Lots of other folks have been saying this but I figured I’d add some visuals. This one’s in honor of all the aromantic non-ace-spectrum folks.
(Image 1: A circle labeled “asexual spectrum,” containing a smaller circle labeled “aromanticism.” The image is captioned “No.”
Image 2: A circle labeled “asexual spectrum,” overlapping with a different circle, labeled “aromantic spectrum.” The area of overlap is labeled “aro aces.” The image is captioned “Yes.”)
we fell out of touch when i moved back from LA but will is such a genuinely sweet person & i’m so happy for him & i highly encourage yall to check him out
About a week ago, @alloverthegaf, was talking about how
confusing it was to want relationships, but also be turned off by them. I’ve
been thinking about that a lot.
I’m aromantic-asexual (don’t experience romantic or sexual
attraction). I’m not sure how much of that orientation is an essential part of
me, and how much is shaped by my experiences. In the same way, I’m not sure how
much akio/lithoromantism (feeling romantic feelings, but only in the abstract,
or if they aren’t reciprocated) is shaped by experiences. I don’t think it
really matters. All three labels might resonate with you, or maybe the feelings
associated with one (or more) are more like a trap you don’t want to define
you.
(Note: I compare identity and trauma here. If discussion of mental health and sexual/romantic identity together is upsetting to you, this might not be safe to read.)
Relationships have a lot of components. Discomfort or fear
can come different sources. Sometimes it can be helpful to examine your
emotions and feeling about these individual parts:
Friendship – Do you have trouble forming bonds with people? Don’t
really enjoy their company? Tend to drift away from people easily or often?
Trust – Is it hard for you to believe other people? Are you
always worried about what others think of you? How are you at being vulnerable?
Commitment – Are you comfortable making promises, being
relied on to help with long term goals, or being unable to change plans without
someone else’s input?
Physical proximity – do roommates drive you crazy? Does the
idea of having to share a bedroom, or see someone EVERY DAY, make you anxious?
Sex – Do you fear, or are you disgusted by sex? Are you
worried about being pressured into something you don’t want to be? Do you feel
sex is necessary for love?
Romance – Do romantic gestures confuse you? Are you uncomfortable
with poetry, flowers, and big emotional displays? Do you feel like you’re doing
relationship wrong if you don’t like anniversaries?
I found romance a huge turn-off, trust and commitment terrified
me, and I ended up being neutral about sex. So, I got counselling for the trust
and commitment issues, found a guy who didn’t understand romance either, and
muddled through the sex until I figured it out.
For me, ‘lithoromantic’
isn’t a label I wanted, even though the idea of a relationship being
reciprocated terrified me. It wasn’t really me, it was about fear.. ‘Aromantic’
and ‘asexual’ were me, though. They weren’t things that made me feel broken, or
came up in therapy when I dealt with my issues. Yes, I was pressured into sex
by a peer as a preteen. But having issues doesn’t mean everything about you is
a disorder. My asexuality was a part of me long before my trauma.
You have to figure out for yourself what parts of
relationship aren’t for you. Some people don’t want sex because of trauma, but desire
to get to a place where they can enjoy it. Others never want sex, but feel that
their terror at making promises is harming them. Maybe you can be comfortable
in a relationship, but only with separate living spaces and a great deal of patience
as you learn trust.
The important thing, I think, is to figure out the why of
your feelings. Then you can decide what to embrace, what to reluctantly accept,
and what you want to work to change.
Note: I am REALLY not saying that these identities are mental issues. What I’m trying to say that relationships are confusing and different orientations can make them even more so. Also, mental health issues are common, lots of us have them, and they affect every aspect of your life. Learn to understand yourself and make things a little easier.
I would really really like an explicitly noromo fic challenge where the focus was on writing platonic relationships between characters with the same intimacy and intensity that fandom writes romance.
Not like, that kind of t for teen gen which is really just romance that fades tastefully to black nonsense, but like. no holds barred, these people mean E V E R Y T H I N G to each other and are the most important people in the world and they would do anything for the other person but without the assumed support of romantic and sexual expectation and intention underpinning it. Actual ensemble gen, or us vs the world, or whatever. just. idk. there are more types of important relationships than just romantic ones and i’d like to see more of that.
I’d nail this.
Um. No innuendo intended.
Would anyone like to help me host this? Because I would love to organize something like this.
Trying to explain to people how I can feel sensual attraction without any romantic or sexual attraction is a surprisingly difficult thing to do. It’s surprising because it really isn’t a foreign concept.
It’s kinda like seeing a really cute, happy, or sleepy animal and getting the urge to pet, cuddle, and hold it. Not because you have romantic or sexual desires for the animal, but because you feel drawn to give it affection, and doing so makes you happy.
It’s also like holding something of great sentimental value. You feel the need to keep it close to you because it’s special and important to you.
For me, there are just some people I get the deepest sensual attraction for. All I want to do is hold them and cuddle them and give them soft little kisses and tell them how wonderful they are and how important they are to me. I don’t have any sexual desire for them. I don’t have any romantic feelings for them. They’re just really special to me and I feel drawn to give them a lot of affection because doing so makes me happy and will hopefully make them happy too.
If you’re close to your family, or have really close friends – it’s kind of similar to that, in my opinion. I feel similarly towards my husband and my little sister. I want to cuddle them, be close to them, hang out, talk, be around them more then anyone else. Looking at their faces makes me feel happy.
Looking at my husband, my heart sometimes feels full to bursting. It’s the same with my kids. I love them so much it’s hard to contain.
The animal comparison seems pretty apt, too. Sometimes, being with a pet can be pure joy. I really like this post.
Thanks so much for your question, darling! Romantic love differs for everyone, so a few
of the mods have come together to give you our opinions 🙂
What Defines Romantic Love?
Mod Joanna says:
Hi, love! I
appreciate this question, because it’s something I’ve been working out myself
for a long time. I’m demisexual, so I
really don’t experience physical/romantic attraction to anyone until I’ve built
a friendship with them. That’s always
made it difficult for me to separate romantic love from a strong friendship,
because for me, they’re nearly one and the same.
But since romance is a big part of my writing (and has been
for several years), I’ve learned much more about romantic love and how to
separate it (fictionally and in reality) from platonic love. In my experience, romantic love…
Functions, at its base, like a strong friendship. The process of meeting a person, learning
about them, becoming attached to them, desiring to spend time with them –
these phases exist in all relationships.
Falling in love seems to happen faster, though, because it’s accelerated
by physical attraction.
Includes physical attraction. Friends can be attracted to each other, but
romantic, prolonged attraction grows and develops over time. Affection tends to “blind” or warp one’s vision,
so that even mundane traits or actions can become attractive. Here’s
an LGF post on growing attraction!
Accelerates physical intimacy. Romantic partners, after a certain amount of
time together, have decreased physical boundaries between each other. The safer two people feel around each other
physically, the more affectionate and comfortable they become. Often, couples start to think of each other
as physical extensions of themselves (which is why some couples feel
comfortable sharing drinks/gum/clothes etc.).
This can be stronger for – but is not exclusive to – sexually active
couples.
Fosters a deep, absolute affection for a person’s strengths,
flaws, quirks, and humor. It gives a desire to be closer to that person – to know
them completely. Romantic love is a
long-term investment in someone’s hopes and dreams, and in helping them to
achieve those dreams. It’s a hope to
see someone grow in good ways, to protect them from bad things, and to make
them happy.
Inspires growth and self-love. Feeling someone else’s affection and
investment both spurs healthier life choices and alters one’s image of
themselves. People in healthy relationships
are more likely to take better care of themselves, to be more ambitious and
confident, and to be more content in hard times.
Ultimately, though, the biggest difference for me is the falling-in-love phase. It’s much more rapid, and much less controllable than the beginning phase of a platonic friendship. In contrast, the later phases of romance – facing differences and staying in love – are more trying than in extended friendship. Being that intensely close to another person is a challenge as much as it is a pleasure. Don’t forget that.
Mod Gen says:
Hey! When I saw this question I immediately had a few ideas,
as I’m asexual
and demiromantic and relationships for me are primarily non-physical and
more about romance and friendship. For me, romance isn’t so different from
friendship – I’m in a relationship that also blurs the lines of being a QPR
(queer-platonic relationship). Our relationship started as a friendship and
slowly developed into more romantic feelings. In my opinion and experience,
relationships/romance that have a basis in friendship are usually more
successful/healthy. Usually, romantic partners are also friends, some more
so than others. For this reason, I would say friendship is equally, if not
more, important than romance in a lot of cases (in my humble opinion).
Showing that two characters who are in a romantic relationship are also
friends is very important. They should have some sort of chemistry, or
banter, they should support each other, etc. etc.
Okay, I’m about to get real sappy: for me, falling in love with someone is
beautiful. I can barely begin to put into words how much I care for my s/o,
how much I miss her when I’m not around, how I can almost feel a physical
ache when she’s not there, how much I want her to be happy. I know her like
I know myself (probably better, actually), and I just feel so calm when I’m
around her. She puts me at ease, and simply being with her can make me feel
so much better and improve my mood. We don’t even have to talk or interact.
My heart doesn’t flutter when I see her; it calms.
Mod Daenerys says:
Hey there! First off, I want to say that a strong, healthy
romantic relationship should also be a great friendship. In my opinion,
the best romantic relationships are built off of friendships – not to mention,
in fiction it is very easy to fall into the controversial love-at-first sight
trope, which it seems like you are trying to avoid. It is also my opinion that
we tend to place more value on romantic relationships than we do on
friendships, which are equally important, if not more important for some
people.
I’m asexual, and biromantic, so relationships in my case are
more focused on those friendship sort of aspects, whether romantic or platonic.
As for falling in love, I think it comes down to having someone that you want
to be deeply, deeply close to. You find yourself wanting to place their
happiness above your own, you start thinking in terms of ‘we’ instead of
‘I’…that sort of thing. A romantic relationship seems to me to be about
holding each other up, pushing each other to achieve your goals, while also giving
them the space and freedom to be themselves. Falling in love with someone is to
have them teach you something about yourself, about the world. There’s a
certain closeness there that I think is different from friendships, and this
can come through in very subtle ways.
In terms of why some people work better as
friends than lovers, I think it comes down to that level of closeness. Romantic
partners tend to make more collective decisions, they work towards goals
together, they may eventually want to build a life together. Yet, we all have
friends that we love very dearly, but we know that if we tried to take on a
task like that together we would be at each other’s throats – either because we
have different goals, we think differently, or we tackle problems differently,
to the point that we piss each other off. There has to be a willingness to work
through problems together, things that don’t always apply even in our closest
friendships.
I hope some of this helps you to make the distinction between romantic and platonic love, and to really explore romantic love in your fiction 🙂 If you have any more questions, be sure to let us know!
I guess this is probably a queerplatonic threesome, and sex is mentioned? Plus the strange gaps in Kon’s knowledge due to his upbringing? Reading shipping fic while being aro-ace sends my brain to weird places.
(Possibly squiky to aces who don’t work quite like me? Be careful?)
After getting random ‘I’m so grateful you’re back’ hugs from Red Robin!Tim and sort of freezing up that one time, Kon starts making an effort to casually be around him a lot. He keeps up conversations with Tim while moving around the Tower so that Tim follows him from room to room. He sits next to Tim on couches. He normalizes Tim having company.
Now, Kon sometimes misses some pretty basic things. Usually, Cassie has his back. Or Tim. But circumstances have left them with three overlapping blind spots:
When Cassie first had sex with Kon at Titans Tower, she had to come to terms with the fact that her obsessively vigilant friend might see the footage.
Tim turned off any emotional response to other people’s sexy times early in his career. Surveillance of gross crime lords. ~shiver~
Cadmus Labs programmers were a little uncomfortable about programming sex stuff, and kind of glossed over sexual mores.
So when Kon sometimes casually makes out with Cassie while Tim is in their bedroom, nobody realizes how INCREDIBLY WEIRD AND INAPPROPRIATE this is.
Which means that when she notices and hisses,
‘TIM IS HERE’
one time, Kon looks completely baffled.
And her,
‘you do NOT have sex in front of people!’
is equally confusing. Which leads to dawning horror as she realizes that they HAVE been.
That’s bad. But it’s her panicked,
‘Have you been trying to seduce TIM?!’ that kind of messes everything up.
(Tim is right there.)
So Kon’s all,
‘What? NO! He is not in to me AT ALL.’
Because Tim totally had to explain sexuality to Kon and Bart and this involved lots of invasive questions. Neither of them really got the idea of any gender being inherently more attractive, though for somewhat diametric reasons. It eventually led to Tim explaining platonic attraction using their relationships as examples. And being able to provide absolutely no satisfactory labels for himself at all. (I’m not getting in to where exactly I see him as NOT fitting completely on the aro or ace spectrums. It’s complicated.)
‘I mean, I’d be fine if he was – would you have a problem with him having sex with us?!’
Like the idea had never even occurred to him. And she’s all,
‘Of course not!’
without thinking. And then realizes that it’s true. The idea seems completely natural? Not something either is LONGING for, exactly, but if that’s what he wanted?
At this point, of course, Tim walks out of the room. He is not dealing with any of this. He is going to quietly freak out far away, which is the correct and logical response.
Kon and Cassie are also freaking out, because now Tim isn’t going to talk to them for weeks while he avoids emotions. And Kon still isn’t sure quite where he went wrong?
Tim doesn’t talk to them for weeks while he avoids emotions.
Then, some time later, he casually follows Kon and Cassie into their bedroom again. Sits down in a chair and gets out his laptop. ‘Is it okay if I DON’T join you?’ With this arched brow and almost smirk. (There’s no sex that time, because it’s awkward. And this thing with him isn’t about sex. But Tim is there.)
They don’t say dating, because they aren’t, really. Tim is just their best friend. As important to them as they are to each other.
He isn’t particularly interested in being around when they’re making out. But his heartbeat always slows and calms when Cassie and Kon are enjoying being together, no matter what they’re doing. And maybe he sleeps in the bed with them sometimes, because he never really gets over being touch starved. (Not after sex, because the bed is gross. Ew.)
It’s platonic, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t important. There are a lot of different types of love.
because the valentines are coming and people are asking questions
I was once talking to an authour about my experiences as an aromantic-asexual, helping her decide on directions for a character she was writing. And I discovered that she equated aromantism with a lack of love.
Alloromantics/allosexuals listen: THIS COULDN’T BE FURTHER FROM THE TRUTH. Aromantic people have all the same love and caring as everyone else, we just don’t have some of that love tied up with attraction. All of our pool of love is free for friends and family.
(Note that, like all other groups of people, some aromantics are less caring than others. Some passionately love a few friends, some love everyone, some are closed down for now and deciding if they want to open themselves up to hurt again. We’re not inherently more or less loving than anyone else.)
tl;dr: aromantic people are just as loving as everyone else. The love others have for romantic partners isn’t missing in us, it’s free to be applied to any type of relationship we want.
some people say there’s a red string that connects fated lovers
psa don’t look at the notes bc there are so many people completely missing the point that these are non-romantic strings of fate and making jokes about where the red string “must be” and it’s making me really angry bc we can’t even have a good artistic representation of aromanticism without people desperately grasping for a romantic interpretation somehow
like the artist has specifically requested that people stop making this about their fandoms and romance bc it’s a personal piece about aromanticism
its great i loVE IT??? we need more aromantic… anything rlly and this is really beautiful!
Are there
resources for asexuals and aromantics that try to explain what sexual and
romantic attraction are like? Or any people who experience either that are
willing to try to explain?
(Warning
for bewildered rambling that may be disrespectful of queer individuals. I think
I don’t understand sexuality on a pretty basic level, so my questions are
probably ignorant and maybe rude.)
Like, I
don’t really understand what makes a person NOT pansexual? Why are you
attracted to one gender and not another? Is it appearance? If it is, why do you
STOP feeling attraction when you find out that someone who looks like the
subset of people you are attracted to isn’t actually part of that subset? Or do
you? Like, if the attractive guy is actually a lady (or non-binary), are you
less attracted suddenly? What if someone is bigender? I mean, they’re the SAME
PERSON?! But do you feel different when they feel a different gender?
And, I’m
really embarrassed to admit this, but I totally thought attraction must be
based on what private parts you preferred having sex with until recently.
Because I can NOT figure out why looking at a person would lead to a desire to
have sex or be romantic with them? I assumed it MUST have something to do with the type of sex you were hard-wired to enjoy. I only have an aesthetic appreciation for
people (with isn’t really based on their gender, I often think that someone
looks cool in a similar way to a building that I really like, or a mountain). And I slightly
prefer the idea of sex if the other person has a penis? It seems less icky??
But how are sex and gender and appearance and everything related?
I realize
that sexual identity isn’t related to the privates of the person someone is
attracted to now. I’m just not sure what it IS related to.
What makes
someone attractive? What makes someone not? I get that some people are more
attractive than other people. But if someone is physically attractive to you,
why does it matter what their gender is? Why do so many people’s pool of sexually
and/or romantically attractive people restricted to one gender?
kiragecko 