#as someone who is ace and is questioning if they're aro

[stardink]

"I don't know if they understand that sometimes, I'd just like to stay the same."

[winndycakes]

Winndy Rambles And Gushes About Chuck Tingle

Wanted to ramble a little about one of my favorite authors, creators and overall just super rad people; Chuck Tingle.

Like many people, when I first heard of Chuck, I took him as some sort of meme. A troll, a joke, someone not to be taken seriously. After all, the majority of his works are "silly short erotica stories around dinosaurs, cryptids and even living concepts and items". How COULD this be serious? It's a question I asked before, years ago, and one that many still do to this day.

One holiday season, a friend had made a post on FaceBook saying "first five people to comment I'll gift you a book". So I did. The book I got was a physical copy of the "Space Raptor Butt Invasion Trilogy" by Chuck Tingle. Since I had a book of Tingle's now, I really had no excuse to not read it for myself.

Erotica normally isn't my thing (I'm pretty ace and grey aro too), but very quickly, I was charmed by the prose. As you read Chuck's stories, there's a fact that becomes very apparent. Chuck Tingle is a great writer, a really great writer. How he writes, how the words flow together, one sentence going into the next. The characters, the plot, the little bits of lore, dialogue and all he puts in... You quickly begin to see; this is NOT a joke.

It is not a meme. He is not trolling you. It is art. Passionate, sincere, genuine art. And it's beautiful. The more you read, the more definitive it gets.

I will admit, I have read aloud many a Tingler for friends and others in Discord servers, both to share my joy of Tingle with others, but also, it is fun to look at how different his works are. It's fine to laugh along with them even.

The moment that really was like... angels singing, light shining down and there's bishi sparkles and a heavenly soft pink background appearing for me though was the summer Chuck Tingle released on of his first full novella's; "Trans Wizard Harriet Porber and the Bad Boy Parasaurolophus". Like many, I was crushed and gutted at JKR's extreme turn to committing to transphobia (and of course the hindsight of realizing... the HP books and universe were not as kind and welcoming as I remembered growing up). So when Chuck Tingle (in one weekend mind you) came out with a 50k novel affirming trans people and their belonging in not just queer spaces, but being on this Earth, as fellow human beings, it was... affirming. It was the welcoming feeling I had gotten with the original HP books all those years ago, but it was real. (Also please read both Trans Wizard Harriet Porber books. They're delightful, fun and the magic system Tingle creates is so, so cool and interesting).

The next thing that got me just mega hype for Tingle was his first foray into horror; "Straight". "Straight" is Tingle's answer to the ever popular trope and genre of zombies and the apocalypse that comes with them, and what a fun turn of tables he takes on them. Zombies in the Tingleverse are not undead beings, they're not humans afflicted by a virus, instead a strange cosmic event happens once a year, when one night, all cishet people on Earth get this animalistic, violent urge to brutally harm and even kill all queer people. I won't get too spoilery about it but it is a very fun romp, and as someone who has been fatigued by zombies, it is a welcome new perspective.

Not long after this, Chuck came out with two full, traditionally published horror novels; "Camp Damascus" and "Bury Your Gays". Both are very different experiences in horror, both a joyful celebration of being queer and your authentic self even in the face of those looking to silence you, permanently if they must. I had the pleasure of meeting Chuck (twice!) while he was on tour for both of these books, getting my copies signed (along with my copies of the Trans Wizard duology and my beloved copy of the Space Raptor trilogy) and was able to tell Tingle myself just how important he is to someone like me; another queer autistic creator. (I was also one of the few people to win the little mini games he gave, twice, but that's a different story).

Ultimately that is what I am trying to get at. Growing up, and even for all of my 20s, there wasn't really someone like Tingle. Someone unabashedly authentic, themselves, queer, open and imo most importantly, joyously so. One is often told "just be yourself" but that can be hard to do when it seems like the world is against you for one reason or another.

Seeing a creator like Chuck shows how important it is to have such a presence in the world, and I was glad I got to tell him myself. I've had a lot of hardships in life, a lot of losses, a lot of grief, but someone like Chuck is there to tell you to keep trotting and remind you; Love Is Real.

And that's truly the ending message:

Love Is Real.

[ltleflrt]

Figuring out I'm on the ace spectrum was so difficult because I have always been a horny bitch. I knew what sex was at a fairly young age, because I'd asked my mom and she's one of those good parents who'll answer questions like those, and as I grew older and would ask more complex questions, her answers would evolve along with my curiosity and understanding of the world. And I remember having fantasies as young as 9 or 10 years old, even if they were hella vague and nothing close to what sex actually is lol

So as I became a teenager, and all my friends' focus turned from playing with dolls to flirting with boys, I automatically thought I was attracted to boys. And I paid more attention to Cute Boys than I did to Cute Girls, because girls were just nice to look at while boys were People To Have Crushes On. Because of heteronormativity. Looking back on it now, I know there were girls I liked to stare at just as intently as boys, although less often because I wasn't trying to pay attention. And I certainly didn't fantasize about girls because I started reading romance novels in 5th grade, so I was fantasizing about male romantic partners because that was the fiction I was consuming. I didn't even realize fantasizing about girls was possible until I was 17, and I had a few "am I a lesbian" internal crises for years because of it.

So when I did start having sex, I had A LOT OF IT with SO MANY different guys, and eventually a couple of women once I started accepting that bisexuality was real. But it was never really fulfilling. Not like my fantasies were. Not like my books were. I was slutty because sex was fun, I was horny, there were plenty of options so I kept searching for that satisfaction I was craving.

Getting married was a relief (even though it turns out I'm aro-spec too lol) because I was tired of hunting, and even if sex with my husband was meh, at least I had someone around to scratch that itch if I had it, and he didn't mind if I occasionally took care of things on my own because I'd read an especially hot scene in a romance.

I learned about asexuality in my early 20s, but I brushed it off. Couldn't be me, I'm far too horny for that. But I think that comes from the fact that everything you hear about Aces is attached to sex-repulsion or sex-indifference. I wasn't either of those things. I was horny all the dang time. I was fantasizing about sex all the dang time. I figured actual sex was meh because my imagination was so vivid that real life could never match up. Which could be true to an extent, but I think not as much as popular opinion would have us believe. If fantasy was really that much better for everyone, then I think we'd have less incels and unplanned pregnancies than we do.

In my 30s I finally saw people talking about The Spectrum, and I started examining my past, and I figured out I wasn't really attracted to anyone I had sex with. I do occasionally find someone attractive; there are men and women and enbies who make my skin feel tight and give me a little wave of lightheadedness lol... but it's always always the fantasy that gets me really going. If given the opportunity I wouldn't have sex with any of those people. Thank you, but no thank you, I'd rather just imagine it than physically participate in the act with them.

(Ok I might go down on them, but that's less about wanting sex, and more about being able to add them to my Tally. Hell yeah I want to brag about making *insert hot person* have an orgasm. There's PRIDE in that kind of accomplishment lol)

I have a lot of respect for aces that are not horny. I understand it even if I don't share the sentiment. And I feel like most of them understand me even if they don't share the sentiment. There's a solidarity between us.

Until I go into a fandom tag for a character that the aces have glommed onto because they're canonically ace or headcanoned as ace. Good lord, the non-horny aces can turn into downright vicious bastards if a horny ace sexualizes their blorbo.

This post is for them.

Horny aces exist. Please look up "autochorissexual, lithosexual, and aegosexual."

Refer to those definitions in regards to romantic attraction as well as sexual attraction.

Some aces may not fall into one of those definitions, because asexuality is a spectrum, but they may still be horny.

Horny aces are not disrespecting you by enjoying being horny on main. We promise we'll wash the stickiness off our hands before we hold your hands in queer solidarity.

And most importantly: Your blorbo is fictional and does not need to be defended from icky sexuality. They exist in an infinite multiverse, so your blorbo and my blorbo are not the same, even if they appear to be on the surface.

AND:

This post is also for the people who are confused about themselves because they're horny but don't actually feel attraction. You're not crazy, you're not wishy washy, you're not "waiting for the right person to come along" (unless you are, in which case I hope you find them). You're just a thin strip of color on a massive rainbow that holds more unique shades than anyone can perceive at a glance.

You're valid. You're one of us too.

And don't be mean to the non-horny aces. Tag your smut so they can avoid it. (But actually so I can find it lol)

[fazmid]

it's very clear why aphobia is one of the gateways to wider queer exclusionism when you have to witness these types like, make up a guy to get mad at. "what if there was a guy that was straight in every way except he was ace/aro/demi/whatever" yeah man what if? who cares? then you realize the real question being asked is "are queer people still valid if I can't tell they're queer by observing them and need to be told directly?" and it's like yeah I see why you also have weird ideas about bi/pan people and anyone else that doesn't fit your mental image of what a queer person should look like. if your basis for queerness is whether someone appears sufficiently queer to others, you cannot construct a meaningful definition of queerness that doesn't exclude some queer people. no wonder you have to keep throwing more and more people overboard to keep your narrow definition of the queer community afloat in your mind. is the next discourse going to be that happily single lesbians with boring gender-conforming taste in fashion aren't really queer? come off it

[genderkoolaid]

yeah, but you do mean 'loveless' like 'romanceless' right? Just cause you're not interested in a romantic partnership, and you're never attracted to anyone romantically, that doesn't mean you can't love your family and your friends. Am I understanding wrong? I feel like it's a widely accepted concept that 'love' isn't just romantic, it's about caring about someone, no matter if they're your family or platonic friend or your pet.

No, "loveless" means love-less. Another anon also asked me to explain as well so:

"Lovelessness" in the aro context comes from the essay I Am Not Voldemort by K.A Cook. The essay confronts normative ideas on love, its inherent positivity and what it means to not love. From the introduction, which brings up the question of non-romantic love:

This June, I saw an increasing number of positivity and support posts for the aromantic and a-spec communities discussing the amatonormativity of “everyone falls in love”. I agree: the idea that romantic love is something everyone experiences, and is therefore a marker of human worth, needs deconstruction. Unfortunately, a majority of these posts are replacing the shackles of amatonormativity with restrictive lines like “everyone loves, just not always romantically”, referencing the importance of loving friends, QPPs, family members and pets. Sometimes it moves away from people to encompass love for hobbies, experiences, occupations and ourselves. The what and how tends to vary from post to post, but the idea that we do and must love someone or something, and this love redeems us as human and renders us undeserving of hatred, is being pushed to the point where I don’t feel safe or welcome in my own aromantic community. Even in the posts meant to be challenging the more obvious amatonormativity, it is presumed that aros must, in some way, love. I’ve spent weeks watching my a-spec and aro communities throw neurodiverse and survivor aros under the bus in order to do what the aromantic community oft accuses alloromantic aces of doing: using their ability to love as a defence of their humanity. Because I love, they say, I also don’t deserve to be a target of hatred, aggression and abuse. But what if I don’t love? What if love itself has been the mechanism of the hatred and violence I have endured? Why am I, an aro, neurodiverse survivor of abuse and bullying, still acceptable collateral damage?

The author criticizes the idea of "true love" that is incapable of harm. Ze questions why we construct love in that way, and how it ignores and simplifies the experiences of victims of abuse ("It’s comforting to think that a love that wounds isn’t real love, but it denies the complexity of experience and feeling had by survivors. It denies the complexity of experience and feeling that makes it harder for us to identify abuse and escape its claws. It denies the validity of survivors who look at love and feel an honest doubt about its worth, as a word or a concept, in our own interactions and experiences.") Ze talks about being forced to say "I love you" to transphobic, abusive parents whose feelings of love was the justification for their abuse.

The core of what "loveless" as an concept is about is summed up in this quote:

There is no substantial difference between saying “I’m human because I fall in love”, “I’m human because I love my friends” and “I’m human because I love calligraphy”. All three statements make human worth contingent on certain behaviours, feelings and experiences. Expanding the definition of what kinds of love make us human does nothing but save some aros from abuse and antagonism … while telling survivor and neurodiverse aros, who are more likely to have complex relationships to love as a concept or are unable to perform it in ways recognised by others, that we’re still not worthy.

Lovelessness is against any kind of statement which quantifies humanity (and implicitly, human worth) in the ability to feel or act or experience certain things. Humans are human by virtue of being human, and nothing else. And, it is socially constructed! "Love" has no natural definition! Some people are not comfortable using "love" to describe positive feelings and relationships, and some people do not feel those positive feelings in general. And those people deserve the right to define their own experiences and their own relationship to the social construct of love.

In essence, lovelessness is both a personal as well as (in my opinion) a political identity, born from aro and mad experiences that challenges not just amatonormativity but all ideas that associate personhood and worth with the ability to feel certain things.

& as a note, there is also the term "lovequeer" which describes using the term "love" in ways which contradict mainstream understandings of what it means to love, and which kinds of love are considered worthwhile.

[loveless-arobee]

Maybe I'm overreacting or w/e, but I think it's a tad bit weird that whenever someone online questions if they're aromantic, people always tell them they're AroAce specifically, even if they never mention sexuality or anything relating to their sexual attraction. Just like. "Hey I'm not interested in romance. What is that called?" - "Oh, you're AroAce!" And then they even often giving only half the definition by telling them "AroAce means experiencing little to no romantic attraction", without mention sexual attraction, which is, like, half the identity.

Even more weird when the questioning person does talk about sex and specifically enjoying sex (often with wording that actually does imply sexual attraction to be present) and then the answer is "you can be AroAce and still want sex!" which is true and all but basically nobody besides AlloAros themselves ever mention the possibility that you can be aromantic without being asexual. Nope. If you're aromantic, you must be asexual.

Which is then how you get these people who come online again to ask "Is it possible to be aro but not ace?" because all everyone ever told them the first time and all times after that was that if they're aromantic, they must be asexual. Which keeps them from finding out themselves for much longer (I know because that happened to me.)

Like. Sure, it could be that they're AroAce,and yes, even if they do enjoy sex. That is all true and fine. But why is everyone who isn't AlloAro or otherwise non-ace aro so unwilling to portray being aromantic but not asexual as just a mere possibility to questioning aros? Why not just mention both of these things so the questioning person knows what to look up?

[valtsv]

friendly question about ur aro identity—

are you ace as well? and if not, what is the line for you between romantic and sexual? like is kissing considered romantic to you?

and, do you date people? or does being aro mean you’re not interested in dating?

thank you 🫡

so this is all personal to me and definitely shouldn't be taken as a reflection on all aromantics/aromanticism in general, but no, i'm not asexual. things like sex and kissing aren't inherently romantic to me, and i tell people that much, and let them choose their boundaries in a relationship to me accordingly. if a friend wants to kiss or even have sex, i'm more than happy to do that, but i identify with aromanticism because i feel uncomfortable with the wider social expectations of the idea of "romance". that a romantic relationship is inherently more special than any other kind of loving relationship; that if you love someone romantically you should demonstrate it through actions that are reserved for that person alone and can't be extended to anyone else (and i don't necessarily mean sex; if someone i loved wanted me to be exclusive to them sexually that's a boundary i'd be willing to negotiate and agree to, but it wouldn't be a romantic gesture to me, just a gesture of love); that you should aspire to seek out a romantic relationship and find "the one" who, once you've found them, you should devote your life to and put before all else.

i guess it's not really romance itself that i have an issue with, but all the societal baggage attached to it. maybe that makes me not a "true" aromantic, but it's a label i identify with, and i find i have things in common with the community who fall under it, so as long as they're happy to have me, i think i'll stay here for now.

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

Hi sex witch! This isn’t exactly a sex Ed question but it is related to sex. I’m aro/ace, and I’ve noticed that a lot of other aro/aces say that allos see friendship as a stepping stone to sex or romance, and less important than romantic relationships. I guess it makes sense, but my best friend irl is a gay boy (im a girl) and he obviously isn’t interested in dating an aro/ace girl. I made a post saying this and people in the notes were saying that he’s either secretly bi and lying to make me feel safe, or I’m an egg. I don’t believe either of those things but it got me wondering, is it common for allos to use friendship as a way to get close to people for the purpose of dating or having sex with them? Personally I’ve never experienced that but enough aro/aces are saying it that I have to wonder

hi anon,

okay so we need to start with the part about your best friend, because it's really important to me that we take a minute to recognize anyone trying to convince you that a gay boy is only hanging out with you because he has secret romantic feelings is being a homophobe. I mean, listen, it's annoying and childish when people act like men and women can't be friends in general, okay? but in this case they're not just being heteronormative, they're being actively homophobic. block anyone who said that. jesus christ.

secondly: I don't know if you've ever, like, spent time with people, but yes, many folks find romantic partners amongst their circles of friends because that's who they spend a lot of time with and build meaningful connections with, which can develop into feelings of sexual or romantic attraction for people who experience those things. I'd say it's less often a a case of anyone "using" friendship as a means to an end and more often a case of people realizing that a friendship is taking an exciting new direction and deciding to pursue those feelings.

there's a long-lasting trope, especially prominent it sitcoms and romcoms, of someone (usually a sleezy man) acting friendly to get close to someone else (usually a woman) with the intent of seducing them, but a.) like most works of fiction, that's much less common in real life, and b.) there's a huge difference between lying to someone intentionally and just developing a crush on someone you already know and like, which I think is the MUCH more common scenario.

like, don't get me wrong here, it's absolutely true that we live in a society(TM) that pretty materially privileges romantic relationships - specifically monogamous, legally-binding relationships - over other types of relations, and that's a fucking doozy. that's a thing to work on, for sure. but it's also not weird or creepy that some people couple up with their buddies.

[66sharkteeth]

If Finze and Nine are your favorites, why choose to center the comic around Rex?

Also, was there a buildup to your choosing of Bell as the love interest? Why her and (if you haven’t answered this already) how did she come to be?

Last thing: I really love your story and inclusion of ace representation! It makes me happy to see someone who is ace but not aro just like me!

I mean, I still love Rex. Even if Finze is my favorite, Rex is probably the most special to me. He's just been on this journey with me for so long and it's been amazing to watch people love and root for him. I get emotional if I think about how much he means to some people and how far his character has come since I made him up in middle school haha.

But to more so answer your question, I think about stories more than OCs. I wanted to write City of Blank, not a Finze fan fic. Back when I came up with CoB, Finze existed but he was just an OC not attached to any particular story (He was actually a lupe on neopets LOL). Finze wasn't even intended to be in City of Blank until I realized he filled a role in season 2. Nine even more so just doesn't fit in the story. All the roles are already taken and as much as I'd love to write a comic about them some day, CoB just isn't their story. That said, I do have a few ideas that focus on them or include them more heavily than CoB does!

As for Bell, yeah, she's been the planned love interest pretty much from the beginning. I did want to like...play with the idea of showing the male protag and female protag (lyss) don't always have to get together, and in fact sometimes they're terrible for each other. They shouldn't end up together just because they're the ML and FL. Rex was always planned to eventually split from the group and join Blan Corp, where he'd end up with Bell. So all of that was planned for a long time and went exactly as intended.

And lastly, thank you! Like I said in the first paragraph, it means a lot that Rex means so much to people now.

[foone]

(Sorry if this sounds mean) If you’re ace why are you looking for mind control erotica? This isn’t a bad faith question, as someone who’s aro but not ace I’m genuinely curious. Maybe expounding on it would help your followers point you at new things?

Also have you read Human Domestication Guide? It’s very mind controlly, though it does have pet stuff if you hate that or whatever.

Short answer: it's complicated.

So to answer in reverse order: I have read some HDG stories: not enough to remember what I read, but in general I like them. And petplay doesn't bother me. So I'll probably read more in future, it's just that it never triggered that "I should read all of this!" urge in me. Which isn't an indicator of how much I like it/the quality of it, that's just a thing that sometimes happens to my brain.

As for why I'm reading mind control erotica despite being asexual... It's complicated (as you might guess).

Basically I'm asexual in the "not attracted to men or women (or anything else/between)" sense. I don't experience sexual attraction, at all.

But that's only one part of sexuality. It may be the primary part for allosexuals, but it obviously can't be for me. I'm still interested in some sexual things, and I'm interested in them for sexual reasons, but it's just that those reasons are never "this person is hot" or "this sex is hot".

Like, not to give a complete listing of my kinks or anything, consider basic rope bondage as a fetish. You could look at the fetish from multiple angles:

It's sexy getting tied up, because of the physical sensation of being tied up.

It's sexy to be tied up, because you don't have control.

It's sexy to tie someone up, because of how they look tied up.

It's sexy to have someone tied up, because you have control and they don't.

It's sexy to have sex while tied up, because you can't resist it (in the scene. This is fantasy, there are safewords)

It's sexy to fuck someone tied up, because they can't resist (in the scene, fantasy, safewords)

And then in fiction you can do the last two minus the watsonian-bdsm: it's not a scene. (I won't discuss this further because discourse)

Only 5 and 6 really need sex itself to be a part of it. You can have the eroticism of bondage and no one has sex, or needs to be attracted to anybody.

I don't have a huge amount of experience here, but from what I've heard this isn't that uncommon in the bdsm community: there's plenty of people who show up at bdsm events solely for "non-sexual" tying/getting tied.

Anyway, once you understand that you can have a kink (even one that seems sexual) for reasons other than sexual attraction/sex* itself, you can probably see why an asexual person might still want to read about it.

Also there's elements of, like, exploration of personal impossibilities? As jms said:

So I cannot forgive. Which makes the notion of writing a character who CAN forgive momentarily attractive...because it allows me to explore in great detail something of which I am utterly incapable. I cannot fly, so I would write of birds and starships and kites; I cannot play an instrument, so I would write of composers and dancers; and I cannot forgive, so I would write of priests and monks and Minbari...

It can be interesting reading stories of people doing things you can't for reasons you never experience, obeying urges you don't have.

* "sex" is also a difficult thing to define, because especially in BDSM terms it gets very fuzzy. What things count as sex? Generally when I say like "they're spending too much time on the sex" or "the mind control is just an excuse to get to the sex", I'm defining sex as something like "some kind of insertion/licking/vibrating for sexual purposes", when many allosexuals (especially, uhh... What's the word for non-bdsm people? Them) would define it more narrowly, and many BDSM kinksters would define it more widely, including a lot of the things I'm not here: I've heard people call getting tied up or impact play as sex, for example.

Anyway you'd think this sort of perspective I've got on erotic fiction, where I'm here for the non-sex sexual fetish things, would be more common? After all, I'm talking about literature here. I tend to associate the allosexual attraction urge as a visual thing: this person looks sexy, so you experience sexual attraction towards them.

I can see how that'd work if you're talking about visual mediums: movies and photos of real people, even drawn images, but this is just words. I guess maybe people without aphantasia can imagine how someone looks from their description, and can experience some attraction based on that? I don't know. I've never really experienced attraction to written characters, so I can't say how it works. Feel free to enlighten me, anyone who does.

But you can definitely tell reading erotica which stories are "this is a sexy story because it has sexy people in it doing sexy things (sometimes kinkily)" and which are "this kink is the primary focus: any sex they have is in service of the kink, or is just a momentary distraction from the kink". I prefer the latter, by far.

Anyways, I think maybe I'm giving everyone a slightly misleading impression of how much I'm into mind control. It's more that I've found a few stories that actually were interesting to me for a couple reasons (first person submissive perspective, rules-based mind control, some worldbuilding) and then I've been looking for other stories that explore the same ideas as well (or better: the particular ones I liked had a little too much bimboification focus for me, which isn't one of my kinks) and failing. Thus I complain a lot about not being able to find the sort of stories I want.

Which, you know, makes sense? I'm an asexual reading through porn. Despite my explanation in this post, this is still not a great fit for me, so of course I'm disappointed. It'd be like if I was scrolling through a football site and not liking football, complaining about how much sports focus this site has. It's a little silly, you know?

But I'm a lot silly, so I continue.

[lovelessrage]

Every month there's a new resurgence of some variant of "aroallos just hate aces!", or random post about how aroallos are simply spiteful and irrational with no attempt made to bridge the gap of understanding, and it's getting old, I'll be honest. If you're not willing to listen, and you assume we're hostile by default, then how can you ever be convinced otherwise? It's genuinely a shame how common it is in aro communities to refuse to hear people out before jumping to assumption, and not just in regards to aroallos either [arospecs and both of the tail ends of the romance enjoyment slider come to mind as other common targets, as well as atertiary aros of all stripes].

I think, as much as I dislike getting preachy, of you actually want to put effort into solving the issue, if you are genuinely concerned about that rift and you have this energy in you to do something, use it to try to bridge the gap. I'm tired, I'll admit it, but I know there's people who aren't and they're worried. Put that worry to action. Come at it as an ally, not on the offense; people are more likely to hear you out and talk about it when they aren't coming into it having to defend themselves and their community.

Please, please listen and ask questions before you assume bad faith, before you assume an attack. We all have biases to look at [that includes why you assume someone is immediately an aggressor, or why you assume someone else is more worth listening to], and clearing the air might do some good.

[stopmyhearts]

Okay. Going to be rambling about my sexual and romantic orientation and how that evolved over time under the cut. Because 1. I like sharing random things about myself 2. This is helpful background for when I get around to talking about shipping and 3. Honestly I've had a lot of things change and realizations in the past half year or so and I need to work through some of this a bit

Also please keep in mind that this is my experience specifically so don't use it to say stupid things (like it being a phase or something) about aspec people of any kind. They're all super cool and are the best part of this

Alright, so the most basic point here is that I kind of want to elaborate on the evolution of it all. Short version is that from about sixteen to seventeen I came to the (honestly hard and at times painful) realization that I was aroace. And I saw myself, I went through life and society as aroace for three, maybe close to four years depending on how you count. I'm out to my family, my friends and anyone who'll recognize the pins or struck up a conversation that went in that direction as aroace. But here's the part where it gets a bit more complicated. And the actual part I want to talk about. Because around last November I realized that the way I felt about a friend of mine weren't entirely platonic. And then I also listened to the gallifrey audios at the same time which I promise are relevant here. So now I consider myself an aro lesbian. At least approximately, I'll get into it a bit more later.

Okay so here's where the rambling part starts. I have no idea how to properly organize it so I'm just taking you along for my thoughts.

The question that I really want to explore here, is whether I was ever really asexual. and I think to me the answer is yes. It's hard to say, because now that I have realized I'm a lesbian, looking back, yeah, there were signs. the way I felt about some older girls as a young teenager, the way I admired certain actresses, the way I felt about certain friends. so maybe I just suppressed it all. but I don't think that's true. I think I was ace, as much as one can ever be. Because the most important thing I learned from all of this is that nothing is ever certain and that is perfectly fine. Something being impermanent doesn't make it any less real.

And really, that was what a lot of my journey in this regard comes down to. When I started out questioning, at first I actually considered myself an acespec sapphic, then 'fully' ace, then arospec, then 'completely' aroace. I know that fully or completely aren't the best words here, what I mean is that I considered myself to have no attraction of that kind at all. And the main thing is that I started out with a lot of maybes. Maybe I'm ace. And I thought I was okay with that until I realized I was only okay with 'maybe yes' and not 'maybe no'. I had to fully accept that I would never have sex, never fall in love, never marry or have that sort of life as society says you have to want. And that was painful! It was really, really hard and took a long time. But I got there. And that was good! and it still is good!

and I honestly think I would never have gotten to a point where I am now, not just in regards to my orientation, but to who and how I am as a person. It's helped me be a lot more okay with uncertainty (for example with my gender. which I was also questioning for that whole time but that's not the topic here). and it has helped me realize what sort of things are important to me in life, that i don't have to follow a set path. I don't know if I'll ever have sex, or a romantic relationship and that doesn't matter to me. if it happens, it happens, if it doesn't, it doesn't.

okay now, so I don't consider myself ace anymore, because I realized or developed or explored or whatever you want to call it that my feelings for (some) women were and are in fact sexual. that part is still relatively easy actually. wanting to have sex with someone honestly always made a lot more sense to me than wanting to be in a romantic relationship. especially because: what the hell even is romantic?

and that's why I continue to be aro. I can't tell what I'm feeling for my friends apart from anything else. I care so much about them! and I do not understand why I should ever put one relationship in a more important position than all others. I don't think I have romantic feelings for anyone. but I can't be sure because I don't know what those are or if that might change in the future. I honestly don't know if anyone can ever be completely sure. but I continue to live my life as aromantic. I see society through that lens. I love my friends, I love a lot of people, but not in a way that would be seen as romantic by some arbitrary definition. or by those people I have talked to that definitely see themselves as alloromantic. and I really don't think that matters at all. so I very much see myself as aromantic.

so, for me, the way I see it, I used to be aroace, and now I'm not. Now I am a lesbian and aroallo. And that could change in the future. But that doesn't make it any less real now.

and also: I hope it comes across here, but I want to repeat it again. seeing myself as aroace, even if it might have been a phase for me, isn't that for many people. and it didn't hurt me in any way, it helped me, it enriched me as a person. I like to think it made me kinder. Asexual people are super cool

okay I'm done now, I think. do feel free to ask questions if you want anything specified.

[prince-liest]

Don't mind me getting on my soapbox for a moment... a lot of this musing is admittedly for the sake of my own processing of this topic, re: aroaceness. Read at your own peril! <3

I'm generally a very "ship and let ship" kind of person, but I think I would definitely append a little caveat of, like, "As long as you're not being actively invalidating and detrimental to others" to that. Which is a delightfully vague statement that can be interpreted practically any way, I know, hahaha.

In the case of this particular post I've just been thinking about how, like... seeing an aroace character like Alastor get written into dozens upon dozens of PWPs (including ones that don't even touch on the subject of his aceness at all) is really not something that I personally find to be hurtful or offensive. It's just smut for the sake of smut, of a character people want to see awful, sexy things done to (or doing). Valid! I vibe with you! More people should just write the PWPs they want to see in the world!

But on the other hand, I've several times seen this very particular type of art (usually it's a comic, but admittedly I haven't been reading very many Hazbin Hotel fics so maybe it's there, too) where Alastor is slotted into the "methinks the lady doth protest too much" trope. As in, he's expressing strong feelings about a character (usually Vox or Lucifer, sometimes Angel Dust) to someone, probably Rosie, and the person he's confiding to is some variant of, "Oh, silly Alastor, you're obviously in love!" And then he denies it, says that the very idea disgusts him, and the character titters to themselves about how he's so naive in the matters of romance or whatever.

And it's, like.

The "strong feelings" in question are almost always frustration/annoyance/disgust, and him being like, "Nnnno, I just hate his person" is treated like a silly and naive misunderstanding of his own feelings because obviously he's in love. Please imagine that Alastor was a female character who was established to be a lesbian. Now examine how that suddenly makes this scene feel.

(Also, Rosie being the go-to for this is a little frustrating when she's the one who, in canon, explicitly says that she wouldn't make that assumption of him.)

There's such a chasm of difference between how I see people wanting to ship Alastor for reasons of "I just want to!" vs folks who engage with him being aroace in ways that are infantilizing and invalidating. There are so many people out there - not just aro/ace people, but anyone who's not exclusively into the standard type of person they should be into at the time society deems they should be into them, which is most queer people and even many cishet folks - that have been told that exact kind of thing in real life. It reads like something out of a compulsory heterosexuality guidebook, and it actively makes it harder to leave the closet or even realize that you're in one at all.

So I guess it just feels frustrating to see it get made into a punchline, especially by folks who are shipping queer ships. I genuinely can't wait until fandom society advances to the point of consistently treating aro/acespec folks as queer instead of Queer Lite (TM), because let me tell you, ime the comphet experience and the amato/allonormativity experience are in fact nigh-identical except for how they're treated within online communities. There's a reason the pan -> gay -> ace pipeline is a thing.

But, hey! We're already doing way better than we were in 2012!

[bloggingboutburgers]

cw: discussions of bullying and aphobia

Hearing aroace peoples' existential crises over their friends discussing crushes, as someone who was socially isolated and severly bullied for their whole childhood and most of their adolescence so had NO friendgroup until adulthood and NO community or inclusion in literally anything (and when it came to sex and romance the other kids explicitly considered my potential involvement in either to be impossible / laughible because of how "weird" they found me (my autistic traits before I even realised I'm autistic)), felt like starving while listening to someone else complain about the food they're actively eating.

Food intolerances and dislike of different foods (as metaphor for being aro/ace) ARE important and difficult to grapple with when you're expected to eat specific foods in specific proportions at different times - but man did it sting until I realised why I felt that way and gave myself a talking to since my trauma doesn't justify belittling the very real struggles of aroace people.

I guess since the choice between 'stay alone or conform' was never really a choice because I was rejected no matter how cis straight or allo I was it taught me to go "fuck it" and accept myself regardless of what other people do or say (which ironically has lead to me becoming dramatically popular all of a sudden at uni, which has been weird to get used to since I have literally no experience with any of this - platonic or otherwise - which did lead to some advantage being taken of me but f*ck it we ball ^^'). And I guess it's just been difficult understanding why anyone would care so much about whether they're "normal" or not? You really have nothing to gain from that, safety is not guaranteed in conformity so best to live aroace and damn all aphobes to hell if they have a problem with that.

It's a mindset I'll never understand and that's only ok now insofar as that lack of understanding no longer results in misplaced anger at people who, for a time, I had once considered spoilt, ungrateful and out of touch. Basically, I'm full of sh*t and to every aroace person reading this you deserve good friends that actually respect you for who you are and do not even TRY to get you to change your mind about sex or romance. Have a lovely day x

Sincerely,

An aggressive emotional support anon

I'm genuinely sorry for all the hardships you went through. I don't mean to equate at all, truthfully from reading you and considering I WAS asked some of those questions as a kid regardless (the "who's your crush" bullshit and whatnot), it definitely sounds like I had it less hard than you did, but... I was bullied in elementary school and middle school, also not necessarily because I was aroace (I don't know why it happened really, I don't know if anyone ever knows, I boil it down to... me being me and there being something fundamentally wrong with me ig), and I definitely also get some of those feelings of "oh boo hoo you call that struggle" boiling in me when people discuss their own past struggles sometimes, so... Yeah, every one person's experience is unique, but I can at the very least very much sympathize.

I think a way it manifests in me is that I now have that compulsive, debilitating fear of being "othered" in any way, shape, or form, so I guess being aroace doesn't help my case. But at the same time... Well, like you brilliantly put it, when you're in a situation like that, no matter what you do, you won't be accepted anyway, and having that knowledge back then is probably also what lead me to figure myself out as aroace so early in life. Because I was treated as this much of an outsider, I ironically had that much room in my own head to form my own identity, far apart from others and the need to conform. Yeah, that identity may include a "piece of shit that doesn't deserve to be supported of part of a group" side that's been forced in, buried deep down and can't be erased, but... It also includes asexual and aromantic, and it's been cemented so hard from so early with such self-affirmation that later down the line, it saved me from a lot of stuff. I never had to force myself into a romantic or sexual relationship because I was undoubtably aroace – and people saw me as an outsider and an eyesore anyway. I spent years of being scared to go to school or out in the street every day, but later down the line, somehow, I feel it saved me from doing so many things I wouldn't have wanted to do.

...Bleh, sorry, didn't mean to turn this into me-me-me crap when you had the courage and sincerity of not only showing your experience, but finding the strength to show more love, understanding and support than a lot of people probably cared to give you for so long, despite all the pain you felt for so long. I guess I just wanna say... This take is definitely inspiring, so thank you on behalf of myself and others I'm sure, but also... I hope that, for yourself, you're also managing to own what you lived through in a way that allowed you to affirm yourself more strongly (it sounds like you are, I hope it IS the case), and most importantly, I hope you're in a much better place in your life now and you'll never have to return to that level of loneliness again.

[marvelandponder]

My sister's asexual, so we have a lot of conversations about what the difference is between a close friendship and a romantic relationship when sex isn't a factor in either of them. And there's really not much of a difference at all, or the difference is a lot smaller than someone would think? So it's absolutely fascinating to see the other side of that - this quasi-aromantic dynamic between Twilight and Sunset in Eros. What's the difference between Twilight and Sunset having a friendship where they have sex, and a romantic relationship? There's not much of a difference - the love is still there either way, the sex is still there, the friendship is still there.

I absolutely adore this ask in so many ways. First of all, love that sisterly support and fascinating discussions!!! I think you'll be pleased with chapter 2 on Friday is all I can say there.

Bevin is aroace, happily single by choice after several years of not knowing aro or ace were thingd you could be, and I'm bisexual and demiromantic, happily partnered currently with a guy I love (and in the past, had experiences of going from friends to partners). Needless to say, Bevin and I have had some interesting discussions about what romantic love even is if you're not someone who devalues friendship for the sake of romance being the Most Important Thing!

I don't want to spoil the two chapters ahead, so I'll just speak to what you've already read: Sunset and Twilight have just entered some super ambiguous territory. I love that you're already thinking this way because I could imagine many readers assuming that because they kissed, it's simple from here, right? They're a couple! They both know what that means - and could only ever mean one thing, right???

I felt like Twilight's lack of confidence in her friendship and romance abilities combined with Sunset's personal hangups around pursuing Twilight when she's vulnerable made for a way to introduce that ambiguity in while hopefully still staying in character.

This is the world where friendship is magic. So, what does that mean for romance? What happens when two friends basically enter into what some people might call a situationship? What's the difference between them as partners, them as best friends, and them in this undefined in-between space?

The thing with Eros is that even if a reader isn't caught up with Empathy for the Devil, they know the answer to will they?/won't they?

Clearly, in the first scene of the story, they will. That's not where the narrative tension comes from when we're reading in the past! These characters have questions -- that I think the story wants to let the reader ask themselves too -- and the reasons why Sunset and Twilight in particular are asking these questions are the focus.

All that to say: I love where you're head's at and am so stoked to see your reaction to chapters 2 and 3 as they come out! (Still going to respond in full to your chapter 1 comment! Just got busier over the weekend than expected haha)

[whotfareweidunno]

B-127's Human Companions

Transformers: Spark-Lost

There's five of them, each having a fraction of the All-Spark! They're all either runaways or are legally living on their own.

Elizabeth 'Liora' Bottz

16 • Female • She/Her • Aro-Ace

Team Leader || Fighter

"My disability is my advantage �� I had to adapt. They don't know how to fight someone like me, but I know exactly how to fight them."

James 'Jamie' Kael

18 • Male • He/She • Ace-Demi

Strategist || Scout

"Society has created a box — a mold — for us. Those who yearn to break free know what it means to fight in a war not made for us."

Cassidy Liams

14 • Bigender • She/He/They • Questioning

Weapons Expert || Fighter

"People tend to think that the young are stupid or weak. We're not. We just never get the chance to prove ourselves."

Michael 'Mikey' Stone

16 • Trans Fem Genderfluid • They/She • Pan

Communications Expert || Fighter

"I know I’m 'immature' but I also know that optimism is rare to come by these days. We all need a little happiness in our lives to break up the monotony!"

Micha Emmitt

14 • Nonbinary • They/Them • Bi

Engineer || Field Medic

"Some say I'm being 'impractical', but I say I'm being prepared. It's not impractical if it could save a life — and that's exactly why I prepare."