Blep

She/her, aroace elder millennial, slightly obsessed with RDR2 I don't know how tumblr works

[sassypint]

Afterlife series: Family portrait

The teenagers didn’t want their picture taken...

Just playing around, taking some pics to accompany my fanfic series.  This AU is such a comfort to me

Series link: https://archiveofourown.org/series/3378478

[21go-gay-today37]

My humble contribution in rdr (albert mason) fandom

Hopefully i will make more

[cowboycallieope]

jack wanted a christmas tree :)

[darkskywishes]

The Invisible Pressure: Asexuality, Relationships, and Consent

There is an insidious, quiet violence that asexual people, particularly sex-repulsed aces, are subjected to in relationships. It’s not loud. It doesn’t always look like abuse. Sometimes, it’s dressed up in the language of “compromise”. Sometimes, it’s even endorsed by therapists and relationship “experts.”

But at the root of it is this one idea: That sex is the cornerstone of every valid relationship. That if you don’t want sex, something is wrong with you. That your partner is entitled to sex. That you, as an asexual person, owe it to them because that’s “just how relationships work.”

Asexual people are constantly navigating a world that tells us our love is incomplete unless it includes sex. That our boundaries are just hurdles to be negotiated. And that if we’re not careful, we’ll be the one accused of being selfish or withholding.

And the truth is, this pressure doesn’t only happen in unhealthy relationships. It can exist even in good ones. Even in the ones where your partner is kind and respectful and never once demands anything of you. Even when your partner is loving, patient, supportive—the ideal partner. The pressure doesn’t just vanish because the person next to you is good. Because the pressure isn’t coming from them: it’s coming from the world around you.

So even in the safest relationships, we still carry that fear. That if we say no too often, too permanently, we’ll eventually be left behind—not because our partner is cruel, but because we were never what society told them to want. And that’s what makes the pressure so hard to name, so hard to fight. So easy to internalize.

Then, even the most well-meaning conversations about consent often fail us. Why? Because while people are taught to respect a “no” in the moment, there’s still the underlying assumption that “no” is temporary. That eventually, we’ll change our minds. That if someone is patient, kind, persistent enough—we’ll come around. But some of us don’t. Some of us never want sex. Not now. Not later. Not eventually. And the idea that permanent or indefinite boundaries are abnormal is what pushes so many asexual people into violating their own comfort to meet someone else’s expectations.

It’s a form of slow coercion, cloaked in the language of compromise.

And when asexual people bring this into therapy—when we try to advocate for ourselves—we’re often met with therapists who have internalized the same cultural script. A script that says “sex is a need and part of a healthy relationship”. We’re encouraged to meet halfway.

But “halfway” always seems to mean giving up your boundaries to preserve the relationship.

Where is the room for our needs? For the idea that sex is not an automatic default but a choice, one that should never be coerced—whether overtly or through guilt, shame, or the threat of abandonment?

Too often, asexual people are pressured into saying yes to things we don’t want. Not because we’re comfortable with it. Not because our desires have changed. But because we’re terrified of being left. Because we’ve been taught that we’re the broken one. That we’re the reason the relationship is “failing.”

We are not broken. We are not selfish. And sex is not the sole measure of love, intimacy, or commitment. A relationship without sex is still a real relationship.

Consent only means something when it includes the possibility of permanent, indefinite boundaries. If “no” isn’t allowed to be forever, it was never truly respected to begin with.

[stonegoddex]

what if we admitted to each other that it's not always really romance that we want. What if we admitted that what we're really craving is intimacy and society taught us romance is the only way to get it.

[i-suggest-aro]

imagine if people actually took romantic consent seriously. wouldn't it be fucking awesome. i know they never will, but just. take a moment and imagine it with me

[i-suggest-aro]

no more "just give them a chance, maybe you'll end up liking them!", no more "if you're going to reject someone, at least apologize to them!", no more shaming people for breaking up/divorcing, no more demonizing people for rejecting other peoples' romantic advances, no more shoving romance in romance repulsed peoples' face on purpose to provoke us, no more "i know we agreed to just be friends with benefits, but i thought you were going to fall in love with me eventually!", no more "i can fix them" when the only thing "wrong" with them is that they want to fuck without dating.

wouldn't it be nice?

[sorcererclow]

A friend I used to hang out with every week once confessed his feelings for me, which I didn't reciprocate. I wanted to stay friends, didn't see why we couldn't, we had been friends the whole time without any romance, why did that have to change? but he decided to stop hanging out with me.

I was heartbroken and felt tossed aside. I didn't understand why our friendship wasn't worth anything to him if he couldn't have me romantically or sexually. I felt betrayed and dehumanised, like I didn't matter to him as a person but only as a romantic prospect.

When I told other friends about it, to my surprise they all sided with him. "He is heartbroken, it's hard to get rejected" even my THERAPIST said this. It's not like I didn't empathize with him, but wasn't I rejected too? No one else could see that but me, they placed me as some sort of villain that had power over him in that situation, when all I did was set a boundary between friendship and romance. All I did was not consent to the terms he wanted for our relationship, I rejected them, my terms were different and he rejected those.

I've had my heart broken by friends over and over and it hurt the same, if not more, than any romantic heartbreak. Why is friendship undervalued next to romantic feelings?

To be honest, to this day I'm still pissed that no one sided with me on this. There's so much unraveling that needs to get done around how we view different relationships in our lives, and I feel like most people can't even scratch the surface when it comes to this questioning.

[asingularcanadian]

Hey as someone who has spent a lifetime just "giving them a chance" its not worth it, love yourself

[sylveons-emo-phase]

Just to be clear: asexuals are not obligated to compromise. You can if you want, sure. If it works for you, if you're happy, if it's the best and healthiest thing for you and your relationship. But absolutely nobody fucking has to. That means that no, absolutely no asexual has to have sex for their partner's sake. No asexual has to agree to an open relationship to make up for refusing sex. No asexual has to only ever seek other asexuals for relationships. Not everyone will be compatible with an ace person or with every ace person. But that does not mean that asexuals are required to be the ones settling. Fuck off with that shit.

[loony-ludy]

I finally realized why this frame of Albert Mason looked so familiar and it’s because he looks like this gay cat I've seen on tote bags

do you see the vision

[mollfie]

Everyone needs to stop calling Arthur Morgan an old(er) man right now

[sassypint]

I'm thinking about starting a new playthrough

*shoves the multitude of unfinished playthroughs out of sight*

😁

[veckati]

arthur's belongings🌾🧡

[aslightaddity]

“How dare you love me like you’ve never known fear” (Home to Me, Devil and the Deep Blue Sea)

[littleshr00m]

Young Arthur and Mary!! posting old art since I never posted on tmblr before 💔

[sketchupnfries]

Some lil sleepy outlaws...and a rat

[troutdraw]

charles and albert is an interaction I would love to see... 1) charles would be so down with albert's mission and 2) albert heaping praise about arthur's involvement to someone arthur knows would be funny. especially if he is there to hear it lol

[spoiledmilks]

i love how he talks to his horses its so cute

commissions are open!!

[sorrytobardin]

You’re a good man, Arthur Morgan.

Writing reads: “My whole code that I lived and killed by. Was it true? Or was there a bigger truth I was too dumb to ever see?”

Quote and hand-writing style taken directly from Arthur’s in-game journal.