I am The Salt™

Yet another aro sideblog. I love being salty and talking about aromanticism so I decided to do both at the same time. Non-SAM aro | River they/them

[amatopunk]

people when someones canon orientation is erased: don’t erase people’s orientation for your ships!!! we need more canon rep and erasing it is wrong!!

people when the character in question is aspec: eh nvm who cares lol

[saltyaro]

This is. A bit weird but. Like I’ve mentioned recently, I’m part of a group of people trying to create a local queer collective. And I’ve learnt some time ago, that one of the members of this collective is aphobic. Like “I don’t feel like saying ‘acephobia’ or ‘arophobia’ because they don’t exist” level of aphobic.

Which is bad enough, and honestly it doesn’t make me want to interact with her because, what an asshole lmao. The problem is, she’s a trans woman. So, it doesn’t feel good to outright dismiss her as an asshole, even though I don’t have the energy to educate her. If I see her and it comes up, I’ll just spam her with sources, whatever.*

Another issue arise though: excl/us/ion/ism, as we all know, is pretty popular among...te/rfs. So, while I don’t want to use up my energy for an aphobe, I can’t help knowing having this kind of bullshit in her head is dangerous for her (also, let’s be honest, it’s really fucking dangerous for the aspec people in her life, but it’s apparently not important to care about us so). So, while my actual main goal in wanting to make her change her mind is, the safety of one particular aroace person I know (they’re close), I’m also genuinely worried she might end up hurting herself because of her wrong beliefs. And I don’t know if showing/explaining to her how te/rfs have popularized aphobia and thrive on it would help? Like, trying to appeal to her own interests at first before getting her to care bout other people and trust/believe us?

I have no idea on if this would work or not. I don’t know her that much, we’ve barely met, and I don’t want to put the work into an aphobe with no garanty that they’ll at least change to be respectful of aspec people. 

So yeah it’s a bit of a complicated situation. Maybe I just shouldn’t care but like I said, there’s this aroace person I care about in this equation. Thoughts?

*On that, I have some pretty convincing studies/reports about acephobia, but not so much about arophobia? I’m thinking about the GLSEN report that is very good for aces, but they didn’t care enoguh about us to survey aro people

[clarabosswald]

listen it’s nice that the crewniverse went all “it’ll never be said in-show but peridot is the show’s aroace rep!!!!!!!” but FUCK does it feel utterly meaningless. like, “dumbledore is gay” level of tokenism. it’s not the first time it was said that peridot is aspec. they had TONS of time to try and figure out how to slip it into the show. just one word. i mean it’s STEVEN UNIVERSE. this show is ALL OUT with the lgbt+ rep… except with aspec people apparently? our representation is just a production footnote? and how fucking HORRIBLE is it that the crew person who let us know about peri’s identity is aspec themself? imagine working on this show, doing storyboards, pouring your heart into a character that’s supposed to share your identity, to be your rep - and see it never get to be said?

i’m just… su, i really do love you, but you fucking let us aspecs down.

[clarabosswald]

been seeing a lot of disgusting “uhhhh well i’m not gonna believe it until rebecca says it”-type comments and that’s EXACTLY why we fucking NEEDED peri’s identity to be EXPLICITLY CANON.

[arotaro]

Can we also talk about how her identity was confirmed in relation to how she feels about shipping?

I’m SO tired of the “aro who is obsessed with ships because they’re ‘interesting’ stereotype. People are really so incapable of comprehending the concept of anyone living a life without romance, so they try to replace it. If the aro doesn’t want romance for themself, clearly they must be overly invested in other people’s relationships to make up for it! Right? Like yes, there are aros who are into shipping and that’s fine, but aro identities should not be talked about exclusively in relation to shipping.

When your rep feels like a side character poorly written circa 2016 Voltron fanfic, that’s not good rep. I’m really not happy about this. I know we’re supposed to all be cheering and throwing ourselves at the SU team’s feet for being ~brave~ enough to write an aroace character, but fuck, do I REALLY have to thank someone for giving me a single stale bread crumb?

[rivermayne]

[saltyaro]

[From Daniel Sloss’ show on Netflix

Transcript: We have romanticized the idea of romance, and it is cancerous. And when you raise children in that world, where everything points towards love and everything's perfect on the outside, when we become an adult for the first time in our late teens and our early 20s, we're so terrified. We're so trying to be an adult that some of us will take the wrong person, the wrong jigsaw piece and just fucking jam them into our jigsaws anyway, denying that they clearly don't fit. I'm gonna force this fucking person into our lives because we'd much rather have something thant nothing. People are more in love with the idea of love than the person they are with. 55% of marraiges end in divorce. 90. Nine Zero. Percent of relationships that started before they are 30 end. If those were the stats for surgery, none of us would fucking risk it. But because it's love and we're stupid, we just lie on the operating table like, "Maybe this time I don't die inside." There's nothing wrong with being alone. There's nothing wrong with taking time to work out who you are because how can you offer who you are if you don't know who you are? There's nothing wrong with being selfish for a bit, because you've got the rest of your life to be selfless. If you only love yourself at 20%, that  means somebody can come along and love you 30%. You're like, "Wow, that's so much." It's literally less than half. Whereas if you love yourself 100%, a person that falls in love with you has to go above and beyond the call of duty to make you feel special. End transcript]

[zominix-art-blog]

Queercore

[aceofsquiddles]

Today on ‘platonic variations of romantic tropes’, consider: Character A doodling their first name with Character B’s last name… because they want Character B to adopt them.

[raavenb2619]

[ID: The Scooby Doo ghost meme. In the first panel, Fred looks at a ghost, labelled “Have you seen how they interact? There’s no way they’re just friends”, and says “Okay gang, let’s see who the ghost really is.“ In the second panel, Fred pulls off the mask and looks at a man labelled “Society has brainwashed me into thinking that romance is inherently more valuable than friendship, and as a result I will insist that anything that transgresses the confines of what I deem acceptable levels of care, affection, and dedication in a friendship must have a romantic component to it”. End ID]

[saltyaro]

One thing I do like about romantic vocabulary is that don’t express your romantic feelings, you don’t explain them, no, you confess

Like oh, you want a romantic relationship with this person? Well go ahead then, confess to your crimes

[saltyaro]

I don’t know where I stand on a particular romance cliché. Specifically, when you have A in romance with their friend B, but A knows B will not reciprocate. In media like in real life, A will either, still want to confess, or will be encouraged to. The official logic is generally something about honesty, but let’s get real, a lot of the time, it’s because A’s still expecting somehow. Which is human, even when you know something won’t happen, there’s often some amount of unconscious expectation/hope.

And honestly, I just don’t know how I feel about this culture of always giving the burden of knowledge to B. I mean, it’s useless knowledge for B at best, and it’s harmful at worst. By harmful I mean, either, it’ll ruin the friendship (given there’s a lack of friendship on A’s part) or, worse, it could pressure B. 

And on the other hand, I...think I can understand the desire to be honest with the people in your life? Not that I think not confessing is being dishonest but yeah. One could feel like they’re hiding the truth and feel uncomfortable with that. 

So I understand the feeling, but imposing those on B really rubs me the wrong way. Depending on the actual intent it could result in terrible consequences, but even with good intents, it doesn’t really bring B anything (maybe some people get an ego boost out of this, but I don’t really get it so I’m not qualified to talk about it).

[autcore]

I respect where you’re coming from with wanting to “de-romanticize love”. I do. But I am begging you to understand this is already a WILDLY common thing.

Let’s start out on the right foot. You don’t respect me or where I’m coming from. The respectful thing to do would have been to contact me and ask me to explain, not to send me an anonymous ask telling me I’m wrong.

Just because you can tell your friends you love them doesn’t mean the concept of love isn’t highly romance-coded.

While non-romantic love is acknowledged in the society I live in, it is never prioritised. If you say “love” “I’m in love” or “I love you” in a general sphere without the context of a specific pre-established non-romantic relationship, you’re assumed to be talking about romantic love as that is the default.

Deromanticising love is not about you being able to tell a friend you love them. It’s about being able to talk about love without it being romance-coded by others.

If love were deromanticised, committed non-romantic relationships would be more common. It would be commonplace to see people hold their close friends at the same level of priority (or higher!) than their romantic partners. It would be commonplace to see friends marrying, entering civil partnerships, or otherwise legally declaring their commitment to each other. Co-parenting between friends would be commonplace. Seeing friends external to a romantic relationship but internal to a system of co-parents/guardians would be commonplace. More people in romantic marriages would feel safe to make space for other important people in their lives. More men would feel less isolated. Aromantics wouldn’t feel like they had to seek romantic relationships for a chance at closeness.

Deromanticising love isn’t “making it okay to tell your friends you love them”, it’s more radical than that. It’s changing the paradigm around relationships in western society. There’s much more to it than just this, but I won’t write you an essay.

[saltyaro]

We’re making a queer collective for my small city, and to organize we’ve made a discord server. We can invite queer people living nearby to join said server, and recently, a guy joined. A classmate of mine. He’s a chill guy, I really like him, so while he never really came out to me, I was like “noice”. 

And he arrived in the presentation channel “I’m probably somewhere on the aromantic spectrum” and I just. 

I KNEW IT DUDE I FUCKING KNEW IT

Why would you be interested in reading the only published manga about an aromantic character if you were alloro huh. I never asked but of course it’s because you’re arospec. 

[creatikermit-ar-ts]

people who tag ships as 'platonic' or 'romantic' are top tier, and to the rest of you who don't please consider doing so

[saltyaro]

I’ve come across this post and it made me think of our community? By that I don’t mean the aro community, but the larger LGBTQIA+ community. 

You know, the concept of cousins basically being the basis of it. “We’re different but the results in our normative are the same for all of us, so let’s bundle up!”

And I like the idea of someone who’s not of a precise identity being able to pitch in about a similar experience they’ve lived through. Being a “cousin” is something I experience both in terms of queerness (though here it’s often pejorative as in “not gay enough”) and neurodivergence which is why I’m allowing myself to draw this parallel. 

I’m tired of identity politics and the idea that you can only speak if you have the corresponding identity, regardless of your lived experience. Sure, we need to find a balance, because it’s still not nice to talk over other people, or make someone else’s experience about yourself, but that’s not what I’m talking about. It’s really about the precise symptoms, and by symptoms I mean, consequences on your life, or NTs/CisStraight people’s reactions to you. 

Does that make sense? I think using this kind of logical could help the community come together more.

[saltyaro]

Hi! I became apart of the aro community this last summer and has been the most validating experience for me. Even though I now identify as aro I have been in relationships that all ended on good terms so I’m actually on talking terms with my exs. And one of my exs is talking to me right now. It’s pretty platonic but I don’t know if I should tell them I identify as aro now? Thoughts?

Hey, I’m happy finding the aro community has been such a positive experience for you!

Well, I’d say you have to ask yourself why you want to come out to them. Is it because you’re friends with them, and want them to know, like any other friend? Is it because you’re worried a bit they’re interested in you in a non platonic way? Is it because, as they’re your ex, you feel like you owe them some “truth”? Or maybe you think it could be nice for them to know you’re aro, so maybe they can help other people find out about this identity?

Maybe clarifying the root of your questionment can help you find your answer. Of course, you don’t owe anyone anything, but from your ask, I doubt that’s where you’re coming from (you also don’t seem to be worried about a potential arophobic response).

So yeah, ask yourself about the reason you’d want to tell them, and also, what is to be gained from this coming out. A friend who gets who you are, some peace and comfort of mind? 

Hope this helps!

[saltyaro]

I just wanted to talk about relationship anarchy for a minute? Okay context--

I recently met someone who I think is cool and nice to talk to. I’ve met them while they were at a very low point, and I just decided to help them a bit because I could (I knew I could, because I’ve known I’m aro for a while now, and part of their issues was a recent realization that they’re aro). 

I didn’t do “a lot”, just my usual emotional support to soothe them and, when they were okay enough, I did push them a bit so they could rest (which they knew they needed a lot but couldn’t achieve because reasons). We spent the following day together, and got joined by some other people we know. It was a very nice day, just doing non-stressful things, and offering support when sometimes, the problems came back. It was honestly pretty enjoyable for me too, when usually spending a whole day outside will leave me with absolutely no spoon before it even ends, this day I had just enough to get back home safely. And my initial goal was making this person feel better, not particularly having a good day for myself! 

And yet, it was good. Sure, I think I could become friends with this person, and would love it if it happened. But, even if it doesn’t, it won’t change the fact that this day spent together was enjoyable.

I’m so used to doing things for others (and I’m sure a lot of you relate) and worrying about being tossed aside after I’ve helped them, that I’ve now realized it’s been difficult for me to just enjoy things. Because I was always helping people to the point where I was just a recovery tool, I stressed a lot over being efficient and, even more, not being disliked. Because I had invested a lot into these people. But it wasn’t the case here. I hadn’t invested anything, I had just stumbled upon a stressful situation: we had just met the day before!

I didn’t give advice, didn’t even try to, because it wasn’t what they were asking for and, because we didn’t know each other, they couldn’t realistically ask for that: I don’t know anything about their life. And I think this lack of expectation - from both sides - made the enjoyment we had possible.

(Because of the context we met in, we also knew we had the same political values, and were “safe” which definitely helps a lot to have a positive experience. The time spent together was not superficial or anything thanks to that trust. Thought it was worth mentioning)

We’re not close, we’re not even friends. Just two people who met by chance and had a moment. And I think it’s important to value such relationships too. It’s freeing. And yes, maybe sometimes, close relationships can begin that way, which is totally cool! But this kind of experience doesn’t have to lead to a friendship or any kind of more defined relationship. 

I’m not saying I want my life filled with only fleeting moments, because that would be tiring (I’m a spoonie, please don’t ask me too much) but...I’ve realized that I very much desire to have those kinds of passing relationships in my life. They may not be the only thing needed to fulfill what I want out of life, but those kinds of moments are still extremely valuable, and I hope my life will have more of those. 

[loveysapphic]

oh to have a group of lgbt friends where we all have wildly different styles and and interests but we all go on trips with each other and support each other’s goals and we live in one little apartment but we’ve made it cozy and our home and we have a homemade meal every night seated at our thrifted dinner table with mismatched chairs, except for thursday night where we agreed to have takeout in our living room and play board games

[a-lot-of-ace-archive]

Guys I just want you to know that you always come first. Love is wonderful and great but if it means undermining you identity and not being true to yourself then it’s not worth it. You are the only constant in your life so put yourself first