#loveless amor aro

[noxwithoutstars]

✧｡:*▹ Loveless Amor Aro

PT/ Loveless Amor Aro /PT end

ID/ A flag with nine equal stripes. Colors middle-out are light green, green, dull red-pink, red-grey, and darker grey. /ID end

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✧ Loveless Amor Aro is a term for being a loveless aro who experiences attraction that is entirely removed from the notion of love.

✧ Requested by anon // @mogai-sunflowers

✧ let me nerd out about the name now lol. Amor refers to Venus' son and the god of desire etc. Roman poets (and Cato minor) talked about Amor and Eros as different personifications, the former being associated with more affectionate feelings and the latter with desire and lust (and even greed).

ID/ a white DNI with a panel of the manga Oyasumi Punpun with 5 kids doing a joint pose. Words are black on the right side: “DNI: anti- ‘contradictory’ labels, anti-mogai, terf, gatekeeper, anti-decolonization, believes ‘narc abuze’ is real, demonizes ‘scary/evil’ disorders + labels.” /ID end

[peanutblackcat]

Mike Martínez com certeza seria amigo de Georgia Warr, de “Sem Amor”.

[aspecpplarebeautiful]

So I'm aro and I do like romance and talk about it a fair bit, and I'm trying to think of tags to tag romance posts for my romance-averse or not feeling it crew, I already tag shipping and have 'love-oriented' for posts that use love as an absolute for people who are loveless/don't vibe with the idea that life or whatever else has to be led with love or that it's more pwoerful or important for everything (frankly I don't think that either), but so far no dice on what I should use for tagging posts about romance/romantic relationships.

Yeah, tagging can be tricky. Could simply 'romance' work? If that's too broad you could break it up into smaller more specific tags. Or if you're looking for a completely different word maybe something like 'amorous'?

I'll throw this out to followers too, anyone have their own tagging suggestions they think might work?

[eldorr]

Royal Aroace

Plain (left), with stripe meanings (right)

Figuring out that aroace flag was coined in mind for Non-SAM aroaces, I decided to make my own variation of the aroace flag. For anyone who wants to use it.

Why “Royal Aroace”? Because it sounds nice. I designed the flag sorta based off of red velvet cake, and corvids. Since the whole aces like cake meme, and I personally like crows. Not really anything more significant than that. I also assigned meanings to the stripes because people seem to like when that’s done, I don’t usually do it just because I don’t know what to put for each stripe and suck at describing colors when it comes to transcripts, but since this is an Aroace flag meant for a broad community, I decided to add meanings. Of course anything not explicitly said in the stripe meanings is also included, this is sorta just a base idea.

=

Ebony bluish purple (First/Top stripe): Aroaces who don’t experience or prioritize tertiary attraction, Non-SAM Aroaces. (Could also be Aplatonic, Aqueerplatonic, Aaesthetic, Aalterous, etc.)

Pastel thunder purple (Second stripe): Amatopunk Aroaces, Non-monoamorous Aroaces, Partnering Aroaces. (Basically Aroaces someone may think of “not actually aroace” due to entering relationships, etc.)

Pastel slate tealish blue (Third stripe): Acespec Aros, Arospec Aces, Aspecs who identify as Aroace, Aspec Microlabels. (Basically anyone who may not explicitly be just aroace due to being aspec, however identifies with the aroace label.)

Pale yellow (Fourth Stripe): Marginalized Aroaces, Community, Inclusivity, Aroace History. (Basically inclusivity of those who are other-wise marginalized in the aroace community due to being trans, disabled, etc. and celebrating diversity and aroace history.)

Pastel dirty pink (Fifth Stripe): A-Amorous Aroaces, Non-partnering Aroaces, Loveless Aroaces. (Aroaces who don’t enter or desire relationships, relationship/love neutral or repulsed aroaces.)

Vivid auburn red (Sixth/Bottom Stripe): Aroaces who experience and/or prioritize tertiary attraction, SAM Aroaces. (Queerplatonic Aroaces, love-positive/neutral aroaces, etc.)

=

This flag was originally posted April 3rd, 2022.

I'd like to note now that I've coined Alspec, this flag also includes Alspec Aces and Alspec Aros.

[aromantisk-fagforening]

5, 17, 19 for aro asks (if havent already answered those)

How did you figure out you are aro?

That's a difficult one. Honestly I barely remember most of the questioning process. I remember trying to talk to an allo about attraction, and she kinda made it clear that attraction wasn't a choice, which had been my understanding for a while. (clueless aro here lol). Also just, learning just how many attractions there are. I don't know if I feel any at this moment, but mainly knowing there are so many ways to feel about people made me lower my guard to aromanticsm.

Do you have any aro related labels that don’t fit into the other groups (like loveless / lovequeer / amatopunk / etc)?

I'm a bit confused by the phrasing, but I'm assuming the question is what aro subcultures/labels I best align with. Maybe lovequeer. Maybe more like microlabels, but I do vibe with non-amorous, romance averse/repulsed (varies). (feel free to send again if I misunderstood, no stress)

Is there a song that is very aromantic to you?

A couple:

Perfume by lovejoy (well, one of the characters)

Tell me this is not an aroace being excluded because of either no crushes or no partner and pretending to have crushes/gets a partner who she pretends to like to be included.

Cute thing by Car seat headrest (the live version is best)

This is one of my comfort songs when I trigger my romance repulsion. It reads like aroallo (alloallo4aroallo kinda) or sex favorable romance repulsed aro to me. It also kinda works as lovelustic.

How do you love? by the regrettes

This is about romantic (+ sexual?) love (or possibly pda) btw (it references a couple before). This sounds like something I would've said before lol. Kinda loveless-core.

[makiruz]

Here's something about the "loveless aro" thing that hit me earlier, and I apologize to anyone who might be offended, but made me realize the whole thing is kinda ridiculous.

So many people who identify as "loveless aromantic" are people who don't feel the word "love" doesn't represent them, that the associations the word has does not describe their feelings.

Here's the thing though, English isn't my first language, it's Spanish, and in Spanish "love" functions differently. First off the direct translation of "love" as a concept is "Amor" love as a verb is "amar", but when you're actually talking about the way you feel about people and things you tend to use different words, when you want to say "I love you" to a family member or a friends you will say "te quiero", when you're describing passion for something you often say "me encanta" or "me gusta" or "lo adoro" (for example, McDonald's "I'm lovin' it" is translated as "me encanta"), "te amo" is used almost exclusively for romantic relationships and even then some people find it weirdly intimate; however, it's agreed that while the word is not used the feeling expressed is Amor, it's Love, different kinds of love

So in Spanish this point does not make a lot of sense because you don't have to use the word "amor" you have so many options to express so many similar but different feelings. So if if this supposed identity only makes sense in one language, the whole thing seems kinda meaningless, or worse yet, artificial; like you're trying to create an identity that can only exists in a very limited, very restricted, very ethnocentric context

[umamaravilinda]

Ler loveless da Alice oseman quando eu ainda estava me descobrindo ace foi algo. Ele te dá um sopro de esperança, que vc não vai estar sozinha e vc não é "sem amor" pq vc tem sua família e mais ainda vc tem amigos que te amam muito. Mas pensando nele agora, quando todos estão se apaixonando e vc não, e vc pode estar mais proxima de ser aro do que imagina, loveless parece só mais uma ficção, onde a protagonista que é arromantica não fica sozinha pq o poder da amizade vence apesar de tudo. Na vida real acaba que não é assim né? Vc tem seus amigos que podem te amar muito sim, mas eles tem os interesses românticos deles, vc talvez não tenha, mas eles tem e apesar da amizade ser algo muito bonito e forte, o amor romântico na maior parte das vezes vai vencer. Uma visão de "eu tenho eles, mas eles tem o romance" e nessa de tenho amigos que vivem romances, quem acaba sozinha provavelmente vai ser eu. Eu sei que a Alice fez loveless justamente pra gente não se sentir assim, mas por enquanto por mais que eu veja, parece que eu sou sim um pouco "sem amor".

[wilting-flower-crown]

This is why, as an English and Spanish speaker, I feel more comfortable telling my parents "te amo" instead of "I love you."

Both mean the same thing, but I've only heard "Te amo" at home and with other relatives in a familial way. I know it's used in other ways, but not in my every day life.

I know I can tell my parents I love them and they'd know what I mean. But I just feel so distant from the concept of love as a whole and switching languages allows me to tell them that I care about them without having to cross that unfathomable divide.

also can I just say. growing up in a Christian church and in a Christian household, my first interactions with the word “love” were in non-romantic and non-sexual settings. it was entirely “Jesus loves you” and “love others the way the lord loves others” and all of that kind of thing. as a young kid, I didn’t really know what love was, but I assumed it was a synonym for “compassion towards”

and then all of a sudden, I was 8 years old, and people were talking about love in terms of boys and girls having crushes on each other. and then all of a sudden, I was a teenager, and it became cringe to say you loved your family. there seemed to be some kind of shift in the definition and application of the word “love”

and now I’m stuck here wondering what love means, and whether that word ever really applied to me in the first place. is love a feeling? an experience? a state of being? does it last forever or can it fluctuate? and how on earth do I know if I’m feeling it properly?

[loveless-aro-culture-is]

To all my loveless aro siblings out there!

You’re whole! You’re fine without love! We can be happy and fulfilled without it!

To the agamous loveless aros: you don’t need any committed SO to be happy.

To the amorous loveless aros: you don’t need to love in order to have a successful relationship.

To the aro-specs, the demiromantics and grey romantics, the alloaros and the angled and oriented aroaces: feeling attraction doesn’t make you any less of a loveless aro!

To the neurodivergent loveless aros: the way you experience ‘love’ is just as important as the way non-loveless people experience it! Even if they’re another ND person!

To the loveless aros who are also lovequeer: your identity isn’t anyone else’s business! How you define your labels is up to you.

[disasterdemi]

Mmmmmm I’m getting the “most mainstream definitions of aromanticism are actually incorrect or not inclusive” itch again...

(This post was very unplanned and quite possibly rambly - apologies in advance.)

This is from a government-endorsed website in my country:

Aromantic/aro: refers to individuals who do not experience romantic attraction. Aromantic individuals may or may not identify as asexual.

Asexual/ace: a sexual orientation that reflects little to no sexual attraction, either within or outside relationships. People who identify as asexual can still experience romantic attraction across the sexuality continuum. While asexual people do not experience sexual attraction, this does not necessarily imply a lack of libido or sex drive.

First of all, a bit of inconsistency with the “little to no” - good to see it on asexual, but it should be there for aro too. Secondly, there’s a big difference in the detail of info there, even though much of it could be easily cross-applied. Thirdly, and linked to my next point, note “may or may not identify as asexual” vs “can experience romantic attraction” - it is clear, if perhaps unintentional, through the explicit naming of the asexual label that aromanticism is being defined around asexuality here to some extent. Word choice is important pals.

This issue is prominent in many mainstream definitions of arospec labels I’ve come across. They often say in the first or second sentence: “derived as a romantic parallel to [ace-spec label]” - which certainly bothers me as an allo-aro. This information can be etymologically important, but in that case it should be in the etymology or history section of an article/info sheet. We don’t see things like “Bisexual: attraction to two or more genders, derived as a multi-gender equivalent to homosexual.” (Disclaimer: I don’t actually know if that’s how the term originated)

And then there are the more obvious oversimplifications (which exclude a lot of aros) like “aromanticism is defined by a lack of romantic attraction” and “aromantic people are those who do not desire romantic relationships”

Continued under the cut:

And the classic: “But many aros are still capable of feeling [non-romantic] love!!!” which, while true, is usually placed right after the definition in a poorly-hidden attempt to appease assimilationists. And there is either no discussion of loveless, aplatonic, non-amorous, or having an otherwise-complicated relationship with the notion of love, aros at all, or, at most, it is an afterthought at the end of the paragraph. And sure, I might experience love - I might even experience romantic love as a demiromantic - but I don’t want that to be the important thing about my aromanticism. It’s not a hole that needs to be filled (but that’s a post for another day).

Now you might say, “But disasterdemi, isn’t it important to condense and simplify information to reach more people?”

Of course! We can’t - and honestly shouldn’t have to - give a full-on lecture to every person we meet, and small amounts of info are more easily transmitted (I say, in my essay-length post). But guess what? Here’s a neat 5-word introduction phrase: “little to no romantic attraction” - sure, it lacks some nuance, but it covers greyromantics, doesn’t centre around sexuality, and doesn’t equate it with desire or action regarding romance.

There’s also uhhh no wikipedia page (you know, the first website most people go to when googling something they don’t know) for aromanticism - just a section on the “Romantic Attraction” page, and... well... just read the first few sentences yourself: (emphasis mine)

Aromantic: No romantic attraction towards anyone

One of the attributes of aromantic people is that, despite feeling no romantic attraction, they may still enjoy sex. Aromantic people are not incapable of feeling love; for example, they will still feel familial love, or the type of platonic love that is expressed between friends.

big yikes for my loveless and aplatonic comrades, and another example of jumping straight from a (very brief and narrow) definition to the relationship between aromanticism and sexuality. Also a couple of semantic nuance issues there... (“despite” doesn’t feel great).

I’m not really sure what to do about all this, to be honest. I hate the idea of my identity being misunderstood (and questioning aros being misinformed), but it feels overwhelming - the idea of trying to educate so many people about an oft-neglected identity. Particularly since we don’t have many large, established community networks around the world and off the internet to reach more people with.

Perhaps we just take small steps, chipping away by educating and correcting those around us when we have the energy, and by boosting other aro voices.

(Maybe I’ll lurk on some wiki pages while I’m still on this roll)

*sighs in aromantic frustration*

[aro-culture-is]

Thoughts on Turning Out by AJR as an aro song? It's not a big mood, but some of it hits home. I think it's a bigger mood for questioning aros but idk. Thoughts?

oH ABSOLUTELY okay okay

so mod kee here with my usual AJR obsession

turning out was my breakup song with my ex-gf when I first tried dating as an aro. I basically (thought I) wanted a qpp, thought that was understood, and uhhh turns out she really just thought she was going to... uh, change that. and like. turning out is a big aro mood i think both for questioning aros and questioning loveless aros (if you don’t know what that is, check out the tag on @raavenb2619) and/or non-amorous aros.

But I'm confused I thought I'd recognize when love was true But I'm confused

definite questioning aro vibes, but also like. loveless mood too.

You say I turned out fine I think I'm still turning out You say I turned out fine I think I'm still turning out I think I'm still turning out

this is just a mood regardless, let’s be real. or maybe like. a 20-something year old vibe. idk.

In my mind I thought the birds would sing and sparks would fly But it's just quiet Am I cruel? Or am I ignorant or was I fooled By the stories I knew

just a general aro feel imo.

I'm a little kid, and so are you Don't you go and grow up before I do I'm a little kid with so much doubt Do you wanna be there to see how I turn out? 

general queer vibe esp if you grew up w/ ~problems~

- mod kee

[aidoubackster]

Noro-vember day 4

Aro Positivity Post

To every aro that uses more uncommon terms:

to the polyaffectionate aros,

to the aplatonic aros,

to the soft-romo aros,

to the neuaros,

to the arogenders,

to the non-sam aros, 

to the romo aros,

to the variorented aros,

to the nonamorous and nonpartnering aros

to the nebularomantics, quoiromantics, grayromantics, frayromantics, abroromantics,  arospikes, recirporomantics, lithromantics, apothiromantics, demiromantics, aegoromantics, aroflux, arovagues, cupioromantics, bellusromantics,

to the amorous and partnering aros,

to the loveless aros,

to the voidpunk aros,

to the aros I haven’t been able to mention here

to all of you, you absolutely matter, the terms you use to identify and explore your identities and life are useful and deserve respect.

You are imporant to the aro community, you make the understanding of aromanticism, relationships and navigation of life richer.

You deserve to be heard, your experiences and understanding deserves to be taken into account.

To all of you, thank you for existing.

[raavenb2619]

1/2 Hey! So this needs some context. First, I speak both Spanish and English. I speak Spanish at home and English everywhere else. Also, I think? I’m a loveless aro. Basically, I really dislike the word “love”. I don’t like saying that I love. I also don’t like saying que yo amo (that I love in Spanish), because the word amor has specific romantic connotations in my head. However, the word “querer” (alternate way to say love, also means want) doesn’t carry those same connotations.

2/2 I think this is because when I hear about amor and love, it’s usually in a romantic context. But with “querer,” I have it associated more with platonic love. I constantly say, “te quiero” to my family, and it doesn’t feel wrong like “te amo” or “i love you” does, even though it technically means the same thing. So am I just a loveless aro? Am I not? Or am I something in between that there isn’t a word for?

Update: I’m an idiot. I don’t just associate “te quiero” with platonic/familial love, it actually means that, and it never occurred to me that the way me and others use those words is different because they actually do mean different things. My question still stands though: would you say I’m a loveless aro?

I’ll be honest, I can’t really decide if anyone is a loveless aro. I can talk about my own thoughts and experiences, maybe give some advice or the occasional insight, but it’s your decision to make, not mine. 

To me, lovelessness is about agency. When society says “everyone feels love” and “love is what makes us human”, that prescribes this notion that I’m connected to love, that I feel love. When I say I’m aromantic, society flip-flops between telling me “you’re aromantic, so of course you don’t feel love” and “you’re aromantic, so of course you feel love for your friends or family or pets or hobbies or something”. In every case, I’m being told what my relationship to love has to be, and then I just have to deal with the notions of humanity, worth, and the rest of the emotional baggage that comes along with it. 

In contrast, when I say “I don’t feel love”, it feels good and light and freeing. I get to explore the implications of those words, figure out what it means for me, all while affirming my humanity and identity and worth. I have a shield I can use to protect myself from the onslaught of “you do/don’t feel love, so you are/aren’t human”. 

Not every aro has the same perspectives, opinions, or experiences; for example, my lovelessness is undoubtedly influenced by speaking a language that uses a single word for many different experiences. It’s possible that if I grew up speaking a language that used separate words for what I call “romantic love” and “platonic love”, I wouldn’t find lovelessness to be personally useful; on the other hand, it’s entirely possible I would still consider myself to be loveless. Language and society are intertwined in interesting and complicated ways, and the way they interact with personal identity can be hard to predict. 

Figuring out your relationship to love can be very tricky, and that’s okay. If you think lovelessness is helpful to you in that respect, then I think you should be allowed to call yourself loveless. But you’re also allowed to decide that you’re not loveless; after all, not every aro is loveless, and that’s okay. Some aros feel love really strongly and it matters to them a lot, and they’re no more or less aro than any other aro. 

Hope that helps, as always feel free to ask for clarification/any follow up questions.