I got a question, I know I'm in the aro spectrum but I wanna know if it's correct to say that I'm pansexual, because I do feel attracted to people but not in a romantic way
It's confusing
yes! there's a few things that might help here:
you may or may not be familiar with the Split Attraction Model, or SAM: at its most basic, this is the idea that there are different types of attraction, and typically is used in reference to people identifying with a romantic orientation, such as aromantic, and a sexual orientation, such as pansexual.
in addition, some individuals are aromantic and asexual, but feel some form of tertiary attraction (where everything else gets lumped due to the original purposes of this model), and use the label oriented aroace to describe their feelings. for example, pan aroace.
if you identify as aro and allosexual (ie, not asexual): alloaro and aroallo are both terms used by the broader community, and there is a flag for that!
cw for discussions of alloarophobia in the next paragraph:
I do want to caution: there is a lot of stigma around alloaro identities. These stigma typically come from a sex-negative (ie: sex is inherently immoral / "bad") viewpoint, and unfortunately, it is often best to be cautious when talking to others about your identity if you are sensitive to that. the majority of people who believe sex (possibly with some specific exceptions, typically religious) is immoral do not care about queerness beyond labeling anything we do predatory and bad, and unfortunately being alloaro is especially demonized for being, in their eyes, exactly about having all of that "immoral" sex. don't engage with them on these topics unless you feel confident in deescalation tactics and comfortable attempting deradicalization work. you don't owe them your time or explanations.
ID: the alloaro flag. 5 horizontal stripes from top to bottom: green, light green, white, light yellow, dark yellow. the greens are identical to that of the aromantic flag.
for completeness - if you identify as aro-spec and ace-spec: you may like the term amid for yourself!
ID: the amid flag. 5 horizontal stripes from top to bottom: dark gray, light gray, white, light blue, dark blue.
if you identify as aro-spec and ace: acemid has your back.
ID: the acemid flag. 5 horizontal stripes from top to bottom: fuchsia, light fuchsia, white, light blue, dark blue. the bottom 3 stripes are identical to the amid flag, and the fuchsia is a slightly more saturated hue of the asexual pride flag purple.
and last but not least, aromantic and ace-spec: aromid.
ID: the aromid flag. 5 horizontal stripes from top to bottom: green, light green, white, light blue, and dark blue. The top two stripes are the aromantic flag's greens, and the blues are identical to that of the amid and acemid flags.
