Happy pride month to aromantics, asexuals, aplatonics and agender people!!

Feeling a bit philosophical here...

So I think love IS an important part of being human (one of many). Know how the ancient greeks had seven different words for love? (Actually eight, but I'm leaving out obsessive love cause that shit ain't healthy):

Eros - romantic love

Philia - affectionate, friendly love

Agape - selfless, universal love

Storge - unconditional, familiar love

Ludus - playful, flirtatious love

Pragma - committed, enduring love

Philautia - self love

And I think it's beautiful, because it's not a ranking system. If you don't feel certain types of love, you don't have to 'settle' for the rest, because each type is still love and love is no limited recource. And an endless amount of love is enough to fill any life with happiness.

There are so many things to love - people, animals, nature, art, music, stars, rocks, your houseplant, your favourite tshirt, pizza, a trashy tv show. Yourself. It seems so silly that people think that, in this big world, someone couldn't find happiness just because their love isn't focussed on that tiny fraction of the universe that is made of human beings.

Submitted June 21, 2023

★ coffee aroace flags !

5 and 6 stripe versions

for any aroace people to use!

READ MY DNI/DNU BEFORE INTERACTING

*Me, poking at my gender with a stick*

am I sure that agender doesn't fit? Really, really sure?

*pokes it again, sighs*

No I'm pretty sure there's some sort of gender there, dont know what, but it's there

*pokes it again*

But it would be so funny if I was anxious, adhd, autistic, aromantic, asexual, and agender

*pokes gender again and glares*

You are keeping my from perfect identity alliteration

Once I’d seen him stand behind my mother’s market stall when a woman held up a necklace my mother made, and ask him how much it was, and he turned to my mother, said Rose? And he said it like something in him grew towards the light.

— Raymond Antrobus, from "Arose," All the Names Given

I came out as aroace to an lgbt friend to day.

Not only didn't I get ANY aphobia, I even got an "it's tough to be a god" joke💚💜

I feel amazing

It baffles me that so many people don’t understand that what makes a QPR or platonic relationship is commitment.

Like that’s it. It is the fact that you are committing to prioritize someone in your daily life. That’s the most simple explanation. Yes it’s different than a committed romantic relationship, but both have the expectation that you are committed to your partner, and shape your life around that.

Am I completely off base here? It seems really simple to me. You communicate and commit to each other.

I’ve never seen anyone put it like this, and that confuses the hell out of me.

Submitted July 5, 2023

I wish I liked aro and/or ace fanfictions, but most of the ones I found are just... not written naturally. So many of them make the cold, emotionless character be the aro/ace one, and they'll inevitably have a scene that goes "Tabitha, you know that as an aromatic and/or asexual, I do not have attraction towards other people. However I desire a relationship for social connection." Why must it sound so clinical each time? The character doesn't talk like that in canon???

Submitted June 14, 2023

a word of advice to any worried aces or aros:

One experience or one exception (or really even a couple) to your usual lack of attraction does not automatically cancel out your identity. You're allowed to continue to identify the way you have and have that one case that's different. The only time you "need" to reconsider your label is when it no longer comforts you. Attraction is a weird and nebulous thing, and it could randomly decide it wants to bug you when it never has before. You're not a bad ace/aro for continuing to identify with it if you experience some attraction. You are not using the rest of us. You are with us, just as you had been.

Submitted May 26, 2023

Not to be pretentious but, as an aroace philosophy major, i can confidently affirm that there are more than a million reasons to why love isn't what makes us human

(Btw, this is a positive post if you’re looking for one!)

I’m aroace, and one of my best friends is bi. We’re both in the same year of high school, and she was the first one of our friend group to get a boyfriend. When she did, I was really scared she’d abandon us, but she didn’t! She didn’t make him her main priority, and she stuck with us.

We have this inside joke thingy for some reason that we’re platonically married and we adopted one of our other friends as our child, and she has never. Stopped. Saying that. Even when she had a boyfriend! She told me today that no matter what, even when/if she gets a romantic partner, I’ll always be her platonic spouse, and I am SO HAPPY! It’s kinda stupid, but I’m so happy that our weird half-joking found family matters to her! She’s not gonna put romance over friendship! Our friendship matters! I won’t be alone, people won’t leave me for romantic love, MY AROACE SELF REALLY MATTERS!

Submitted June 15, 2023

i'm ace and aro and i'm scared i'll be alone forever.

how do i reconcile all this with the fact that:

i *do* crave deep, emotional connection?

i *do* want to have someone in my life who i can turn to and feel like they get me and will listen to me infodump?

i do want a someone who will be my emergency contact

i do want someone who will accept--not just tolerate--me

genuinely, but terrifiedly, asking: am i doomed to feel endless loneliness for the rest of my life?

Submitted June 12, 2023

so you know how a lot of queer people grow up in a homophobic and purity obsessed environment? i feel like i almost had the opposite. i grew up in a relatively sex positive household with decent enough sex ed at school. abstinence was never pushed on me. i didn't grow up feeling like there was anything wrong with queerness... unless that queerness was aromanticism and asexuality. yes, i was lucky to grow up in an open minded household, but that doesn't mean i had a perfect childhood. no matter if you grew up in a conservative environment or an open minded one, if you're an aspec kid, you gonna get fucked up.

if you grew up conservative, it might seem like a virtue at first. you're one of the "good" kids because you're not interesting in dating, you're perfectly happy to "wait" because you don't understand what the rush is. until you become an adult and suddenly you're hounded with questions. why don't you have a boyfriend/girlfriend? who are you going to marry? when are you going to marry? when you get married you'll be able to have lots of sex, as a reward for waiting. what do you mean you don't actually want sex? that's unnatural. you need to reproduce. now it's no longer a good thing to be disinterested. there is something wrong with you.

if you grew up in an open minded environment, it's very isolating. from my experience at least, you're hyperaware that everyone else is experiencing these feelings that you don't, and everyone is saying how normal it is, all teenagers have these feelings. you're not interested in boys? it's okay to like girls. look how progressive we are. why do you still look lost? who do you have a crush on? when are you going to start dating? why can't you be a normal teenager? you'll understand when you're older. sex is a normal and expected part of being an adult. why do you look uncomfortable? when are you going to lose your virginity? virginity is shameful. it means you're ugly. what a loser.

so yeah. i guess i'm lucky to grow up in the household i did. i'm trans and so grateful my family is supportive. but they don't know about my aroaceness. it's the part of my identity that makes me feel the least safe. i feel like i have the opposite problem of an allo person who grew up conservative. i'm an aspec person who grew up in an environment where sex was seen as normal and healthy to the point that not being interested was seen as abnormal and unhealthy. no matter what, aspec kids are shamed. the best case scenario would be a gay kid growing up in the latter situation. there is no best case scenario for aspec kids. and there won't be until aromanticism and asexuality are given widespread awareness and acceptance.

Submitted May 13, 2023

I desperately wish I had a platonic partner. I crave all of the activities and the exclusiveness of dating but without the sex or romance.

Submitted May 20, 2023

To be honest I wish that in adult media there was more stuff about friendship

Like I know that it's seen a childish but I got really tired of almost all shows and movies being about love

I also wish a more accurate representation of aro and ace people. Because aro and ace people can love too, not all of them but still

Submitted April 18, 2023

Finds out I'm ace - never really cared about sex anyway.

Finds out im aro - never needed relationships either

Finds out I'm agender - that's probably why I've felt like a body all this time

Finds out I'm aplatonic - okay, how much deeper will my loneliness go?

Finds out I'm autistic - goddammit

Submitted April 29, 2023