It’s okay to want things you don’t have attraction for.
It’s okay to look at all the cute romantic things you’ve seen or read and to want that too.
It’s okay if romance makes you happy.
It’s okay to love romantic stories.
It’s okay to think romantic kisses are sweet and reassuring.
It’s okay to be happy in a romantic relationship.
It’s okay to enjoy “ridiculous” romance movies that all have the same plot.
It’s okay to be happy.
It’s okay for romance to make you happy.
You don’t have to tear apart romance to be aromantic. You don’t have to reject romance to be aro. You don’t have to live a life without it.
Just be you, and do what makes you happy
Hello!!!! I’m making this blog 110% because I couldn’t find a god damn positivity post in this entire hellspace of a “blogging” website so. I’ll do it myself.
I’m not entirely sure what my gender is beyond “nonbinary” but I really resonate with maxigender and wanted to see some pride so! It will be done! I’m also autistic, aroace spec, and nblnb (exclusive attraction). As such, this blog is entirely inclusionist, and y’all can get lost if you dont like that.
How has representation (coded or explicit) in media helped you? How has a lack of it harmed you? What would your ideal aro/arospec representation be? What do you think the aro community could do to make ourselves visible to others? What would you like more people to know about aros? If aromanticism and its spectrum were widely known, would you be more open about your arospec identity?
I just... i want aro to stop meaning “never feels romantic attraction”. I want aro to mean “little to no romantic attraction”. I want a relatable loveable character who is demi. I want cupio characters, romantic daydreaming characters, who cant fall in love with anything but the concept of love itself. I want grey characters, who have imprecise and imperfect patterns of romantic attraction, who are struggling with and confused about whether they are aro or not. I want characters where their being aro doesnt affect them at all. I want characters who are constantly going on about their being aro, because it’s important to them. I want aro characters in healthy romantic relationships. I want aro characters who realize they love their partner differently than their partner loves them. I want to watch QPRs form and grow. I want the narrative around aros to stop including dogs or pets or kids or having something to care for. I want aros to be enough when they are completely independent. I want aros who are enough independently but still want more as a partnering/ amorous aro. I want to see that i can have a future the way I want it, not the way allos want it, not how romance repulsed aros want it.
i want aro characters who are represetative of the community theyre in. i want diverse aros. i want aros who’s aro identity matters to them and still feel limited romantic attraction. i want aro characters who feel like they have 1,000 hoops to jump through to feel romantic attraction. I want aros who feel like their romantic attraction comes out of no where. I want romantic aros who are feeling broken from being told their identities are just internalized amatonormativity. I want aros who feel more broken from the community they were invited to join than the constant harmful messages from society as a whole. I want aros battling with whether or not they’re “really aro”. I want aros who aren’t sure they count at all. I want aros who identify with specific labels but would never use it for fear of being “less aro”. I want aros who are scared of expressing their feelings because they dont want to be outcast. I want nonbinary aros who are sick and fucking tired of the constant nbphobia theyre seeing in the community. I want aros who are tired of watching communities step on eachother for rep.
i want grey-ace aros who aren’t sure if this community sees them as an allo aro or an aroace or somewhere in between. i want romantic aros who aren’t quite sure why theyre always being placed as closer to the other group, never belonging, why they’re always viewed as other. I want a-specs who arent sure if theyre going to be viewed as allo or ace or aro or the “wrong kind” of a-spec, who aren’t sure if theyre viewed as an alloaro or alloro ace or what. I want ace-spec aros who just figured out theyre aro to be horrified at the way that aros talk about alloro aces, who feel violated because thats how you used to talk about them, too.
I want aros who feel personally sickened and attacked by the way that theyre viewed by everyone. I want aros who feel like they’ve been physically beaten from how pained they are regarding aro stereotypes. I want angry aros (allies) who didn’t realize there were aro stereotypes. I want angry aros (allies) who are pissed at how aro-spec people get treated by everyone. I want hurt aros who are constantly being told they aren’t enough. I want aros who have heard the “not 100% aro” and “100% aro” terms so incredibly often that they’re sick to their stomach, because they aren’t even fully aro according to you. I want arospecs who call out the pain they see being caused. I want aros who make the connections with the rest of the queer community. I want aros who are proud of all of their identities. I want aros who are proud of none of their identities. I want romantic aros who are tired of being excluded.
i just want an aro like me.
I have seen aro rep, mostly coded, mostly accidental, with very few exceptions. It doesn’t ever feel representative of the community as a whole, but you can pull jughead from my cold dead hands.
what i want people to know about aros: it’s so much more than the surface stereotypes youve seen. it’s so much more than the "never” you always see. you dont have to be any less romantic to be aro.
and no, i dont think id be more open about my aro identity until...
How did you learn you were aromantic or arospec? How long did it take to find the label and to accept it? Did it click immediately, or was it a journey of denial and/or mislabeling? How has learning you were aromantic or arospec changed you? Your perception of yourself? How you act around others? Your personal relationships?
i.... discovered i was aro the hard way. the long way. months of debating and questioning. identifying with arospec identities and refusing to call myself aro. i just. i wanted to not be dating anymore. my arospec (demi) bf at the time and i talked about a QPR. i was only vaguely aware of it. i only googled it because he brought up things like “zucchini” and i was confused. the aro wikia came up. i read through it. i came out with an understanding of quoi, which became about 80% of my identity. i still wasnt aro-spec. i couldnt be. my bf told me that wasnt possible. wasnt allowed. i wasnt aro-spec.
i believed him.
i believed him for a long long time. we had dated for 3 years, with constant cheating and betrayal and abandonment and pain. so so so much pain. we eventually broke up because i found a new demiro bf to have? i was dependent. id been in and out of abusive relationships my whole life. i was only 18 and i was broken. so incredibly broken. the trauma in my life had seeped into the cracks of who i was as a person. i was practically a pre-teen’s angst fic OC at this point. just a broken collection of traumas and fears and dependence.
i had been in and out of relationships throught all of high school and my 8th grade year. i was in college and only left my abuser because i found someone else to date. ...i got assaulted. again. it was nothing new. i left this boy upon finding a new aro-spec datemate i wanted.
i.... finally realised i wasnt happy. realised i didnt want to be dating him. because this was my first ever time experiencing “independent feelings” or romantic attraction. I had felt ‘romantic crushes’ before... but where people told me i should. or at the suggestion of others. or because someone confessed to me and i didnt believe in the friend zone.
i didnt believe in the friend zone. why would you have a friend you wouldnt be willing to date. that shouldve been my first clue. i didnt know where romantic attraction and platonic attraction were different.
i had discovered quoiromantic and detailed QPR in..... may? i came to terms with identifying as a-spec in like september (but im grey-ace!) and i only accepted... parts of the aro community into my life at november ish. i didnt call myself aro until late december. and even then, i never felt like i belonged. the aro community stereotypes/ reputation preceded my introduction to the aro community as a member. i was made aware that the aro community is built for having 0 romantic attraction. for not wanting romantic attraction. for being romance repulsed.
i am not romance repulsed. i want romantic partnership.
i talked more and more with my arospec datemate. i told them i felt like i wasnt even good enough when i was playing a good aro. i was invited to aro servers. they were full of ableism and nbphobia and god everyone hated romantic aros. i never know whether or not i feel romantic attraction. i’m only sure on one- them. i call them my first romantic attraction but really i dont know. i think everything else has just fallen under quoi for me.
i realised that i hated kissing. i mean i didnt really. it was okay behind locked doors, with people i wanted. but the number of people i wanted was incredibly small compared to the number of people who had tried. I remembered i used to hate holding hands. it felt horrible and i hated it. it was only okay when it started being only used with friends. i remembered my feelings of self hatred and “self-objectification”
i dont get along well with my aro identity. i WANT my aro identity. but we’re on bad terms, constantly fighting and never sure if i belong. defending myself has ended badly. i dont think its important for every arospec to love the aro part of them. its okay to hate it. i hate being romantic and wanting romance and sometimes feeling romantic attraction. it means i dont feel like i count as aro OR allo.
....i want romance. i want my one great love. i want love. realizing im aro just means it’ll be harder for me. that i can get it if i work for it, but more importantly if i respect myself. i can get love if i respect my boundaries and dont force myself into anything. realizing im aro means that i belong no where, in no community, and in the community all at once. realizing im aro meant realizing it was just another thing to face gatekeeping for- but this time on both sides.
i dont have flowery happy words about being aro, because for me it wasnt a flowery happy thing. its just a true thing. a hard thing. something that fits into the story of my disjointed life. and its something i face everyday.
my hope is just to belong. and to force others to see me so that they can feel as though they belong too.
First, to understand this, you have to understand the origin in the term pangender, and why the term maxigender was created.
Pangender (and sometimes omnigender) refers to a gender which is ever expansive. It includes all genders, hence why it uses the word part “pan” meaning all. It is described here as
“a non-binary gender experience which refers to a wide multiplicity of genders that can (or not) stretch to the infinite (meaning that this experience can go beyond the current knowledge of genders), always within the person's own culture and life experience.”
this term created a lot of controversy, as the explanation of “all genders” rubbed many individuals the wrong way, as some genders are cultural, linked with nuerodiversity, or other parts of an identity that a person cannot possibly contain all of (see: two-spirit, autigender, and intergender). The definition of pangender has grown and expanded and changed to meet this criticism, as seen in the quote, but the damage was already done. To many people, pangender is seen as an offensive or outdated term.
As such, a new term Maxigender was invented to meet these criticisms, and mainly used as a counterpoint to people who identify as pangender. This term can or may replace pangender, but I am not personally suggesting that it has to.
I do think, however, that this is a good, useful, and important term to have in our communities, and will be publicizing it (and positivity for it) as much as possible, here at maxigender-maxi-genuine. There should be lots of pride and positivity coming your way here!
Please do share this meaning, though, if you feel it resonates with you or could be of help to questioning members of our community!
Maxigender means identifying as all genders available to you.
hey there!! i just wanted to ask, what is the difference between the pangender and the maxigender labels? im not trying to be rude and i apologize if you hear this question a lot, but this is my first time hearing about maxigender!
So to begin: history. Maxigender is a term used against pangender people as an “alternative” way to define their experience when the blatant lies about pangender = every gender ever = racism became popular. It, as an identity, is a reclaimed term.
I use maxigender, because i never felt connected with the term pangender. My gender encompasses boy/girl, but i never have a binary experience of them. I’m a nonbinary boy or a nonbinary girl, and my gender falls under “all and none” of the genders. Because I find that my nonbinary experience of all genders is integral to my gender identity, I wanted a term that could imply that. It is “all possible genders” but i am able to determine the sphere in which my genders exist. I am never binary. I never have a gender, but I also have too many genders.
Maxigender just speaks to me in a way the word pangender never did, but the two identities aren’t entirely separate. There are some people uncomfortable with calling themselves pangender because it doesn’t define their experiences (clearly enough), and that’s where maxigender comes into play. Maxigender is distinct but similar to pangender, but it can NEVER be used to replace pangender, and shouldn't be suggested as a replacement, because it was used against pangender people.
I have a tag (#mod tonks) where it is everything i have personally have said on the topic, but when it comes down to it, maxigender is a reclaimed term that is for people who connect to that label better, and feel as though it relates better on a personal level. Its definition is personal to each individual who has it, but i would say as a general rule it is “all available genders” with an optional “(within the user’s set parameters)”
