#differentiating platonic and romantic feelings

[fishystarry]

realizing that i’m aroace is actually kind of heartbreaking for me. but it makes things make so much sense

(actual things i’ve said and thought)

me: “i just wanna make out, like in a friend way, you know? like, for fun? no feelings attached?”

me: “i like you but sometimes i just wanna act like best friends and not hold hands and play video games or something”

me: “i wanna cuddle you and hold your hand because i desire romance and i think it should be you but i get a gross yucky feeling when i do it”

me: *really liking someone platonically and trouble differentiating between romantic and platonic feelings*

me: *gets over relationships quickly when they end*

me: *could get into a relationship with any of my friends and be okay in it*

me: *experiences alterous attraction and extreme platonic love*

and i could go on and on

[twoa-plus]

this is not a polished essay it is a giant yap session u have been warned

gotta be at least in the top 3 posts most likely to get me blown up by a missile but why is every depiction of bill & ford’s relationship either “hehe cute/sexy romance >:3c” or platonic psychological horror. why can’t we have both (not the cute/sexy thing, just the romance) like. u guys are aware that Really Really Horrible non-platonic relationships are a thing right. like u guys do know that right

idk i don’t really have words to express this eloquently but this fandom’s fixation on the idea of Romance = Good feels really weird to me. i really really love exploring complicated fucked up characters & their dynamics with each other and it’s just exhausting to not be able to do that without 14 pages of clarification. i know every fandom is like this to some extent i wasn’t born yesterday but it seems ESPECIALLY bad here. and yes imo it IS important to differentiate between a platonic & romantic relationship in this context bc that DOES make the way it reads a little different and that can be an interesting thing to discuss

also while i’m yapping abt things that would get me beat over the head with a shovel, y’all gotta learn that different interpretations doesn’t mean bad interpretations. like using bill & ford as an example:

“this is a good healthy relationship” bad interpretation. do you know how to read

“this is a really fucked up abusive platonic relationship” valid interpretation

“this is a really fucked up abusive romantic relationship” also a valid interpretation

(^does not apply to aus just the Actual Canon Written Text, aus are obv a case-by-case thing)

someone having the second interpretation does not make them homophobic i cannot believe i have to say this. someone having the third interpretation does not mean they support abuse (i actually can believe that i have to say that one at this point)

personally i actually don’t really care either way between the second and third i just wish we as a collective could have one (1) interesting and nuanced conversation about their dynamic & what led to it & all that stuff without spending 75% of the time just clarifying the opinion of “abuse is bad” it is so fucking tiring

anyways. fiddauthor truthers rise let’s all beat bill cipher to death with hammers

[unfogged-arc]

i don't have twitter anymore so you guys get all my late night nonsense posts.

[agalychnisspranneusroseus]

There are two wolves inside of me. One headcanons Marcy as a lesbian because of her obsessive, possessive and codependent tendencies with her friends. The other headcanons her as aroace. Because of her obsessive, possessive and codependent tendencies with her friends

[sirlancenotalot]

the fact that people still use the "no one would talk to a friend that way" "no one would grieve for someone like that if it was just platonic" etc arguments to prove a ship is canon is so annoying to me. yes i get it, we got queerbaited hard but where does it say that romance has to be higher than a friendship or no one said friends couldn't also be lovers or vice versa....? i normally say "popular media tropes that usually are for romance" when i talk about fiction but pulling a blanket statement like "NO ONE talks to a friend that way" is so invalidating to so much of our queer experiences. the beauty of queer friendship literally lies in the emotional fulfilment we get from our friends in a way that i don't normally see in cishet friendships for whatever reasons. so idk it's just been bothering me to see these kinds of posts every now and then. "you wouldn't do [x] for your friends" i would actually. i would sell my soul for them. i would kill for them and kill myself for them. i would do anything for my friends that i would do for a partner. the "proof" for a ship doesn't have to be by invalidating their friendship. also like aren't most of the ships so powerful when they're also each other's closest friends? do y'all not think of your partners as your best friends?

[thats-a-mood-gabriella]

People far more eloquent than I am will be able to explain this better than I can, but I know I'm not the only one who head cannons Blitz as demiromantic and theorizes that this is the first time since Fizz that he's felt this way.

There was something so... Idk. The way he said "I guess" in answer to Millie's question. Could be just him being reluctant to admit it, but it hit me like... Like this feeling is so unfamiliar to him that it's like "I guess these feelings I am having are that? This feeling is so foreign to me that I'm inexperienced at naming it."

I am probably explaining this terribly but that answer was so demiromantic to me and I felt it in my soul.

[zoppzoop]

Hmmm introspecting after reading a post lmao but I've come to the realisation that like I don't particularly care to differentiate between platonic and romantic relationships? Like i love my friends and I guess that's it? I am also having the realisation that i probably have not had an actual crush in almost like,,,, over a decade at this point and the last 'crush' i remember having g was one of those made up ones that you make you to be able to talk to and relate to your friends with yknow. I almost wanna say I think i might just be aro? But also at the same time I absolutely do get flustered when someone I find cool or pretty talks to me so like idk? I don't care about getting into a romantic relationship with them so like eh??

And other than that when I think of getting into a romantic relationship with any specific person it just doesn't feel appealing to me but then I yearn for the vague concept of it all if that makes sense???

And then there's also the thing about intimacy? Like i feel like hm how do I explain it. Like if a friend wanted to hold hands or cuddle or kiss or sth I wouldn't have a problem going along with it without it having to be explicitly romantic? And if a romantic partner didn't want to have any of the intimate stuff I'd be okay with it? Which brings me to like,, how do people even differentiate between platonic and romantic relationships?? Because to me they're pretty much the same. Unless ofc I'm straight up missing something

[mcybree]

Was Jimmy ever truly in love with Scott any smp yes or no

depends on how you want to define it. Jimmy has a tendency to hype up the people he’s teamed with, and that + the way he very openly admires Scott / puts him on a pedestal in Third Life* can be easily read as “falling in love” with him. I personally believe this is the case, considering the way this dulled out in subsequent life seasons, but honestly it’s all up to interpretation? You could make a good argument for this being a platonic crush of sorts, but I think 3l!fh is more compelling if read romantically on Jimmy’s side, especially with how fh fucks with the expectations of what romance is (see: scott’s oddly traditional idea of romance, while Jimmy just seems happy to exist around him). For esmp1!fh though i think jimmy was just happy to be given attention LMAO he alliance-zoned that guy

*im referring specifically to how jimmy complimented scott’s building abilities on at least three different (but probably more) occasions, even when scott specified that he took his house’s design off google

It is very interesting to compare how Jimmy is w/ Scott VS his recent(ish) interactions with Joel, though. bc despite both relationships being often read as romantic, Jimmy expresses that very differently with each of them. I’m inclined to think that this is bc there is an air of un-seriousness with Joel, where it could just be brushed off as “bros being bros” instead of a serious romance, bc serious romance comes with standards attached that jimmy likely doesnt give much thought to or even care for. Like. Smallidarity to me isnt even dating I do just think they’re like that

[aoyagi-vbs]

Are you

A homosexual?

I'm not exactly sure where I stand. I think it's termed as being in questioning...?

[lostusagis]

( what if i just made kagura gay, huh??? how about that? WHAT IF MY PORTRAYAL OF HER WAS GAY???? )

[uselessnbee]

look i love sibling coded madwheeler more than anything but also also

queerplatonic madwheeler?

queerplatonic madwheeler.

the way stobin are (in my mind they are just at least a tiny bit queerplatonic i don't take criticism)

like are we friends? are we like siblings? are we just two souls who somehow merged together and we understand each other in this special way and we're so close and have this weird special bond and people are often confused whether we're friends or siblings or dating and the truth is that it's just us

yeah i like that with madwheeler very much

[zapsoda]

btw i tried whole milk for the first time recently and it wasnt very good i dont like plain milk

[clementine-kesh]

i’ve said it before but in my experience being gay or bi can lead to a bit of a blurring of the lines when it comes to platonic and romantic feelings. which i think makes sense given the vast majority of us have grown up in a cisheteronormative society where we’re attracted to the same gender we’re expected to predominantly be friends with

[daffodi1]

Kinda related to that last post but again I don't wanna derail-- y'all have got to stop diagnosing shitty cishet men as aro as an excuse for them being unable to commit and treat their girlfriends/wives w/ respect. Aromantic people are capable of being in loving relationships and committing to people. That fuckboy who won't commit isn't aro, he just wants to use people and I guarantee you he'd lose his shit if one of the many women he's two timing went after someone else.

[microwaving-tesilid-argente]

the writing fanfic to "huh? this doesn't seem like how romance is normally written" to "am i somewhere on the aro spectrum" to "oh god the reason i dont identify w the generic aro label is bc i need a microlabel" to "fuck i need to rewrite this whole fic" pipeline

[moonssugar]

being bullied by girls your entire life to then finding out youre a lesbian later on is such a wild ride because on one hand girls tormented you for being autistic and you didnt have the space or time to figure out you were gay because of that but on the other hand now youre in love with any girl thats marginally nice to you