#alloromantic person: well I want to do it so you guys are in the wrong for making me feel bad

[styrofauxm]

Yeah you support aro people but do you listen to aro people when we tell you something you like doing hurts us?

[thoughtfullyrainynightmare]

Hi! ^^ I got curious by you mentioning about your views on romance through childhood to adulthood. No need to answer these questions since they can be a bit personal, but I thought you might want to talk more about them.

I'm curious about what your idea of love is nowadays? I remember you said you identified as demisexual, do you think that also affected your early life views? Or does the demi part only affect sexual attraction for you, and romantic side is still alloromantic (so not demiromantic)? My apologies if I remember wrong ^^

Hiya! I don't think I mind particularly much talking about it

I haven't thought about my orientation while growing up, but I was able to notice that I felt attraction differently from some of my friends. I distinctly remember one moment in high school when a friend of mine looked at a guy pull up with his motorcycle, and she went "ooh that's a hot guy", and I went "I like his bike". So I figured that I just don't feel sexual attraction in a same way as (at least) that one friend did. But also I did realize quite early that a picture of a hot guy (or a gal for that matter) did nothing to me.

In terms of romance... I suppose I haven't been drawn romantically to that many people either. Like I can count them with the fingers of one hand. And all of them have had qualities that admired in them. But then again with my fiance it just kinda clicked. I had known him for a few years but then year we started dating, things moved along very fast, because it just felt right. It wasn't a rational decision in that sense by any means. It was just based on emotion.

I think that the idea of finding a partner has always appealed to me, which is why even as a toddler there was such a component in my games. But I didn't play "house" because that was boring. They were more like... action but with a partner. Think of the movie "Mummy"

So, I was somewhat career oriented as a child, and even more so in my teens. Which... was probably influenced by my mother, because she was ... more about career than family, while my father was more of a family and friends oriented person.

In my teens, I didn't believe in love to say the least.

But in my adulthood, after, y'know, finding my fiance and falling in love with him, I did grow to believe in it. Actually, I think that was the first time, for myself, when I realized that what the feeling of love is. At least for me. I always thought that it should be something more, but not really... what more. If that makes sense.

So... what is love, to me, these days? I think it's... a lot of things. Because there are many different types of love too, and since I consider myself as an ambivert, I'm also not very energetic in terms of showing affection all the time. But I do want to do things to them, listen to them and spend time with them. I would say that a lot of my platonic (and some of my romantic) love is about wanting to give the people I care for things, time and effort. And it's about wanting to do those things, not feeling like I need to. But a big part of it is trusting that I will get something in return as well. That it's not all one-sided. If that makes sense. Because to me, love, like real love is about being in a dynamic, give-and-take type of a relationship (in its broader meaning). You might scratch your friends' back, and they'll scratch yours. Maybe at a different time and in a different way, but they do

So... I guess I'm a demi in both sexual and romantic sense?

It doesn't mean a whole lot to me though. I just go with the flow ^^' The labels are there for the simplicity's sake

[elytrafemme]

31, 34, 36 :}

31) Do any system members have a different gender or sexuality? How do you guys handle this?

oh Boy, don't we.

so, yes, every single person has a unique gender identity and sexuality. to give a very brief rundown (with some detail lacking): i'm genderfluid & an arospec ace lesbian, dahlia is cis girl and aro bi, klav is queer in very way but sometimes IDs w bisexual, nightshade is gender apathetic and mspec, rory is cis guy and gay, cynthia is demi girl and something .

i could talk about this for a while, but this kind of thing actually crops up a lot of different issues or interesting phenomena. for one, gender dysphoria is shit when certain alters from -- rory gets horrible dysphoria and dysmorphia, klavier does as well, the others are more dysmorphia than dysphoria though. secondly our body has lived a very complicated life in terms of relationships and romantic/sexual attraction and having people be allosexual or alloromantic is kind of a mindfuck for us (looking at you klavier -_-)

the most interesting thing actually pertains to klavier, which is that the two of us have very closely linked experiences when it comes to attraction, and i'm a lesbian and he's a queer guy sort of creature that has a heavier preference towards men as a whole. meaning that i actually 'resonate' or 'feel like' a gay guy pretty often and he 'feels like' a lesbian pretty often because those experiences have overlap. it's really strange but a true bestie moment.

34) Do you see your system more as family, more as friends, more as roommates, or anything else?

there is no term better than systemmates, honestly. i've tried but it's pretty hard to figure it out because everyone has different relationships with one another.

some examples: klavier has in the past considered the system his family. he, dahlia, and i have called ourselves best friends, but i would not individually refer to dahlia as my best friend and vise versa. me and nightshade have a very non personal relationship and are the most distant of everyone in the system. rory and i could be considered to have a somewhat familial bond. cynthia is someone i consider a friend. klavier and dahlia lie somewhere more than friends but have no explicit relationship. etc.

36) Name your favorite quality of all the members you can think of! Including yourself! ;)

YAY YAY YAY OKAY.

me: i always want to improve myself and do better, as a host but also as a person, and have never really lost the desire to become a happy person, which is an extremely admirable quality for the hardship i have been through.

dahlia: despite an angry streak, she is able to keep a cool head when she needs to protect the system -- she holds me accountable for the things i do to wrong her but has never let her temporary annoyance with me get in the way of keeping me safe (same goes for everyone else in the system)

klavier: absolute ray of light, has gone through so much and yet is so endlessly kind, always lets himself feel things no matter how difficult it may be.

rory: knows his own boundaries but also supports other people as long as he physically can, will front to help me out but will not front long enough to experience the mental anguish he gets from prolonged times in the body, very trustworthy in that sense.

nightshade: has found a lot of joy for themself and has been able to strike the balance between work and relaxation.

cynthia: i know very little about them but they have nice music taste!

[asking-jude]

Hello Jude!

I’m starting with the premise that I’m a pretty closed off person and that I have never, in all my 19 years of life, had a crush or a romantic attraction to anyone. I recently started to experiment “going out” with a guy like 4 months ago and had my first kiss. Eventually he started to catch feelings (I didn’t) and even if I wanted do more with him I had to stop this thing because I felt like using him since I didn’t like him in that way. Then I downloaded Tinder to find other queer women (I’m bi) since I live in a small town and it’s difficult to find them here. I eventually ended up going out with three girls, but one of them didn’t inspire me much so I currently am texting with the other two. I went out two times with one of them and yesterday it was the third time. When I met her up at the station she was with a guy. I immediately understood he wasn’t a friend. The situation got embarrassing since me and the guy started staring at each other until she quickly hugged him and he took the train to go home. I asked her who was him and she started telling me things that were obv red flags about him (she didn’t seem aware of that). Now, I too am hanging out with another person (the other girl) so it’s not that I’m jealous…but the thing is that I had started to feel, even if little, something for her. But when she told me that she was hanging out with me and that guy, who was a walking red flag , you know what I’m saying, putting me and him at the same level in her mind made me feel extremely disrespected. Like I understand if she was hanging out with decent people but HIM…come on now. So my little feelings for her immediately dropped. The date went well we chatted and made out and a bit more in my car but now I see her in a confused way, like a nice person to hang out it and someone to have sex with. No more feeling. Tell me what you think and sorry if this is a bit stupid.

Do you want free mental help? What about remote, pay-what-you-want counselling? Visit askingjude.org.

My first question to you is: do you want to be in a relationship in the first place? The vibes I’m getting from your post seem to indicate no, but I want to be sure. 

You are right that the situation with the girl and her friend was very suspicious; I can completely understand her not wanting to go meet up with someone she met online all by herself, but the way she went about it just seems… off. As I read this, I was expecting you to say she asked you to join them in the bedroom, but I’m glad I was wrong. (That happens too often with bi women, unfortunately). 

When you were talking about the guy, you mentioned red flags. Did you mean that her being with him and talking about him was going to be a roadblock for your potential relationship with her? Or did you mean that the guy had a lot of bad behavior that she was attempting to excuse away? Either way, it’s best to just steer clear of them because they don’t sound like they’ll be a good match for you. Besides, as I mentioned prior, they should be asking if you’re comfortable with joining them and forming a polycule, not springing it on you like that. 

It’s great that you know that you’re bi. Did you know that there’s more to attraction than just the gender of your partner? I am getting some what I call grayscale vibes here from your post; in other words, I am suspecting that you are not alloromantic or possibly even allosexual, and you are instead closer to the demiromantic or demisexual side (or even further towards aromantic or asexual). These words describe the frequency (if at all) and conditions under which you can experience romantic or sexual attraction, respectively. 

To elaborate, someone who is alloromantic is someone who can experience romantic attraction just in general, and may not require particular conditions to be met in order to experience it. Someone who is demiromantic, such as myself, requires a strong emotional bond and much emotional intimacy for romantic feelings to have a chance of developing. Someone who is aromantic experiences little to no romantic attraction at all. 

The same can be said for sexual attraction. It may help to remember that you can exist on different parts of the scale for romantic and sexual attraction. In other words, your criteria for romantic attraction can differ than that of your sexual attraction. 

If you would like to go down these rabbit holes, I have some great places for you to check out: 

The Fandom that is linked above is a treasure-trove of LGBT+ knowledge.

It is also possible that you are feeling the pressure of amatonormativity. This is the idea that romantic relationships are the ideal life goal for people; this is the norm, and everyone should be in one or seeking them out. 

I have an article from the professor who coined the term and an article about why it’s unfair: 

The pressure to be in a relationship might be interfering with your natural processing; it genuinely is harder for you to learn to trust your own judgment when you feel rushed or pressured into something. I am glad you listened to your instincts when they told you to get away from that couple in your post; at best, their communication skills are nowhere near where they need to be. There is also the fact that you are simply young and still figuring yourself out; you are still outgrowing old habits and high school experiences. You may not have had enough chances to meet enough different kinds of people yet, so you might just need to keep broadening your horizons and meet more people. You can find all sorts of cool people to befriend and/or date through classes, clubs, or volunteer work.

I am wondering if, perhaps, a queer-platonic partnership would work better for you. That is a relationship that occupies the liminal space between friendship and romantic partner. It’s great for folks who desire more than friendship without all the social or cultural baggage or expectations of romantic relationships. This article explains it quite nicely: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/bound-together/202109/queerplatonic-relationships-new-term-old-custom 

I really hope this helps make some sense of a confusing situation. Remember that you still have lots of room to grow and learn; I was your age when I started questioning and figuring things out, and it took me till I was maybe 25 to find enough of the right labels for myself. Three years later, I’m still trying to learn more and see if I’ve outgrown any of them yet. 

Feel free to reach out if you have any other questions. 

Socially-distanced hugs,

Angelica Barile

Ask A Question Here

[aro-comics]

Debunking Arophobia (Part 3)

NOTE: This entire series is dedicated to discussing arophobia and it’s harm - in case this isn’t something you want to see, I’m putting each post in this series underneath a read more.

Debunking Arophobia, Part 3/7 - PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE, READ THE LAST PANEL (and this description) BEFORE COMMENTING. Ok I'm figuring you read the last panel by now 😅 I hope it's come off clearly by now that this part is NOT aimed at aro people who are, or wish to be in romantic relationships. Not all aros are romance repulsed, or uncomfortable with doing romantic things and wouldn't necessarily run into the problems I've outlined here. But the thing is, immediately reacting "No, you shouldn't let yourself identify as aromantic and keep looking for a romantic relationship" (as was basically the gist of what my mother said in part 1) is not an appropriate reaction when someone tells you they're aromantic, in part, because YOU DON'T KNOW THEIR COMFORT LEVEL WHEN IT COMES TO ROMANCE. Many aromantic people are NOT okay with the idea of being in a romantic relationship - and there's nothing wrong with that. Nobody tells a straight man "well, you never know. You might be bi, why don't you try dating a man for a bit, even if you might be uncomfortable at first, to see how you like it?". Because encouraging someone to date somebody that they're fundamentally NOT ATTRACTED TO is ... not appropriate. 🤔 And it shouldn't be okay to tell an aromantic person to do the equivalent here.

I also want to mention that, while I've never dated anyone, I have tried to be nice and maintain close bonds with people who I’m almost certain were hitting on me. I hope to god I wasn't "leading them on" (and I don't think it's fair to say someone is doing that when it isn't intentional or they aren't aware), but ... I can tell how hurt and disappointed they looked when they realized I didn't like them that way. That look of pain has haunted me my whole life, and in some ways has luckily kept me from pursuing a relationship that would’ve made me uncomfortable. But I have no doubt that this would have happened if I tried to date someone, and it's part of the reason why I believe it's so wrong to tell someone to deny their identity as aromantic.

[Image Description:

Slide 1: Celia speaks to the viewer directly again with an incredulous expression, “But if you force yourself to date someone that deep down, you know you’re not attracted to -”

Slide 2: “- it could hurt you” An asterisk is drawn, which in the bottom corner is clarified further with a note saying for the reader to read the last slide. 

The guy from before is now shown on a date that he appears to be VERY uncomfortable with. The girl he is on a date with has light skin, long brown hair with bangs, and is wearing an off the shoulder long white dress. She says “Babe I think we should get boba next -” while he mutters an “oh, okay”. 

Slide 3: The girl leans in for a kiss. Her eyes are closed, while his are wide open in alarm. 

“And maybe, because you’re not being honest about what you can or can’t feel -”

Slide 4: “- The other person sense you’re not into them that way.”

The girl has pulled away, and she seems a bit embarrassed. The guy is trying to be nice and smiles awkwardly. 

Slide 5: “Maybe they feel like it’s their fault, that they weren’t good enough somehow.”

The girl now turns away, and she seems sad. 

“Maybe it hurts them.”

Slide 6: A pure text slide. The note from before is clarified here. 

This is not directed at aromantic spectrum people who want to be in a romantic relationship, nor a comment on the nature of their relationships. 

The point I’m trying to make here is that it isn’t right to try and convince someone to do something they may not want, and force them to be dishonest with themself. I believe that the key to any good relationship is communication, and by no means a romantic, or any other kind of relationship between an aromantic and alloromantic person inherently unhealthy.]

[aro-culture-is]

i haven’t had many crushes on people in my life and they always form after people have said “oh you like them don’t you!?” or “aww you like him” or “you guys would look so cute together” so recently i’ve been questioning if i’m aro.

ive never been in a relationship before the one im in now and ive never really wanted to be. if i feel feelings for someone they always fade and if they reciprocate my feelings they go away IMMEDIATELY. its always been like this and i’ve never thought much about it.

anyways my best friend (that i thought i liked sorta) told me they liked me so i panicked and said same and when they asked if we could date it was ok. as soon as i said that my feelings disappeared. i cant remember how long ago that was but it was a couple months ago. ive genuinely thought something was wrong with me bc i cant feel anything romantic to them ever since they told me abt their feelings. i don’t know what to do bc i know that they really like me. my friends constantly show me screenshots of them talking about me and stuff like that and i don’t know how to tell them i’m on the aro spectrum and definitely don’t have romantic feelings towards them. we’ve kissed and it felt like i was kissing a wall. should i be feeling something ? what does romantic attraction even feel like bc im not sure ? am i just messed up ? sorry there’s so many questions in this mess of a submission i don’t know what to do and i don’t want to lie to my partner anymore

--

hi!

with regards to the first paragraph, I really can't tell you if what you've had has been romantic attraction or anything. I can suggest that, without knowing you, maybe you never had attraction, maybe the pointing out was required due to a lack of emotional awareness, or maybe something else entirely. I can't say.

if i feel feelings for someone they always fade and if they reciprocate my feelings they go away IMMEDIATELY. its always been like this and i’ve never thought much about it.

this however - I can tell you more about this!! there is an aro-spec identity, lithromantic, defined as the following by AUREA:

Describes a person who may stop feeling romantic attraction once in a relationship or stop enjoying it.

with regards to your relationship: I'm aromantic in a way where I'm quite certain that I've never felt romantic attraction. I ended up in a few romantic relationships - two I won't count as really much of anything, and two with the same person who I'll refer to here. I didn't really... care?... about the "label" on our relationship. As far as I was concerned, we were close, and while I knew I wasn't romantically interested in her, I thought that she understood that and was okay with it (turns out, uhh she thought I'd "realize" I was actually attracted to her at some point. yikes). I know she really liked me - she could wax poetic about me, had clear visions of a future of us together, and was well and truly smitten with me. I... thought of her as a good friend who I enjoyed hanging out with, having sex with, and talking to. When we kissed, I felt like I was honestly kissing a wet wall.

I say this not to turn the conversation to me, but to give my personal experience as an aro person in a relationship. What I can say I learned from this was that I was always going to be uncomfortable in that romantic relationship. In my case, I decided that for our happiness, we needed to break up. I wasn't happy being in a relationship, and while that alone was reason enough, I also felt that she'd expressed very clearly a discomfort with my identity and wanted someone who returned her intense emotions. Some alloromantic/aro relationships work - but ours did not.

I have two main comments with regards to what I think could be beneficial for you:

as long as you anticipate it is safe to do so, I would try to have an honest conversation with your partner - "I think I'm aro-spec, and I want to be open with you. Neither you nor me can change this - and it isn't your fault in any way. I didn't really know it when we first started dating, but... I don't think I'm romantically attracted to you."

there are negotiations in any relationship. depending on you and your partners desires, you may decide to break up. you may decide to continue a relationship with more communication of likes and dislikes - possibly a trial, possibly with the intent of continuing a long relationship. Communicate your wants and needs as such, use "I" statements - "I feel like ---", "I think that---", "I want ---".

I hope that this helps somewhat. I hope that however this goes, you will feel more comfortable and understood, even if just by yourself.

- mod kee

[wearequeer-andwearehere]

Hey! So I’ve recently been wanting to get into a relationship. I had something going on with one of my friends but I just don’t have the emotional attachment? After we broke it off she told me she started dating some guy and I really just didn’t care? This happened again when I got a crush on another friend but wen I found out they were interested in someone else I just kind of shrugged it off.

Don’t get me wrong I do want to be in a relationship but I just don’t know where I’m the spectrum I fit. I label myself as pansexual as I do have that attraction. Ive also heard of panromantic and a romantic but don’t really understand the concept. Help?

Heya :D

So aromantic basically means to experience little to no romantic attraction! Some aros still feel sexual, aesthetic and platonic attraction, and some don’t, it’s different for each person!

Aromantic (click for link to wiki)

Aromantic (often shortened to aro) is a romantic orientation defined by a lack of romantic attraction. Romantic attraction is often defined as the desire to be in a romantic relationship and/or do romantic acts with a specific individual. For non-aromantic (alloromantic) individuals, romantic attraction is involuntary and even occurs when someone doesn't know the other individual (though one might not act on it). Aromantic individuals do not have an innate desire to be in a romantic relationship with specific individuals. They might also feel disconnected from the idea of romance.

A common misconception is that all aromantics lack emotions, lack the ability to form social connections, and are "loveless". In reality many aros are capable of feeling love- platonic love such as that between a mother and child or best friends. Aromantics can also meet their emotional needs through queerplatonic relationships, or other non-romantic relationships. Some aromantics get platonic crushes or "squishes", also known as platonic attraction. On the other hand, some aromantics may not experience platonic love or attraction, and may identify as aplatonic. Others may not desire partners of any kind, and may identify as nonamorous. Some aromantics embrace the loveless label and reject the idea that love is necessary for happiness.

Being aromantic does not mean that one is unable to experience sexual attraction. An aromantic individual can have any sexual orientation. They may identify with a sexual orientation in addition to the label of aromantic to specify who they're interested in sexually, if anyone. For example, a heterosexual aromantic individual is sexually attracted to individuals of a different gender, but is not romantically attracted to them. Some aromantics are also asexual (aroace), meaning they do not feel sexual attraction as well. Not all aromantics identify with a sexual orientation, some identify primarily or only as aromantic (non-SAM aro/aro neu). Some aromantic individuals may additionally experience tertiary attractions, which are attractions outside of sexual and romantic, and may use specific labels to describe this attraction. Examples of tertiary attractions include aesthetic, platonic, and sensual attraction.

Romantic dispositions among aromantic individuals can vary. Some aromantics may still have or seek or a romantic relationship despite not feeling romantic attraction to anyone (cupioromantic). Other aromantics may be repulsed by the concept of romance, either as a concept applicable to themselves or in general. Terms like romance-repulsed, romance-indifferent, romance-favorable, or romance-ambivalentare commonly used to describe these feelings.

Also there are different types of attraction, like aesthetic (finding someone attractive) platonic, romantic, sexual, etc, so you can have different genders you’re attracted to for each type, e.g, panaesthetic aromantic bisexual, etc!

Okay so, in terms of you being aro, it’s possible you could just be at an age where you don’t feel romantic attraction yet. I’m not sure how old you are but yeah, it’s a possibility you’re just not old enough to feel romantic attraction yet

However, if you’re sure that’s not the case, I’ve got more info on aro identities for ya! Here’s a master list of aro identities!

https://wearequeer-andwearehere.tumblr.com/post/661974123043586048/do-you-happen-to-have-a-list-of-arospec

Hope I could help you out, and I wish you luck with questioning! Lmk if you have anymore questions, and have a great day/night :D

[messyflowr]

having adhd + being aromantic

heya friends :D I hope you're all doing great and taking care of yourselves :] if you haven't already, make sure to drink some water and/or grab a snack. that being said, let's get into today's topic: aromanticism and adhd!

disclaimer: I'll - of course - only be talking about my experiences as a person with !! self-diagnosed adhd that also happens to be aromantic*! your experience might be different so please be respectful if you decide to reply to this post :) that being said I'm excited to hopefully reach people with similar experiences to mine!

*(also important to note I pretty much feel No romantic attraction, if you are demiromantic or greyromantic, etc. your experience is bound to be different and some things might resonate less with you).

let's get into it! (long post ahead)

aromanticism combined with adhd is definitely...an interesting pair. for me, I've never felt the "rush" to get into a romantic relationship, another thing about me is, I hyperfixate on people (especially new friends). that usually presents as an amplified qpr.

I thought that since I always wanted to be around someone, always be talking to them, always focusing on them, that I must want to BE with them. insert impulsivity, I ruined a few friendships because of unnecessary love confessions.

when I spoke to my friends (middle/high school), I felt left out when they talked about their crushes, since I didn't have any! I never took interest into someone Like That. so I started saying "well I have a crush too actually!" even when, in reality, it was an obsessive idealization of someone at best.

it took me till a few years later to realize that "wait?...I never wanted to kiss that guy...I didn't even really want to get into a relationship with that girl..." and that's when I found the label 'aromantic'.

I, in some way, never "realized" that being in a relationship would entail all that it does: kissing, sexual acts, commitment, etc. (I still do not get any of this stuff, that's why the list is short lmao) so when I said I had a "crush" all my brain really processed is "I want to talk with this person a lot, get to know them well, form a deep bond, hang out together often, because I think they're so nice!"

that, you might think, is not a huge issue once you figure it out, right? WRONG.

I still struggle with hyperfixating on people, and it's hard to set good boundaries (especially at first) because I show the same interest alloromantics show (if I had to guess...) to their romantic interest just...without any romantic intent!

sometimes I still question myself, "what if I want to be with this person?", "I must want to be with them!" and adhd only makes it Worse.

if you have adhd or know anything about it, you know how addicting novel stuff is to us, really. so, if someone shows interest for me, my brain finds that a fun, interesting, new situation, which sometimes results in me leading people on or confusing them.

is kissing "novel, interesting, etc." to think about? yes! would I actually ever kiss that person? absolutely not.

if you relate to any of the feelings I shared, you're not alone, you're not crazy, you're not a bad person. you are valid and it IS hard.

it is especially hard because (I'd assume) hyperfixating on someone that is available and interested in you as an alloromantic comes with its struggles, and you're always going to be in the process of balancing your time and managing your symptoms, but your attraction is straight to the point.

as an aromantic, it's not. (again, talking as an aromantic that feels little to no attraction). we're just working hard to not ruin anything. it's confusing, and like any hyperfixation, it consumes us and our time.

I'm SO lucky to have friends that understand that and that generally wouldn't question anyone for just wanting to spend lots of time together, but I can see how that could actively and continuously ruin friendships.

if you're aromantic and have adhd and are struggling because of it right now, you're going to be okay, you are a great person and you are loved.

I wanted to touch up on a lot more relating to this subject, but this post is adhd-unfriendly (read: long) enough already, soz...

if you read through all of this, thank you so much & feel free to share your experience, reblog, etc. doesn't matter if you are demi or grey etc., really!

have a great day, I love you :D

[aspiringhorrorauthor]

hello, PLEASE tell me your aroace analysis of the black parade album, i would like to see it 👀👀

What up guys, I just passed a vet med practice exam and I’m aroace and emo as fuck so let’s do this

 First off, I will preface that I know that this wasn’t quite MCR’s idea of the album, but art is interpretive and I will at every possible opportunity rub my grubby little aroace hands all over that shit. This is also gonna get long so here’s a read more

 Okay so first off, let me just exclude the following songs from this interpretation simply because they are exactly as they appear: The End, Dead!, Welcome to the Black Parade, Sleep, Teenagers and Blood. I can’t find anything to really psychoanalyse in this regarding the aroace experience so much as they are about the emo experience. And also, as a heads up, I feel this may teter more into aromantic interpretation than asexual simply because that’s how I roll, baby.

Let’s start with ‘This Is How I Disappear’, there’s something in here that strikes me as ‘coming to terms with being aroace Very Badly’, that first onset of panic when you realise ‘oh crap, I’m not allo’. I didn’t have the ‘hell yeah no sexual/romantic attraction oh wait there’s a word for that?’ realisation often stated online, I was in a lot of denial, especially when I first started listening to this album.

The lines “And without you is how I disappear/and live my life alone forever now” really strikes this message to me. The gnawing sense of loneliness and isolation when you first realise that you’re not like everyone else, that ‘living a life alone’ is both what you want from life and dread, as an amatonormative society drills into every one of us that love and relationships is what makes us important in life, and without it we will simply disappear. The line hits home the pain of questioning, the horror of when you realise this is who you likely are before you can truly accept it. It’s not a pretty part of being aroace, it wasn’t for me, but it is an important one, and the lines always hit home to me in this era.

Added on to this is a sense of how we’re seen in media. Consider the line “Who walks among the famous living dead”. There’s a real push in amatonormativity that love and romance is what makes us human, what makes us alive, and without it, we’re not human. Therefore, by extension, the aromantic narrator is ‘not alive’ by these standards, nor is their community they’ve yet to find. This is also doubled down by the monster symbolism throughout the song; especially when I was younger, aromantic (and asexual) coded characters in media were always the bad guys, the monsters who could only be stopped by the unstoppable power of love; the narrator is lamenting how this part of themselves seems monstrous, evil to society, when really that isn’t true, and this evolves over the course of the album.

Let’s move on to The Sharpest Lives. This is less aroace specific, but it certainly seems like a downward spiral of the narrator, which carries on from the self-loathing of Disappear. There’s really only 1 line I want to talk about here: “Juliet loves the beat and the lust it commands/Drop the dagger and lather the blood on your hands, Romeo”. This is an obvious allusion to Romeo and Juliet, but it turns on its head the usual story of Romeo and Juliet being in love; Juliet doesn’t love Romeo, she just loves the beat, and Romeo is taking it too far. This speaks to another experience, not exclusive to aromantics, but definitely strongly felt in it, when someone misinterprets the relationship or your feelings and tries to push for romance when all you wanted was a good time. I had an awful experience of this myself, so I’m claiming this one for the aroaces.

(As an aside, I got into MCR around the same time we did Romeo and Juliet at school, so imagine little me, not knowing she’s aroace and sick to death of talking about romance at school and hearing this line. To say I lost my shit was an understatement. I ADORE that line.)

Next up is ‘I Don’t Love You’. I’ve talked about this one before on my blog, but this is the song that really gives it away to me that this album is very strongly catered towards aroaces. “But it’s a break up song!” No, it’s not, if you look at it from the correct angle. Also I’ve gone to further lengths with other break up songs so try me bitches (See: Love Drunk by Boys Like Girls being about disregarding amatonormativity rather than breaking up with someone. It’s so damn obvious too)

Here’s the short of it: I Don’t Love You is actually about falling out with a friend because you had entirely different ideas as to what it was you wanted from your relationship. The aro narrator wants it to remain friends; they’re happy with where they are, and doesn’t want it to change. The other ‘person’ in the song is alloromantic, and wants it to become a romantic relationship. The most important line for this is the most important line in the song: “When you go, would you even turn to say, I don’t love you like I did yesterday”. Let’s focus on the word choice here: ‘Like I did yesterday’. When allos talk about love, they talk about the amount; if this was about falling out of love, it would reflect that, that the other person in the song loves them less, not differently. The narrator is lamenting that their friend no longer loves them as a friend; the friend’s view of love has changed, they love them romantically, and less as a friend as a result, and the narrator’s insistence on remaining friends has highlighted this.

What’s more, I don’t think this is the first time the narrator has gone through this. Admittedly, I misheard one of the lines for years and I insist the line is “Another time was just another blow” but I’m not American so we don’t have dollars, and this is about me and my interpretation of the album so we’re in this ride together and I’m driving so lets do this. The song is very pained, you can hear it in Gerard’s voice, and there’s so little about the pain of losing a friend, especially when they wanted romance from you, that this song really speaks to.

What really gets me though is how the narrator is clearly still struggling with being aroace too. Let’s consider the line “Sometimes I cry so hard from pleading”. The narrator clearly isn’t at ease with their identity yet; maybe they wish they could keep their friend, but their placing their boundaries down, even though its costing a friend. These boundaries are important, and its important for our friends to respect them too. And listening to, and singing along to, this song really makes me proud for the narrator in a sort of self-love kind of way when you couldn’t love yourself.

Final matter on this song: the narrator still thinks of them as a friend, which is tearing the narrator apart. Yes, the line “Don’t ever think I’ll make you try to stay” might make you think differently, but I believe that’s the narrator setting their boundaries; they’re not going to become an item just to please their friend and make them stay. Instead lets look at “Better get out while you can”. The narrator sees that their different views on the relationship is incompatible, and suggests they ‘fall out’ before their friend gets too caught up, and the rejection pains them both even more.

Now for House of Wolves. Not a long to say on this one, but I see it as being about media and ace exclusionists. See, the song flips between another character seeing the narrator as an angel and as a sinner simultaneously; just as how the media depicts asexual/aromatic/aroace people as non-human, that our sexuality (or lack thereof) makes us incomplete (the sinner aspect), while exclusionists say that we must be loved by the same media (and by religion too) for being aspec (the angel aspect). The song flip flops between them very rapidly, a state of confusion that felt very poignant for me when I was questioning in the height of the ace discourse.

Okay Mama is just here not for interpretation but because my English teacher once told us to analyse songs for her to mark as revision for exams and she loves long songs and kept making us analyse them so I analysed Mama and handed that in and got an A*. So Mama said AroAce rights that day.

Disenchanted is another strange one, filled with lines that mean more to aroace interpretation than the song itself. It spoke to me most when I was on my year out, having failed to get into uni despite good grades, still struggling with coming to terms with being aromantic, and dealing with severe anxiety. All in all, it was a year of disenchantment. It’s a good song. So what about an aroace interpretation?

The main thing about the song seems to be pretending to be someone you’re not. And really, when talking with family who expect you to be allo, how can you be anything but? I was told in this time that ‘Girls only go to university to find a husband’, which is many levels of wrong, but that thought always sticks in my head with this song. Moreover, I always think of break up songs with the line “You’re just a sad song, with nothing to say”, because they ARE just sad songs with nothing to say; and yet we’re expected to love them, because it’s a universal experience. There’s never been nothing to them.

But really, the line “I spent my high school career spit on and shoved to agree, so I can watch all my heroes sell a car on TV” is what really spoke to me. You spend school years being told that these people are sexy, you’ll want romance one day, and you have to agree or we’ll bully you mercilessly for it. The kids at school knew who was aroace before they knew what aroace meant. And we grow up watching heroes we relate to on TV, the fantastic loners who don’t need a significant other, only for fandom and the shows themselves to pair them up, make them “sell cars on tv” and sell out what made them special to us. And it hurts. And this song reflects that so well. In this song, the narrator is reflecting back on the years lost by hating themselves, slowly coming to terms with being aroace.

And finally, Famous Last Words. This is the real tipping point where the narrator feels comfortable with themselves, and finally confronts the friend from ‘I Don’t Love You’. The song is sung by one person, yes, but it feels like a dialogue between the friend, who still wants to hold a romantic relationship with the narrator, and the narrator who’s finally had enough. The introduction is from the friend, their thoughts on the narrator and how they know that they’re not going to win, but maybe they can make them feel bad for it “But where’s your heart?”, the friend is accusing the narrator of being heartless for being aromantic. But here’s the thing:

The narrator’s accepted who they are. “Well is it hard understanding? I’m incomplete.” The narrator accepts that they’re aroace, that to the friend, they are different, they don’t experience romance. The pain that they felt in the first few songs, of being the living dead and disappearing, makes them feel incomplete still, but they’re finally secure with being aroace enough to declare that, while they aren’t fully there yet, “I am not afraid to walk this world alone.” The narrator knows who they are, and they’re no longer afraid of it. Even when the friend tries to backpedal “Honey if you stay I’ll be forgiving” the narrator knows that the friend isn’t worth the pain anymore “Nothing you can say can stop me going home.”

That’s also why the lines about ‘love’ in this song are so important too. “A love that’s so demanding I can’t speak” “A love that’s so demanding, I get weak”. The narrator is explaining that, for them, romance is demanding; it’s not easy, and it’s not worth it for them, it’ll tire them out. The first quote can also speak of their friendship now; it’s so demanding, the narrator feels that if they stay, they may not be able to speak up for themselves any more. They have to friend break up, for both of their wellbeings.

And finally, the last verses “Awake and unafraid, asleep or dead” is the final attempt at kicking the narrator, harking back to “the famous living dead”. But the narrator refutes it by insisting that they’re not afraid to be alone anymore. And the song ends with the narrator winning, leaving the friend for good, for a better life.

 And that’s the aroace interpretation of Black Parade.

And it’s 2200 words long fuck

[w-k-smith]

The Deetz-Maitland-Beetlejuice family is coping pretty well with shelter-in-place, until Adam invents an extremely complicated board game that no one else can understand. As more of them stop playing, the more obsessed he gets with perfecting the rules, leaving Lydia worried about what the endpoint might be.

Read here on AO3, or below the cut. All my off-topic ramblings author’s notes are on AO3, though.

 Day 1

No one knew what Adam was up to until it was too late.

The Maitlands loved their hobbies. Barbara often said picking up and putting down new hobbies was their only consistent hobby, and Lydia considered it to be one of the most fun things about them. Every couple of months, Adam and Barbara found something new they wanted to try, and asked a living member of the household to pick up supplies at the craft or hardware store.

The Maitlands would be the first to admit that they often had more enthusiasm than talent, but sometimes one or both of them turned out to be really good at something. They’d knit sweaters for every person, living and dead, in the house for Christmas. Beetlejuice refused to admit how much he loved the pullover his boyfriend and girlfriend made for him, and wore it nonstop for weeks, and only Barbara’s puppy-dog eyes had convinced him to part with it for one afternoon so she could wash it.

So Lydia was curious when Adam gathered an armload of scrap paper and cardboard and disappeared into the attic. She hoped it would be fun, or at least interesting, because she was anxious and bored enough that she was starting to miss school.

Connecticut’s shelter-in-place order had cast a new energy on the house. Lockdown was going fine, with a few bumps. Even with the protection of Beetlejuice’s sandworm-wrangling skills, the ghosts didn’t leave the house much, and were happy for the extra company. Beetlejuice had volunteered to do grocery shopping, but wasn’t one for sticking to a list or following directions, and had come back with eight boxes of Kashi cereal, a kumquat, and fish food. Delia was coping by meditating and doing yoga in the backyard up to six hours a day. She’d banned any discussion of the news in her presence, and Lydia still found her stress-vaping on the porch at three in the morning.

Lydia was annoyed at how well her father was doing. Charles was adept at sewing masks out of scrap fabric, and kept his hands busy by making piles of them during his endless Zoom work meetings. He’d also forced a quiet hours rule for those Zoom meetings after Lydia and Beetlejuice played a game of tag that ended with a broken window.

“Restricting the movements of the people is a symptom of a fascist state,” Lydia told her father.

“Go do your schoolwork,” he said.

“It’s Saturday. And I did it already! How do you think I know so much about fascism?”

He pressed his thumbs between his eyebrows. “I don’t care if you play around with Lawrence all day.” Charles had taken to calling Beetlejuice by his first name, because he had to explain Beetlejuice’s presence whenever Beetlejuice was around when visitors came over, or, these days, whenever Beetlejuice barged into his office while the webcam was on. “This is Lawrence, my oldest,” Charles typically said, quickly and gruffly, and people seemed to assume he meant “my oldest son, who I have from a previous marriage,” rather than “my oldest dead roommate who is my daughter’s best friend and is in a committed relationship with the deceased couple in the attic.” And Charles himself seemed fine with the assumption. It delighted Beetlejuice utterly. “Please just be quiet for a few hours.”

Lydia sighed, and stormed off. “We have to make as much noise as possible today,” she told Beetlejuice when she found him sitting at the top of the stairs.

“Normally, I’d love that, but we have a new problem,” he said. “Adam’s being weird.”

“Everyone in this house is weird,” Lydia reminded him.

“Adam’s destroying the living room.”

Lydia leaned over the banister. Adam had covered the living room floor with scribbled-on pieces of paper, figurines, and little improvised game pieces. He was speaking intensely to Barbara, but her head was tilted to one side, like she did when she was confused.

“What are you doing?” Lydia asked, walking downstairs. Beetlejuice floated behind her.

“I invented a board game!” Adam said.

“He did. It’s called, um…?” Barbara trailed off.

“It doesn’t have a name yet,” Adam said. “But it’s part Risk, part Monopoly, part Dungeons and Dragons.”

Lydia frowned. “That sounds–”

“Do you want to try it?” he asked, and his eyes were so bright and excited Lydia couldn’t turn him down.

“Let’s all play,” she said. “I’ll get Delia.”

“I’ll get Da-CHARLES,” Beetlejuice said.

Fifteen minutes later, everyone was sitting in the living somewhere that wasn’t covered with paper. Adam gave them all a set of pieces, but they each seemed to have a different assortment, because, as far as Lydia could tell, they were playing against each other. Except where the game was collaborative. Except where they had to group into different factions.

“I’m very confused,” Delia whispered to Lydia.

“I am, too,” Lydia whispered back.

“Why don’t we all ever play the games I make up?” Beetlejuice asked.

Charles didn’t look up from the board. “Because, Lawrence, much like you, most of them are very messy and hard to understand.” The roots of Beetlejuice’s hair started to turn purple. “Ergo, you are not allowed in charge of family game time.”

“Family game time?” Beetlejuice repeated, and the purple faded back to green.

Lydia saw Barbara catch Beetlejuice’s eye and mouth Oh, he loves you right before Adam announced he had an idea for a new challenge play.

 Day 2

One by one, the players dropped out of the game.

Charles was the first to go, because he got an emergency call from the vice-director-of-blah-blah-blah. Beetlejuice kept cheating, was ejected from the game by group consensus, and spent several hours sulking behind the couch.

Delia gave it a valiant try. She put more effort into following along than anyone except Barbara. Her enthusiasm started real, became fake, and ended with her asleep on the floor wrapped up in her caftan.

Lydia stopped playing, but stayed in the living room. She messed around on her phone but kept an eye on the Maitlands, wondering how far the game would go.

Finally, right before midnight, Barbara gave up. “Are you going to be OK on your own for a while?” she asked.

“Sure!” Adam said. “I’ll have this perfected in no time.”

Lydia watched him tape two pieces of poster board together, then went upstairs to go to bed. She hoped he’d be done by morning.

 Day 3

Lydia began to get worried. Adam’s game spread across the living room like a spider’s web, as he added more pieces, more levels, more intricate steps that only he could understand. It still didn’t have a name.

“Ghosts can get obsessed,” Beetlejuice told Lydia. “How do you think some of them keep haunting the same hallways for centuries without imploding from boredom? I’ve never seen a ghost get this wrapped up in a board game, though.”

“Something you haven’t seen?” she said. “That’s concerning.”

 Day 4

Lydia made Barbara and Beetlejuice sit down in the kitchen.

“I need your help,” she told them.

“What’s wrong, sweetheart?” Barbara asked.

“Whose body do you need me to hide?” Beetlejuice asked.

“We have to stop Adam.” Lydia pointed behind her at the living room. “This is madness. And not good madness. You guys have to stop him.”

Barbara nodded. “We have talked to him. But he’s pretty determined about this game. I suppose we could start another conversation…”

“I don’t mean that,” Lydia said. “I meant other stuff.”

“Other stuff?” Barbara asked, frowning. But Beetlejuice was grinning, because of course he was.

“I mean distract him romantically,” Lydia said. “Look, kissing is gross – you’re just mashing your food holes together. But this house is getting desperate. If you alloromantic people can’t use your wiles–”

Beetlejuice choked on nothing. “Wiles?”

“–What’s the point of having them?”

“That’s not appropriate, Lydia,” Barbara sighed.

“I’m offended you assumed I hadn’t tried already,” Beetlejuice said.

“We have to scare him out of it,” Lydia said. She and Beetlejuice stood in the foyer, right outside the living room, watching Adam drift around his enormous board. “Like the hiccups.”

“I’ll do the snake face,” Beetlejuice said. He started to storm in, but Lydia grabbed his sleeve.

“He’s seen the snake face. You do it all the time,” she said.

“Ooh, oh, what if I make the furniture come alive, and they all behave like different wild animals, and they all have teeth–”

“That’s not shocking enough. How about that thing where you turn yourself inside out?”

Finger guns. “I like the way you think, scarecrow.”

Beetlejuice strode into the living room, out of Lydia’s line of vision.

“Hey, sexy,” she heard him say. “Having fun – aaagh!” A squelch, splattering sound, a howl through an inside out mouth.

“Hi, BJ,” Adam said, his tone distant. “Can you hand me that deck of cards?”

“There are cards now?” Lydia whispered.

She heard a wet snap as Beetlejuice put himself back together. “Sure. Happy to. This isn’t disappointing at all.”

 Day 5

“Hey, guys?” Adam asked from the other room.

Lydia walked in cautiously. The debris of the game was still strewn all over the living room, so you couldn’t tell if the current round was in progress, or if a tornado had hit a hobby store.

“This is nothing, isn’t it?” Adam said, in a tired, defeated voice.

Lydia nodded. “Yeah. Sorry.”

“I just wanted a distraction,” Adam said. “I know we’re all as safe as we can be in here, I just get so worried.”

“Adam’s back! C’m’ere, hot stuff” Beetlejuice charged down the stairs, tackled Adam onto the sofa, and kissed him on the mouth. “Babs and I thought we’d lost you for good!”

“We didn’t think that,” Barbara said. She squeezed Adam’s shoulders.

“I completely understand, Adam,” Delia said, coming in from the kitchen. Charles was close behind her. “I’ve found diversion to be the best way of coping when life gets upsetting. When I was kicked out of that all-women ska band in the ’90’s, I threw myself into underground poker tournaments, and long story short I was briefly engaged to a prince of what turned out to be a micronation.”

“I’ll clean up the mess,” Adam sighed. Lydia suspected that would be easier said than done, because Beetlejuice was still sitting on Adam’s lap and wasn’t acting like he was planning to move.

“Then let’s do something fun together,” Delia said.

“Monopoly?” Lydia suggested, unable to hide her grin.

A chorus of “Absolutely not!” and “That’s not funny, young lady!” with Beetlejuice adding a mock-offended “Lydia Cordelia Deetz, who raised you?” though that wasn’t even close to her middle name.

“I’m kidding,” she said.

“How about a movie?” Barbara said, scooping up the closest pile of papers.

“Make it something with a lot of sequels,” Charles said. “We’re at home for the long haul, after all.”

“We’ll have to remember all this for the next plague,” Beetlejuice said. Lydia could have asked him why he sounded so sure when he said “next,” but decided it was just better to get some popcorn and ignore it.

[what-even-is-thiss]

i'm almost 100% certain lo and virge are demiromantic can you please add your thoughts

Well I always hesitate to make headcanons about the sides’ sexual or romantic orientations because Thomas is gay as heck but I guess it could be an interesting thing to think about.

Anxiety said in the Valentine’s day video that Thomas’ romantic relationships always started when he least expected them to. Now alloromantic people can have attraction come slowly over time but the difference is that they can have attraction without an emotional connection as well while demiromantic people can only have that attraction after an emotional bond is formed. As you can expect, very different experiences.

However, there is that part of the alloromantic person that can take time to feel a connection with certain people. Perhaps in instances where the attraction comes over time it can start as an intellectual interest. In cases where Thomas doesn’t feel attraction to a guy right away but feels it later, the attraction stems from the mind first instead of being led by impulse and aesthetic or sexual attraction like the infatuation at first sight Patton and Roman would generally initiate.

So I would say if you want to see Logan and Verge as demiromantic there are two different ways attraction could play out:

Scenario 1: Thomas is infatuated with the person at first meeting. He finds them aesthetically and/or sexually attractive but his guard is still up and the feelings are simply feelings. If a relationship of some kind emerges whether friendship or otherwise and the initial feelings of passion do not fade or he feels the motivation to renew that passion and more is learned about the person he begins to feel more comfortable and less anxious around them and begins to feel an intellectual connection as well as a passionate one. This is the point where the mind becomes invested and anxiety about the relationship lessens or is redirected into maintaining it.

Scenario 2: Thomas is not initially attracted to the person but somehow comes into regular contact with them. A friendship forms and slowly he learns more about them. As more is learned he begins to feel attracted to them on an intellectual level and slowly his anxiety either lessens or is directed at not losing their friendship or respect. In this case the attraction stems from the intellectual interest rather than immediate feelings. In time the heart also becomes attached and romance seems like more of a possibility.

I’m on the aromantic spectrum but not demiromantic so most of what I wrote here comes from psychology and my general habit of trying to figure out how people work by observation. I don’t know what it’s like to be romantic or how to differentiate platonic from romantic attraction so I might not have gotten something accurate and I’m very much looking at this through an intellectual lens so I might’ve gotten something wrong. If I did, sorry.

[aroacepositivityplace]

The other day this girl I sit with at lunch (who is the most homophobic and misogynistic person ever, like she told my birthday friend she's not bi she just thinks she's bi!?!?) Was like if I was ever queer I think I would be like aro. Even tho she has crushes all the time and thinks a ton of guys are hot and I didn't say anything but inside I was like nope nope stop talking no

Ew? I’m really sorry that you and your friend had to deal with that. I don’t know how your lunchroom is set up, but it might not hurt to move so you don’t have to listen to her, especially is she’s saying such awful things to your friend (reassuring your friend would also be a kind thing to do if you haven’t all ready).

I will say though that if she’s thinking about things like this, the odds are there that she isn’t alloromantic. Straight and cis people say some really weird and gross stuff about queer identities, but hearing someone say that if they had to pick one they’d want to be a-spec strikes me as being born from both ignorance and discomfort with her own orientation. Aside from that, even if she way overshares, goodness knows how much stuff I said about how I felt romantically/sexually/about my gender wasn’t true at all or that I was mistaken about. I don’t like it any more than you do, but she very well could be aro and deserves to feel comfortable with herself if that’s the truth. You absolutely don’t have to like or interact with her, but just because someone is a gross person doesn’t mean that they can’t be queer or question their orientation/gender.

One of my ex friends that said awful things about me behind my back after I started to be vocal about figuring out my gender and orientation. Fast forward two years and she turned out to be bi. Beyond that, she hasn’t changed at all and is still toxic.I want absolutely nothing to do with her and have no plans to ever reach out, but I do realize that there’s probably a lot of internalized queerphobia that she’s been dealing with. It doesn’t make anything that she’s done okay, but it does help me understand why it happened. 

I know that you were just venting and there’s nothing wrong with that, but I just felt like this was important to say. I apologize if this came off as preachy.

[purrplelace]

Ace Like Jughead

This post is being written for January 2017′s Carnival of Aces, hosted by @aceadvice with the theme: “Many Ways To Be Ace.” This is what I was planning on writing about, but it also connected a lot to some feelings I had about this post about Jughead’s erased asexuality by Queer As Cat, so I included that response as well.

Asexual. It means a different thing for each asexual person in the world. It is also how I most prefer to identify. Not Greyromantic Asexual, which would also work, or Aromantic Asexual. Just Asexual.

For me, my asexuality and my aromanticism are not two different things. They are connected. They interact with each other, impact my life in much the same way as each other. When I call myself asexual, I mean something very similar to what someone who is sexually and romantically attracted to two or more genders means when they call themselves bisexual (as opposed to a biromantic bisexual). When I call myself asexual, I mean that I am not interested in people in a sexual/romantic way, regardless of their gender.

I am not opposed to using the word aromantic to discuss my experiences, especially within ace and aro circles. But I still feel that for me the two are connected, and identifying primarily as asexual is important to me.

Now, you might be thinking something along the lines of “But asexual means you don’t experience sexual attraction” or, “You are harming alloromantic asexuals with your personal identity.” That last one is the one I am most afraid of when discussing this among ace people. And to be totally honest, I am not cool with the idea that saying my personal identify harms others. (And it sort of reminds me of the whole “asexuality is inherently homophobic because it sexualizes gay people” thing.)

I am going to go on a tangent and talk about the second-wave feminism concept of “The Personal Is Political.” The idea is basically to have an awareness of how political and oppressive forces can shape our daily lives. However, this has somehow morphed into “I need to fight oppressive forces with my daily life or I am a bad person” (here is an example, cw for sex and kink mentions). And I disagree with that. All that leads to is burnout (and another oppressive force acting on your personal life).

Here is a link of some contemporary views on “The Personal Is Political.” I personally liked this quote the best:

The personal as the political was never meant to be a prescription of how to live your life. It was never meant to be a rallying cry to shave off your hair and take up with the lady next door. But what it was really meant to do was create an awareness of how our personal lives are ruled by political forces. Of how the fact that women were not economically or politically equal to men meant that their relationships were unequal too.

Katherine Viner, in On the Move: Feminism for a new generation

Awareness about how political and oppressive forces can shape our daily lives is meant to help us make informed decisions about our lives, and to help us figure out what we need to combat on a political level and how we are going to do that.

In preparation for the CW’s Riverdale, which is premiering later this month, I had seen several posts by other aces talking about how the comics have a canon asexual character in them. I had been feeling sort of upset about being ace for a week or so, and I decided it was probably because I was watching too many TV shows where the romance played a big part. So the not-so-easy remedy for this is to read/watch something with an ace character. I remembered what I had read about Jughead, and I decided to take a leap of faith (I haven’t read a graphic novel since I read Captain Underpants in the first grade) and buy Chip Zdarsky’s graphic novel Jughead, Volume One.

I loved it.

I cannot begin to express how much I loved it. In every issue, there was something pertaining to his asexuality mentioned somewhere. He actively deals with other people’s attitudes/awareness about his asexuality and it is... so great.

For those of you who have little exposure to the comics, Jughead is explicitly referred to as asexual by another character, he explicitly says he does not get crushes, and he has negatively reacted to touch (especially by girls flirting with him) on many occasions.

In other words, Jughead is ace like me. Sure, there are a few differences--I am a little less touch averse. I don’t have the superiority complex he has about it. Jughead never really says himself how he identifies, so we can’t be sure what he knows about asexuality/aromanticism and if he would identify like me or as aroace or something else, but either way, his asexuality and lack of romantic interest and touch aversion are all related and interconnected, much the way mine is.

Cole Sprouse recently said that, in spite of his efforts, Jughead is not currently being portrayed as asexual on the show. And most of the articles that reported about it said things like (note: these are not direct quotes, I reworded them to emphasize the issues in the logic) “Jughead will not be asexual because he will have romances” or “Jughead will not be asexual because he will want sex.” On the part of the people writing those articles (and possibly Cole Sprouse, but the context was given by the reporters so it is hard to tell), that wording is awful and wrong. And the show is not out yet, so we can’t even properly correct them because we don’t know what they were trying to say in the first place. Does he have romances? Does he have sex? Does he say “LOL I’m a straight dude?” It is not clear.

Here is a snippet of Queer As Cat’s post I mentioned at the beginning of this post:

sure, Jughead showing romantic (or sexual) interest in women may be out of character for him, but that’s not even what everyone’s making noise about. people are specifically fighting to “keep Jughead #asexual”, even though aces can “have romances”– in every possible sense of the word– with women (or anyone else) and still be asexual. given that, what is it that people are really fighting for?

the “One True Asexual Narrative”, that’s what.

and once again, whether people are consciously aware of it or not, the fight for that specific narrative is being had at the cost of asexual representation that deviates from that narrative.

When I get upset about the asexual erasure in the CW’s Riverdale, I am not upset about asexuality as a whole being erased, I am upset about Jughead’s asexuality being erased. Jughead’s asexuality means that he doesn’t have romances. I am not fighting for “The One True Asexual Narrative,” I am fighting for Jughead’s Asexual Narrative, which does not involve romance or sex or even casual touch. I am fighting for the narrative that could allow others to empathize with me, and give me something to relate to so I don’t feel like shit about my asexuality after watching too much TV.

There is actually only one asexual narrative of a recurring character that has been on TV so far (that I am aware of), and that is Voodoo from Sirens. And her character was alloromantic, dated, and masturbated. She was awesome and the best part of the series, not gonna lie. Jughead is a very different kind of ace from her (especially in the fact that he is a guy, there aren’t a lot of ace guys and I know that that bothers many of the ace men I know), so if you were to truly fight for having multiple asexual narratives on TV, Jughead’s from the comics would diversify it best. (Though I am really in the camp of any asexual narratives on TV being good. As long as it isn’t what happened in House.)

There are so many ways to be ace. My way is just one way. Jughead’s is another. And Queer As Cat’s is another. You, the reader, assuming you are asexual because you are reading this post, have another way of being asexual. None of these ways of being ace invalidate each other. Every time an ace character comes into the spotlight, it seems that there are the people who say “but they are not like me, so they are not good representation.” We get so little that we begin to fight over crumbs, and it does not help. We need to start fighting for all types of asexual narratives to be told, not just ones that are like our own. And celebrate when our ace friends of differing romantic orientations have their narratives told. Which unfortunately there is nothing to celebrate at the moment. So we need to fight. Together.

[aro-culture-is]

1)I'm aro & even tho I came to know about that term just recently I've alys had the 'aro' personality & those who know me knows it. I'm 23 & never been in a relation. I'm also introvert so I don't really have close friends & i don't desire other's company whether romantic or not. When I was 14 I had this guy frn & I guess we were pretty close. I stopped talking to him over some argument about he wanting me to be his gf. I wasn't planning on not speaking with him forever but he died a week later

2)So since I'm in 20s and suddenly everythings about finding the missing piece crap I always get pressured into seeking it. I tell my mom time and again that it's not for me but she keeps pointing out that I'm shy introvert and I don't know what I'm missing and the story of that guy. I honestly don't have much memory of him now but she tells me that I was devastated and she was worried sick for me cause she thought he was my bf. So now I'm confused and try to look at myself w/o those things

3) but I can't. I don't know if I need therapy and this aromantic is sth in me that can be fixed. I don't mean to degrade the word. And I don't know if I want it fixed even if it's fixable. I don't know how to answer to my mom bringing up possible trauma that may be possible for me being aro. There has to be other people with similar situation. What is on the other side?

4) sorry this this getting too long but I want to add about how he died to get a gist of how fucked up it was. I used to help him with studies and we often had extra classes where I used to go with him insisting that he go since he had difficulty getting decent grades. That day I didn't call him as I said I wasn't talking with him. He had gone for swimming when we had class. He drowned in a river nearby. It was never known if it was accidental or not.

--

TWs: trauma, implied suicide (as a possibility), internalized arophobia

okay... so, i’m going to preface this with the fact that regardless of the aromantic side of things, the language that you used throughout this would make me inclined to suggest therapy regardless. i’m not a professional, i’m just a 20yo who’s seen a lot of the growth of the aro community on tumblr over the last 7 years.

the reason i’m saying this is specifically that you mention “i guess we were pretty close”, “don’t have much memory of him now”, etc., especially paralleled with how you keep mentioning that you’re getting info about this from your mother. again, i’m not a professional, but that speaks to me of a traumatic situation (aka: something that you were not emotionally capable of processing when it happened) in which you either didn’t form memories well (a stress response, but this seems unusually severe in my limited understanding) or possibly have repressed it to some degree. both are totally normal responses, but nonetheless it might help to speak to a qualified professional about your experience with this if it’s distressing you enough to ask me, a random internet blog, about it in this detail.

additionally, in all honesty, i’m concerned that your only source of info seems to be your mother. while i’ll say in full disclosure that my view is impacted by my own (shitty) relationship with my mother, many parents want their children to lead what they picture to be a perfect life, to the point of causing damage in their attempts to mold their children into those lives. if this specifically is only being brought up when you talk about being aro / in conjunction with conversations about dating, that would lead me to suspect this is the case.

with regards to the aromantic side of this ask:

1) being aromantic is first and foremost about attraction. if you don’t think you’ve ever, or rarely, felt romantic attraction? you’re aro. you don’t have to claim the label if you don’t want to, but I think in your case it sounds like you do want to.

2) with ppl assuming that you were dating someone especially when you were 14, i’d disregard anything they say. at least in USA culture, mothers especially are poor judges of who is and is not dating in my experience, and typically assume any friends who happen to be a guy and a girl must actually be dating. literally it’s so rare for parents, especially mothers in this culture not to assume that that i actually cannot think of a person who i know who didn’t have their parents make that assumption at least once when it wasn’t true.

3) the relationship between aromanticism and trauma is often personal. ppl who have experienced trauma that they believe caused them to be aro are still aromantic if they chose to label themselves such, and it is directly unhealthy to take that control away from a trauma victim. while again, i am not a professional, i was given basic training about how best to support a victim of trauma, and the number one thing is that you must give them the reigns. they ultimately must have power over what happens to them. empowerment is extremely important.

that said: studies do find that the average alloromantic person experiences their first crushes around the age of 10. if you personally don’t recall having had any crushes before this experience, I wouldn’t be quick to describe your aromanticism as stemming from trauma. if you did have crushes, but you recall picking a person to have a crush on, that’s not what an alloromantic person calls a crush, that’s what an aromantic person who is trying to fit in calls a crush. so. there’s that to think about.

4) from the last point: “curing” aromanticism. if and only if your lack of attraction stems from trauma do i believe there is a chance that therapy could help to unlock any form of attraction you used to have. in all honesty, though, I would strongly advise that if you do believe this is the correct course of action for you, you cannot go into this with a therapist who isn’t respectful of queer identities. you cannot go into this with the expectation that everything will “return to normal”. trauma is complex. therapists with no knowledge of aromanticism could easily do harm simply because they aren’t familiar with the fact that people who don’t experience romantic attraction can live fulfilling lives.

--

this ask is complex. i’m really hoping i’ve answered it the best i can, but ultimately, all i can do is say this:

i’m sorry that you experienced this. what happened was not your fault, and you deserve to be able to move forwards with your life regardless and feel content with your life.

for as long as you want it, the label aromantic is yours to claim. no one can take that from you. sometimes, well-meaning people may try, because they don’t know better than to assume it is harming you. that does not mean that they know you better than you know yourself.

trauma is complicated, and healing from it can feel daunting. however, therapy can help you process what happened then, what is happening now, and come to a conclusion about how best to move forwards. it sounds to me like you harbor a feeling of guilt about a situation that, no matter what, was not your fault. accident or not, anyone who tries to imply that it was your fault is wrong. i know that my words as a stranger might not carry much weight, but if nothing else I want you to know that you are allowed to stop carrying this weight.

this ask is complex because in all honesty? i don’t think is about aromanticism. as someone who is currently in therapy, and who regularly discusses my own trauma with my therapist, i’m reading a lot of the same types of feeling i’m currently confronting in your ask.

best wishes