#nonpartnering aromantic

[nonamorous-culture-is]

Not a "culture is" submission but I have a question if that's okay.

I recently stumbled upon the terms "nonamorous" and "nonpartnering". Pretty much everywhere I've seen them, they are used synonymously. So I was wondering, is there a difference? Searching tumblr and LGBTQIA+ wikis didn't get me any answers.

There is a difference in the sense that someone can be nonamorous and not nonpartnering or vice versa.

Nonamorous tends to describe one's inclination towards relationships. A nonamorous individual may not feel a pull to enter relationships at all.

Nonpartnering more has to do with one's actions. A nonpartnering individual will likely not enter relationships.

So someone could be nonamorous where they don't tend to enter relationships or have a natural inclination to enter relationships, but not nonpartnering as they enter relationships.

This isn't everything, there are more nuances, but this is the simplest entry to understanding the differences.

[redysetdare]

Hey... Hey if you say you support aspec people that means you also need to respect repulsed aspecs. Non-partnering aspecs. Loveless aspecs. Platonic aspecs. Other a-attraction aspecs. Old aspecs. Young aspecs. Aspecs who use labels you don't understand. Non-sam aspecs. Traumatized aspecs. Dysphoric aspecs.

You cannot only support part of the community. It's either all of us or none of us. You can't play favorites because one kind of aspec makes you feel more comfortable than others.

[it-is-only-a-novel]

[ID: meme with two panels.

Top panel: two red buttons one is labeled with: "supporting nonpartnering aros" the other is labeled with: "supporting partnering aros". There's a hand reaching out, with two fingers going to press both buttons.

Bottom panel: image of an illustrated person sticking their thumb up and smiling approvingly.

End]

[aromanticduck]

I'm non-partnering because I only commit to the bit.

[roses-are-repulsed]

You can be repulsed by QPRs btw. That's a valid form of repulsion. it doesn't matter if it's "not sexual or romantic tho!!!" because repulsion doesn't start and stop at only romance and sex.

Not every aspec has to like the idea of being in a QPR. being repulsed by QPRs is not an anti-QPR stance. it's just a kind of relationship that people can have a multitude of feelings on like any other.

[pokimoko]

A non-partnering aromantic asexual crocodile for the request?

This little guy sure knows how to rock.

[aro-sora]

“Some aros feel romantic attraction”

Very true! Let’s not forget about the aros who do feel romantic attraction and still for whatever reason don’t want a romantic relationship

[ayspec]

nonpartnering and nonfriending folks who are lonely are valid. there’s this unspoken rule that to identify as either, you can’t ever be lonely because that means you’re a faker. if you really don’t want friends or a partner, then why are you lonely? you’re just lying to yourself and are probably depressed and repressing your desire for relationships.

and you know what? that’s bullshit. one: even if you are depressed and don’t want relationships due to repressed attraction, you are still valid in identifying as nonpartnering and/or nonfriending. you can be either of these due to mental illness, trauma, etc. and i’m done with this sanist rhetoric that you’re not allowed to be either if it’s because of mental health issues. i don’t care if you’re nonpartnering or nonfriending because you were born that way or experienced something that made you that way: we’re all equally valid.

two: loneliness does not inherently mean “i’m lonely because i don’t have friends” or “i’m lonely because i don’t have a partner.” for some it does and to not feel lonely they require relationships, while for others it doesn’t and to not feel lonely they only require talking to folks online or saying hi to someone at a store.

loneliness varies between individuals—that’s why an extrovert with a group of close friends might still feel lonely while an introvert with one friend they occasionally talk to might not feel lonely. some folks aren’t lonely because they don't have friends or a partner: one can be lonely for other reasons, and the “cure” for loneliness isn’t inherently to form relationships. you have to dismantle the idea that everyone experiences X the same and requires the same things as you. you’ll be surprised how much bigotry (not just aphobia) can be resolved by understanding this concept.

[fucknugg3t]

Ok now someone make a fwb Elliott mod

fuck it man I’m not leaving this in tags youre going to hear me because I’m CORRECT

[aroallo-corvid]

THIS POLL IS FOR PEOPLE WHO ARE AROMANTIC BUT *NOT* AROALLO.

e.g. just aros, non-sam aros, aroaces, etc.

(explanation for why I have made this poll under the cut)

I made this because I noticed from the poll asking about whether aroallo people were partnering or nonpartnering, a majority (not exactly "sweep" majority but still the winning option) identified as nonpartnering, and I was wondering if aroallo people were more likely than other aromantic people to identify as nonpartnering.

Now that my maths exams are over I have apparently become a massive statistics enthusiast . who <2's sampling bias

[contagious-watermelon]

there's something to be said for the fact that it's so much easier to accept yourself as asexual than as aromantic. when you realize you might be asexual, you have to contend with a giant shrinking of your dating pool, and the realization that you won't be able to have kids the way people want you to. but you — or, I at sixteen — can take comfort in the knowledge that you'll still be able to find love — that thing which we've been told since practically birth that will be the purpose of our life, basically. get a nuclear family, have kids, fall in love. people who are single spend their whole time complaining about it, wishing they had a partner. someone dying alone is the worst thing that can happen to a person. if you're not dating someone, you're alone.

and the alloace (or someone who thinks they are, at least) clings as tightly as they can to the insistence that we can still love — because to deny that would be to doom yourself to forever be alone, unable to find a place in our society. the reason i think that so many aroace people realize their asexuality before their aromanticism is because of exactly this, that asexuality can still be somewhat (with much effort) slotted in to romantic society. aromanticism cannot, and every aro person has to contend with that when they discover their sexuality. (at least, i did.)

a lot of people in the aro community are trying to do the same as the ace community has, to hang onto "we can still love" with the skin of their teeth. to insist that it's still possible to aro people to date — for that way they'll have some way of still fitting in. this, in my opinion, is why qprs have so proliferated throughout the aro community specifically; so much so that being aro, you're assumed to want a qpr as much as an alloromantic person would want a romantic partner. it's a fear of reckoning with what your place your sexuality puts you in wrt society, of facing the fact that you will be forever alone. because, if you spend your whole life being told that a bachelor, a spinster, a crazy cat lady is the worst thing that could happen to you, when you realize you're not going to ever fall in love? you don't want to accept that perhaps they were wrong, that perhaps you can live a completely fulfilling life without having to replace romance with anything at all, be it friendship or a qpr or anything else.

[sourgecko]

Having BPD while also being aroace has been the most unbearably isolating experience for me.

My BPD causes me to fixate on random people and become extremely attached to them and desperately want to be their priority like they are for me, but I never will because even if they don't already have closer friends, they'll definitely prioritise their partner over me. I almost wish I could force myself to date them in spite of my sexuality, but that would be unfair both to them and myself, and I simply don't want any part in that.

People always tell me "you can just meet other aroace people and then you can be their priority!" But it's really not the be-all solution they think it is. Firstly, I cannot control who I develop my FP attachment to and unfortunately it has always been allos or at the very least, partnering people, so far. Secondly, do you realise just how many extremely rare occurrences would all have to align in order for that to solve this issue? I'd have to meet someone who is also aromantic and asexual and non-partnering all at once which is already extremely rare, and they'd have to actually like me and I'd have to like them an equal amount and both of us would have to want to be each other's Priority, the chances of all that overlapping in one person is so rare. Either that or finding an allo person who doesn't treat friendships any lesser than relationships, but in this society that's pretty much impossible.

So yeah, in my 19 years of living, I have yet to know what it feels like to have someone truly be your priority, your favourite person, your best friend, and to be theirs at the same time, and I am emotionally crushed being surrounded by people who all seem to have that for themselves already.

[redysetdare]

enough stories about how someone learns to truely be happy through love. i want a story where someone is desperately seeking out love thinking it's the only way to be happy only for them to learn by the end that happiness is what they make of it and they don't need love at all to make it.

[it-is-only-a-novel]

Me: I'm not interested in a partner

Them:

[ID: meme from Star Wars. A person saying "is that legal?". End]

[aromanticduck]

Being aromantic is like knowing most of your friends will one day move to Paris, but you don't want to live in Paris. And if you ever get sad about how much you're going to miss them when they go, people just try and tell you that you too can find a place in Paris! As if the problem is not having a house yet or being unable to sort out your transport, rather than not wanting to live there at all.

[olivescales3]

Legends of Chima Pride Flags (part 1)

I tried making them align with canon characterization and worldbuilding as much as possible. I took a little bit of liberties to speculate how they would behave in the future too, of course while taking into consideration the effects of canon events.

(do not remove the watermark; do not tag as furry)

Explanations:

Because we don't know if animals feel the same type of sexual/romantic attraction like humans do, the animals from Chima are *at least* on the aroace spectrum due to them literally being just evolved, highly intelligent versions of their predecessors. Chi was made by the Phoenixes, which do not reproduce sexually; Chima animals' behavior and anatomy is almost identical to those of the Phoenixes, since language, third pair of limbs, among other Phoenix traits were projected evolutionarily onto them; this thus leaves the conclusion that 'human' romance and sex is not a thing for Chima animals, since it's also non-existent for the Phoenixes.

Laval is shown, throughout the show, that he is a caring lion who was also willing to choose a mate in the last episode, which is why I chose the partnering aroace flag for him. He doesn't have a specific choice of the partner's sex per se, since there weren't any teenage lions for him to be paired with (and the show not being focused on romance; point being that all romance subplots were pretty forced), and him choosing Li'ella really felt like it was some kind of last resort, so I kept that up to interpretation.

Cragger being hurt by those close to him (his parents' death + Crooler using him), along with his overall discontent about his existence being possibly forsaken due to Crunket, his mother, having an affair with Laval's uncle, Lavertus, all at a young age makes me assign him the non-partnering aroace orientation. During the first season of the show, Cragger's mental state is extremely fuzzy and miserable for a tween; he willingly told Laval to kill him out of spite, then attempted to personally murder him by letting the lion prince drown alone— all of it while behaving and speaking in ways that showed his depressing anguish. However, even if the later seasons show Cragger as a childish youngling that barely has any care in the world, he's still pretty aware about other's wrongdoings; he explicitly called out Fluminox' selfishness— "you let your son escape because you were feeling sorry for yourself?"; and he made backhanded jokes against Lavertus. It's not like Cragger would consciously be non-partnering, but the lingering, instinctive trauma would make him not want to have a mate.

Worriz was an easy pick for non-partnering aroace. He's constantly described in canon as a cunning liar who is willing to hide his true intentions– that is, gaining tremendous advantage in power– beneath treaties and promises. Not only that, but in Legends of Chima: Laval's Journey, Worriz immediately turned against Cragger when he understood that he was not getting his hands on the 'Triple Chi'; in the same game, he was shown to not be afraid of threatening others with extreme violence, like when he straight up told Eris he would maul her after he got his hands on the Triple Chi. His horrible violence doesn't end with just words; he directed attacks against the Eagle Tribe TWICE: once by attempting to pull the entire Eagle Spire down, which would cause as many casualties as possible, and twice by setting the Eagle Library on fire and subsequently erasing the tribe's culture and discoveries from existence, an event that happened in Laval's Journey. Of course, he'd make an exception for Windra since they're both vicious and violent... Worriz' violence is not the 'cause' of him being non-partnering; he is, in general, a real and terrifying threat, and would take advantage of anyone if he could— he wouldn't see relationships as innocent and would twist it to gain some kind of power.

Crooler was a hard pick. It's not known much of her besides her using Cragger, but the reason behind those acts are shown explicitly in the show to be envy, and not personal like one would assume. She was capable of demonstrating remorse to a certain extent, and told Cragger a few times she loved him. The honesty of these emotions are not known, but the fact that she was able to show a less 'evil' side of her places her view of relationships into question. If she grows into a better person, then she might get into a healthy relationship, but if she continues to be cunning then she won't. This nuance made me choose demi-partnering for her.