Gamer's Balance

Ambiverted old-school gamer with a third eye POV on freedom, diversity, equality and finding common ground for all people. ^_^ Enjoys video games (Fighting, strategy, RPG, puzzle, platformers and racing), cinema (horror, action, sci-fi, independent films, erotic films), non-traditional romance and non-monogamous relationships (open relationships, LGBTQ+, polyamory, interracial/interethnic/interspecies), comics (DC Comics, Marvel, IDW, Dark Horse, Image), vintage/retro stuff, art, animation, cryptography, and technology.

[merrygeist]

a special kind of camaraderie 

[ngamer480]

If there’s ever going to be future GB stories about the EGB’s someday, this dynamic should really be explored more often; they would have the intellectual chemistry of “Ray & Egon”; the platonic chemistry of “Ray and Winston”; and shades and sprinkles of “Egon & Janine”. The relationship would be queerplatonic and I would headcanon both of them as either Demi/Ace or Demi/Aro. ^_^

[ngamer480]

To go even further alongside those mixes and shades of Egon/Ray; Ray/Winston; Egon/Janine parallels for Ky and Rollie with the right writing and character development, their dynamic would also be more evolved to parallel some shades of the Mulder and Scully dynamic from The X-Files, which is another show about the paranormal alongside government conspiracies and extraterrestrials (even it had a crossover with Ghostbusters in the IDW comics); Ky and Rollie would be the Agent Mulder and Agent Scully of the EGB’s. Whether at AO3 or FF.net; I would love to see fanfics to explore Ky and Rollie’s dynamic this way.

[mathematical-cheese]

Queerplatonic does not mean and has never meant "more than friends". Reducing qprs to "non-romantic and non-sexual relation that is more than friends" is not accurate at all of the wide variety of relationships that might be qprs. For one, qprs can contain elements of romance and/or sex as much as the people in a give qpr are comfortable with. For another, "more than friends" just shows that you haven't done any work to deconstruct amatonormativity. Weaving a relationship hierarchy into the general definition of any type of relationship is amatonormative. This doesn't mean you can't value your own personal relationship as "more than friends", it is general statements about the inherent values of different relationships that is the issue.

[aro-ace-culture-is]

Another rant.

One day my grandma said, "You should get married soon"

I asked, "what if I don't want to? I have my friends....and you."

They replied, "Friends are never equal to a husband, no matter how close you are".

I was really curious. "Say, what is the difference between the two?"

"You know. The feeling of someone being there for you, with you, always, 24/7 no matter what? Friends are never gonna give that feeling. I have friends too, but my husband is certainly different. Irreplaceable."

Now this is an old lady who married in her teens and spent 60+ years with her husband. She was dependent on him, according to all the stories she told me about their relationship. Now she's over 90. I bet my ancestors were like, "A girl's gotta marry and settle. Marriage is a priority". Because everyone in that era (in our area) mostly married....and sustained in the relationship. It was obviously more than any other relationship. It's on a whole another level. And also because I picked this belief up from them.

What I knew in my heart:

That's bullshit. Friends can give that feeling too. If we try enough to focus on friendship. And can prioritize it enough. If we love our friends enough in her own way. People are different. And there are many among them who value friendship as much as romance. But I get where she's coming from. It is what she learned from her experience. I don't blame her at all.

What I felt:

It hurt. It made me doubt my new beliefs. Growing up, I was taught marriage was the norm. I grew up thinking I would marry one day, it's inevitable. It's impossible for me to be single cuz no one else would be with me. That I needed a person to be always with me. I grew up believing it hard. Now that's backfiring. Especially after I learned about my aroace identity.

All this rant is for one doubt. Is there a norm in this extremely diverse world? Either everything is normal or everything is abnormal. There is not one generalization or stereotype that is completely true because the world is fucking abnormal with kinds of conditions and people. There's not one invalid emotion or identity because humans are naturally complex. It's human nature. It's normal.

Nevermind this is all over the place, lemme just end it with some slogans.

BEGONE THE SO-CALLED NORM!

BEGONE STREOTYPES!!

BEGONE GENERALIZATIONS!!!

Amen.

Posted on Nov 01, 2023

[thriftdyke]

it really does bother me how no one can seem to answer the question “what even is romantic attraction, really.” like some people are like “it’s who you wanna kiss and cuddle <3” and I’m like ok well kisses and cuddles can be either sexual or platonic depending on context. “It’s who you feel passion/desire/arousal for” well that just sounds like sexual attraction which you can have without even knowing somebody so I fail to see how that’s romantic. “It’s who you want to go on dates with” I go on dates with friends all the time plus “date” is a social construct anyway there’s really no innate difference between a date and hanging out. “it’s who you have deep feelings for” great news for you that can be literally any type of relationship. my friend told me she defined it as “who you wanna give roses to” and I’m like do u hear urself??? like the more I talk to people the more I’m convinced romance and romantic attraction is an elaborate socially fabricated illusion that has no real defining characteristics. and like there’s nothing Wrong with it being a constuct but why people are so attached to defending the supremacy of it is something I cannot for the life of me figure out

[li-binauje-artisse]

Okay this is half a vent, but... I find it really....*interresting* that every time an aro and/or ace person is getting in a relationship with someone who is allo, this is automatically seen as abusive (the aro/ace person being the abuser i mean). I mean, the main arguments are "you are denying them an actual fulfilling relationship", "you are lying to them", "you could never be enough", etc... which is...well aphobia, nothing less. (And the normative idea that a relationship MUST have sex, or [romance coded stuff idk]. And both at once.) And i don't really care about the "yes but some are/ace actually don't mind kissing / sex/ etc.." card because yes that's true and they deserve recognition too but that's not really the point because we don't have to justify our existence (and to push aro/ace who are not like that under the bus) and also people think we're lying about either not minding it or about being aro/ace anyways when it's the case. Even an ace person not minding sex will be seen as a lesser partner due to their asexuality, if it's aknowledged. Even without mentioning aromantism or asexuality at all, some people will sometimes say "i don't think i love [partner] exactly the same way as they love me" or "i don't really want to have sex with them" and immediately call them manipulative. Or tell them that they have to leave their partner or else that's abuse. Not question asked. But i notice that when a relationship like that actually does not work, 90% of the time people say that it's the fault of the aro/ace person. ON BASIS of being aro/ace, as if the other person involved never had any say in it and could only "suffer from an abusive incomplete relationship". Like, you guys realise that we don't have some mind control power right? (Also idk why people are treating a failed relationship as a crime, that shit happens all of the time) But no, it's *always* the job of the aro/ace person to notice things are not going well and "set our partner free" or else we are manipulative. As if we were some kind of creature that must not be involved with "normal people" or else they suffer from our presence. We have to hide for their own good. I mean yeah, sure, sometimes aro/ace people are actually dickish/abusive/etc.... but cool story bro, anyone can be like that regardless of their orientation. And i say that as an aro who could not care less about being in a relationship, but many aro/ace people are and the way i see people talking about them is nothing less than disgusting.

[verminetroglodyte]

I don't know if I'm really aromantic and at this point I'm too afraid to ask.

I know I'm allosexual. I like to cuddle people. I like little intimate moments with moderation. I don't want to "build a life" with someone. I would enjoy having multiple partners with whom I would share more than just sexual encounters. I don't want someone in my house 24/7. I don't see myself falling in love and getting married have kids and pets. I would love to live in my own apartment with a cat and my "partners" in the same building. I don't like sharing my bathroom with someone. I'd enjoy having someone there to make fun of me as I irremediably fuck up my haircut and have to buzz it all off, then have nasty sex with me on the couch.

I don't know if that makes sense and it's probably too specific to have anyone who'd be up to do that without fucking it up by asking me for "love".

[usernotfound404sblog-deactivate]

The worst thing that amatonormativity has done is that people have become so obsessed with romantic/Eros love that it’s becoming socially unacceptable to show any other types of deep affection without people thinking that it’s romantic or sexual. Best friends even often have trouble being affectionate with each other without society calling them “gay” (which is a harmful thing to say anyway), or the heteronormative “a man and a woman can’t be ‘just friends’ there must be something going on in between them”. This society is so over-romanticized and so over-sexualized that other types of love have had to be watered down because people jump to conclusions.

[anesica]

amatonormativity is annoying. it makes people assume romantic stuff even when there's nothing like that going on. for years, i've been focused on disliking amatonormativity itself.

but recently, i've been dealing with grief and guilt. admittedly, the way i handle amatonormativity isn't the best. i lash out towards the very people with whom i'm thought to have some sort of romantic undercurrent with. i feel guilt over the things i did to put distance between us. i feel grief over how those friendships, some of them close friendships, ended because people thought there was something romantic between us.

no, that isn't right. those friendships ended because of my own fault. regardless of the amatonormativity, i was the one who decided to sabotage those friendships. i ought to take some accountability, at the very least.

i grief for the friendships i lost because of my actions. i regret all the hurt my past friends have felt because of my actions. i detest the person i became when i get so overwhelmed with amatonormativity.

and this? this feels more intense compared to previous annoyance of amatonormativity, back before it hit me just how much damage i did to my past friends. it really drives the point how much amatonormativity has affected my life.

[mathematical-cheese]

"QPRs and other non-romantic committed relationships are not inherently amatonormative because there existence challenges amatonormativity" and "the way that some people frame QPRs as inherently more than friends is recycling amatonormative rhetoric like 'they must be in a romantic relationship or at least a QPR because friends don't do that' and is no more helpful" are statements that can co-exist.

There are phrases like "romantic relationships for aros" that completely miss the point of QPRs and frames it like aros need to make up for not experiencing romantic attraction (at the same level as allos). Ignoring the way that some people treat QPRs and other non-romantic committed relationships as a stand in or a substitute for romantic relationships is ignoring the hurt this causes non-partnering people.

Notice the nuance in what I'm saying. I'm not saying that QPRs are amatonormative. I am saying that the way some people talk about them is. Also notice I'm not talking on an individual level, this isn't about people who feels their qpps are more important than their friends. I firmly believe everyone has the right to choose what relationships are important to them and how important they are. I am talking about people who make generalising statements that do a disservice to the point of QPRs and other non-romantic committed relationships and harms non-partnering people

[qprstories]

I’ll have known my qpp for 6 years this October, and we officially declared ourselves in a qpr earlier this year. It’s been very lovely :)

She lights up my whole world and not a day goes by without me being happy that she exists and is a part of my life. We’ve been each other’s supports through the end of high school, through covid, through all the bad and the good over these past few years.

I love spending time with her and I love when she wants to spend time with me too. I love when I hear her talk about random things that I know nothing about. I love giving her car rides when I’m able to, and when a song comes on and we both sing in silly voices along to it.

I’d love to be able to tell teenage me—who had been friends with her for a few months and feared that our friendship would end once we hit university—about how remarkable that silly little friendship ended up becoming.

To sum it up, having a good qpr is rad as hell 💫

🌻

[qpr-culture-is]

qpr culture is going to theirs moms birthday party and meeting a lot of people of theirs family and being happy every time they introduced you as theirs friend bcs that’s what you decided to call each other in public, but knowing that in private we’re a qpr. at the end of the night they are so happy that you could meet theirs family that he told you how much they love you and how amazing think you are. so you just kiss theirs cheeks and tell them that thank you, they are incredible and you’re very glad to meet theirs family, “I love you too”.

-

[qpp-love]

it took me a long time to realize i didn't need a romantic relationship to be whole, even while i had my qpp. it wasn't till i realized i have someone right in front of me that whole time who cares about me and want to spend his life with me that i saw that romance isn't everything, and i wouldn't trade him for the world.

[tummy-hurts]

The two-things-are-true of firmly believing in everyone's right to use whatever labels for themselves they want, and how I haven't seen any tumblr posts about queerplatonic relationships that use the original definition of queerplatonic and the thing they're using the word for is partly covered by alterous and partly needs a new umbrella term and worrying that the original sense of the word will be lost.

Queerplatonic originally meant a platonic relationship that is given the same level of importance and commitment that much of scoring gives romantic relationships, and the special term was meant to make it un-ignorable that 'this isn't like your platonic relationships' but it is still platonic because platonic doesn't have to be limiting. When people say queerplatonic relationships can have elements of platonic and romantic feelings, that's one of the definitions of alterous attraction; the other of which is a third feeling separate from platonic and romantic, which people also use queerplatonic for. And when people say queerplatonic is anything outside of the platonic/romantic binary, like an equivalent to 'nonbinary', then I think that's an umbrella term that hasn't been invented yet, personally.

[jilted-love]

You all need to be reminded that Queerplatonic Relationships are long term committed relationships that originated from aromantic people who want the consistency and loyalty in romantic relationships without the expectations of performing romance. If you don't want to commit to a platonic relationship, then you don't want a QPR ("platonic" word here is used as the opposite of "romantic" instead of "sexual" because some queerplatonic partners can be sexual and others can be non-sexual).

QPR is not just a quirky term for intense emotional friendship because any friendship can have that intimacy but not all friends commit to each other in the way that makes the relationship queer. The queerness in queerplatonic means we have a relationship that's so devoted and yet platonic because we are debunking amatonormativity here that dictates to us (by society) that romantic relationships must be the priority.

If you just want to kiss and hug your friends and hold their hands or anything else intimate but you don't think you can be committed to that friendship, it's not queerplatonic relationship you want. If you're misusing queerplatonic term, you're erasing the meaning of this word that helps aromantic people communicate our boundaries, expectations and experiences as queer people. Please just respect us. Treating QPR like it's just a "friendship" is as rude as treating it as "romance lite". I want a commitment but no romo. It's that simple.

Edit: This is not gatekeeping or exclusionary. All this post is saying is that QPR is a non-romancebased commitment. Anyone can have a QPR if you can be committed to people even if you aren't expecting romance from them. Any misunderstanding over this is not my responsibility. Maybe read better.

[cann1bal-kitt3n-x]

[funstyle]

[cosmicanger]