Tired of partnered relationships

[Unikitty]

I am honestly getting tired of the obsession over partnered relationships. I'm even feeling this on aro websites I browse where people use QPRs as a replacement for dating. No disrespect to people who find these relationships helpful, but it sometimes seems like people push it as a way for aro to "still have legitimacy" and it kind of stings. I also feel like it helps push the mainstream societal idea of partnered relationships into having more worth and people in these are more worthwhile. Discovering I'm aro has helped me begin to unpack this idea but it kind of makes me sad how prevalent it still is. I consider myself non partnering and I'm still in the process of accepting that about myself, but this seems like a rare thing for people to be and it's a bit isolating.

[Guest]

I agree there is that pressure everywhere you go, but you're not alone! I'm non-partnering too, because I don't like the idea of committing to someone for life or calling someone my partner. It's unfair that we're expected to have a partner to be legitimate or worthwhile. 

[nonmerci]

I'm exactly the same. Some aros tend to replace romance with friendship in the amatonormative discourse, which doesn't destroy the discourse, it just changes the object. And I don't like when other kind of partnerships as used to humanize aros like "we don't have romantic partners but we have other partnerships don't worry", it reminds me as aces were like "we don't have sex but we have romance, so we are still humans".

And outside of the aro community, I saw some people using "self-partnered" instead of single (term coined by Emma Watson), and I don't blame them if they relate to the term, but like, it just reminds me how you can't escape the pressure to be partnered, if even feminists coin terms that makes you partnered when you are single...

 

I wish the aro community advocate more for all types of partnerships and non-partnerships to be valid instead of creating a new norm.

 

Edited April 18, 2023 by nonmerci

[Holmbo]

Yeah I'm also unintrested in qpr or squishes. Perhaps you'd enjoy exploring relationship anarchy. I find it really fits with my values about relationships.

There's also some nice solo content like The community for single people on Facebook and the podcast Solo.