#Aroace Sam… a concept…

[thepandalion]

nothing to fuck you up faster than scrolling a character situation tag (as in "X character is sad in this one" way) and seeing an author you recognize who apparently wrote a fic for it that you don't remember reading

[lednet-sorrow-au-blog]

I honestly like the rep there,it has it.

Can we just appreciate how good aroace rep moon is. Like he the the very and I mean very few aroace canon characters to be aroace and was confirmed in the show multiple times, is more Then just his sexuality, is not a stereotype, and are adment on keeping him aroace and not have gain a love interest (yes I know people who are aroace can be in a relationship I'm just saying it for the people who are on the aroace spectrum that doesn't want a relationship) shout out to all the aroace Sams fans and people.

[yourstrulynobody]

Since its pride month, I have an excuse to give my hcs abt the SAMS/LAES/EAPS casts sexualities + other stuff (these are all personal hcs, so its alright if you dont agree with them <3!!):

{ People here are: Samuel (my human au; human SAMSSun), SAMSSun, SAMSMoon, SAMS/EAPSEclipse, SAMS/LAESCosmos (formerly Lunar) aka the og squad <3 + mentions of SAMS/LAES Terra (formerly Earth), SAMS/MGAFSMonty, SAMS/LAES Solar and LAES/SAMSNebula :D!! }

~• (1.1) In my human au, Samuel is Aegromantic (enjoys the concept of romance, but doesnt wanna partake in any romantic relationship) and Asexual (feels little to no sexual feelings). Yes, I know its a human version of a canon show, but I have to create backstories of everyone so it makes sense and all, so I put a small hcs for Samuel (and for others, too) while mostly everything stays the same. :) /lh

~• (1.2) While my hc for SAMSSun is that hes Lithromantic (likes romance and gains romantic feelings, but those feelings fade the moment its reciprocated) which he'll never know since nobody likes him back (sorry Sun). I still hc that hes Asexual since, yk, robots.

—I also hc that, since Moon was build from scratch again, Moon's model is two inches taller than Sun's since Monty messed up the measuring lol.

~• (2) Not really an hc, but I feel so represented with SAMSMoon. Like fym theres a universe of one of my favorite characters out there that sees themselves the same way I do—Aroace (combination of Aromantic and Asexual; feels little to no romantic and sexual feelings) and Agender (does not identify with any specific gender)? I love him sm /motherly

—anyway, actual hc: Moon purposely sings badly just so he isnt asked to sing... but Sun knows Moon can sing well since Moon used to do so when he got control of he and Sun's formerly shared body, unknownly providing comfort. <3

~• (3) Eclipse is Aroace like Moon is, but its more of a: "romance is dead" rather than Moon's "Unless I find the right person" lol. (This differs from the "Eclipse's Eclipse Twins" AU where he is a straight asexual :3... srry for yapping abt this AU sm. I just love it :'3)

—Eclipse's model gets taller with each rebuild bc I think its funny that he used to be Sun and Moon's height until, like, he gets revived and hes suddenly 3 inches taller THEN hes 5 inches taller than his previous heightened height. Moon just goes: "My neck is cramping from this. Cant you kneel?", and Eclipse goes: "No."

~• (4) Cosmos initially thought they were Aromantic (feeling little to no romantic attraction) because they came from Moon, but when Gemini showed up, he realized he was Demiromantic (develops romantic attraction only after developing a deep bond with someone). He was in severe denial at first until he decided "Screw it" and got together with Gemini. <3

—Cosmos is StarTools (Solar x Nebula) wingman trust /silly. Idk, I just see Cosmos seeing Nebula eyeing Solar and vice versa, then he tells that to Terra so she can help Nebula while Lunar helps Solar—his helping, however, consists of a lot of teasing before he gives actual advice lmao.

Uhh... I dont usually share my hcs, so have this rare moment of me doing so ig??.. Kinda nervous since I try hard to not stray from canon :'3

(i also think i speak too meanly which is why I use tone indicators and emojis often :) )

[woodbrook-wanderer]

🦆 Lurching To Spring : A Post-A Day to Rite Of Spring 🦆 [12-21/30]

BENEATH THE TREES WHERE NOBODY SEES THROUGH QUEER LENSES: A special dissection of color in Woodbrook

Happy Pride Month, everyone. To celebrate the last day of June, today would be a perfect day to talk about BTTWNS' queercoding of its characters and world. As much as it bothers me how shallow the explainations on BTTWNS' worldbuilding can be canonically, I do not believe that they were written to be harmful, deceptive, or to mislead queer readers from its text. The busy town of Woodbrook and Samantha Strong are meant to be read as a mature storybook or bedtime story, yet many readers and I have an itch to explore more than meets the eye.

HORVATH'S THOUGHTS ON SAM & GENDER/SEXUALITY

In the Instagram May 1st BTTWNS AMA, Horvath was asked about if Sam's gender (masculine) presentation was a conscious decision for the story. He was also informed about the headcanon of her being a Butch Lesbian. The question and headcanon was denied credibility with the following statements:

PH: "So when I was putting Samantha together I definitely wanted her to be female. [...] I don't know, I just didn't want to see another male serial killer and that's not interesting to me."

PH: "Also, she's definitely masculine presenting and I feel like ultimately I don't think she's attracted....I don't think she's a lesbian. In the traditional sense of being into other females. [...] I don't think she's attracted to other beings. I think she's attracted to like...killing."

PH: "...That's how her brain works. She has no...she has no emotional connection to anyone. And that's just not the way she works."

PH: "So in terms of being masculine presenting it felt like, my main way I thought about it was her drab is very utilitarian. And so a lot of male clothing has a ton of pockets, it's very comfortable, that was a lot of the thinking I had behind it."

So to summarize: she was always planned to be a woman, she wears masculine clothes because they're utilitarian, and again, Sam would not fit under any sexuality because she doesn't have the emotional capacity to connect or love others. I am disappointed with these answers and although I did expect that Sam was highly likely NOT lesbian, the reasoning behind her masculine presentation is missing a lot of the depth the text presents us with. Even if it is not canon, I and others still believe or headcanon Sam as being lesbian or aroace because of the context clues one could weave together to come to such a conclusion.

Sam & the concept of love revisited:

Now for a sentimental question… Did Lola truly mean nothing to Sam or is she just lying to both herself and to us the audience? Is Sam truly a reliable narrator, because most serial killers tend not to be?

Horvath: It’s fair to say that she’s definitely not a reliable narrator. She may think she’s relating what she considers to be an objective view point, but it’s very much problematic. And yeah, when it comes to Lola and all the rest, I don’t think Sam has any capacity for emotional connection. She’s just not wired for it. She understands it intellectually, but she’ll never know what that means. I think for Sam, her relationship to Lola (and some select few other folks in Woodbrook) was completely for its social appearance and benefit. The key to Sam being able to hide in plain sight is for everyone to think they know her (which was something that I obviously dove into in a broader sense with other characters throughout the issues). It felt like she’d do just about anything to paint the picture that she was one of the upstanding pillars of the community that they all assume her to be.

This is the answer you will encounter every time Horvath is asked whether Sam would find an exception or even feel love at all. It's stated in multiple interviews, in the AMA, and you are supposed to accept this as it's presented in the text itself. However! It's also important to remember that Sam is confirmed to have ASPD. When it comes to defining love, empathy, or feelings in relation to a person who has this PD, it is unfortunately very easy to simply chop it up to "oh, they don't feel such a thing, they're manipulators." because of the behaviors the person may display and because of representation such as this. Again, let's remember that Sam is written as such to avoid making her too sympathetic or giving her too much grace as a serial killer- and while it is hard to strike a balance between clearly condemning their actions but giving them some humanity, Patrick Horvath's writing is enough to make her sympathetic enough while leaving open all her wounds. Even so this black and white simplification of her feelings towards love is incorrect when examined in the text.

Sam does value the people in her life. She finds comfort in seeing them be a part of her routine, appreciates their efforts to include her into their families, and in return, she gives back the best she could. A small bit of altruism and understanding the sentimentality behind what they value even if they don't strike as important to her.

This might also be read as Sam easily replacing the lost characters in her set (ex. Charlie), but it's always striked me as sweet how she considers hiring Lewis instead of another young adult or person in Woodbrook to be her assistant. Of course she probably didn't immediately suggest it but still, even if she does not love the way neurotypical people see it- or how Woodbrook, a fairly conservative town in the 1980s-90s, defines love. She's still doing things in her best interest but weaves her friends' needs into her own plans.

Then AGAIN, this is Sam we're talking about. The pagan lady who talks to bears and sees herself as a wild bear. A wild animal. A snake cannot feel love emotionally but will remember the feeling of safety with a handler. Sam knows what love is intellectually and feels love when Lola was still around. Love to her is about belonging: belonging to, belonging with, and owning. The problem is that she can't differentiate- but how can you do that when on top of not getting the adequate help for your mental illnesses, being beleaguered in town, and not having a choice in your own family. Sam has been forced to be Woodbrook's definition of Good, and all that's to say is that Sam knows what love is. It's a force. A wild, wild storm and a push.

Where does she belong?

Sexuality Dissection: AroAce!Sam

I can see why this is the immediate conclusion one can come to after reading the interview excerpts, skimming through the issues, and paying attention to the end of the Curare scene. Sam isn't at all interested in having a family or seeking romantic relationships with anybody in town. She also quickly turns down Otto's advances during their camping trip in '62. Woodbrook folk do see this as odd (Lola questions this in the goggles scene wondering if Sam would be fine without any of the traditional trimmings of womanhood)- but as we see, she's very much well and happy on her own! The discussion on Sam and love above still applies platonically.

Sexuality Discussion: Lesbian!Sam

This headcanon has a lot of layers to unravel to justify, but as a lesbian, I feel that Sam is one because it feels right- because it aligns with a lot of what she desires and because it is a reinforcement of her identity as a boar. Sam isn't explicitly shown to have any sexual or romantic attraction to women but she has this fixation on feminine women in particular. She studies them, toys with them, and speaks either damningly and glowingly of them. The first woman we can connect her lesbianism to is Lola. The kind of language she assigns to her friend- almost denying such affection she openly gives her while also enjoying feeling belonged with Lola as seen in the dinner scene sounds almost like a self depricating jab to Lola for accepting her as she is, warts and all.

The disease running through her brain is slowly withering her body away. My only friend.

Sam has this pattern of speaking of feminine women in a flowery but also scolding dialect for having the capacity to love so openly and love so freely the way she can't be nuturing and gentle as Woodbrook expects of her womanhood. This is why women like Melody seem to dance in her thoughts as a figure she doesn't want to be, but also just out of fascination for how long they can hold out being good without needing to satisfy a hunger...maybe she wishes she could also be as good, but for all she knows, she's fascinated by feminine women amd their ability to love unlike her.

So it comes as a shock when Melody Davis is a potential suspect.

Can you spot the monster? Could be your friend. Could be your neighbor. Could be the butcher...whose dead husband may not actually be buried in the ground. Who's to say?

But with a feminine woman like Cherry, who as we've discussed is Sam if Sam decided to be Woodbrook's definition of Good, Sam still holds fascination in pushing her buttons and spreading her thin. Like a lion toying with his food, she enjoys seeing women she can hold some power over even if they might be at similar wave lengths in intensity struggle to comprehend that it's like a game to her. But feminine women are all the same to her, she likes the idea that she could do more and be more being a boar whereas presenting like a sow like the rest of them places an extra weight of pressure- the need to be good twice the boulder than she remembers carrying.

Then comes the motif of lavender flowers. We can connect their presence in the story as what it's commonly known for- relaxation and soothing. Woodbrook is an idyll of peace and serenity so the flower is a perfect symbol for the town. But did you know lavenders are also symbols of lesbian love? Lavenders are also a symbol for lesbians who are excluded from the feminist movement in the 1970s. The term lavender menace was used by Betty Friedan calling lesbians a threat to the feminist movement.

Sam's lesbianism is also connected to her gender presentation as a butch/hypermasculine woman. This would also make her a father figure in Nigel's life, and contributed to his dependence on her and Lola to coddle him like a true family.

Then, we have the hints and nudges of Sam and Monica developing a friendship or a relationship in Rite Of Spring which according to this blurb suggests pent up emotional tension. It also plays along with the butch-femme dynamic Sam fixates on!

Sam being masc DOES matter to BTTWNS' narrative:

I discussed in the past how Sam's gender and presentation does matter to the narrative. Had she been a man, it would be quite hard to imagine why Nigel would've challenged him because he is a true boar. Yet where we are, Sam takes up being a boar as part of her identity but not completely all of it. She knows and reaps the benefits of her womanhood but feels more comfortable being masculine. Sam takes inspiration from nature to dictate her routine, her actions, her behavior, and the reassurance that she is just as powerful or as worthy as they are. She may just see men's clothing as utilitarian and more comfortable than women's wear, but having that desire to look masculine and to sport the same haircut as her grandfather shows us that the intent had always stuck at the back of her mind before killing Otto and taking his clothes. But even as a masc, she is still very distinctly feminine. On my discussion on Sam's gender, people had pointed out that her methods are neat and clean, focusing more on a "reverse building" or "packing away" method of killing her prey.

Unlike wild boars who assert their dominance by popping their jaws, marking their scent with urine or feces or blood, Sam adapts the strength and the confidence of a dominant male, but keeps herself and her tracks clean. Spraying crap everywhere to assert dominance sounds more like a Nigel thing to me than anything.

Sam as a transgender allegory:

If anything, I hope this thread at least establishes that Sam desires one thing- control. Control over how folk feel about her, control over feminine women she's interested in, control over the story, but especially her own presentation. Gender and sexuality talk aside, Sam is desperate to be seen as a person who could juggle and hold her life neatly together. She was expected to give up her other ambitions for the shop and never really given any choice to want for anything more. Then again, she'll do anything to be that pillar of good when she has no other choice to be anything else.

But Sam isn't good. This isn't how she feels or wants to feel. She knows within her the need to control something and everything in her life is still so strong that it extends into controlling the body. Modifying it. Taking it apart to observe and switch around. All the pieces seemed to click, but not in her. Not yet.

So she searches and wanders, dissecting and puzzling, bodies are like a collage until they become a mannequin for her to copy and style. Still, they are buried inside her. Repressed. Repressed. Repressed.

The thing is, Sam is never honest even with herself but the sound of a distant circus has faded from the lietmotif. It's silent and acoustic as she thinks of herself if this rearranging is good for her or if it is wake up call to abandon her ambitions playing god.

But this is her. She can't explain it somehow but this body, and the nature within it that emerges, well..

It's always been inside of her.

BTTWNS is as queer as it gets, and I'm grateful to have a comic to dissect so thoroughly like this. Happy Pride, Woodbrook.

[velvetvexations]

as a (now transmasc) person who was unwillingly dragged into ace discourse when I was 16 and considering myself aroace (still aro, just kinda-sorta dropped the ace)... when I started seeing people shitting on transmascs in the latest run of transandrophobia, I literally thought to myself "wow, this feels just like ace discourse."

hell, even the binary aspect of it is the same. ace or not ace, trans man or not trans man (or, trans man and trans woman). there's no in-betweenness and zero room for anyone else. like, the vast majority of people -- myself included -- call it ace discourse for ease... but the aromantic hatred was visceral, too. the erasure of aros, the declaration that the SAM was total bullshit, the accusations that alloaros are actually just heartless, manipulative predators... etc. I honestly blocked out the majority of it because it was so bad and I was going thru other major traumas at the time.

but now I see it as a transmasc: the assumption that every transmasc was read as a fully cis perisex (and usually assumed to be white and thin) girl who presented as gender-conforming or, if tomboyish, had accepting family, friends, etc.

and I've noticed that when I talk about my own experiences (especially as someone who recently found out they're intersex with elevated T even on progesterone BC), especially when I talk about how I was treated as a freak of nature, as a near-untouchable by most people except those who fetishized me and/or wanted to hurt me, and how my masculinity was demonized instead of rewarded, and how I've experienced transmisogyny despite being AFAB... I can TELL that it makes people uncomfortable and forces them to confront their lines of thinking.

idk! my thoughts and maybe a bit of trauma dumping (sorry) along with my perspective. I saw another anon talk about how Southern queers tend to be more understanding of transandrophobia as a concept and why it happens, and I don't think it's coincidence that I'm /also/ a Southern queer.

I appreciate you sharing, anon. <3 Love you.

[aroaceenjolras]

My issue is that the split attraction model is just a complete fucking hassle to me and I would like to not have to deal with it any more than absolutely necessary but also... For someone like me, who prioritizes speaking clearly and being understood well, it kind of... is? Necessary? Like, I understand that non-SAM aces and non-SAM aros exist, and they don't owe anyone details about the """""other half'''"" of their attraction, if such a thing even exists as a concept in their minds, but the rules are different for me. Because I can't choose which side to prioritize over the other, and because they both stem from the same source— a fundamental lack of, and disconnect from, hegemonic ideals of what intimacy entails and consists of.

I wish there was just one word that covered that and was easily understood, and that wasn't "aroace," because that still just treats my aromanticism and asexuality as two separate things mashed together rather than as one whole thing that is specifically rooted in the fact that I'm fundamentally not designed for a ~normal~ relationship.

I don't want to just call myself ace and have people assume romance is on the table, or just call myself aro and have people assume sex is on the table. In reality, not only are those things not on the table, but there is no table, I just cut a chunk out of the wall of my house and put it on the floor for you so you'd have a convenient place to eat lunch.

So much of my identity is rooted in having an utterly alien thought process compared to most people and every second I have to water my identity down to adapt to the community's norms feels like someone's pushing my head underwater.

[the-writing-avocado]

So it’s pride, and that means it’s probably a good time to post this. I’ve been sitting on the concept for a while now of re-writing Sam Smith’s ‘Stay With Me’ but as a platonic song because there isn’t enough romanticisation of friendships for an aroace overly emotional menace such as myself to latch onto. That and I’ve been coming to terms with the fact that whilst I’ve accepted I probably won’t ever fall in love, all my friends, my most beloved people, will one day all have another specific person that they’ll prioritise more than me. Anyway, without more moping, voila:

You know it’s true

I never could try to fall in love

But i can’t stay all alone

Because i’m just human

And This friendship hasn’t gone to plan

No, I don't want you to leave

Will you hold my hand?

Oh won’t stay with me

Your friend is all I’ll be

This ain’t love, i hope you see

Oh my friend, won’t you stay with me

Oh, why am I so emotional?

No it’s not a good look

Gain some self control

I’m afraid they think it’s love anyway

No one understands

And it hurts to explain

But won’t stay with me

Your friend is all I can be

This ain’t love, i hope you see

Oh my friend, won’t you stay with me

And if you can’t It okay,

We’ll walk different paths

I won’t steal you away from the life you’ve dreamt

I accepted that long before i asked

But if there’s somehow still a chance…

Won’t stay with me

Your friend is all I would be

This ain’t love, i hope you see

Oh my friend, won’t you stay with me

Stay with me

If you could be happy

And if you can’t, i hope you see

My friend you’ll always be.

[krislgfox]

So, here's quick concepts of Sam, Jade and User from my Farm au! :_]

Some facts about Jade and User(since I already made info about Sam) under below↓

Jade:

-In this au she's mechanic

-She's 30 years old

-As it's already written she's 6'2ft tall(188cm)

-She's lesbian and ace

-Usually she's the one who's very busy right when something special happens

-Knitting is her hobby

User:

-They're decided to live with this gang bcz yes

-The text on the head is able to change to other texts, like "bruh", "ouch", "hehe", "damn" and ect

-The "hair clips" can change its color to Users fav color(I just use my fav color, okie?)

-Can't really hold anything with their "hands"

-As it's already written, they're 5'11ft tall(179cm)

-They're sizeshifter

-They're nonbinary and aroace

-Is it shorts or skirt?

-No shoes only socks

[remidyal]

Game Changer Season 6 episodes, ranked by my personal enjoyment

Because I also enjoy arbitrarily ranking things! If you disagree... I mean, that's fine? I liked every episode this season, just.. I liked some episodes better than others. I'm grouping the Ratfish episodes together, so we've got eight entries. Spoilers for, um, every game changer episode this season, obviously.

#8 Pencils Down:

I'm not as into drawings and all as I am a lot of the other stuff, though this was probably the most wholesome episode of this season. I'm, naturally, opposed to wholesomeness too.

Favorite bit:

The proposed tattoos were a lot of fun.

#7 Ratfish (parts 1 and 2):

I think this one got hurt for me by a couple things - I know absolutely nothing about the show they're mimicking, unlike Survivor or the Bachelor, and I did not particularly enjoy anything directly to do with the Ratfish or understand why I should care about his opinions and arbitrary decisions. I assumed that the cast would recognize who this person was and we'd get some kind of payoff there, but nope. Everything just between the cast was great, though.

Favorite bit:

Honestly there's a ton of quick moments to choose from here, but I think my favorite is Brennan incorrectly going for the seat marked Brennan Lee Mulligan at the end.

#6 The Newlyweb Game:

This one was gentle good fun, I enjoyed everyone involved, there were just more standout moments in some of the later episodes on this list. This is fighting with Pencils Down for the most wholesome episode, or at least the one that would least fit into a saw trap. In spite of that this would be the episode all time of Game Changer I would least be willing to be on, even in the world where I'm not firmly aroace and have a partner - I think I would sooner light myself on fire than let someone I know have full access to my phone.

Favorite bit:

Revealing how many unread emails people had and the shock and judgement at totally reasonable numbers, as someone with around forty thousand unread emails in my primary gmail account dating back to 2004.

#5 Bingo

We're really into tough competition now! I loved this episode, and that it somehow turned into a tormenting Brennan episode even though he wasn't even supposed to be there. This was obviously slightly rigged so that the players in the third set of Bingo were most likely to win (and it was actually impossible for the people on stage) but honestly pulling it off was so good.

Favorite Bit:

I mean, it's the reveal to Trapp and everyone of the existence of the third group of course.

#4 Second Place

First, I know that for meta reasons this should be second, but it's not. Oh well. Sam alleges that this episode wasn't intentionally meant to torment Brennan; I do not believe Sam's lies. Everyone in the world saw the twist at the end coming and it's still funny.

Favorite bit:

Ally declaring that Brennan can ring the gong the loudest and Brennan's brain breaking harder than anything that Sam had actually planned.

#3 Sam Says 3

I can't believe this one's only third. If this is how Sam Says ends - and I have a hard time seeing how a fourth edition can escalate, even outside of the BTS claiming that they see three times as the limit for the same premise most of the time - then what an ending. I'm not sure any other game concept has managed to make the players so consistently tricked. My only critique of it is that I think I like the first couple times at this well just a little bit more, with nothing in this quite matching Ally flying to New York or the Something We'll Have To Bleep energy for me.

Favorite Bit:

It's hard to top the fake Sam body dropping from the ceiling.

#2 Beat the Buzzer

Every episode with the Seven cast is always incredible, and production-wise this seems like the craziest thing they've ever pulled off. Any episode where they break out of just the stage is always good, and I think this is the most extensive use of that they've ever done. Incredible variety, great cameos from Aabria and Persephone, complete manic energy from all three contestants. A+ episode.

Favorite Bit:

There's so much here, but I think mine as someone who worked as a pizza delivery driver was the entire exchange where Rehka just ends up getting the bag with the buzzer and a bunch of loose oreos. Was production prepared with everything that was on that menu or would they have actually ordered breadsticks somewhere to use as a prop?

#1 Deja Vu

Time loop stuff is always a favorite of mine, and pulling one off as an episode is ALREADY a great premise before you even get into all of the other cast and the editing. (Shout out to Siobhan Thompson for being in exactly two Game Changer episodes and them being this one and Escape the Green Room; guess we know what pepper rating she puts down.) Great chemistry between the cast, a truly deranged display from Sam, and of course the Wenis. Genuinely the WEIRDEST episode of the season, too, always a good sign.

It's a shame they already repeated the premise too much to do a follow up to this one...

Favorite Bit(s):

I'm doing two for this one because it's my list and I can.

"This isn't fucking Um, Actually!" with sincere righteous anger.

Everything to do with Zac as Grant, most of all how easy it would have been to just make that Zac as Zac.

[normystical]

ok starting from scratch bc this is an entirely different concept. like the only thing it has in common is being a harem anime trope thingie. maybe could have the mc be a non sam aro, or perhaps aroallo, or aroace, idk hard to decide. but regardless maybe he sleeps with one of the girls that likes him but it doesnt go any further than that. maybe could get into how he may be guilted for that.

also could have like,, maybe if its the reasonable girl thats disabled and/or intersex that he sleeps with,, explore how she doesnt want to be fetishized, but also wants to be wanted sexually, and doesnt REQUIRE being wanted romantically. like, exploring how purely sexual attraction IS NOT the same as fetishizing someone yk? because in the hands of most other ppl, the lesson would unfortunately be to be romantically in love with the person of minority status that you sleep with :/

[chaifootsteps]

All this hate on Charlastor fans ALMOST makes me petty-ship it.

I say almost and I won't because I have Rosie and Alastor as LG solidarity besties. And that's because when the pilot rolled out, I thought Alastor was gay based on his words to Angel "And what can you do, my effeminate fella?", then I saw a comment saying he's gay and ran with it not looking back twice (I wasn't in the fandom all these years, I unfortunately disliked the pilot thinking Angel was a walking stereotype and the RACISM, the SEXISM, too much for me even if I loved the concept of HH.)

Tbh, did Viv ever say Alastor was gay at any point? Then perhaps changed it to aroace??? Idk, I remember this very vaguely and it's not like it wouldn't be in character for her to say shit so she escapes criticism/is able to dunk on people via "well, atchually-"

I don't think she did, but I remember the SH crew -- including Sam Miller -- was joking about it him being gay when the first images from the series dropped.

[shrinkthisviolet]

1, 11, 12, 20, and 21 for the fanfic ask game please!

1: How many fics have you worked on since January?

Oooh well by my count:

This year, 25-ish prompt fills + 13 other fics = 38 posted fics (roughly speaking. I'm counting the Tumblr-exclusive ones too, so I might be off by 1 or 2 😅)

And regarding WIPs…well ofc the Morgan AU, the Lucy AU, the CK time travel AU (specifically the interlude fic - thank you s6 for reigniting my muse), the Saviris/Westallen s3 fix-it (which I meant to mention in a previous ask game 😅 my bad for forgetting). I've also sorta made headway in the aroace Morgan fic, but…not much, I've been putting that off until after the 1x15/1x16 fic. So that adds up to…4-5 WIPs

(And also a Savitar/Mirror Iris fic that is starting to emerge from conception and become a proper WIP, but I haven't started writing that yet 😅 and my other WIPs are, ofc, backburner WIPs)

In total, that's about 42-43 fics! Though I might start taking prompts again soon, so that number might jump up. Depending on if I take prompts before 2024 ends or not

11: What fic was the most difficult to write?

Definitely i love you (i’m sorry). Admittedly it might be because I spent so long on writing out that specific chunk of time (1x11 to 1x14) that I was getting a little burned out on it 😅 hence why it took so long to finish. But I'm glad I wrote it

12: What fic was the easiest to write?

Oooh definitely i would take the suffering (from you). The prequel to it took a little bit of time to get just right, but this fic flowed sooo so perfectly 💞 honestly that just proves to me that I need to write more Savisco, I clearly love them

20: Share your funniest line

Tory shrugged. “No sweat. Like I said, it can’t be easy watching your teenage dad date your friend.” “Oh God, don’t say it like that.” Sam shuddered. “It sounds wrong.”

~CK AU interlude

Time travel makes for some hilarious explanations, doesn't it 😂 this is, ofc, them talking about Daniel and Ali. You can't tell me Sam wouldn't feel kinda weird about it, so the girls talk a little about that

21: What's something that surprised you while you were working on a fic? Did it change the story?

Yep! I've talked at length about how I didn't intend to make Morgan & Iris close friends so early on, and Barry & Morgan friends so early on—Morgan & Iris being coworkers (and acquaintances, as originally intended) was supposed to be a means to an end to get Morgan in the loop about Barry being awake, and lead to Morgan vs Eowells tension (which Eowells temporarily dispels by pulling rank on her. Yk, like the good dad he is! 🫠). And yet…I love Iris, so obviously that bled into me writing her and Morgan as friends, and that just kept developing and I decided to let it happen. So they became besties! It made for a great way to fix my most hated plotline of s1: Iris being locked out of the loop until 1x20, and let in in the most ridiculous way (I say this as someone who loves Westallen soulmatism…that lightning touch was a cop-out way to reveal the secret to Iris). I love them to bits 🥰

And ofc…I never intended to fall in love with Barry & Morgan as much as I did! They were gonna be friends/teammates, discover siblinghood later…but I couldn't help myself. So they're siblings now 😅 the awkwardness later will remain, but it'll be about "oh my god, new stepparent" rather than "oh my god, new step sibling"

2024 in review ask game!

[ryanyflags]

hi!! i really don’t know who to ask but it seems like you have a lot of knowledge about this stuff, is there a term for someone who’s romantic and sexual attraction are entertwined? like one type cannot exist without the other / someone isn’t able to separate the concepts? i can’t really tell if that’s aro/acespec or if it’s just demi, any help would be appreciated lol

This vaguely reminds me of ansequencerose, but the opposite. So sequencerose / sequenceromanticsexual?

The wording could be a bit confusion, because follow the original terms' wording, it would be:

only experiencing romantic attraction after sexual attraction is felt, and only experiencing sexual attraction after romantic attraction is felt.

It's a bit weird because it's circular in it's existence. But it could be read as they both have to exist to exist at all, one can't exist without the other.

Though I'm not sure that covers the covers the "isn't able to separate the concepts" part. Which reminds me of non sam (non split attraction model), and ay (non sam aroace(spec)). One meaning of non sam could be experiencing all your attraction one, so not separating them into different attractions / concepts. So maybe you could call it non sam rose (or non sam romanticsexual).

For non sam, it's a label you can add on to anything. You mentioned demi, so you could just do that. And since ay is aroaspec-spec, you could also just use ay.

I feel like there's got to be a specific label for this, but I can't think of one. That part of a-spec terms isn't really my focus. Anyone else want to add on?

[snurgle07]

What's some of your favorite rarepairs from some of your favorite fandoms?

Ooh that’s a fun one! I'm definitely a big multishipper, and it doesn't take much for me to enjoy a rarepair. Sooo I'm gonna stick to the two major fandoms that have given me brainrot and only name a few because I can ramble for sure haha. I can elaborate more if prompted tho :>

For Mob Psycho 100

QPR Ritshou: Ritshou is by no means a rare pair within the fandom (there is a lot of content!) but I have a very specific vision of them in a queer platonic bond specifically. I like viewing them as more alterous than romantic, mainly because I am attached to the aroace Ritsu headcanon and I love to project. I’d absolutely love to explore this concept in art or fic one of these days because it's very complex in my head! I’d say that brand of Ritshou content might be too self-indulgent for others to care, but I've surprisingly seen some QPR content for these two already!

Tokugawa/Kamuro, Takenaka/Inukawa, and Matsumine (looking at you theo!) also appeal to me (separate from each other ofc)! I like the opposites vibe of the last two and I wish there were more content for all of them. (Though I completely understand why these are rarepairs at the same time haha). In my head, their dynamics all involve quiet/serious guys who secretly enjoy the company of the other a lot, and I think that's cute.

For Psychonauts

Frazie/Sam: I know people tend to hop on the Frazie/Norma train, which is definitely a fun pairing, but I’ve fallen for the idea of Frazie with Sam instead. The comedy potential of Raz finding out his big sister is dating Dogen’s big sister is golden to me. I think they'd get along well! They're both weird woodsy girls who shift between nice and intimidating. I want to draw these two together eventually!

QPR Clem/Crystal: I have an aged-up Psychonauts 'AU' of sorts in my head. These two would live together, and generally be very touchy-feely in terms of affection, but not romantically be a thing. It's a very sweet concept to me! They'd be inspired by Cassie and Compton's relationship while interning at the Motherlobe, and they mostly act as feeble supports to each other's severely low self-esteem! Fun. On a similar note, I think Crystal and Phoebe would be cute romantically.

Maloof and Elka for that matter! I think Nils and Elka would be on and off for a long time, and she'd eventually fall for Maloof's cutesy mafia boss schtick. They'd have a sorta opposites dynamic that'd be cute I think!

And yea! Those are what came to mind! Thanks for the ask! :D

[noa-ciharu]

I'm grateful for having tumblr aroace community when I was 18-21 and grasping the concept of aromanticism/asexuality but as I grow older I feel more and more out of touch with tumblr's aroace circles. I guess that's the result of me growing older and cultural differences. Cuz to me a lot of debates going on there come down to theory vs practice (in my case in very queer-friendly country :>): how you perceive yourself and your relationships vs how 99% of society will perceive it and how much do you let it get to you over time. Because you can only go as far with society that won't even acept people wanting to stay single isn't some mental illness, try explaning qprs or SAM to them

[never-wake-up]

I’ve been wondering about that too, it really does seem like aromanticism gets a lot less attention in research than asexuality.

Maybe romantic attraction is just harder to define than sexual attraction, since there’s no clear “physical response” marker, and it overlaps so much with things like friendship, care, or social bonding.

Maybe researchers (and society) are more drawn to studying sex than romance in general. I could be wrong though.

Maybe people also conflate aromanticism with just “not being in a relationship right now,” or assume it’s trauma-related, so it gets dismissed before it’s ever seriously considered.

I have more thoughts, but that’s the gist of it.

Just sharing in case it helps, thanks for bringing this up 🌸

I think you're right about aromanticism being perceived as temporary/being single/trauma/mental illness and that hindering research. Then again it was the same thing with asexuality so with time as aromanticism becomes more well-known it'll be more of a subject of interest. And love is indeed a very vague word and concept (more so in English than in French I feel but that might just be subjective)

I also think that it might have to do with the fact that a lot of non-queer or even allo queer people only see aromanticism as a subset of asexuality. One thing is noticed and found glaringly obvious is that all (free) articles on the SAM only look into alloaces and aroaces, not alloaros which is kind of appalling to me? I mean it's a pretty empirical gap; it's like studying a book but only focusing on the text found on the left page, of course you're not gonna get the full picture. When you haven't thought much about this, it's easy to conflate sexual and romantic orientation (and that's not even touching on alterous attraction) and if they have no reason to reflect upon it, researchers are likely to just assume they always are the same way (i mean personally i didn't know they could differ from one another before discovering the anatractional spectrum and it didn't occur to me that you could be aro until I heard about it, and I'm probably not the only one). Maybe there's a perception that asexuality and aromanticism are basically the same thing reversed and so there's no need to study that ? They're similar but different experiences but on paper they're virtually identical. That's just an hypothesis thrown at the wall, don't take it too seriously.

Queer studies are intrisically linked to gender studies, so there are also several studies about what asexuality can reveal about feminism and stuff like that. I notably found several radfem or radfem-leaning articles about how asexual women are fighting against patriarchy by not having sex, but i admittedly only skimmed them and i wasn't sure whether or not they talked about asexuality as in "the orientation/identity" or asexuality as in "the fact of not having sex" like it is discussed in disability studies for example.* Similarly I feel like a relatively high field of asexual research is focusing on what asexuality can bring to other field of studies (sociological, feminism, disability, literary...) or what it can bring on studies on other allo orientations rather than on asexuality itself. It might have been sampling bias in my research but I do find it interesting how often it's studied for what it could bring rather than what it is.

*I also think this ambiguity (and research on asexual plants and the like) plays a role in the relative quickness in which asexuality research seemingly took off after that (and also Brotto and Yule who are seemingly on all fronts of asexual research they wrote SO MANY articles both on their own and together i'm in awe)

I also noticed a pattern of asexuality papers being mostly literature reviews and not bringing much new information and a redundancy of topics (namely HSDD, masturbation, but also surprisingly the relatively high rates of suicidal ideation and self-harm in the ace community) so they have a lot of papers but they're comparatively on less interesting aspects of the orientation imo (shout-out to that one paper about finger length and asexuality because that was definitely a pressing issue everyone was wondering about lmao)

To be fair, the academic interest on asexuality is relatively recent (Anthony Bogaert's 2004 paper seems to be recognized as the first on asexuality as we know it) even if the label has been around for a long time (I'm separating HSDD research from asexuality research because they've been recognised to be two different things since then but research about HSDD dates back longer). In comparison, aromanticism as a label was coined in 2005 on AVEN (and added to the dictionnary in 2018 which is neat and seems like a rather small gap to me but i don't know much about that) so we're early on that front :D

Don't hesitate to tell me more of your thoughts I find it really interesting <2