#aromantic confirmed

[ashizkool]

New sexuality meter: your reaction to the Abs in deadpool and wolverine. Not even joking, as an aroace person, my first reaction to it was "huh. They kinda went overboard on the highlighting didn't they. " and then I went home and opened my socials and saw people Freaking Out over it lmaooo

[mossy-aro]

tbh as much as i do think it is worthwhile to discuss the topic of shipping aromantic/asexual characters and the nuances of it all (as well as the general attitude allos have towards aspecs in fandom spaces). it also makes me sigh equally because like... what characters. i'll be real guys we don't even have characters to discourse over. literally there are like 3 ever and none of those have fandoms anyway and the ones which do are like 'it was confirmed on twitter in a nebulously worded post by the creator'. its so bad out here

[geronimomo-spd]

did they say in the audio that he's aro too or did they just say he experiences romantic attraction but not anything else? sorry i have no money to buy the boxset lol

he declared he feels nothing of the sorts! they explain the differences between someone who feels romantic and more sexual attraction, and then River is like "oh doctor! you told me you feel nothing of the sorts! you are looking for someone who doesn't have romantic feelings in particular abd here you are!"

(because River and him talked earlier about them being husbands and wife of course, and he was like "a wife??? me??? not now or ever! I don't do that sort of stuff! couple things that is")

so then when he looks for someone who does not feel romantic attraction to save the day later, river makes him realise that's him! so he uses that to win the day!

so yeah!!! offical aromantic doctor!!!!

hoped i explained it well hehe

[do-you-know-this-queer-character]

Do you know this queer character?

Riz is Asexual and Aromantic and uses he/him pronouns!

[pickafandomanyfandom]

My brother just told me that my father told him “Aro-ace people don’t have feelings”

THATS HOW HE TOLD MY BROTHER WHAT BEING ASEXUAL AND/OR AROMANTIC IS?!?!!!? JUST OHH YEAH THEY DONT HAVE FEELINGS AT ALL. WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK.

When I tell you the unfathomable rage that stirred up in my stomach. I was absolutely speechless. Like that slapped me across the face I legitimately couldn’t.

[celtrist]

Hazbin & Helluva Vs. Aromanticism

(Aka: I have a problem with the Spindlehorse team about this, not shippers.)

(Also this is mainly about Alastor but can go for Octavia and Mammon too.)

Alright, so I've cleaned up this uh... rant, to make things a little more clear hopefully. But to summarize here, this is about the team's lack of commitment when every other character is allowed full confirmation of their orientations but these (potentially) aromantic characters aren't.

While I have no beef with shippers (I think you can ship whoever with whoever you want, I ship Alastor too on occasion), there is some conversation about how the fandom might be a bit of a reason WHY they "can't" be confirmed as aro. But again, my main problem is more with the showrunners than the fandom at this point about this.

I'll also be getting into why it's "important" and the double standards against characters being aromantic.

This is not an attack, ship however way you wish (again, I do it myself). My intent isn't really to stop the shipping, that would be ridiculous. But more so to give my thoughts on why it's BS characters like Alastor can't be confirmed as aromantic when other characters are allowed confirmed orientations.

I will start off by saying I don't mind the shipping of Alastor. While it's NOBODY'S business but mine, I suppose it's important to clarify that I'm someone who does currently identify as aroace. I might be wrong but who cares, it's how I think of myself now at least to some degree (I do after all still have fictional crushes. Real-life romance is not an interest for me though, don't like 'em).

I'm gonna get what I don't think people talk about enough on both sides of being for and against shipping Alastor, and then I'll talk about the shippers as they're (I realized) not my main issue at this point.

A little history: So Alastor has been long time confirmed as an ace character. He hasn't been confirmed as being sex-repulsed or anything, but I can personally say I don't mind either flavor of him being repulsed or favorable (though I imagine the series will lean towards the former to counter everyone else's sex-favorable attitude and for jokes). This statement was initially taken VERY poorly by fans who, at the time, were shipping radiodust and radiobelle/charlastor, one more than the other. Care to take a guess which? The answer will not surprise you.

But then people realized "Oh, asexual doesn't mean he COULDN'T get with someone" and people even went further to "Being asexual doesn't mean he CAN'T have sex", both very true statements. So shipping was back on the menus boys! And his asexual was certainly blurred a bit (to the point where it wasn't even him being sex-favorable asexual as much as just not asexual, something that still happens but certainly not as bad). But overall, people were taking his canonicity as asexual with as much grace as a duck.

So here's where MY problem comes in. While I have some gripes with shippers, I had an epiphany that "Oh. It's not really the shippers I have a problem with. It's the people WRITING THE DAMN CHARACTER". Which, might I just say, is so much worst.

The shippers, while they got annoying at some points and certainly can be still, are just having fun. Because shipping just happens to be the way most people like to interact with characters in the media they're into. Hell, I am no different. I just have the misfortune of only really getting into rarepairs most of the time (curse you my bizarre tastes). I've even shipped with Alastor, I like AngelicSmile/radiojoy quite a bit.

Back on track. Now, what do I mean by my main problem being with the writers more than the fans with this? Well, queue this darling of a clip about the topic (this is the only clip I've found of the live stream, feel free to watch the whole video but just wanted the clip here).

This. Single. Clip. Infuriates me.

Vivzi, while I'm sure not meant to, pretty much implied "Alastor being aromantic and 'non-shippable' would ruin people's fun". I'm sure she meant it as a way to keep others from policing shippers (which didn't work, it still happens), it really just reads as "a character being aromantic is not a fun character". Like there's something wrong with being aro.

Not to mention some other things that would contradict this statement:

Viv in the past said "fans are allowed to ship outside character orientations", so... what makes that so different here with confirming Alastor as aromantic?

It being confirmed is not relevant to the plot. Great, so is every other orientation not relevant. Why can't Alastor be confirmed as aromantic but Vaggie can be confirmed as a lesbian or Vox bi? What does Vox being bisexual have to do with the plot? Neither is relevant to the plot, but one can be confirmed but not the other?

People were gonna ship him ANYWAY. Like, there's really no point in pretending. They were going to anyway because of the first point I already mentioned, but also people ship against canon orientations ALL THE TIME. It's just gonna happen and there's nothing wrong with that in of itself.

You've kind of just implied it's canon by not wanting to say specifically him being aromantic is canon or not. If Viv had just said "I don't wanna confirm his romantic orientation because...", then this statement would be fine and fair I suppose. But she had to call out him being aromantic specifically. And I mean, he COULD be something else (he was slated to be a couple with Mimzy originally after all), but the context doesn't seem like that would be the case. Plus, would she really feel the need to hold back from saying "Alastor is homoromantic" or biromantic or heteroroman- actually yes for that last one probably.

So riddle me this, with these points, why the FUCK would it be so wrong to confirm Alastor as a canonically aromantic icon and help get MORE REP for this very very very VERY underrepresented orientation? And I've thought of a few reasons to this, one of which being to avoid the same backlash that they got for Alastor being ace. Which, DID HAPPEN WHEN THE VOICE ACTOR AND SOMEONE ELSE ON THE SHOW CONFIRMED ALASTOR AS AROMANTIC BUT BACKTRACKED ON THE STATEMENT.

To which, fine. THAT'S on the fans (especially as no one would've complained if he was confirmed as homoromantic, which is a double standard VERY PRESENT in this fandom, but also many others quite honestly). But I can see another reason is to avoid others policing shippers about it.

Which, if that's the case, shit luck it's happening anyway.

To cower away from this orientation because of fans being upset says a lot, both about the fans and the creators. There is a whisper of "Alastor isn't allowed to be aromantic". That "being aro isn't allowed or appreciated".

We live in a world that at this point has a lot more lgbtq+ characters than ever before. At this point, there's just a lot of gay/lesbian and bi characters, and that's wonderful. But, there's barely a handful of aroace characters. And when they are, nobody wants to pay attention to that part of the character. So why can't the deer man be aromantic? I would imagine it would honestly make things a little better ship wise because ship wars wouldn't occur seeing as, well, there's no ship to be fought for. None of them could be canon.

So you might see where I'm leading into this, but I can only really think of one real reason Alastor being aromantic just "can't be confirmed" where as everyone else's orientations can be.

His popularity. Like, that's weird but walk with me here. Alastor is the most popular character in the fandom. There's honestly no denying it, he just is. And what do people do with the most popular character?

THEY SHIP THEM OFF IN A LOVEBOAT.

But wait, if he's aromantic, he can't be on a love boat. THIS IS BS-

And then... the outcry. And we HAVE seen this happen. I mentioned before, he was stated to be aromantic on two occasions by two people who work on the show, one of which is his voice actor (which I'll be fair, I personally don't think VAs always know the characters they play the best, that's the writers). But they had to backpedal because people DID complain. People WERE upset. So it's kind of shown just aromantism isn't really welcomed, at the very least not for a character like Alastor.

And that's the key: "Not for a character like Alastor". But if it were say, Niffty or Mimzy who are either overlooked or just not very popular, THEN it's probably more than okay for a character to be aromantic. Because no one wants to ship with them much, so they can be aromantic all they want.

AKA. The aro community is allowed the scraps but not the dinner.

At this point, you've probably noticed I switched gears from the creators to the fans because I DO think they could be a reason why Alastor "can't" be confirmed as Aromantic. I'll give credit, I'm pretty sure it's mainly on twitter and wouldn't be surprised if it was a "loud minority" thing going on, but the people have spoken. They vehemently cannot STAND the idea of Alastor being aromantic.

But I don't have a problem with these people quite honestly- I mean I kinda do, but my main issue is the lack of commitment when the other characters are allowed confirmed orientations. Why can't aromantic people get confirmed rep? Because "it'll ruin people's fun?" That's such a crappy reason because it's just saying being aro is bad on some level or isn't okay. Why can't the aromantic community get the dinner this ONE TIME? It's one character in a pool of many others that are canonically gay or bi, so why can't the aro community have this ONE popular character?

I'm not even asking for people to stop shipping him, I think that's perfectly FINE. It wouldn't change the canon. I'd appreciate more LOVE given to the aromantic identity (and I'm talking about the far end of it, so absolutely NO interest in romance as many have used aro Alastor but it still comes off as just normal shipping, but that's just me). There's such a double standard to the treatment of aromantic characters to the other characters in these shows (because Octavia and Mammon are in the same boat here), and the reasons given are so crappy that they sound more like off-hand excuses.

Again, I don't MIND people shipping Alastor, or Octavia, or Mammon who is randomly shipped with Adam the most. Let me repeat:

YOU. ARE. ALLOWED. TO. SHIP. THESE. CHARACTER.

But what I have a problem with is that these characters aren't allowed to be OFFICIALLY aromantic. How would it feel if this was a gay character? That they didn't want to confirm it but there's been indications with past statements and even in-universe stuff indicating so? I WANT Viv and her team to STICK with what route they were gonna go with.

And some might argue "what's so bad with nothing being confirmed?" Other than the fact every other character's orientations are allowed confirmation and Viv's crappy way of putting it in not confirming anything. There's, by all technicalities, nothing wrong.

However, if I may pose a counter, why is it fair for people to demand or ask for gay representation or confirmation but not aromantic? Because it's "not ruining anything"? If that's the case, I'm inclined to say that may be a bit aphobic. Because how is it that a character being aromantic can "ruin" the character or something, but a character being gay DOESN'T "ruin" the character. It's a double standard that I don't think most people realize or want to say because you don't want to be dissing on gay stuff.

But WAKE UP SHEEPLE. The gay stuff has PLENTY of things by this point. Whether through fan works or official media, it is growing and it is growing rapidly. And we should be HAPPY about that. But alternatively, Aromantic (and asexual) rep BARELY gets any attention in either fan works or official media. People would be UPSET if a ship like Angel Dust X Vaggie or Stolas X Verosika got into one of the top most popular ships. But Alastor? Nah, it's fine.

Again, while I don't mind the shipping itself, hopefully, you can understand how it might feel to see one of the most popular ships involve a character that goes against their orientation and it's YOUR orientation. It doesn't. Feel. Great.

And not everyone who ships Alastor even would LIKE him to end up with who they ship. Some people just like it staying in fanon. I have met SO MANY nice people who ship Alastor with characters that I personally don't really like him shipped with. But it's clear that I don't think THEY'D mind if he was confirmed aromantic because it doesn't change their life. They'll still keep shipping him because that's fun for them and that's FINE. People explore themselves through characters with confirmed orientations and they don't always line up with canon, and that's FINE. I don't think people should be policed on shipping with the deer man, they're just having fun. Would I appreciate a little more love for the aro identity? Sure (I mean just look at Alastor's ship weeks activeness vs. his aro week activeness), but if that's not how people have fun they shouldn't be forced to do stuff with it.

But Alastor being seemingly "not allowed" to be confirmed as aro has set a precedent that there's something wrong with being aromantic. And personally, it makes me feel a tad unwelcomed sometimes.

It's the precedents. Again, why is every other character's orientation allowed to be confirmed but Alastor's isn't? What is so wrong with him being aromantic? Hell, he might not even BE aromantic. But at least I'd KNOW instead of floundering around hoping upon a star for some aromantic representation.

It's okay to be gay but- WHOA HOLD YOUR HORSES THERE. WE'RE GONNA HAVE TO PUT A PAUSE IN THAT ARO BUSINESS YOU GOT THERE.

A character's worth is in how shippable they are. And if they're aromantic, they're not shippable. And unfortunately, there are just enough people to throw a hissy fit about it that Viv doesn't want to confirm it.

Because apparently being aromantic would "ruin" things.

[starryjoy]

i rly don't care about what people do with fanfics and stuff but the people in the fields of mistria subreddit going "well even if olric turns out to be aromantic he could still be in a qpr with you!!!" make my blood boil. if you're an aro person saying that whatever. if you aren't, you are required to give an aro person 10 dollars per offense.

like this is not an "aro people can still date!!!" moment this is a "I know he's aro but I still want to date him and won't accept a no!" moment

[spyres]

apparently the confessions blog is posting dumb takes we have to put it down now

[sissytobitch10seconds]

I honestly think it's so interesting that people tend to pick Kaz when they're making a character aro/ace when in the books Tolya mentions having no interest in romance or finding a partner and Harshaw (who was sadly omitted from S2) is mentioned to only love fire.

[autistic-katara]

does it annoy tf out of anyone else that when a character says smthn like: “i’m not in love with [a male character], i was in love with [female character], it took me a while to accept and i’m incredibly scared telling you please don’t tell anyone” people immediately go “ah yes, canon lesbian, i don’t know how u can’t pick up on that”

meanwhile when a character says smthn like: “i’ve tried for years to force myself into a romantic relationship, thought it would ‘fix me’. but i realise now that’s not how it works, a romantic relationship won’t fix me and i honestly don’t think i was attracted to any of the people i tried to date, im going to swear of romantic relationships for life bcz i don’t experience romantic attraction, later guys ily platonically” 99% of the fans go “oh, ok. so they’re probably asexual but it’s definitely up to interpretation. wtf is ‘a romantic’, yeah they’re a romantic; in a romantic relationship with their ‘best friend’ who i ship them with and is basically canon. very homophobic of the author to make them explicitly state that they weren’t into them like that. they must hate gay people despite the rest of the queer characters in here…”

[celestial-fucker]

I’m personally alright with ppl shipping Alastor with others as long as they do it in a way where they RESPECT HIS IDENTITY because istG I’m blocking ppl left right and centre because they DON’T. RESPECT. HIS. IDENTITY. AND. OUTRIGHT. IGNORE. IT. WHEN THEY SHIP HIM WITH PPL

AND QUEER PLATONIC RELATIONSHIPS EXIST, BUT no you HAD TO GO AHEAD AND FIT EVERYTHING INTO the amatonormativity ideal that YOU HAVE. IF YOU HC ALASTOR AS GREYROMANTIC BC YOU’RE GREYROMANTIC AND KIND OF HIM AND SHIP HIM WITH ANOTHER CHARACTER I CAN GLADLY ACCEPT THAT YOU HEADCANON THAT BECAUSE AT LEAST YOU’RE RESPECTING HIS IDENTITY IN A WAY THAT ISN’T HARMFUL FOR THE AROACE COMMUNITY AND THE LITTLE REP WE HAVE IN MEDIA. But nooooo ppl have to ship him with Vox because ‘aromantic ppl can still be in relationships!’ and I KNOW this as an aro-spec person I have thought about how I wouldn’t mind dating some of my friends (despite all my feelings for them being PLATONIC) and this does not invalidate my identity! (Idk where I am on the spectrum btw but I’m defo on there somewhere). AND I JUST HATE IT WHEN PPL SHIP ALASTOR LIKE THIS okay thank you for coming to my little rant I got worked up by some ppl literally shipping him with characters and not validate his identity without anything more than the ‘oh but aro ppl can still date 🥺🥺😩😫’ like stfu btch

[styrofauxm]

(this was back on my dash and I have thoughts again, sorry)

"it's just shipping"

uh huh, that's why people lose their shit when you say Peridot (Steven Universe) is canonically aroace

and why people call for Yelena Belova's (Marvel) orientation to be switched to lesbian for the MCU. Despite rightfully being mad about the erasure of many other identities (queer or otherwise)

and why people complained until the end of the series that Nita and Kovit (Not Even Bones) were aspec and not dating

and why people practically celebrate the backtracking of the confirmation that Alastor (Hazbin Hotel) is aromantic

and why people with non-canon gay ships get really upset at non-canon aspec headcanons

and why there is a massive gap in the amount of people who ship gay/lesbian characters with women/men and the amount of people who ship aroace characters

It's not shipping, it's not discourse. It's aphobia.

[mothman-did-nothing-wrong]

*twirling my hair and kicking my feet* omg....so many fellow aromantic followers...hiii (^///^

[normystical]

Okay look I can get by "I headcanon Alastor as arospec/He's on the aromantic spectrum in this" but like, "Aromantic people can date despite not feeling romantic attraction"??? Alastor had a mental breakdown because he was perceived to seemingly care about others PLATONICALLY. Look me in the eyes and tell me you think this man would date others without being attracted to them for non-nefarious purposes.

[wigglyscardigan]

ella ashmore is the most aromantic character i have ever laid my eyes upon and if anyone tells you otherwise you are legally entailed to financial compensation

[angieblogging]

what’s up with autistic men being aro/ace?