Do you feel included in pride

[ellie04]

due to bad experiences with other queers i sometimes worry that i wont be welcomed into the community.

[Jot-Aro Kujo]

Sure. I used to be a lot more insecure, especially in the heyday of """"ace discourse"""" in the mid-2010s, but now I'm kinda old and jaded (well. I'm 25 so I'm still young lol, but yknow what I mean). I'm here, I'm queer, I've got better things to do than worry about people hmphing about other people's identities.

[ellie04]

9 minutes ago, Jot-Aro Kujo said:

Sure. I used to be a lot more insecure, especially in the heyday of """"ace discourse"""" in the mid-2010s, but now I'm kinda old and jaded (well. I'm 25 so I'm still young lol, but yknow what I mean). I'm here, I'm queer, I've got better things to do than worry about people hmphing about other people's identities.

Yeah that time was awful 

[aro_elise]

the first time i went to pride (with my lesbian friend and her queer friends, including another aro) i was so nervous.  which is silly because anyone's allowed to go.  like it's on public streets.  but anyway.  if you mean in general, do i feel that other people consider me to be lgbt+?  sometimes.  but i consider myself to be, so there we are.

[S-Hawk]

kind of. i dont partake in any events anyway. i just draw

[CatsAndCake]

I feel included in pride, but I don't go to events so I don't know if the rest of people think the same. :)

[HelloThere]

There’s sorta visible divide between the rest of the community and aro/aces everyone else is going on and on about their partners and stuff like that while we’re just here living our lives, eating cake, and doing crap we like.

[CanadianBird]

When I see other people walking around with pride flags I feel the sense of community, but when I tell other people that I'm "not straight" it's probably not the way they think seeing as they'll usually assume that I'm a lesbian.

They know we EXIST, but just are often forgotten about :,)

[HelloThere]

1 hour ago, cerimonials said:

When I see other people walking around with pride flags I feel the sense of community, but when I tell other people that I'm "not straight" it's probably not the way they think seeing as they'll usually assume that I'm a lesbian.

They know we EXIST, but just are often forgotten about :,)

Yeah, most people in my class think I'm gay. The funny thing is that the one guy that's moaning all the time is considered to be joking, but I help a guy pick up a paper (because I want to be nice) and then suddenly I'm gay! I mean I wouldn't see that as a bad thing, but it makes me laugh a lot. XD

I mean, they probably know I'm not straight but seriously that's where their brain goes?

[SwiftySpeedy]

Well, the Asexual part yes. But the Aromantic part no. actually being aromantic is so unacknowledged that my auto-correct automatically changes aromantic to romantic lol. 

[HelloThere]

22 minutes ago, SwiftySpeedy said:

Well, the Asexual part yes. But the Aromantic part no. actually being aromantic is so unacknowledged that my auto-correct automatically changes aromantic to romantic lol. 

I’ve typed aromantic so much that it’s just accepted it as vocabulary now. XD

[Balfrog]

I felt decently welcome queerwise at the portland (OR) pride parade I went to. There was a kid wearing an aro flag, I saw some arospec pins, and everyone was nice to our group. I don't think I am going to another official parade though since it had cops and corporations, which felt very condescending, and there is something heartbreaking about needing a security checkpoint to go to most of the pride merch stands.

I don't hang out online much with people I haven't met offline, nor do I have much social media. I missed a lot of queer discourse and """ queer discourse""", which missing the latter probably helped me feel comfortable.

[HelloThere]

10 minutes ago, Balfrog said:

I felt decently welcome queerwise at the portland (OR) pride parade I went to. There was a kid wearing an aro flag, I saw some arospec pins, and everyone was nice to our group. I don't think I am going to another official parade though since it had cops and corporations, which felt very condescending, and there is something heartbreaking about needing a security checkpoint to go to most of the pride merch stands.

I don't hang out online much with people I haven't met offline, nor do I have much social media. I missed a lot of queer discourse and """ queer discourse""", which missing the latter probably helped me feel comfortable.

I'd love to go to one at some point just to test the waters, though I'd also want to go to vidcon and see my favorite creators but both things probably won't happen under my parents roof. XD

[Keith]

Not really. During the past 4 days of pride month I've seen a lot of posts about it, most them were made by people who were a part of the LGBTQ+ community as well, yet none of them included aro/ace/aroace people. It makes me so sad, because even if we are acknowledged, we usually aren't taken seriously. And even though I agree with the mindset Jot-Aro Kujo has, I still wish our community accepted us more (can you tell that I live off of others validation??? /hj).

[The Newest Fabled Creature]

I'm LGBT in different aspects of my life (multisexual and trans) but I also consider my aro identity to be LGBT and would consider myself a part of Pride if I went to an event with specifically aro-centered celebration in mind. I've never been to a parade before, which I wish I could this year, but a queer related crime happened near my city very recently, so - yeah, that's not gonna happen. It's plain awful. I did go to a family event last year, the first ever in my rural county, but they haven't planned anything for this year sadly - could be related to the fact that my State has 13 anti-LGBT laws in place. But, yeah, even with the event last year I was still coming to terms with being aro and although they didn't have aro-themed pride stuff it was cool because most of the people there, both young, middle aged, and elderly, had an awareness of the aspec community.

Edited June 14, 2023 by The Newest Fabled Creature

[HelloThere]

1 hour ago, The Newest Fabled Creature said:

I'm LGBT in different aspects of my life (multisexual and trans) but I also consider my aro identity to be LGBT and would consider myself a part of Pride if I went to an event with specifically aro-centered celebration in mind. I've never been to a parade before, which I wish I could this year, but a queer related crime happened near my city very recently, so - yeah, that's not gonna happen. It's plain awful. I did go to a family event last year, the first ever in my rural county, but they haven't planned anything for this year sadly - could be related to the fact that my State has 13 anti-LGBT laws in place. But, yeah, even with the event last year I was still coming to terms with being aro and although they didn't have aro-themed pride stuff it was cool because most of the people there, both young, middle aged, and elderly, had an awareness of the aspec community.

It’s always nice just to know that people know you exist at places like that. 

[Poopyguy47]

Idk, it feels like aromanticism gets kinda overlooked in a lot of LGBTQ discourse. As someone who is still sexually straight, as well as cisgender, it sounds kind of stupid but sometimes I feel like I don't count? Like some fucked up version of impostor syndrome in more general LGBTQ circles. I also feel that the prevalence of lumping sexual and romantic attraction also doesn't help.

[Moth Lady]

I only realized I was aroace recently, so this experience might be different for me, but I've never felt excluded from the lgbtq+ community. I went to pride a few days ago, and I definitely felt included and loved there. It might help that I am also trans, but I don't think I would be seen as less queer if I wasn't.

[Holmbo]

I've never felt excluded but pride is a pretty wide event in Stockholm. A lot of people who walk in the parade are just allies of different kind. But I don't really relate that strongly to LGBT+ identity. I feel more closely related to relationship anarchists and solo polyamory people regardless of their romantic orientation.

[Queerdo]

I think one point of tension I feel between queer and aroace communities is that queer people have our own critiques of amatonormativity (a concept grounded in queer theory to start with). So every now and then I see a post that 1. reinvents the wheel and 2. assumes that non-straight relationships mirror straight ones. Queer people literally wrote most of the better books on ethical non-monogamy and families of choice.

It's a conflict that mirrors a long-standing one between "gay rights" groups and "radical queer" groups. Do you see romance (including marriage) as a civil right? Or do you see it as a form of cisheteropatriarchal power? That debate has been going on for at least 50 years now. Along with disagreement about the degree to which we are "born this way" when heterosexuality is also a political system. 

[TheApothiAroace]

I would say yes from my perspective because aromanticism and asexuality are not heteronormative in most cases and are not amatonormative which means that we are included in pride (as pride is for anyone who is not heterosexual/monogamous/cisgender) but we are gate-kept far too often even by other aros or aces, and a far too large portion of those gatekeepers are from the lgbtqia+ community themselves. So do I fell like we belong there? Yes. Do I feel like we are welcome? Barely ever, if ever.

[HelloThere]

5 minutes ago, TheApothiAroace said:

I would say yes from my perspective because aromanticism and asexuality are not heteronormative in most cases and are not amatonormative which means that we are included in pride (as pride is for anyone who is not heterosexual/monogamous/cisgender) but we are gate-kept far too often even by other aros or aces, and a far too large portion of those gatekeepers are from the lgbtqia+ community themselves. So do I fell like we belong there? Yes. Do I feel like we are welcome? Barely ever, if ever.

I’d say it’s just sorta reclusive in a way, everyone else is dating and talking about sex/relationships and we’re just sitting the corner. Plus my life’s not hard and I’m not scared for my own safety, unlike gay or trans people so I’m sorta just sitting on the sidelines anxiously wanting to help, console, and talk.