#can make another post asking for people's definitions of qprs specifically as well!

[knifearo]

I am a romance repulsed aro and I honestly never knew what a QPR really is. Or maybe I do have an idea, and the idea I have in mind isn't very favorable because to me it looks like a different flavor of 'aromantic people can date too!'

Can someone pls help me understand how this even works because i don't want to base my definition off from guessing what it means by observing what people make it out to be.

okay so as a nonpartnering aro i am going to preface this with the fact that i am ALSO definitely not an expert on qprs. i will offer you the wikipedia definition first:

Queerplatonic relationships (QPR) and queerplatonic partnerships (QPP) are committed intimate relationships which are not romantic in nature. They may differ from usual close friendships by having more explicit commitment, validation, status, structure, and norms, similar to a conventional romantic relationship. The concept originates in aromantic and asexual spaces in the LGBT community. Like romantic relationships, queerplatonic relationships are sometimes said to involve a deeper and more profound emotional connection than typical friendship.

personally i think my best understanding of the term is that it's a platonic (nonromantic) relationship that's been queered (in that it is a different kind of relationship from "typical" platonic relationships). this comes with all kinds of caveats for sure and like i was saying in that earlier post we're just not far enough in the popular discourse with some of our terms. platonic is not a term that encompasses all nonromantic relationships, and the wikipedia entry essentially saying that it's "more than friends" is part of a kind of rhetoric that a lot of aromantic people consider amatonormative. generally though! from what i understand. a queerplatonic relationship can be whatever you want it to be. another anon just said that "it doesn't go friendship -> QPR -> romantic relationship. they're all just……. relationships!!!!" which is a fantastic way to put it. a qpr is whatever two people who have a relationship that they think is best described as a qpr have. queerness often inherently defies labels etc. etc.

i know the idea of partnering specifically can feel like it's just following the conventions of amatonormativity and the expectation of pairing up with one other person. i would personally not label my relationships as qprs at this time in my life for that reason. what it comes down to is how people choose to describe their own experiences though! ultimately the queer people in qprs are not the ones making it "romance lite"; they are queer people in queer relationships. the people who make it feel like "romance lite" are the alloro people who ARE falsely equating it to "dating for aros". and i think we can just safely ignore those guys. or tell them to shut up. and go back to having queer relationships.

everyone please add on anything you feel like needs to be added/corrected about qprs!!! saying rn that i am NOT the expert and i defer to those of us who engage in qprs <2 hope this is still helpful though :)

[pluviophile-imagines]

Could I ask what your sexuality headcanons are? I love comparing mine with other peoples’!

Ok second half of this; this is just like. non-students who i Actually have thought about HJBAFV not at all a comprehensive list. Again disclaimer i write all these chars as bi in my fics, also i am bi myself so the vast majority are also bi, and also leaving a lot of these vague so u can imagine ur favorite ship or urself or w/ever

ok lets start this off with Aizawa. I think....... hes another one who's rlly unlabelled, doesnt super care to think it through and define it, but calls himself gay bc his interest in women is very, very rare and it's just way easier to say than explain all that. Definitely do buy into the idea that he had a crush on Oboro in hs but i do NOT buy into the easermic agenda sorry. Definitely not someone who goes looking for dates, but doesn't say no if someone asks him and hes interested (also im not gonna give her a whole section but i saw a hc a while back that the Ms. Joke stuff is literally that shes a lesbian and hes gay and shes fucking with him and i love that so much i just wanted to put it out there)

on the topic of the erasermic agenda: Hizashi's pan and knew it before HS, had a sudden & intense crush on Aizawa for the first month they knew each other and then immediately got over it in favor of a similar sudden, intense, and then immediately fading crush on Midnight. Hizashi and Aizawa r just rlly good friends imo; maybe they messed around for a bit in their twenties but it never went anywhere serious. He dates around a lot, not even necessarily to settle down just to have some fun

Midnight is aro/ace but does get in qprs & gravitates towards women wrt that. Most people dont read vigilantes but theres a woman in that, Kazuho, who i imagine she's been in a long-term qpr with; her relationship with aizawa and hizashi leans a little more towards a qpr than a normal friendship, too, but it's not rlly defined that way

All Might is married to justice queer but v much not interested in relationships. He and that one guy from the first movie are ABSOLUTELY exes and i won't hear otherwise; it's the only relationship he's ever had, and they broke up bc he had to go back to japan. He was heartbroken but did eventually get over him; his lack of romance afterwards is from genuine disinterest and not being hung up on his past. I can see him finding someone else in his later years, after he's retired. Definitely feels like he's not worthy of it tho

Hawks is bi but unfortunately didn't get to figure that out until like Now in the timeline...... if youll let my dabihawks history shine through i think dabi was the reason JHBASFGJHB he was basically brainwashed by the commission to become a hero so he didnt have time to Figure That Shit Out; he knew he was into women bc that was easy & what the commission expected from him but then he started this undercover assignment and met dabi and realized Oh...... Fuck. Hawks is hard tbh, bc i think between the control that the commission has over him and his own convictions as a hero he doesn't pursue any romance (tho he does get crushes or find people attractive) and most of his flings are done to keep up his prettyboy act, not out of genuine interest in being a fuckboy. Can't imagine him having a relationship until well after canon but I do see him being interested eventually

Onto the villains, Shigaraki is unlabelled but probably would call himself queer if asked. Definitely admires women more but isn't very interested in romance; AFO actively encourages him to pursue the things interested in so imo if he were he'd talk abt it more lmfao. I kinda see him as demi as well, not the type to fall immediately but requiring a friendship beforehand; tho unlike Bakugo as i said in my last post I dont think it happens suddenly but rather slowly. Y'all know im a big fan of shigaraki being absolutely whipped for his s/o so i do thing hes a big piner, tho he's also pretty bold and unashamed of his affections. I'm a big fan of him falling for a member of the league or a civilian; definitely can't see him falling for a hero unless the hero was already halfway to turning sides already. I think he's also attracted to intelligence and someone who pushes him to think more abt his ideology...... maybe im just projecting at this point JSHDFBVAJKSHD but my point is that the gender of his partner is definitely the least of what he considers/notices

Dabi is bi and, here's my bold take, demisexual; not interested in sex unless its with someone he loves. Absolutely doesn't even think abt romance for most of the years where he's on his own. He's got revenge to plan. By the time he joins the league that hasn't changed much, and he's demi so he's not interested in sleeping around, plus he rlly denies any attachment to people at all. As I said in that other ask tho I do rlly like the idea of him with Magne, so I think they have a fling for a bit before her death :( it's one of the things that leads him to isolate himself further, unfortunately, even from Jin and the other League members with whom his relationships aren't romantic. I can see him dating someone post-canon bc i think hes gonna be redeemed lol. It could be someone he knew before but they probably didnt date again bc he was v guarded; i think magne was rlly the only person he dated

Magne is pan and heres the kicker: I think shes t4t, which led to a little moment just before she and dabi got together where he was like "she wouldnt be into me :/" but she was into him anyway so all was good. She got around in her circles, mostly casual stuff tho she yearned for something more serious.

Spinner's bi & trends towards women but does occasionally get things for men and they're almost always intense. He thought he was straight for a while even once he joined the league and then suddenly got a crush on Shigaraki (around the time of MVA) and realized otherwise LMFAO he's definitely a hopeless romantic type, the whole mutant prejudice thing makes it rlly hard for him and i can see him being rlly happy with another mutant-type; i feel like as he matures he starts to gravitate towards them

Toga is canonically pan to my understanding, iirc her interest in Uraraka and Deku is the same (and romantic) in canon tho i might be wrong. Poor girl just needs therapy. I like the idea of the two of them becoming her friends over her being involved with them but i totally can get behind her having a thing with Uraraka (and maybe Tsu) at some point post-canon (presuming she gets redeemed), tho I think a qpr between the two/three of them would be longer lasting. And again presuming she gets therapy i can see her settling down with someone, gender irrelevant

Jin is unlabelled bc he hasn't much thought abt it, definitely had a thing for dabi and for hawks which does make me sad on both counts. I think he likes women slightly more abstractly/aesthetically and gets crushes more on men,. The dabi thing fades as they get closer and start to view each other as brothers. In his later years he doesn't rlly care about romance, I think he enjoys the experience of crushing but doesnt like dating people; his found family in the League is far more important to him. But i can see him falling head-over-heels for someone quite suddenly and having a bit of a whirlwind romance. Also someone for whom gender isn't much of a factor

Mr Compress is also queer and also hasn't rlly thought abt it. Definitely leans more towards women; he's like 30 but i like to think he also goes for older partners, 10 or 15 years his senior KJBADSJFHB idk he just has that Vibe with the way he calls himself an old man etc. A lot of the league i cant see sleeping or dating around much, i feel like they prioritize each other, but I do think mr compress gets around more than the others. i can see him having a bit of a fuckbuddy who he catches feelings for

Kurogiri is fun; as Oboro I do think Aizawa's crush was reciprocated, tho he wasn't around long enough for them to act on it :( he's bi, tho kurogiri isn't supposed to have personal interests. I like to imagine the brainwashing isnt as good as AFO wants it to be tho so I like the idea of him falling for someone anyway. I also like the idea of the heroes managing to undo the nomufication and I 100% can see him, aizawa, and someone else (someone he was involved with as Kurogiri) ending up in a triad as a result of aizawa and the third partner helping him through the aftermath of all that shit

Lady Nagant is a manga-only minor character but im in love with her so imma talk abt it. Shes bi and leans VERY heavily towards women, probably spent years questioning whether she was rlly bi or a lesbian before finally having a fling with a guy that she genuinely enjoyed. Has only ever been in long-term relationships with women and I v much think she has a gf at home who stayed even when she was arrested 🥺

Finally imma talk abt Natsuo bc i love that boy. He's one of the few unmarried chars with a love interest and he canonically has a gf. I do see him as IDing straight in canon ngl, but the kind of straight where he might actually be bi but his preference leans so heavily towards women and he grew up in a bad home so he just doesnt rlly think abt it bc hes v happy with women anyway. In shiganatsu thoughts shigaraki is the first man he has a thing for; i rlly can see the two of them in a triad with a woman specifically, who helps the two of them find each other and is the one who initiates bc its definitely a weird situation for natsuo

[thedreadvampy]

Like idk what you want from me here. If you want to engage me in a specific question about ace/aro identities, as I've said several times and nobody has ever actually done, then ask me the specific question. Don't fuck around with vague gestures at Points of Discourse and then get cross with me because I haven't answered the Exact Question you Didn't Ask But Expected Me To Intuit.

Preface: If you don't want to answer any of these because you are allo/allo and don't have a say because its not your place, say that. In fact, I'm asking these because you seem to do have opinions on things you shouldn't based off things you have said in the past.

I also want to state that I agree fully with your points about Martin- minus the blatant aphobia. Not just acephobia, arophobia as well.

1. Do you think qprs are problematic? I believe you once made a post saying roughly that qprs are just normal friendships, or something like that, that has since been deleted. What is your current opinion?

2. Are het aros lgbt?

3. Are het aces lgbt?

4. Cis aro/aces lgbt?

5. Cishet aro/aces?

6. Do the spectrums and micro identities exist? You've implied in the past they don't, in the post about how they were supposedly created from sex positivity

7. Can aros be in or desire romantic relationships?

8. Can aces have or desire sex?

9. Does the split attraction model exist and does it benefit people?

10. Can teenagers identify as aro/ace or do you think they're too young?

11. Can you be, say, an aroace lesbian, or an aroace gay, aroace bi, etc. Idk how to phrase this one but like can you be aroace and still id with another orientation?

I could send another anon detailing the aphobia in the post, because I at least am certainly not upset about Martin being sexual, rather it was the very blatant aphobia. It could have stemmed from ignorance, and if that's the case I don't mind explaining it.

Ok this is a lot of questions, some with quite involved answers, so I'm gonna answer them chunk by chunk so it's a bit more manageable, and then I might come back to some of the surrounding message. This isn't gonna be an immediate bang bang bang, but I'll try and work through them over the next couple of days.

Question 1

1. No, I don't think qprs are problematic. I don't necessarily understand them but I don't need to understand them to understand and respect that they're a thing that's important to a lot of people. I don't know what post you're referring to, but I'm surprised that you say it was deleted, because I very rarely delete posts except, occasionally, reblogs where people have flagged up misinformation or dogwhistles or which I reblogged by accident. tbh I'm the messiest online presence I'm way too lazy to delete past posts or block people even when I probably should bc I don't like to feel like I'm ~hiding evidence~. So I'm not saying you're wrong, you're probably totally right, but I'm surprised.

I'm thinking about what posts I've made that you could be thinking of, and obviously I don't remember everything I say on here bc I say A Lot and I actively post to get things out of my head so 🤷‍♀️ but I do remember making a post a while ago where I said that it was a normal expectation of friendship to have some friends close enough that you'll live with them, raise kids with them, etc, and I'm wondering if that was the post you're thinking of? I did have qprs in mind while writing that to a degree, but only because I think 'you wouldn't do this with your friends' is a very common argument people put forward about qprs and I think it's a weak argument, because many people have different definitions of friendship, and the only argument I think is needed for any sort of I Have X Emotional Relationship To This Thing is...I Have X Emotional Relationship To This Thing. Like you can't offer a universal materialist definition of the differences between romantic, queerplatonic, sexual and platonic relationships, because the boundaries are very personal and it's really an emotional and experiential difference. so if that is the post you're thinking of, I wasn't criticising The Concept Of QPRs as much as saying that I thought trying to put hard lines around What Friends Do Vs What QPPs Do was a) counterproductive when arguing with someone who thinks QPR is Just Normal Friendships bc. if they do those things with their friends then saying NO THIS IS A QPR THING just reinforces their existing belief that you're talking about the same thing as they mean by friendships and b) to me seems to set a painful expectation to young people that you can only get these kinds of close friendships occasionally and in the form of a QPR and it will be stigmatised and misunderstood (and depending on how people talk about it, is only accessible to aspec people and allo people should only expect it to come through romantic/sexual relationships), when in fact most people of most ages I know have friends with whom they can share things like housing, deep feelings, futures, finances, who they miss if they don't see for a few days, who are mutually supportive and vital to their wellbeing. I don't think that's mutually exclusive with the existence of QPRs though - like I personally don't know what the difference is between a QPR and a close friendship, but I also don't know what the difference is between a romantic relationship and a close friendship but I know there is one and I know it's not a question of What You Do but a question of How You Feel And Interact, and that's pretty hard to define in unambiguous terms.

Like generally I don't Not Think QPRs exist, and I think it's a dick move to try and tell people they're wrong about how they experience and define their relationships because???? how are you meant to know that better than the person whose relationship it is??? but I do think the way people talk about QPRs (both from the perspective of defending them and from the perspective of attacking them) is pretty rife with problems and I don't think it's invalidating the reality of QPRs to talk about where the arguments and language around them potentially falls down or has unexpected consequences.

On the other hand, I don't know if that actually is the post you're referring to - the reason I'm calling back to that is that that and a few resultant asks are the only time I remember talking about QPRs on here in the last year or so. So like, several of these questions reference past posts, which is very fair, but I do need it to be clear that, since I don't really tag anything and I don't have a great memory, I can only really speak to What I Think Now In This Context, not to what I posted in the past and what I was thinking when I posted it. Like, this isn't too deny responsibility - I reckon I'm responsible for what I post even if I don't still agree with it, which is why I don't tend to delete my own posts on purpose - but just to deny capacity, I guess? I don't really KNOW what I've posted so if you talk about it in vague terms (and I do understand that if it's been deleted there's not a lot you can do but that) I may not necessarily be responding to the part of it that's worried you, so if I'm not speaking to something specific I've said or done, it's not because I Don't Want To, I just don't necessarily know to.

I'm waffling about this because looking through your messages there's a lot of "you said X" and like. given that the intended message of the post that's kicked this off was very different to the message people have taken from it, it feels important to me to know whether if I looked at the posts you're referencing I'd be like "ah yeah I did believe that but now I believe X" or if it's more a situation of "oh right I can see how you took X from that but my thinking was more Y".

(also sometimes when people say "you made a post" they mean "you reblogged a post" and I am a compulsive discourse scroller so sometimes I reblog a random post to bookmark my place on someone's discourse blog or I accidentally longpress the reblog button while scrolling - I try to delete reblogs that I don't agree with but sometimes I miss some, all of which to say if there's a post on my blog that doesn't seem to reflect what I say in my original posts then it doesn't necessarily mean I'm a crypto-whatever so much as I'm very lazy and messy with my blog. Doesn't mean I shouldn't be held accountable for reblogs but it's useful to know if we're talking original content or reblogs bc I'm unlikely to fully accidentally make a post. but I quite often accidentally reblog stuff. I doubt this is the case with this sitch just bc of your phrasing but I want to cover my bases)

anyway tl;dr: no I don't believe that QPRs themselves are inherently problematic, nor do I think I have at any point believed that, but I do think that a lot of the language and ideas used to talk about them are based in miscommunication or absolutist ideas about relationships and can have damaging knock on effects.

[ayy-spec]

Arospec Awareness Week Ask

1. Where are you on the aromantic spectrum?

I identify as demiromantic, but I also use the term gray aromantic and sometimes aromantic.

2. What are some other labels you have tried out?

I used to think my romantic and sexual orientation worked exactly the same so I identified as abroromantic for a while and at one point identified as only liking girls. I don’t clarify the gender of my attraction with labels, but I have been romantically attracted to 3 people in my life and they were 2 guys and a girl, so I think I could be attracted to people of any gender.

3. How long have you identified as aro-spec?

I definitely identified as alloromantic ace-spec for a while before questioning being aro-spec, so that was probably when I was 19 or 20? So 3 or 4 years.

4. How old were you when you first heard the term?

I heard about the term aromantic when I was in high school, probably 14 or 15. I heard about the terms aromantic spectrum, demiromantic, and gray aromantic later than that but not by much.

5. Are you sam or non-sam?

I use the split-attraction model (SAM) because I feel like my romantic orientation works differently than my sexual orientation. I am demiromantic and abrosexual gray asexual. 

6. Do you wear a white ring?

No, but I do usually wear a black ace ring! I haven’t been wearing rings since the pandemic however because it’s just another thing to clean. I’ve been considering getting a white aro ring.

7. Are you out?

I don’t have a straightforward answer for that. It doesn’t come up a lot, but I’m definitely not in the closet and I do talk about it sometimes. A big reason it doesn’t come up is because I don’t think about romance that much lol.

8. What are some aro headcanons you have?

I’m going to make a post about this later this week when I’ve had more time to think about it, but my 2 biggest aro-spec headcanons are Amethyst from Steven Universe being aromantic (and asexual) and Fitzroy Maplecourt from The Adventure Zone: Graduation being demiromantic (he’s canonically asexual).

9. Are you romance favorable, indifferent, adverse, or repulsed?

I would like to try out a romantic relationship! I don’t know how I’ll feel about it until I’ve actually tried it, but like I said I don’t think about romance very much, I had a boyfriend in high school for a few months and I wasn’t very into it, but I also didn’t like him like that anyway.

10. Are you in a qpr? Do you want one?

I’ve never been in a queerplatonic/quasiplatonic relationship but I’m not averse to the idea! If I met someone and felt like that would be a good fit for us I think I would go for it, but I’m not actively seeking one out.

11. Are you in a romantic relationship? Do you want one?

I’m not currently in a relationship. I’ve tried dating apps a few times but nothing ever came from it, plus it’s hard when I rarely feel attracted to people based on a quick look at a picture and bio. I don’t have a lot of opportunities to meet people my age either. I would like to be in a romantic relationship, I think. I’m also open to polyamory so I could see myself being in more than one romantic relationship.

12. Tag at least one aro-spec blogger on tumblr to help grow connections

I’m going to tag @acespectips and @arospectips ! acespectips is a blog run by arospecs who experience sexual attraction helping out questioning ace-specs, and arospectips is its sister blog which is run by acespecs who experience romantic attraction helping out questioning arospecs!

13. Do you know any facts about aro history?

Unfortunately, not very much! I believe that the word aromantic was added to the Merriam Webster English Dictionary in 2020 (might have been 2019?) and I know that quite a few aromantic terms were coined on the AVEN forums. 

14. What piece of media that you like has a canon aro-spec character?

Unfortunately I don’t have a lot of arospec representation in stuff that I like. I loved Steven Universe when it was running and Peridot was word-of-god canonized as aroace, but imo her aro-ness was not really explored. I use the Choices app a lot and there’s an aroace character named Zephyr in the Elementalist series. Jughead from Archie comics seems fun, but I’ve never read the comics.

15. What’s your ideal friendship?

I don’t have any specifics in mind. As long as we get each other and can communicate, there’s a lot of ways I have friendships with people!

16. Did you have a good discount chocolate day? (the day after Valentine’s Day)

I did not partake because I only go to stores when I really need to right now, and I didn’t really need anything that day. 

17. What are some issues you have faced from being aro-spec? (if you’re comfortable answering)

I have trouble understanding romantic relationships a lot of the time, and the rules relating to them. I don’t understand why people decide to stay in relationships where they’re not happy or fight a lot (this is not about abusive relationships, just ones that don’t seem to be working) so I have had a lot of trouble trying to help out friends who are having problems related to that. 

It’s also been very frustrating when I was actively looking for a relationship on apps, because it seems clear that most people are able to determine whether or not they would be open to dating somebody very quickly in a way that I can’t. I honestly wish that I wasn’t a-spec, but I don’t dwell on it and I’m not ashamed to be the way I am.

18. What are some positive experiences you have had from being aro-spec?

I like the online community I’ve found! I love that I’ve been exposed to so many different lifestyles and kinds of relationships that I likely wouldn’t have known about if I didn’t engage with the a-spec community. I’m glad that I never went through a phase of being super preoccupied with dating when I was a teen. There’s a lot of problems and drama that comes along with romantic relationships that I’ve been able to avoid as well lol.

Questions Source: @swords-and-aros

[violetemerald]

Carnival of Aros – November 2020 Call for Submissions: “Commitment”

The Carnival of Aros is a month-long recurring blogging festival where bloggers on different platforms all write (or vlog, or create content) on a specific theme. Submissions are typically posted on everyone’s own blog (or whatever platform they use, such as YouTube). Different bloggers typically host the carnival each month. For more information about the Carnival of Aros, please look here! And don’t be afraid to host the carnival yourself sometime soon. The only rules are that a) submissions are tied back to aromanticism in some way, and b) the theme inspires your submission in some way.

Feel free to ask me questions if you have any on WordPress in comments, in a reblog, in a tumblr message or Ask, or at my email address luvtheheaven5@gmail.com! This entire post has been cross-posted to WordPress.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

For November 2020, the theme I chose is “Commitment”. The prompts below are meant to help give you ideas of various directions you could take your submissions, but the topic is meant to be broad so anything that the word inspires, even if it has nothing to do with any of the prompts below, is welcome!

The dictionary of “commitment” that I was imagining would be most likely to be focused on:

n. The state of being emotionally or intellectually devoted, as to a belief, a course of action, or another person.

There are also other common definitions, such as:

n. A pledge or obligation, as to follow a certain course of action.

There are other definitions of the word, especially if you expand to the verb “commit”, such as “committing a crime”, which you are welcome to explore if you’re interested. However, the prompts I have below are mostly based on the first two definitions I just listed up above.

Prompts:

How do you, as a person who is aromantic or on the aromantic spectrum, feel about committed partnership or other kinds of commitments in interpersonal relationships? Do you have friendships that contain commitment? Do you make a conscious choice to have uncommitted dynamics, and prefer a lack of commitment?

Do you want more or less commitment in your life than you currently have?

Do you commit ideologically to anything? Do you commit to certain goals? Do you commit to any actions/behaviors?

If you are fluent in one or more languages that aren’t English, does that language/do those languages have different connotations around these ideas, or varied words that would reflect the ideas which we consider wrapped up in “commitment” in English?

Does commitment to a person evoke a sense of safety/security/comfort for you, or perhaps does it evoke a sense of being stifled/stuck/trapped? Are there other ways commitment feels that are quite different, like confusing/nonsensical?

Does a lack of commitment (of any kind) in your life, hypothetically or practically in the present, feel like “freedom”? Or what does it feel like?

If you’ve ever been interested in non-traditional relationship structures, such as friends-with-benefits (FWBs), queerplatonic relationships (QPRs), polyamorous or polyaffectionate dynamics, relationship anarchy, etc – how does or doesn’t “commitment” factor into your plans?

What do you think of the commitment aspect of queenieofaces’ “Five Factor Model of Relationships”? Do you consider any other aspects of the model relevant to the theme of commitment as well? Is there another model of relationships you find useful that might have a commitment component, either in name or in practice?

Are there things you might like to do that might be related to the aro community or aro activism, but which feel like “too much commitment” so you are not pursuing them? Or are there things you definitely don’t want to do and one of the reasons you know you don’t have interest in that is because of the commitment that would be involved? (I’m even thinking things like becoming a parent.)

Are there any things in your life which you realize now are actually commitments, but you never framed them as commitments before?

Are there prejudices against non-partnering aros and/or people of all orientations who choose to remain single that have to do with societal beliefs about commitment, and if so is there something to explore there, such as myths and misconceptions?

Hopefully some of these prompts help inspire you, but feel free to take the carnival topic into any direction you’d like!

The deadline for submissions is the end of the day Monday, November 30th. I will wait to post the round-up post till around 9:00 PM EST on Tuesday December 1st, and if you submit anything later that week, I can edit the post to also include it, but ideally you’ll get your posts in while it’s still November.

Good luck!

Please submit by posting a comment below to this WordPress post, emailing me at luvtheheaven5@gmail.com, or feel free to direct message luvtheheaven on twitter, luvtheheaven on tumblr, or luvtheheaven#8738 on Discord. I’m around at all these platforms. Within 24 hours of you sharing your submission, you should get a confirmation from me that I’ve received it. If you haven’t, feel free to reach out an additional time.

Good luck with your submissions! And like I said above, feel free to ask if you have any questions.

[scriptlgbt]

My story is about pirates. The MC is a trans guy and the captain is a lesbian who is some sort of big sister/mother figure to him. It's quite violent. I was wondering if it could be problematic? I know it's problematic to show trans woman being overly violent in fiction but what about cis lesbians and straight trans guys? Also, do you know about real any queer pirates i could read about? And what did pirates think about homosexuality/transness?) How was it being queer in the pirate world?

A conversation that I had, that is relevant:

ME: [PARTNER], do you know anything about queer pirates?

PARTNER: I know that there were many, and they’d sometimes be like -

ME: Sea husbands kind of thing?

PARTNER: Yeah, and one would inherit from the other’s booty, and when it was divided up, they’d share their share of the booty.

ME: [mischievous grinning face]

PARTNER: [nodding] And they might share each other’s booty.

Disclaimer: This whole thing is going to largely focus on what is known as the Golden Age Of Piracy. I’m also not a historian, I just hardcore, love pirates with my heart and soul. This is going to be a long post.

So, this is super generalized, but pirates, and even sea-faring folks in general (see: - or sea, hahahahaha - the LGBT+ history of Brighton in the UK), have tended to have a much higher rate of LGBT+ folks and minoritized people in general, throughout history. As far as most research I’ve done goes. Being in a travelling situation and having the anonymity of being able to move around with chosen family generally has great appeal to folks whose existences are filled with oppression and a sense of not belongingness. This has also applied for racialized people, women in general, impoverished folks in general, a lot of different people who wanted to reclaim a place in the world that ostracized them.

Another fun fact, the use of the term “Friend of Dorothy” as a euphemism for gay folks was investigated by the US Navy. They misunderstood it as meaning that there actually was a woman named Dorothy who could be routed down and coerced into outing her “friends” to the military. Cruise ships and others have also used this phrase to covertly advertise that there were meetings for these folks. (Source: Wikipedia | “Friend of Dorothy”) 

But to get to the pirates, specifically.

Most pirate ships largely had their own code that everyone on their ship had to agree to. Some had things like, “you’ll be marooned with one knife, and no food if you are caught not reporting loot to be divvied up by the crew fairly” and things like that. But generally, whoever ran the ship, the Captain, would get to pick the rules. And with the partial-democracy that comes with the idea of mutiny, and the more notable reliance on the labour of it all, in general, things were able to be slightly more consensus-based than the on-land governments.

There are numerous women who became pirates to take ownership of their lives in ways that weren’t permitted on-land. Anne Bonny and Mary Read are historical figures that might be worth looking into. The two of them shared lovers, sailed together, had intense care for one and other and with their dressing up in masculine-coded attire and the like, there’s a lot to go off of in assuming they may have been romantically involved with each other. If not, at least they had some iteration of what a lot of contemporary folks might find comparable to a QPR.

The concept of “sea husbands” was also called matelotage (or bunkmate) depending on your crew. It was kind of the buddy system, but gayer. With little need to consistently explain it to outsiders, folks at sea were freer to explore the different ways a relationship with another person can be, without so much worrying about how it looks to others at a passing glance. And as pirates, there’s less concern that you’ll get shit from the law for gay stuff Of All Things. 

Buccaneer Alexander Exquemelin wrote: ‘It is the general and solemn custom amongst them all to seek out… a comrade or companion, whom we may call partner… with whom they join the whole stock of what they possess.’  (Source)

It was just normal. They also had a version of health insurance where someone was compensated if they ended up disabled from battle. The compensation of death of your partner also works into this.

As for transness, these kinds of things have had fickle definitions and historically, it’s hard to be able to pinpoint specific people as fitting cleanly into contemporary cultural definitions of transness, because frankly, the past had different culture to now. When it comes to writing canonically trans characters in contexts where the language might have been different, it’s important to focus on making sure that a trans reader can identify the personal connection with that character’s experiences and feelings, just as much as it is to use language to name folks as trans. 

Representation can go deeper than surface terminology and the like, and in cases where the terminology doesn’t necessarily match, it has to. Language like, “I never really felt like a [assigned gender] - I see myself more like [desciption of actual gender identity or name for it].” - is as good as just saying the character is trans in my opinion.

Depending on where the character is from, they also may have just outright had a word in their language for their identity. 

Gender presentation was significantly freer with pirates than it was for folks on land. Things like earrings, frilled sleeves, varied hair length and similar, were not uncommon, although the gendered coding associated with these aspects of appearance had different implications than they do now. Gold earrings on seafarers were there to fund a proper burial if someone’s body washed ashore. Gendered clothing was also coded in more binary ways on land. Folks who wanted to be coded as men could do so by wearing pants and folks who wanted to be coded as women could do so with skirts and dresses. (Tangential but fun fact yet again: dressing in those big poofy skirts usually included massive pockets. They were generally not physically attached to the skirts, but if you wore it all properly you would easily be able to reach into them.) 

Pirates and other seafarers also had clothing referred to as ‘slops’ for cleaning (if they were of the rank that cleaned anyway) which were pretty wide-legged pants that could almost pass for a skirt. 

Material that pirates used for clothing was largely what they stole, but it was cut and sewn into the same shapes a lot of other seafarers wore. At the time, it was largely illegal (under English rules anyway) for people who weren’t the bourgeoisie to wear anything made with nice fabric. Rich people saw this as deceitful, and these laws enabled richer people to not mingle on an equal level with those of a lower socioeconomic status.

As pirates, if you’re already shunning the law, may as well wear full calico suits. (Like Calico Jack Rackham.)

There’s more info on pirate and privateer clothing here. (The link is to a free book in HTML format, complete with illustrations and talk of materials, and how the clothes worn at sea varied from clothes they wore when they came into shore and towns.)

I could write a book on this and still not have covered enough. But the gist is that pirates were a big counterculture of outsiders living their lives. LGBT+ people and racialized people got thrown into the mix (and jumped right in) and experienced much more liberated lives than they might otherwise. That isn’t to say they were flawlessly inclusive - there still definitely were a lot of things people thought of in congruence with colonial beliefs. There was racism and homophobia - but it looked a lot different, and was a lot lighter than you’d think. And there were some ships which banned women, but mainly I think that was because they typically didn’t have the background to hold their ground on the ships, and were considered more of a plus one to certain crew members (who brought them - the rules were specifically about bringing them onto the ship rather than them being there of their own accord) than part of the crew. Sometimes women were part of the crew.

Notably, Anne Bonny and Mary Read were in a polyamorous triad with Calico Jack Rackham. (I think a cis + het historian might argue about this but that would seem like denial to me tbh. There is much, MUCH more evidence pointing in this direction than against it, and it would be extraordinarily hard to argue otherwise.) I would definitely do some research on them!

I also recommend this book (link is the free text on WikiSource), A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the most notorious Pyrates. It is perhaps the most famous contemporary record of the lives of a number of pirates from the time, including Anne Bonny and Mary Read.

As for the sensitivity aspect of this ask, I’d say that what you are describing is completely fine. As long as the violence isn’t used to dehumanize or completely demonize, I would even say that I don’t have any warnings for you about it, or precautions to advise on.

Thank you for this opportunity to infodump about LGBT+ pirates. I hope this is not overwhelming, but I’m also happy to parse out segments of this better upon request. (Our ask will be open eventually, I promise.)

- mod nat

[arosnowflake]

About arospec headcannon thing anyone from FMA of your choice and a character from a series/book that you have enjoying latelly!

“character from a series/book that you have enjoying latelly” bold of you to assume I’ve had the attention span to be reading anything anon. the only thing I’ve been reading lately is ‘The Bacchae and Other Works’, demonstrating that I can, in fact, be a smart literary reader every once in a while, but the only play I’ve finished is Ion, and like… sure Athena is aro, but I also feel like headcanoning a greek god as aro is kinda cheating, but in the spirit of ancient greek myths, I’ll be doing my fave aro headcanon, Percy Jackson. He’s going under the cut though, because Ed’s turned out… long. Sorry about that.

Anyway, from FMA, I’m (predicatably) picking Edward Elric, because I can’t and won’t stop:

What arospec identities do they have? (Can be as specific or vague as desired)

I generally headcanon Ed as nebularomantic, though I also really really like the headcanon of him having my exact aro experience because honestly, I like projecting onto him. But I usually go with nebularomantic because I feel like the headcanon possibilities for that are more interesting, so I’ll go with that in this post.

(Or arovague, a little more, maybe? He’s nebularomantic in the sense that a) alexithymia makes figuring out whether he’s feeling platonic or romantic attraction pretty much impossible, and b) he feels like he doesn’t really fit into society’s ideas of romance due to it heavily being tied up into neurotypical standards, and finds the concept of romantic relationships/romantic attraction somewhat inaccessible to him as a result. So he’s kind of a mix between nebularomantic, quoiromantic with the ‘disidentifies with the concept of romantic attraction’ definition, and arovague, I guess, but I think he’d just use nebularomantic because it’s easier and it still encompasses his experiences very well.)

How proud of being arospec are they?

Pretty proud, if only because he knows it pisses people off and he loves doing that. He’s not dropping it into every conversation ever, but he definitely has a couple pins and shows up at pride with the flag painted on his cheeks.

Do they prioritize their arospec identity over any others?

I’d say that on the Minority Identity tier, it’s probably his least important identity to him, definitely after autistic/ADHD (kind of the same thing to him) and nonbinary. It’s still pretty important to him, though. Maybe the only thing he prioritizes it over might be his amputee status, mostly because, since he grew up with a bunch of automail engineers and later living in Rush Valley with Paninya and Winry for a long while, amputees have kinda become the norm for him. However, I can also see that, due to the Circumstances surrounding the loss of his limbs, he might prioritize his physical disability anyway, because he’s had to learn to take pride in it, whereas for the nebularomanticism, that came pretty naturally.

Are they out? If so, how did they come out, and to whom?

He’s out to pretty much everyone, although the only people he actually sat down and had a conversation with were Winry, Paninya, and Al. Winry because she helped him figure out he wasn’t allo (even if he couldn’t pin down his specific aro identity), and Paninya because he brought it up when he proposed starting a qpr to sort of close a sort of ‘qpr’ triad between him, Winry, and Paninya. Al also knows because Ed talked his feelings over with him when he was still questioning, and then Mei found the identity ‘nebularomantic’ and told Al, who told Ed, and that’s how Ed figured out his identity.

How do they feel about romance? Romance-favorable? Romance-neutral? Romance-repulsed? Or does it fluctuate?

Romance-neutral, largely. I mean, he’s married, so that counts as romance-favourable probably, but honestly? He’s mostly neutral to the concept of romance because he doesn’t understand why it exists. It’s pretty much impossible for him to separate neurotypical expectations of romance and love from the concept of romantic relationships/romantic attraction in general, and this was one of the main reasons he and Winry decided to change their relationship from ‘romantic’ to ‘idk what but we’re definitely important to another/queerplatonic-ish’; he constantly felt like he was failing in romance, and Winry had a bit of trouble adjusting her expectations from a generic romantic relationship to one with Ed once they moved from a long distance relationship to a short distance one, so they felt like it was best to change the label. But that said, he’s not repulsed, and he’s not necessarily opposed to the concept of a romantic relationship, he just doesn’t really understand why that exists and has trouble living up to the neurotypical standards it generally entails.

Have they ever experienced arophobia? If so, how?

Some mild stuff, but nothing extreme. He married Winry fairly young, so that warred off all the ‘I can fix you/you need to be fixed’ and ‘you’re horrible and are going to die alone!’ flavours of arophobia, but at the same time, the fact that he married her means that a lot of people deny, ignore, and/or erase his arospec identity. Even showing up in public with an aro/nebularomantic pride flag doesn’t stop people from ignoring it. Since he’s a pretty high-profile figure, this means that it’s especially noticeable.

In addition, he’s also faced some ableist-specific arophobia in people saying that he just doesn’t understand romantic attraction because he’s autistic/ADHD, which, yeah, duh, that’s why he identifies as nebula? But people use that to deny his identity, saying that his aro identity isn’t real because it’s caused/affected by his neurodivergency, or that it must be fixed with therapy. He generally punches those people in the face and they shut up really quickly.

How do they show their arospec pride?

Like I said, he goes to pride and paints his cheeks in the nebularomantic/aromantic pride colours (one on each cheek), and he doesn’t shy away from talking about it in day-to-day life. On the rare occasion that he makes a public appearance such as an interview or as a gala attendee (mostly when he’s lost a bet to Mustang or Ling), he usually takes either a small or big flag with him (depending on the mood he’s in), just to smirk when people get awkward or try to ignore it.

Do they actively try to combat amatonormativity in their daily lives or elsewhere? If so, how?

He constantly corrects people if they call Winry his wife (yes, they’re partners, and yes, they’re married, but ‘wife’ specifically has connotations to him that he doesn’t like), constantly corrects them if they assume he’s alloro, and just generally is an obnoxious arospec fuck who’s not going to let any part of his arospec identity get erased.

Was it easy for them to label themselves arospec, or was there a long period of questioning? How many labels did they have to try before landing on the one they use now?

The questioning process took pretty long, both due to the complicated nature of his identity and alexithymia hindering the process. As I already said, it’s pretty much impossible for him to distinguish neurotypical expectations of romance from romantic attraction/relationships, but he was also aware that societal expectations =/= romantic attraction at its core, so he didn’t know if his confusion surrounding the matter was enough to make him anything but allo. Furthermore, there was the fact that alexithymia made trying to figure out whether what he was feeling was platonic or romantic pretty much impossible: he could barely figure out if he was feeling hungry, fuck if he knew he was having a squish or a crush. There was also the obvious fact that yup, he sure married Winry, and he didn’t want to divorce her because he did want to be in some kind of relationship, but he didn’t know if that was because he was feeling any kind of romantic (or platonic, for that matter) attraction, or because he simply felt at home with her, and yes he did consider that the ‘at home’ feeling might’ve been romantic, but probably not, since he also feels it with Al, but then again it was still very much different with Al, so maybe…?

Anyway, you get the point. Questioning was long and messy, and eventually came to a head when Winry basically said ‘look listen I don’t know what’s going on with you, but you promised not to keep me in the dark anymore, so spit it out’ so he did and she basically said ‘well in my expert alloromantic opinion that’s not very allo’ and he went ‘oh. shit. why didn’t I ask you earlier’ (it was because he’s the world’s smartest idiot). So they sat down and figured things out, and eventually agreed that it would be best if they ‘cancelled’ the romance aspect of their relationship for now, just to figure out what would work for them.

Also Mei was actually the one who found the term ‘nebularomantic’ way later, when she was researching arospec identities after her and Al’s relationship crashed and burned horribly (she definitely has access to a huge library of queer identities in Ling’s palace shut up), and Al heard her say the definition and he went ‘oh shit that’s my brother’, so then he called Ed and that’s how Ed came to identify as nebularomantic.

Would they be interested in a QPR? Why or why not?

He’s in a queerplatonic triad with Winry and Paninya! The relationship is actually kind of complicated, with Winry and Paninya being in a romantic relationship, Ed and Winry being in a committed relationship they’re chosing not to label at the moment, and Paninya and Ed being in the world’s most casual qpr, but the three of them call their triad ‘queerplatonic’ to simplify stuff. He probably wouldn’t necessarily search out a qpr, I think, but he very much loves people (regardless of whether or not it’s platonic or romantic or something else entirely), and he does like living with other people, so he’d probably have fallen into one naturally anyway, even if canon hadn’t played out the way it did.

Final thoughts?

If you think that I won’t headcanon someone as arospec just because they married and had kids at the end of the series then you’re so fucking mistaken.

What arospec identities do they have? (Can be as specific or vague as desired)

Percy’s demiromantic!

How proud of being arospec are they?

Very proud! If you think he ever stops making demi jokes, you are very very wrong. He goes to pride, has pins, has a flag up in his room, and generally won’t shut up about it.

Do they prioritize their arospec identity over any others?

Somewhat! He’s both demisexual and demiromantic, and he doesn’t necessarily separate those two out, but he does prioritize both of those over his demiboy identity, though that’s definitely important to him too and he’s proud of that as well (plus, he appreciates the pun material).

Are they out? If so, how did they come out, and to whom?

He’s out! After he figured it out the first thing he did was kick Annabeth’s door open and go ‘Annabeth Holy Fuck!’, so she knows. His mom and Paul know, because he actually had a Serious Coming Out conversation with them (he knew they’d take it well, but still). Everyone else at camp also knows, because he won’t shut up about it, and also like everyone at Camp Halfblood is queer as fuck, so they just kind of expected something like this sooner or later. The puns are an unwelcome surprise, though.

How do they feel about romance? Romance-favorable? Romance-neutral? Romance-repulsed? Or does it fluctuate?

None of the above, he’s very firmly romance oblivious. He’s not going to catch you flirting with him, he WILL read over romance subplots without picking up on them, he is always the last to catch on to relationships his friends have started, etc. etc. He’s romance-favourable in the sense that he’s currently in a romantic relationship with Annabeth, but honestly, I don’t think he cares enough about romance to use any of the above labels.

Have they ever experienced arophobia? If so, how?

Yeah, he’s had a bunch of assholes tell him that he’s just straight, or that he needs to use demi as a modifier, or that demiromanticism doesn’t exist, etc. etc. However, he’s been lucky enough to have a supportive family and a queer as fuck friendgroup, so it hasn’t been as bad as it could’ve been and he’s had a lot of support.

How do they show their arospec pride?

PUNS (IN THE FORM OF DEMI- JOKES). SO MANY FUCKING PUNS. NEITHER HE NOR I WILL SHUT UP ABOUT THE PUNS.

Do they actively try to combat amatonormativity in their daily lives or elsewhere? If so, how?

Sort of? He’s loudly demi, which combats amatonormativity pretty much automatically, but he’s not exactly the type to go around educating everyone about the concept of amatonormativity or anything. That’s what Annabeth is for.

Was it easy for them to label themselves arospec, or was there a long period of questioning? How many labels did they have to try before landing on the one they use now?

Honestly, he just sort of assumed that the world was playing a prank on him regarding this ‘falling in love at first sight’ thing, or in general, this ‘falling in love’ thing. He’s never had a crush on anyone before Annabeth, and was honestly halfway convinced that the concept was fake until her, but he also never really analyzed that? He just kind of… assumed that was normal. Calypso was the first real wrench in that theory, but he chalked it up to her being not human and went about his life.

Aaand then he overheard someone talking about being demi, got massively confused for a second, asked for clarification before, you know, calling a satyr, and realized ‘oh hey that’s me!’.

So all in all, the questioning process was pretty straight forward, just hampered by him being very oblivious.

Would they be interested in a QPR? Why or why not?

Hmmm, maybe? I think he’s satisfied with his romantic relationship with Annabeth, but I also don’t necessarily think he’d be opposed to one. I don’t think he’d search one out, but if someone asked, he’d probably be willing to give it a go.

Final thoughts?

This was my first ever aro headcanon and I can and WILL die on this hill.

[just-graysexual]

Hi, (male guy here) I posted a question yesterday anonymously about my questioning of my potential gray-asexuality. But my answer has not been replied to yet, and I thought that you may not have seen it. So, I thought I would just submit my question in a post this time, here it goes: When I was a younger and in school my main focus was on education and not on relationships. However, most of my friends were girls. It was because of this that many people thought I was gay and asked me about it. But I have never felt that way (been interested in anything below the belt of another guy) about another guy. Nor have I ever had any real intense sexual attraction towards women, but I would like to have a romantic and semi-romantic relationship with another woman that I really care about one day and possibly even start a family. I do sometimes feel mild sexual attraction towards women though, so does that make me graysexual?  Also, over the years I have noticed that I have this urge to touch other guy’s hair (it’s like when you see a dog/cat and want to pet them) or comfort them. Would that be considered sensual attraction or something else? I’ve always longed for a really close brotherly relationship with another guy, because I’ve never had a really close guy friendship that lasted longer than a year. I’m not sure what this means either.                                                               -would appreciate any advice or comments.                                                  -Confused and questioning-     

Hey,

Just to be sure, are these your Anon message’s too? 

Don’t you worry I see them. I apologize for my delayed response. I’m quite busy throughout the week and have very limited free time. 

You hang in there. I know that all of this is quite confusing and hard to understand. Finding yourself and understanding your sexuality is never easy. Especially when you notice that you appear “different” from other people. But don’t you worry, you are not alone, and don’t ever stress about what other people think or say. I was accused of being gay when I was younger too. And I was in a similar situation. I was not sexually attracted to males, but I was not sexually attracted to females either. It left me terrible lost and confused; especially when other people told me I was something. But what other people think of you is not important. They are not you. They do not know what you are going through. They don’t know what you are feeling. Therefore, they have no say in who you are and how you should identify. Only you know what you are feeling. Only you can decide who you are. No one else has that power but you.

You seem to be doing a great job at understanding your attractions and what you are into. This is great; you are doing great. This can only help you in the long run. Keep in mind that the attractions are all separate from one another. Just because you are romantically attracted to one gender does not mean you can’t be sensually attracted to another. It’s okay if you attractions work in different ways in regards to different gender. It is most certainly possible to only be attracted to a certain gender in a specific way. There is nothing wrong with having preferences and liking certain traits or qualities of a gender, but not another one. It’s totally cool if you are romantically attracted to women, but sensually/aesthetically attracted to men. The more you work on your attractions the better you will become at it. Remember attractions are involuntary. You don’t chose or control your attraction. You cannot help how and who you are attracted to. And the attractions can happen separately from one another. Just because you feel one attraction does not mean you have to feel another.

It sounds like you are both aesthetically attracted to men and women. This means that you do find them visually pleasing and physically attractive to look at. You appreciate a person’s beauty and admire them. You think to yourself that this person is very beautiful, but your thoughts do not go beyond this. 

Your liking for men’s hair and needing to touch it could be sensual attraction and sensual desire. Which keep in mind that desires are different from attractions. A desire is something that you can control. It’s a want for something. Your desire can happen even without any target or object for you desire to take place. Sometimes you may just feel like touching men’s hair would be sensual desire. This is different from sensual attraction where there will typically be a target that brings out these feelings. Your liking for men’s hair could be just a characteristic of what you like, what you find attractive on men, and what pleases you. We all have something that we like about certain people. For example, some people, even if they are ace or aro, really like other people’s arms. They are not necessarily attracted in any way to the person, but find a deep appreciation or even attraction for well toned arms. It’s perfectly fine to have a certain attraction or appreciation for a body part. Some may view it as a type of fetish, but there is nothing wrong with having a fetish. I would not look too much into this or stress about it. I think it’s just a personal trait of yours that you like men’s hair. Like how some people like nice arms.

If you feel like developing a semi-/romantic relationship with a women, then you may be romantically attracted to women. This would make you heteromantic. Your romantic attraction happens when you see someone and want to date them. You want to develop a romantic relationship with them and do romantic things with them, like going on dates and maybe even kiss.

If you do feel some sort of a mild sexual attraction toward women, but it’s not really significant and you don’t really have much interest in sex, then yes, graysexual can most certainly work for you. In fact, you maybe heterosexual and graysexual. That’s the beauty of graysexuality. If you understand your sexual attraction enough to know who you are attracted too, then you can attach other orientations to your gray-a label. Many people can be attracted to the opposite sex, but because they don’t feel the attraction strong enough or have the desire for it this is what makes them gray ace. This is most definitely a characteristics of graysexuality. And is a perfectly valid and acceptable reason for you to identify as.

It’s also perfectly fine if you long for a relationship with another man. There is nothing wrong with wanting a close friendship with someone. I think you should probably try and explore your platonic attraction. There is a lot of ways to be attracted to people and platonically is one of them. This is where you have an attraction towards someone in a way that you want to be friends. Sure we make friends and we have friends, but when you are platonically attracted to someone you feel a strong urge to actually develop a friendship with a person. And you want to build that friendship and be with them. And you can develop things like squishes or plushes on a person you are platonically attracted too.

I also think you should explore your alterous attraction a bit more too. Alterous attraction is a type of an emotional attraction. The feeling is more than platonic, but not really romantic either. You see a person and you know you are attracted to them, but you are not sure how. You know you what to be with this person, but you don’t fully know what type of relationship you want with this person. Look into this and see if you are alterous attracted to anyone. You maybe experiencing this, but are just not aware of it.

Since you did say that you want a romantic or semi-romantic relationship with a women, I think you should probably look into a queer/quasiplatonic relationship (QPR). QPR’s are wonderful relationships. It’s more than just a friendship and could even have some romantic things about it depending on the people in the QPR. Many people even go on to marry the person they are in a QPR with. Check it out. Maybe this is a type of relationship you can benefit from.

Based on everything that you told me, I do think graysexual can work for you. However, if you want to explore some more feel free to keep looking into other ace orientations, like quasisexual/quasiromantic or paragraysexual.

Quasisexual/romantic: this is where you feel that your attractions are non-traditional. In other words, you believe you feel your attractions somewhat differently than other people. You know you feel some type of an attraction, but you can’t really describe it. 

Paragraysexual: is a type of gray-asexuality where you feel garysexual is close to what your sexual orientation is, but still does not really describe you well.

Poke around and see what you can find. There are a lot of orientations out there and a lot of information. Just take your time with everything. The more you work on it, the more you try other labels, the more you research the easier everything will become and eventually everything will fall into place.

Hang in there. I know that it’s difficult and confusing and hard to understand, but you will get through this. Try working on your platonic and alterous attractions. This will probably help you out more. I wouldn’t worry too much about feeling the sensual attraction and desire for men’s hair. That is perfectly fine and nothing to stress about. It’s okay if you are attracted to people in different ways. It’s okay if you attractions are gender specific. It’s okay to feel attracted to one gender in a certain way and another gender in a different way. It’s okay that you want a good friendship with a guy. It’s perfectly fine if you want a semi-romantic relationship with a women, but don’t have a lot of sexual feelings. You can most certainly identify as graysexual. The final decision is always yours though, go with whatever makes you most comfortable. Take your time with everything. If you need any help, have any questions, or would like me to clarify or elaborate on anything feel free to message me anytime.

[queercondensed]

[Image Description:  A preview of a pamphlet entitled “Aromantic Identity & the Aro Spectrum, with the front and back laid out side-by-side. There is a summary, disclaimer, and helpful resources on the left page and sections titled “Aromantic Terms,” “Being Aromantic,” and “Understanding Aro Identity” on the right. The smaller text is too blurry to read. The entire pamphlet has a dark green, light green, and gray color scheme.]

Aromantic Identity & the Aro Spectrum version 1.1

This is an updated version of an earlier pamphlet on the same subject included in the original run of Queer Condensed. It serves as a basic overview of aromantic identity with definitions, validation for aro, arospec, and questioning readers, explanations of stereotypes, online resources, and more.

Updates are pretty extensive, including a formatting change, addition of “alloromantic” definition, color switch of yellow to gray to reflect the more commonly used aromantic flag, large portions of rewritten text, and minor changes to the suggested resources.

I could not have made this updated pamphlet without help from readers sending in corrections and suggestions. As someone who isn’t aro, the information that @aphobephobe and @kdkorz10211 provided was indispensable. I also want to thank them and @shes-cured for beta-reading it as well.

Click here for the list of all resources and to download the pdf of this pamphlet. If you download or use this, a reblog or link to this post would be much appreciated!

This work is free for noncommercial use as long as credit is given. The original Publisher files can be requested via ask or email if you’d like to edit the pamphlet yourself.

The text can be read below the readmore, formatted in the intended reading order.

Front Panel:

Aromantic Identity & the Aro Spectrum, A Condensed Guide

Produced by Queer Condensed, queercondensed.tumblr.com

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Inside Flap

Summary

Aromantic identity is often lumped in with asexual identity, but the two are very different and deserve separate materials. In this pamphlet we focus on the former and look at what “aromantic” and “aromantic spectrum” means, the many types of love that exist outside of romantic love, some of the struggles and stereotypes of aromantic people, and how unique each aromantic person is from the next. We stress that aromantic people are complex and should not be boiled down to their romantic feelings as they often are.

A reminder: if you are aromantic, on the aromantic spectrum, or questioning your identity, you are valid and amazing!

Disclaimer

Queer Condensed is meant to be a guide, but in no way is anything in our pamphlets definitive. It’s hard to be definitive when you’re dealing with a subject that’s so subjective. Take what you read as an introduction and maybe check out the provided resources or ask people open to taking questions if you want to know more.

 Published on August 12th, 2017

Leftmost Interior: Aromantic Terms

“Aromantic” is an identity that indicates a lack of romantic attraction towards others. Along with this, there’s the idea of the “aromantic spectrum,” or a range of other identities that are similar to aromanticism. Some of those identities are included on this list of aromantic-related terms.

Aro / Arospec

Short for “aromantic” and “aromantic spectrum”

Grayaromantic / Grayromantic

An arospec identity; someone who has infrequent or hard-to-define romantic attraction towards others

Demiaromantic / Demiromantic

An arospec identity; someone who needs a strong bond with another before feeling romantic attraction towards them

Alloromantic

Someone who is not aro / arospec

Queer/Quasi-Platonic Relationship (QPR)* 

A relationship between two people that is not romantic, but stronger or more intimate than friendship

Squish*

An aromantic or platonic version of a romantic crush

Sexual orientation *

How someone identifies in relation to who they’re attracted to sexually; different from romantic orientation

*People who are not aro can also use these terms

Middle Interior: Being Aromantic

Aros and arospec people are frequently forgotten about or misunderstood, even in LGBT communities, but their lives and identities deserve attention.

Society places a lot of stress on the idea of romance and relationships, but that doesn’t mean aro people are without feelings. Many aro people find love and companionship in different ways, including friendships and QPRs. Some aro people even enter into romantic relationships with partners that understand that the feelings may not be the same on all ends. Some aros don’t make connections at all, but that doesn’t make them broken.

Each aro person’s experiences are unique. Some like physical affection, some find that too romantic or simply don’t want it. Some are open and proud of their identity, and for some it’s just a personal trivia fact. Some discover their identity early in life and others realize much later. Some find love in non-romantic ways, others don’t feel any sort of desire for it. There is no “right way” to be aro or arospec, just as there’s no “right way” to be other identities.

Talking About or To Aro People

Aro people are the judges of their own identity. Do not assume or say that an aro person will find the “right person” some day and stop being aro. This implies that the aro person is just going through a phase or can’t figure out their own attraction.

 Rightmost Interior: Understanding Aro Identity

Alloromantic people often question or ridicule aro identities because of a lack of understanding. This usually comes from the belief that romantic relationships or feelings are vital to being human when they’re really not. Not everyone goes about having romantic feelings in the exact same way, so aro people aren’t an abnormality, just experiencing feelings that are uncommon. If it doesn’t bother the aro person, it shouldn’t be of concern to anyone else.

Common stereotypes of aro people include that they are being difficult, they are bad at socializing, they are incapable of feelings, those that have sexual relationships are manipulative, and they are unhappy. Consider that these stereotypes ignore these kinds of love:

* Platonic  * Parental * Sexual

* Familial * Aesthetic * Queerplatonic

These ideas also make it seem like humans can be boiled down to how we engage in romantic relationships, which just isn’t true. Thinking only in terms of who one loves is incredibly limiting and harmful to those who don’t experience certain/any types of love.

Aro and arospec people are in need of kindness and understanding as they navigate a world unforgiving to them, not an insistence that their feelings are wrong. Prejudice and unearned anger are wrong, not them.

Back Panel: Helpful Resources

Aro Glossary

Arospecawarenessweek.tumblr.com/glossary

Aromantic Wikipedia

Aromantic.wikia.com

Aromantic FAQ

Aaceclub.tumblr.com/aromanticism*

More on Romance Repulsion

Romance-repulsed-aros.tumblr.com

Additional Resources

QueerCondensed.tumblr.com/tagged/asexual

Our pamphlet on asexuality has many resources that, although not aro-specific, contain information about the aro community. Check it out for a few more websites to look at!

Thank You!

This updated version of this material couldn’t have been done without reader input, especially that of Tumblr users Aphobephobe and Kdkorz10211

*This blog is no longer active, but the information is still relevant