what I’ve been thinking of as romance, as being a huge romantic sap, is making grand gestures of, basically, “look! I know what you love and I want to do special things for you around that!”
like, my partner always says that I am the greatest at giving gifts, because I deploy that skill. I’m like, “look! I know what will make you super happy, and I’m gonna make it happen, in proportion to how important you are to me!”
but like also, I’m realizing that it’s not actually about romantic relationships for me, because it’s just like… I want to show my love of any kind for people by being super thoughtful and celebrate whatever amount of emotional closeness we have… and I want the same from people… and it’s totally regardless of what KIND of relationship it is… it’s just that for my partner, it’s going to be the greatest that I can make it….
Soooooooooo that might kind of be the OPPOSITE of what people actually mean by being romantic??
also I kind of think that the reason it’s so hard to figure this stuff out is that society in general doesn’t fucking know either.
This might be something where Love Languages theory might help; I’m not a huge fan of it generally, but I do recognise that many people find it useful.
But other than that, I think the last paragraph is spot on.
Mainstream culture keeps trying to quantify the acceptable level of intensity, when it comes to wanting people in your life and showing them affection. And one of the ways it does that is by labelling greater levels of intensity as “romantic” rather than platonic. Which just doesn’t work.
I’m an intense person. I wouldn’t have described myself like that, but I have to face the fact that that’s how others experience me. When I develop any kind of feelings for someone, I’m really into them. Including in what I now find out may be a particularly autistic way of wanting someone, wherein they become one of my special interests.
And firstly, a lot of people seem only able to understand that at all by calling it romantic, even though there’s no reason to think that automatically.
And secondly, I’ve always had people on my case pressuring me to say that I’d be uncomfortable if I were the one on the receiving end of it. And I just wouldn’t. In fact, if someone did have feelings, but they didn’t manifest in a similarly “intense” [normal, to me] way to mine, I wouldn’t feel wanted. I want the same back that I give, and that is not remotely unreasonable.
My biggest problem with that has been parsing it from the concept of “lovebombing”, which is interest that’s fake as hell, and [luckily] has always felt fake as hell, to me.
But people not getting their heads around the idea that I could be wanting someone that way without it being an unhealthy romantic obsession comes a close second.
(fyi y’all that was tagged “i’m grey-aro – for reference”)
First of all: same. Intense, with special interests in people, and that’s my “love language” if you like – I want others to do things that show they really know me, as well as wanting others to express their affection for me through platonic physical affection.
And second;
The thing about how our (amatonormative) society keeps trying to say “you must be X amount of romantic to ride,” and then defining it incoherently (like “we mean really big and obvious and intense about your passion! yeah, that’s… probably a measurable thing!!”)….
That makes my brain go, “but what is it then? What is it tho? What is being romantic? What is it? It’s not a thing, is it? This binary is completely indefinable and indefensible! Then how am I supposed to know if I’m The Thing!?!”…
and then I realized OF COURSE IT FUCKING IS. BECAUSE ALL THE OTHER ONES ARE TOO.
Like, how the fuck can I sit here being nonbinary, knowing perfectly well that the gender binary is a lie… that male and female are not opposites, and they’re p much impossible to define except as vague clouds of feelings, styles, physical traits, and ways of being in the world.
People can still BE men or women or bigender or genderfluid or agender or demi or third-gender or something else entirely.
It’s just that you can’t draw a box around what any of those things are, and tell other people, “this is exactly what this gender is, and feels like, and looks like.”
Probably because genders don’t EXACTLY exist. Because alongside them, there’s a very visible, tangible, strong system, that very much exists, that makes up what the genders are in a given culture+era, and uses that as a major part of the entire system of oppression and abuse. (the kyriarchy.)
So no matter what gender actually is, or what genders there are, the whole idea of them is dragged down, and enormously warped by, the system of oppression that uses them. Like if gender was a mattress, and oppression was an elephant sitting on it.
So of course “aromantic vs alloromantic” is really hard to define, and to describe, and to discuss.
Because not only is there this elephant crushing it, but it’s not even supposed to be thought of as even being a binary (much less as a spectrum, or as multiple options).
We’re not even supposed to be able to see the mattress. Only the elephant.
…Imagine my reaction when I opened up the trailer for On the Basis of Sex last week and saw Felicity Jones grace the screen. British Felicity Jones, with her fine features and her awkward American accent, beautiful, perfectly manicured, and erasing any trace of Ginsburg’s roots.
…But I think what hurts more about watching Jones portray the first female, Jewish Supreme Court Justice is how little they physically look alike. Justice Ginsburg has strong, identifiably Ashkenazi Jewish features. She looks Jewish. Missing from Felicity Jones is any trace of RBG’s large Jewish nose. In its place is a delicate, slightly upturned nose. One that conforms more closely with White Western Christian standards of beauty. Frankly, the absence of RBG’s schnoz is bumming me out.
…This issue is more than skin deep. Judaism is a huge part of Justice Ginsburg’s identity now, but it also provides another dimension to her early career. While it’s definitely true that when RBG went to law school, it was uncommon for women to attend, and when she challenged legal precedent she was a young woman disrupting what has historically been a boys’ club, it was also unusual to be a Jew in these contexts at the time.
When Ruth Bader Ginsburg entered law school, many top universities still had “Jewish quotas.” Not many Jews were practicing law, and not many historically had done so. So it was not just that she was a woman disrupting these norms and defying conventions in the legal field, she was a Jewish woman in a professional field that did not have many Jews or women. She was a double anomaly. She is doubly impressive.
And yet, any trace of her Jewish identity — from her accent to her face — is erased in the casting of Felicity Jones in the role. This should be pissing people off. Prosthetic makeup is used all the time to transform actors into their roles in biopics. Prosthetics were used to make Nicole Kidman into Virginia Woolf in The Hours and Meryl Streep into Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady. So why is it missing here? Why are we allowing a key component of this icon’s identity to be erased? Why do we need a young Ruth Bader Ginsburg — who, it should be noted, was a total babe but really that’s beside the point — to be conventionally beautiful?
The way I see it, this is really problematic for two reasons. First of all, the irony of altering the appearance of a historic figure in order to make her more conventionally attractive in a movie about her combating sexual discrimination is almost too rich to put into words.
Second of all, representation is important.
…Ruth Bader Ginsburg grew up with identifiably Ashkenazi Jewish features at a time when it was not easy being Jewish in her professional field or in society in general. When RBG’s character is robbed of these features, the story loses something. We all lose something. Something important and integral to Ginsburg’s, and America’s, struggle.
And beyond the story, we lose something else. As a girl growing up with a big Jewish nose, I hated my nose because I thought that was what I was supposed to do. I thought my nose was actually incompatible with delicate femininity. How wonderful it would have been to have more examples of that in popular media, to know that it could be otherwise. And how wonderful it would be now to see the story of a young Ruth Bader Ginsburg: hard-headed, trail-blazing, beautiful, and Jewish.
Read Anna Miriam’s full piece at Alma.
idk what age exactly they’re going for but i could see mayim bialik as a young ginsburg. also, the fact that bialik is a highly educated jewish-american woman too makes her seem like a good fit.
I’ve seen Jenny Slate suggested and I’m just going to let the pictures of Jenny and a young Ruth speak for themselves.
But yes, Mayim Bialik would absolutely have been a really good choice as well.
listen I have big Mayim Bialik feelings too, not least from growing up around the Blossom era. But the amount of energy she’s maybe-unintentionally given to anti-vaxx misinformation, as both a celebrity and a damn scientist, is horrifying to my autistic ass.
A real autism feel: Being able to express yourself better by typing/writing rather than words, but psychiatrist appointments and casual conversations require you to talk and thus not being able to really express yourself
I can see my words therefore I know them.
But speaking, speaking I do not know them or what they do.
I just read this super sad post about this girl who’s asexual and married and everyone is basically telling her that she doesn’t deserve her husband/she’s just a prude/she should just do it anyway.
So I want to tell you all right now that if people tell you this, or if they tell you you’ll never have a relationship, it is BULLSHIT.
My husband is asexual and I’m not. He’s sex repulsed, we don’t have sex, we never have.
And it doesn’t matter to me. You know what does? He does. His mental health and wellbeing matter to me. Because he is my best friend and he’s one of the smartest, kindest, funniest people I’ve ever met. And he’s had people tel him that he’s broken and it makes me SO ANGRY because they are WRONG.
Being different doesnt mean you’re broken.
If you don’t like sex/don’t want it/etc. Do not let anyone tell you that you’re inferior because you’re not.
Do not let anyone convice you that you’ll never have a relationship because they’re wrong(if you want one).
You are not broken, and it will be okay.
This made me feel really good. Remember this, for all my ace spectrum friends out there
I hope you don’t mind me reblogging your tags but these are my feelings EXACTLY
I’m always a little nervous that I’m not “good enough” for a “real relationship” because sex isn’t on the table. So yeah, these stories are reassuring
The amount of pressure from society to have sex is incredible. We’re told it’s linked to relationship health and if you’re not willing to do every damn thing you’re labeled a prude. It’s incredibly disheartening, especially considering how one’s libido can change over the years even if you’re not ace. Nice to see a supportive piece from a partner.
OK, kids, buckle up it’s story time.
When I got married, I hadn’t had sex yet. Waiting until marriage was important to me, so that’s what I did. My wedding night was the first time I had sex.
It sucked.
I figured, ok, this is new for both of us, it’s probably going to take some practice.
A year later? It still sucked We tried a lot of different stuff. A lot of different stuff.
It sucked so bad, we even bought a copy of “Sex for Dummies”.
(it didn’t help)
I started working late so I didn’t go to bed at the same time as my husband. Every time he would travel for work, I’d be grateful that I didn’t have to go through the awkwardness of avoiding his advances when I went to bed.
He didn’t think it was healthy for a newlywed couple to have sex less than once a week. So we scheduled it. Repeat, scheduled intimacy. I thought I was putting on a brave face and doing what I needed to do to maintain a good relationship.
Because I had no idea that asexuality was a thing.
I talked to my husband, told him I didn’t like sex. He didn’t understand. I lost track of how many times I said: “It’s not that I don’t want to have sex with you. I don’t want to have sex with anyone.”
So it was established, Amber doesn’t like sex.
But we still did it. Because I wanted my husband to be happy. Sometimes halfway through, I’d start crying.
And he’d always be supportive, and apologize.
After he finished.
So when I found out about asexuality, and told him how I felt, he suggested I go to a doctor. Because obviously there was something wrong with me.
So I went to a doctor.
(surprise, surprise, I’m perfectly healthy)
Then I told my mom. When she suggested meds to improve my sex drive, I broke down in tears. I told her there was nothing wrong with me. And my mom has been 100% supportive of my orientation ever since. When people ask if I’m a lesbian, she teaches them about asexuality.
But anyway back to my journey of self-discovery
So I tell my husband, I’m asexual, I don’t want to have sex. You are not asexual, you do want to have sex. One of us is going to be miserable in this relationship, and I’m tired of it being me. I love you too much to make you miserable for the rest of your life, but I love myself too much to be miserable for the rest of my life. We might have to face the fact that we’re not right for each other.
So his immediate response is “no, I can change, I’ll do anything, divorce is not an option, etc”
But I can’t exactly ask him to stop wanting to have sex. Because that’s not how allosexual people work. And he can’t seduce me into wanting to have sex, because that’s not how asexual people work.
Anyway. He cries, I cry, we decide on marriage counseling to help our comunication.
Because we’d been married for almost 6 years by this point, and had been together for 3 years before that, and we still can’t really talk about what we want (or don’t want) in regards to sex.
So we go to counselling for 6 weeks. The first 3 sessions individually, and the last 3 together. During the together sessions, the therapist would prompt us with a question, and we’d talk to each other, being completely honest about things.
During (what turned out to be) our last session, I’d finally had enough. I’d had enough of being embarrassed about what anyone else would think. Enough of the gender roles I was being forced into. Enough of paying someone to watch me talk to my husband. Enough of pretending to salvage a relationship that I had been increasingly avoiding over the past 2 years, and I said:
“Josh, I love you. We have communication problems, but we’ve been together almost ten years and I’m willing to work through those if you think we can make it work. But I am never having sex with you again.”
(At this point, the therapist who’d been trying to get us to communicate put down her notebook and said, ok I think we’re done.)
Then and only then, did he agree to file for divorce.
—————–
I say all that to say this:
Don’t you dare fucking tell me that asexual representation doesn’t matter. I would have six years of my life back if I had known.
And if you’re in a relationship, talk to each other oh my God. About everything. What dream you had last night. That song from scout camp that randomly gets stuck in your head. The reason you don’t like sweet potato. That embarrassing thing you did in third grade that still makes you mad when you think about it. If you and your partner can share these tiny, intimate details, talking about sex is no big deal. And it takes practice, so practice.
————–
On a happy note, now, 3 years after the divorce, I am in a happy, stable relationship with another ace. And if you happen to ask my mom how I’m doing, she’ll tell you “I’ve never seen my baby girl happier.”
It gets better. But it’s up to you to make it that way.
@theonetheonlyjordanelizabeth please read this ❤️ I may be sex repulsed but I know that I love you and thats what matters ✨
I know this is already really long and really informative, but I also wanted to add a partner’s perspective. I too, have an ace fiancee. I knew about it before our relationship. I didn’t know it was a thing until I met her, and that was huge to me because I learned something new and also came to understand an old friend a little better.
I, on the other hand, am not ace. I am at the complete opposite end of the spectrum. I am pansexual, and she has a hard time I think coming to terms with the fact that I don’t want to make her have sex.
Like, ‘Really?’ you might ask me. Like really is my only reply. I have loved her for a long time now, and being we met over Tumblr and we knew one another before the relationship, sex isn’t a big deal in our relationship. and I can think of at least ten of my friends who would feel the same way right now.
ASEXUALITY IS A REAL THING, LOVING, SWEET ACE RELATIONSHIPS ARE REAL! Just because your partner wants sex doesn’t make you broken. Just because you don’t want sex doesn’t mean you should have to force yourself to do so.
Just be honest with one another, love one another. If a relationship can’t survive a healthy, honest conversation, then it wasn’t a very strong relationship to begin with.
TL;DR People who can’t see past sex as a ‘core’ in a relationship with someone ace/sex repulsed is an asshole.
It is okay to need sex in a relationship. It is also okay to be sexual and not need sex in a relationship.
i hate when people ask me to “watch their stuff” like what if someone comes and actually tries to steal it. do i have to fight them. i’m not ready
I still remember the one time I was sitting in a coffee shop back when I was in college. I had my books spread out everywhere and umpteen empty mugs around me, and this woman comes in with her stroller, sits down and starts taking the baby out. After about ten minutes she looks over at me and goes “Could you watch her for a second? I really need to go to the bathroom and my husband is late.”
Expecting her to put it back in the stroller and push it toward me I said “sure”, though somewhat reluctantly as I imagine every scenario ranging from the opening sequence of Roger Rabbit to Taken managing to occur in the time it would take me to blink.
Instead she walks over, plonks this infant toddler down in the middle of my French notes, says thank you and walks off.
She was gone for forty minutes.
And that’s the story of how I tried to teach a toddler to say “my mother abandoned me here” (“ma mère m’a abandonné ici” still the only words I fucking know) in French and almost resigned myself to motherhood.
@thebibliosphere I’m pretty sure you either babysat for someone who just HAD to hook up in the bathroom, or a drug addict who wanted to shoot up in the bathroom.
Oh boy is this an old post.
And nah, far more mundane than that. She was on the phone and could see me from where she was standing, apparently. I remember her coming back over like “oooh, so sorry, had to take a phone call, but I could see you were doing okay” which is still like, Not Good Parenting To Hand Your Child To A Stranger For Forty Minutes while you take a phone call, but still more mundane than “doing lines in the washroom.”
I dunno sometimes it takes a village.
One time we were checking out at the grocery store and my (at the time) two year old was being well, two. Just generally done with the store and beyond overwhelmed. The cashier motioned to take him and whole he has never taken kindly to strangers, jumped right into her arms and stayed there for the duration of our transaction.
When i was cashiering, I had a lady come in who needed to use the restroom. It was a single person room that required a key to get in. She had a brand new baby, and needed to wash a bottle. You could tell she was just run down and over tired (probably from having a new baby). So after I ring her up I give her the key and she asks if she can leave her baby with me. I’m a mom so obviously I said yes.
She was gone longer than I anticipated and the baby started to cry. Instantly I just swooped them from their carseat and held them cause crying babies and I just don’t mix. Next thing I know I’ve got a line of customers… and a baby on my chest. I got everyone rang up, and mom came back at the end now seeing that I had her baby in my arms. I apologized for holding said baby, but that they had started crying, and mom was ultimately appreciative and looked better than when she left.
I will say 40 mins is a little much with a stranger but I bet that mom was really just so appreciative of you and the fact that you were willing to watch her baby for so long. 🖤
And gosh darn lucky I wasn’t a murderer or child abductor.
Cause y’see here’s the thing about it taking a village, the village has to be willing and also that phrase was coined when in the village, you generally knew everyone in your local community. I was raised in a village, I grew up being “raised” by people who weren’t my family. And what that phrase did not mean was, “dump your baby on a random college kid in Costa Coffee”.
And there’s awhole lot of difference between “oh god I need to pee, can you watch them for a sec?” and “yea 40 minutes with a perfect stranger while I take this phone call seems fair”, like in retrospect it was some reckless, selfish nonsense on her part. What if I had to leave and she hadn’t come back in time? What if I had to go to the bathroom? What if something had happened to the baby?
She might have appreciated the moment but 22 year old me did not. It was 40 minutes of pure terror and wondering what in the hell was going on. Like I’m glad you feel able to do those things for other people, I am glad there are people out there like you who are able to do that, but oh boy was it not a good thing for her to do. Please don’t make out like it was.
Okay, I have 4 kids, all of them able to talk and function perfectly well – my youngest is six. And I STILL wouldn’t ever ask a stranger to watch them, for any reason, ever. I have never needed to pee that badly or had any phone call so urgent that I would have handed off any of my children, no matter the age, to a stranger. Having someone hold a fussing two year old while directly in front of me afet THEY OFFERED is ENTIRELY than “watch my kid while I go do a thing.”
The correct response when someone offers to take your kid is “no thanks, I got it… they’re just such a handful at this age.” The correct response if you are taking a call is to do it next to your baby who is quite possibly freaking the fuck out that mommy’s not there.
To all of you out there who have children or someday want to, NEVER leave a baby alone with someone THEY don’t know because for most of them, their reaction is not cute
Seriously. My oldest is a teenager and I’ve yet to think passing any of my kids to a random stranger I happen to be next to in public is a good idea. Stressed out tired parents don’t always make them and it might have been a big help to that one mother, but that doesn’t make it a generally good idea especcially for a phone call in a coffee shop.
The ‘it takes a village’ is friends helping out and letting your friends know you’re willing to do so. ‘It takes a village’ is the kindness of strangers who see your kid or you is struggling and helps out by getting something or helping to return a lost kid, it is not asking any random to babysit at a moment’s notice. A lot of kids will not react well. Even older kids – 7-year-olds suddenly foisted on others is still not a good idea and likely result in the child letting out their stress of suddenly missing parent and stranger in very unpleasant ways.
Urocyon's Jaunts 2.0 
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