#THIS is the aromantic experience

[aestophobia]

I'm so in love with my friends. Every little mannerism or personality trait. I don't know how every one of them isn't being bombarded with love confessions when they're all so perfect and beautiful and funny and kind and

[mikeru-funzies]

OH MY GOD

Cupid missed

[sunbloomdew]

do you ever see a person and you are overcome with incredible fondness? and you just think "oh." but not in a romantic or sexual way you are just filled with warmth and it makes you happy, it just does. and you think "i'm so happy you exist. i'm happy you are somewhere out there in the world, doing your thing". it's love but also not entirely

like people are lovely and i feel it in my entire chest like a burning candle that smells like roses and a sunny day

[our-arospec-experience]

Love makes us human? No. Chins. Chins make us human.

[morally-earl-gray]

part of being aroace is going "we're too young to date, we're just kids" for most of your life because it was true. and then you're in high school and suddenly everyone is dating, and you're still going "we're too young to date, we're just kids". and then your classmates are fucking in the school bathrooms and your friends are coming to school covered in hickeys and your best friend has a boyfriend that she plans to marry, and you're still going "we're too young for this, we're just kids." And then you realize that you're not a kid anymore, you're not too young for this, and that you're just... different

[thepileofclothesonyourdesk]

[notbrucewayne48]

"aphobia doesn't exist"

bitch literally not that long ago an aroace youtuber animator was insulted by almost half of its community for being it

[infiniteorangethethird]

btw shoutout to those who feel they are aspec because of their autism. To the aros, aces, apls, afams, and everyone else who feels their orientation is a direct result of their neurodivergency. Your feelings are valid, and you're not "just reinforcing stereotypes" by being yourself, bc you're not a character in a story, but a real person with real, lived experiences. I see you and I feel you

[cosmicredcadet]

The response to "ace people are just virgins who can't get laid!" Shouldn't be "ace people can still have sex!" but instead " being a virgin isn't a bad thing."

The response to "aro people are just heartless freaks!" Shouldn't be "aro people can still feel love!" And instead be "not feeling love or other emotions doesn't make you a bad person."

Instead of pushing the idea that aspec people can be "normal like allos" we should instead be trying to normalize aspec experiences. Yes aspec people can be normal because aspec identities are normal. Some aros fall in love. some aces have sex. but they should not be the only valid aspec experiences. We should not use these experiences to make the aspec identity more palatable to amatonormativity and allos.

[queerglassgrass]

''But aromantics can still date-'' we can also beat you to death. do you want us to beat you to death?

[THIS POST IS ABOUT AROMANTICISM. DO NOT DETAIL. PLEASE VRO IM SO TIRED]

This post has been edited to come off as less hostile. Just don't start any drama or beef and we'll be chill! :3

The people in the notes are honestly so based help (yapping under cut)

Main reason I edited this is because I don't want alloromantics to start beefing with me or make this post about them but honestly if you can't respect aromantics you can go fuck yourself and find a different post because that's what this post is about :)

The fact that we CAN date doesn't mean we SHOULD/HAVE TO

The aros who want to date do (live your truth, partnering aros :3), and the ones that don't? News flash, THEY DON'T! :)

Love isn't what makes us human, and dehumanizing aromantics just because they don't feel romantic attraction is gross, and you shouldn't feel the need to jUsTiFy our existence by saying that we can date.

[bloggingboutburgers]

Yeah, I know "not all aro/aces" and all, but please don't use "not all aro/aces" as an excuse to not explore anything exclusively aro/ace ever. Otherwise any trace of aro/aceness might end up effectively lost to fandom osmosis.

To sum up... If you wouldn't be homophobic that way, please don't be aphobic that way.

[desperatecheesecubes]

Growing up asexual is actually so funny because all of a sudden people all around are like ‘oh my god what if I don’t know how to kiss??? I have to practice!’ And start doing unhinged things and the whole time you’re like

[leikeliscomet]

The aspec community REALLY needs to add intersecting identities to these analysis' instead of making general statements. How helpful is 'ace women are seen as pure because everyone thinks all women are asexual' when we look at the sexualisation of Black women and the Jezebel, the idea Black girls are 'fast' and the general sexualisation of women of colour e.g. spicy latina trope? Are we factoring in how the desexualization of women of colour e.g. the Mammy, the 'submissive' East Asian women trope, the virginity myth isn't acceptance of female asexuality? Does 'ace men are expected to be more sexual' factor in the sexualisation of Black men and other men of colour e.g. 'savage' Arab trope and the antiblack trope that they're inherently predatory? Or the desexualisation of East Asian men? How easily can we define the ace men v ace women experience at all if trans and non-binary aces are missing from most ace representation despite facing the brunt of anti ace discrimination? If we're solely defining these experiences by cis aces? How easily can aroallos 'just have sex' when you factor in the demonisation of gay sex, HIV/AIDS crisis and seraphobia and how this affects gay, lesbian, bi and pan aros? How easily can alloaces 'just partner up' when you factor in the ban of gay marriage that is still in many countries across the globe and the historical policing of 'homosexual behaviours' and this impacts gay, lesbian, bi and pan aces? And this isn't even getting into disability, religion etc. yet. When there's SO many factors that play into how an individual participates in sex and romance, or if they're even allowed to participate at all, how much can we clearly cut the aspec experience into alloace v aroace v aroallo. Or sex favourable v sex indifferent v sex repulsed. There's A LOT we can learn from each other.

[sadisthetic]

the madness frustration loneliness of the dissonance of a mismatch of the rotten heart to the rest

allosexual aromantic swag happy pride *peaces out*

[our-arospec-experience]

it’s time to break out one of the oldest memes I ever made

My thoughts are with all the other aros out there in this trying time 😔

[our-aroace-experience]

Being AroAce and having aesthetic attraction is funny sometimes. I think a lot of people are attractive but I don’t want to do anything about that information.

aesthetic attraction can be super weird sometimes