wary but listening
Mar. 5th, 2019 12:49 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sciatrixso I'm commenting on the aromantic community again.
It's not...
I have such complicated feelings about it! It feels like the people who are continuing the conversations I had ten years ago are also erasing me and the context of those conversations, and I admit I get so bitter at the way that I only ever seem to hear from aromantic community and spaces when they're expressing derision at people who associate them with asexual communities, like there was some kind of cadre of aromantic allosexuals who came up with the whole thing.
And then the older I get and the less I'm convinced romantic orientation is a useful metric for talking about the way that people navigate the world of attachment, because I think the thing people are often talking about is more about limerence and less about the way you find people to grow together with and make families, but limerence is only really relevant when you're starting something new and not so much when you're moving together along a path.
And I worry about the endless hyperfocus on beginnings and not on journeys. Because I think that's what connection with people is, and at the end of the day, I think that the best things that aromantic community discussion has to bring to the table is to really emphasize the concept of chosen journeys that we take with other people.
It's not...
I have such complicated feelings about it! It feels like the people who are continuing the conversations I had ten years ago are also erasing me and the context of those conversations, and I admit I get so bitter at the way that I only ever seem to hear from aromantic community and spaces when they're expressing derision at people who associate them with asexual communities, like there was some kind of cadre of aromantic allosexuals who came up with the whole thing.
And then the older I get and the less I'm convinced romantic orientation is a useful metric for talking about the way that people navigate the world of attachment, because I think the thing people are often talking about is more about limerence and less about the way you find people to grow together with and make families, but limerence is only really relevant when you're starting something new and not so much when you're moving together along a path.
And I worry about the endless hyperfocus on beginnings and not on journeys. Because I think that's what connection with people is, and at the end of the day, I think that the best things that aromantic community discussion has to bring to the table is to really emphasize the concept of chosen journeys that we take with other people.
no subject
Date: 2019-03-06 07:29 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-03-06 07:32 pm (UTC)(I realise this is barely relevant, I just saw a thing the other day on twitter again that made me groan and roll my eyes)
no subject
Date: 2019-03-06 08:47 pm (UTC)Few of us have the luxury of being entirely self-made and self-actualized persons. I'm a survivor of explicitly anti-bisexual violence. I can't escape from the cultural reality that straight culture hates bisexual people and bisexuality in distinct ways by preferring a different label.
no subject
Date: 2019-03-11 06:58 pm (UTC)