this isn’t really a secret but it might be of interest. i just made an aromantic group on facebook bc i couldn’t find any really. http://www.facebook.com/groups/aromantictalk/

[IMAGE: Black text on wooden background.]
[TEXT: I just moved in with my two queerplatonic partners after more than a year apart, and I’m happier than I’ve ever been. they’re in a romantic-sexual relationship, intend to get married, and I’m the aromantic-asexual third angle on our trio diabolical. I don’t worry about who has the more profound bond. I have worried about making either of them jealous with my being close to their mate— since I have a talent for stepping on emotional property rights— but so far, those fears seem unjustified. we understand each other. and want to be together. and the relationship anarchist in me swells up with joy when strangers mistake us for a polyamorous triad. lol @ normal ppl udoneven]

[IMAGE: A baby’s hand grasping the finger of an adult hand.]
[TEXT: I want a child someday, but I can’t imagine myself having a spouse.]

I just wish there weren’t so many stigmas attached to that statement.

I wanted to put my two cents in and say that, from personal experience, most people who are aromantic and/or asexual probably aren’t sociopaths/psychopaths. 

My brother is a sociopath (officially diagnosed) and I am aromantic/asexual. There is truly a world of difference between us. He is cruel to animals and humans (especially when he was younger). He has a wife and multiple children and they are all living off of relatives’ money (in their own house, with new cell phones and all!) Although most people can’t tell when he manipulates people (for pleasure, monetary gain, whatever…) he frequently boasts about it, shows me how he does it. It’s NOT a trait I see frequently. So just because you don’t feel love or empathy or whatever every two seconds, doesn’t mean you’re a sociopath and it’s not a topic that should be taken lightly - which it all too often is. (It angers me that either the word sociopath/psychopath is taken too lightly or it’s made out to be that they are all serial murders) 

If you want to discuss further, feel free to contact me!

Hi.

I consider myself aromantic.  I have absolutely no conscious interest in relationships (or sex or anything…even real friendship).  But I have a weird problem of sorts — sometimes, I’ll develop a “crush” on someone, like a girl in a class I’m taking.  I feel typical crushy feelings towards this person, sometimes to the extreme that I feel like I “love” the person.  But I don’t rationally acknowledge these feelings — like, I’ll feel like I want to talk to a person I have a silly crush on, but I think “no, that’s stupid and pointless” and I suppress those feelings.

It’s not because I’m afraid of rejection or anything.  I sincerely do not want to be in a relationship.

I feel like there’s a divide between the rational and emotional parts of my brain.

What would you call me?  A “wtfromantic,” perhaps?  Have you encountered people with feelings like mine?  Any words of advice, in general?

I’m almost certain there are others out there that are in the same situation that you are in.  I can definitely understand what you mean when you say that there is a divide between emotion and reason. There have been times where I have attempted to do some introspection with regards to my feelings towards other people and in almost 9/10 of when I do so, I keep reminding myself that regardless of what my feelings may be, the fact remains that I predominantly enjoy my own company, and I have no interest/desire in engaging in behavior that is typically perceived as romantic anyhow (i.e I don’t like kissing, hand holding etc.)

I suppose it will help if you ask yourself why you do not wish to engage in a romantic relationship.

With that said, I don’t believe that suppressing feelings is necessarily a good idea. Just out of curiosity, could the reason that you consider your feelings to be ‘silly’ and your ‘crush’(or whatever it is) as stupid and pointless  is because you realize that it will not result in a romantic relationship? Because if so, then I think it would help you if you remember that mainstream society has unfortunately a way of devaluing relationships/behaviour that isn’t perceived to be romantic . Just something to think about

One problem with the term “sociopath” is that it doesn’t have a strict definition—in psychology there is Antisocial Personality Disorder (ASPD) and psychopathy, which are two vaguely similar but ultimately different things. (ASPD is diagnosed by behavioral patterns while psychopathy is more of a personality assessment, for one.) Both of them are generally misunderstood and labeled as “sociopathy” by society.

 I think the problem is is that media/mainstream culture typically perceives sociopathy as being asocial, which I think, ties into the conflation with aromanticity since there is this perception that since aromantic people commonly don’t desire romantic relationships, they don’t desire relationships at all (which ties into the relationship hierarchy problem and the idea that non-romantic relationships don’t exists/ are unimportant)

I think this is true. (Another thing people don’t seem to realize is that people who suffer from psychopathy can be quite social. One of the factors in the Psychopathy Checklist, Revised is “glibness/superficial charm”. I am not sure if the same can be said for people with ASPD, but I am no expert.)

Another problem is that people seem to be associating aromanticism and asexuality with a lack of empathy (and since that is one diagnostic factor of both ASPD and psychopathy, they automatically associate aromanticism and asexuality with “sociopathy”). These things do not correlate. There are aro and/or ace people with lots of empathy, and there are ones with impaired empathy. The same can be said of people that are neither aro nor ace. In addition, lacking empathy does not automatically mean someone suffers from ASPD or psychopathy. (More importantly, a lack of empathy doesn’t automatically make someone a raging asshole. Empathy has many definitions, but generally people agree that it refers to the ability to understand what other people are feeling. Someone who has difficulty doing this is still capable of being kind and compassionate—it’s just motivated by thoughts rather than feelings. It might be innately harder for someone with impaired empathy to display what is socially accepted as compassion, but that doesn’t mean they can’t get better at it with practice.)

(Uhh so this turned into a long ramble, but I think I had a point in there somewhere.)

[Image description: white text on a purple background. “I had to get a psych eval. One of the questions I was asked was my orientation: homosexual, heterosexual, bisexual, or questioning. I have never been more ashamed of who I am.”]

It was an electronic form, too, so I couldn’t even explain.

[[Image: dark pink text on light pink background. Text: “Yes, I’m an aromantic asexual. No, I’ve never had sex, no I never want to. Yes, I write (and read and enjoy) queer porn and romance novels. No, I don’t think my ability to write convincing romance or sex is compromised by my lack of personal experience. Yes, I am totally fine with all of this!”]]

[I’m aro and I’ve recently gotten into a platonic “thing” with a friend of mine (I think)

I’m afraid to talk about it with her because I feel like quantifying it would just be proving the “you just haven’t found the right one yet” people right. (I’ve always been very anti-relationship)

(I feel stupid for being more concerned about this than the actual possibility that I’ve just misread her intents)

pictured = a closeup of two hands clasped.

text = for me, aromantic doesn’t mean i don’t want that kind of relationship. it means i will never feel love that way, and i refuse to lie about it. i feel like the only aro who wants that kind of relationship, and the only aro who feels lacking in their ability to love.

“Because of the relative emptiness of the source site, it feels like something that was put together by a couple of people and not by a community. I like the ace flag because they at least attempted to get many peoples’ opinions and there is real thought behind it, real representation of the community.”

I’m actually one of the people who originally put together aromantic.org. At the time there were absolutely no resources for aromantics that were not exclusively asexual spaces. We made the site in the hopes that it would encourage a community, because we were sure we weren’t the only ones who felt the way we did.

And it worked! I was so excited when the aromantic community suddenly exploded on tumblr! 

We designed the flag to be as inclusive as possible and we used fairly basic color symbolism. Green, (being the opposite, complimentary color to red, which usually represents romance), represents aromanticism. Yellow, like the yellow rose which represents friendship, stands for various forms of queerplatonic love. Orange, being red once removed toward yellow, represents lithromantics. And black represents romantics who choose to reject traditional romance.

We decided to make a flag even though there were so few of us because having a rallying symbol, we felt, would help coalesce the community. And I think it worked!

That said, of course now that there is a large, active community we should reopen discussion of the flag and any other symbols.

- From detectivepunchymchitsthings:

[IMAGE: A woman wearing a strapless wedding dress]
[TEXT: It sounds silly, the hardest part of coming to terms with my aromanticism was accepting that I will never have a wedding.

I wish I could have a platonic marriage.]

I’ve been planning my wedding since I was a little girl, and it hurts to think that I will never get to experience it, that I will never get to put any of these plans in motion. I can’t even use my plans for any of my friends weddings, because a lot of it was symbolic and wouldn’t really apply to anyone else.

Maybe it will get easier someday, but right now it makes me want to cry.

hernameishelen:

acesecrets:

[Text: I’m aromantic. (but I have so much love to give)]

Reminds me of the song, “I Have Forgiven Jesus,” by Morrissey.

[Image Description: An image of holding hands. Text: I wish that touching wasn’t seen as such a romantic thing because sometimes I just want somebody, anybody, to hold my hand. (without having to be a couple)]

[Image Description: White and black text on golden yellow, texturised background. Text: I’m ace and aro. I’m out and active with my ace identity. But I’m terrified of coming out as aro. WHY?!”]