

On 9/28/2021 at 2:44 AM, Guest pan_the_panther said:

"aromantic asensual nonalterous panplatonicflux neptunic-aesthetic neptunic-sexual cis male"

People usually don't know about the SAM (split attraction model), so I think that using all of those labels will just confuse people who hear them. The aromantic part is good defined, so it is a good idea to still use it. The rest of the labels mostly belong to the SAM, so I don't think it is necessary to use them if it is not required for the context. You could try to use aromantic neptunic, since you feel attracted to femme-presenting people in a sexual and aesthetic way.