#aromantic inclusion

[corelliaxdreaming]

I have no intent of playing Fate of the Empress, but the way they openly advertise the fact that you can be straight, gay - or play without romance at all makes me so freaking happy.

[amalgamezz]

things that allos do that make aspecs accuse them of being aphobic:

mocking their labels and vocab

invalidating their existence

trivializing their experience

excluding them from the queer community

comparing them to paedophiles and MAP groups

comparing them to their oppressors

things that aspecs do that make allos accuse them of being homophobic/queerphobic:

existing

talking about their personal experience and headcanons

expressing their wish to be included in the queer community

[codthefishgod]

To all the people who think aspec people aren't LGBTQIA+ because we aren't "discriminated against enough", here's a lovely list of reasons why you need to educate yourself:

- We suffer from dehumanisation, people actively devaluing or even erasing our humanity because of our identities (The voidpunk community is heavily supported by aspec people because of this)

- We suffer from self hatred due to feeling as if and being told we are broken, that no one can be happy unless they're in a romantic/sexual relationship, because of allonormativity and amatonormativity that actively damages our mental health

- Amatonormativity shapes laws that put us at an active disadvantage, such as giving married people financial and legal benefits

- Aspec people have been victims of conversion therapy, correctional rape, a lower quality of life, and other effects of being a marginalised and oppressed group

- We suffer from our identities being pathologised and deal with medical stigma because of this, causing many of us to feel unwelcome in and even avoid health care settings

- We suffer from our identities being erased, which can range from people completely denying our existence and people equating it to celibacy, to an almost complete absence of aspec representation in the media (It's been getting better lately, especially for alloaces and aroaces, but I have yet to ever see a canon aroallo character, and representation for those on the spectrum rather than in the extremes is often ignored)

- YOU are creating a hateful, exclusionary space in a community meant to be about inclusion. The same thing that happens to us happens to bisexual people, to polyamorous people, and other identities that are "disputed." In a community meant to be about rejecting the norm, YOU are shoving us out because we don't fit the norm of being LGBTQIA+. Because we're not enough like you.

These are only a few examples of aphobia that people like me deal with. Discrimination and oppression against aspec people stretches far beyond this.

But even if it didn't, it is disrespectful and harmful to everyone involved to gatekeep membership in the community based on oppression and discrimination.

We aren't LGBTQIA+ because we experience oppression. We are LGBTQIA+ because our existence alone goes against heteronormativity and other societal norms forced upon us.

[yiddishfiles]

Something that i think is equally important to saying "asexual people aren't asexual because of trauma/body issues and asexuality isn't a phase" is saying "for some people their asexuality IS because of trauma/body issues and it might be something that can be worked through with therapy/recovery but they r still asexual" lots of ppl are asexual for lots of different reasons and u can't go around prescribing the ace experience

[inkkkkss]

"Aro/aces aren't part of the lgbtq+ community , they don't face any oppression "

The LGBTQIA+ community is for people who deviate from the cishetnorm. Its for people that don't fit the image of liking the opposite gender sexually and romantically, while identifying as their AGAB.

Aros and aces don't fit into the ideal hetronormative identity therfore THEY ARE PART OF THE COMMUNITY

[voids-ideas]

"It's forced inclusion this" "it's forced inclusion that"

GOOD

If we were included voluntarily, we wouldn't need to be talking about inclusion

[enbeemagical]

normalize being a little bit in love with your friends

normalize being not at all in love with anything

normalize love being confusing and weird as hell

normalize love not being romantic

normalize love not being

normalize not loving

normalize loving in the wrong way

just. normalize being unapologetically yourself

[thereallyreallylatebird]

Daily reminder that using "asexual" as an umbrella term for ace-spec identities is fine and good.

But also,

Daily reminder that using "asexual" as an umbrella term for ace *and* aro-spec identities is not.

Aromanticism is not a subset of asexuality, and should not be grouped under the term asexual as if it is. Doing so erases aromantic allosexual people by making being asexual a barrier to entry to being aromantic.

No, it doesn't matter that's how it's been used in the past. Terminology changes. No, it doesn't matter if you don't mean it that way, people trying to figure out their identity will still see that you're grouping aromantic under asexual and assume they can't be aromantic because they're not asexual (partially why it took me so long to figure out I'm aro).

That's all.

[fixing-bad-posts]

[Image description: The words, "AROS & ACES belong in OUR SPACES," coloured using the colours of the aromantic pride flag, asexual pride flag, and the 9-stripe Gilbert Baker pride flag. The text is overlaid on a blurry image of lavender flowers.]

---

i was inspired to make a text graphic based on one of my first and most popular posts

[esf-art-and-design]

You wanna know something crazy?

I work for a LGBTQ+/Queer non-profit, I’ve had to sit in on training seminars on how to best support our community, how to create a space that is actually safe for everyone in the community, etc.

You wanna know the one thing that was emphasized by these professionals running these seminars (who are also a part of the community btw)

Telling queer people what their labels for their identity ought to be is extremely harmful.

Gatekeeping the community from other people who are figuring themselves out because of labels is harmful?! Shocker I know, but yes it is.

You know what this means right? It means that:

You don’t get to tell a guy experimenting with queer sex that he’s gay/bi/queer/etc if he ID’s as straight

You don’t get to tell a woman experimenting with queer sex that she’s lesbian/bi/queer/etc. if she ID’s as straight

You don’t get to tell aces who are hetero sexual/Romantic that they don’t belong in queer spaces

You don’t get to blame bi lesbians/m-spec women for creepy cishet men entering wlw spaces to hit on women (in an entitled way) (that’s called misogyny babes)

You don’t get to tell someone they are unlovable/not deserving of a relationship/etc. because of the label they use

You don’t get to tell people that actions invalidate their labels because “actions speak louder than words”

You don’t get to demand to know what labels someone uses because of their actions. (Or you don’t force someone to out themselves)

You don’t apply labels to someone from pure speculation (you could be outing someone and putting them in danger)

You don’t get to tell people their labels are “contradictory” or “don’t make sense” and demand they choose one label over the other

Other Labels cannot harm your own identity, and if you act like it can your wrong and harming the community

And ultimately, It means that according to actual professionals within the lgbtq non-profit space, the exclusionists in the community are wrong and are doing immeasurable harm.

Basically what I’m saying is that everyone is welcome here on my blog, policing identity is harmful, and yes, the exclusionists that told you that your identity is invalid or made fun of you for your identity we’re so fucking wrong.

Everyone who experiences sexual orientation, attraction, gender identity, and gender expression differently belongs within our community.

Gatekeeping only keeps people deserving of services away from the spaces where they can get those services. It keeps them away from peer support. And that’s not good, especially if you know the statistics for self harm and suicide within the community.

[citnamora]

What is more aro than reworking the very definition of love?

[ceresia-selestarr]

Yknow I think people should be able to label themselves however the fuck they want when it comes to sexuality/gender and that includes people who don’t want labels at all. If you see someone who labels themself a certain way, and your first thought is something along the lines of “They don’t fit the requirements of that label” instead of something like “Let me explore how they view themselves and how they label themselves in order to better understand why they want those labels, and how that overall fits into how they want to be perceived.”, then there’s something wrong.

These spaces don’t exist to exclude others, they don’t exist to tell someone they’re wrong, and they especially don’t exist to hurt others. Everyone has their own self identity, learn to respect it, because it isn’t that hard and it’s not gonna fuck up your life if someone goes against your preconceived ideas of how certain things should be. Acceptance doesn’t cost anything, but exclusivity and oppression does.

Let people be themselves, it really won’t hurt you.

[lizzieraindrops]

like oh my god. yes ikora is extremely aromantic. yes chalco is the love of her soul. yes it's entirely platonic and all-consuming. yes she's also demi for eris. yes it's incredibly lesbian/sapphic. yes that's equally important. yes this does incorporate them into the greater reef polycule. what's not clicking

[demiaroacejolynekujo]

Lately, I've been seeing discourse about if it's okay to romantically ship Alastor with other characters regardless of the fact he's canonically aroace. I've decided to put my two cents into this as an aroace person.

As a romance and sex favored aroace person, using the whole "ace/aro people can be in relationships" thing should only be used when aphobes and exclusionists are trying to dehumanize Ace/Aro people, not in shipping discourse. I understand that people are trying to say that in good faith. However, that statement can be used as a way to exclude and invalidate romance/sex repulsed Ace/Aro people.

The only way it's okay to romantically ship Ace/Aro characters is if those said characters aren't romance/sex repulsed. Alastor is clearly a romance and sex repulsed aroace character, and putting him in romantic/sexual ships ignores his undesire for a romantic and sexual relationship. However, there's nothing wrong with putting him in platonic or "frienemies"/rival ships as long as you're not doing it for the purpose of wanting him in a romantic/sexual relationship.

I can not speak for the entirety of the Ace/Aro community, but it's important to acknowledge that there's nothing wrong with aroace people who don't pursue romantic/sexual relationships. It's completely valid, and it's also important to normalize the diversity of the Asexual, Aromantic, and aroace spectrums.

[lesbianpolls]

question: for my lesbian oriented aroaces, what do you primarily call yourself?

1) lesbian oriented aroace

2) oriented aroace lesbian

3) aroace lesbian

4) oriented aroace

5) other

[aro-who-reads]

Found another "aromantic" mention in a book out in the wild, in Australian queer fairytale retelling anthology 'Everything Under the Moon'.

According to the forward, one of the stories is about an aromantic character!