Responding to Abnormaldiversity

cw: purity culture, Christianity, slut shaming, pedophilia, sexual harassment, misogyny, discussion of rape culture


As many of you know, there is another blogger on here, Ettina from abnormaldiversity, who is very upset that I don't think she's a Valid Kweer for being a cis aromantic asexual and that I won't admit how privileged I am for being a dirty allosexual.

I've linked her post above, and I'll be responding to it here.

Having  role  models  of  your  gender  and sexual  orientation

This definitely doesn't apply to any aromantic and/or asexual people. It's easier to find gay or bisexual role models than asexual or aromantic ones. In mainstream media, asexuality is represented by problematic fiction suggesting we can be cured or are lying, and the occasional interview with asexuals. Aromantics have even less representation - especially allosexual aromantics.

It does, actually, apply to straight asexuals and aromantics. Your asexuality or aromanticism don't cancel out your heterosexuality.

As for the "mainstream media" thing? Yes, asexuality and aromanticism are presented as something that people are lying about or that need to be cured - but it's not because of acephobia or arophobia.

It's because of misogyny, toxic masculinity, rape culture, intersexism, gender roles, and ableism. It's because, while women are shamed for being sexual for our own enjoyment, we're constantly expected to perform emotional and sexual labor for men. It's because of expectations placed on men to sexually objectify and dominate women. It's because of social entitlement to sex and romance and a society that doesn't take any rape seriously unless the victim is a cishet white woman. It's because of gender roles placed on how men and women are expected to feel attraction. It's because people think if your body, reproductive system, or hormones are "wrong", you need to be fixed so you're like them. It's because of social stigma on how neurodivergent people and survivors of rape or abuse often experience attraction.

And these things are hardly specific to ace and aro people, nor are they shared experiences among all ace and aro people. More importantly, they were not created to systemically oppress ace and aro people.

Learning  about  romance  &  relationships from  fiction,  movies,  and  television

Again, not true for aromantic or asexual people. Although not all romances show the characters having sex, the vast majority imply that they eventually will want to do so. And models of how to discuss asexuality and negotiate ace/allo mixed relationships are not found in mainstream fiction at all.
And as for aromantics, while there are certainly characters who don't seek out romance, or who are in a relationship that could be interpreted as a QPR, I can't think of any work of fiction I've seen that explicitly describes a character as wanting deep personal connection without romance. And portrayals of characters who want sex without romance are frequently negative and colored by slut-shaming - especially if the character is female.

Learning about the relationships that you want and desire through media isn't necessarily a privilege - for many gay and bi people, these portrayals are often oversexualized. They show only feminine cis wlw, because those are the wlw most palatable to cishet male fantasies. They treat mlm like lapdogs for cishet women. They kill off lesbians and force bi women into boring m/f relationships intended to save them from their sapphic desires. They treat sga relationships as if they're lesser than m/w ones. SGA people are hypervisible in mainstream media, which has dangerous consequences for us in real life.

And even for cishet "allos", relationships are often portrayed unhealthily, particularly for women, who are often expected to do the majority of the emotional, domestic, and sexual labor in relationships with men, to sacrifice their own desires to make men happy, and to put up with selfishness, disloyalty, and entitlement from men. 

There is also a lack of quality representation for straight people of other identities. Trans and intersex people, especially women with penises, are treated as jokes, tricksters, and fetishes - and I don't think I've ever seen a canonically nonbinary character on TV outside of Steven Universe. Disabled people are desexualized or turned into inspiration porn. Men of color are treated as predators, and women of color as aggressive and uppity, as mammy stereotypes present only to support white people, or as exotic sex dolls from the land of Karmasutra, come to fulfill white men's wet dreams. But all of these people are capable of being straight and, therefore, of having straight privilege.

So are heterosexual aros and aces. And while cis aroaces* are not straight and don't fully benefit from straight privilege, they do benefit from homophobia.

Ettina mentions how characters who want sex and not romance are shamed for it. First of all, I have never seen a cishet white male character be shamed for wanting sex and not romance by anyone except the female characters in the show he's in (and honestly, women have a right to be concerned about this, considering how unwilling men in general are to put emotional labor and commitment into relationships with women) and overall, his fear of commitment is often supported and encouraged by writers, viewers, and male characters. Joey Tribbiani, anyone?

As for women who are punished for it? I mean, there's Samantha from Sex and the City, but that's more of an example of biphobia and specifically bimisogyny - refusing to label a clearly bisexual woman's sexuality and showing her as sexually impulsive and unwilling to commit to a partner. 

Beyond that, please remember that I'm a nonbinary wlw who was raised Catholic, and in Christianity, all women have their sexuality weaponized against them. There even entire seminars marketed at Christian teenage girls, intended to make them feel like shit about themselves and convince them that they're "impure" and doing womanhood wrong unless they're cishet, dress "modestly", and don't have premarital sex - I even know women who attended these seminars when they were in high school.

But I can assure you, cis female heterosexuality is still rewarded, no matter what religion you are. Just because a straight aro woman is shamed for wanting sex doesn't mean that she's oppressed for her sexuality. It means that she's oppressed for being a woman.

Furthermore, Ettina's so-called show of solidarity with aro women who aren't ace is incredibly...performative and shallow. For one thing, the reason she made this post in the first place is that she was upset with a questioning aro wlw for calling out her homophobia, meaning that she, a cis aroace, is talking over some of the most vulnerable people in the aro community. She also insists on calling us (them?) allosexual even after many aro wlw have said that it bothers us - them? - and that we (they?) consider it sexual harassment. And I'm sure that Ettina doesn't give a shit about aros who are trans or nonbinary, either, considering that she, a cis woman, has complained about my "hypocrisy" regarding cis people dictating nonbinary identity and she also doesn't seem to consider that trans and nonbinary aros and aces might be just as uncomfortable around cishet aros, cis aroaces, and cishet aces as I, a nonbinary trans person on the aromantic spectrum myself, am.

In other words, Ettina only values aros and aces who benefit from both homophobia and transphobia - aros and aces who are like her.

Living with  your  partner  and  doing  so openly to all 

This is probably not a big issue for hetero aces, assuming that they can actually find a suitable partner. But for aromantics, QPRs tend to confuse people, often being mistaken for romance (which is especially problematic for a romance-repulsed aromantic) or else treated as 'just' friendship.
QPRs are also more likely to involve individuals who don't have a compatible sexual orientation (so a heterosexual aromantic could easily have a same-sex QPR). And siblings can be QPRs. Lastly, many people seek out multiple QPRs. If a QPR is mistaken for romance, they could be targeted with homophobia, anti-incest sentiments or anti-polyamorous sentiments.
On the legal side, unless a QPR choose to get married, they lack the legal rights to care for each other in sickness, help their QPP immigrate, or share custody of a child.
And speaking of immigration, both romantic aces and aromantics could easily run afoul of the procedures for detecting immigration fraud marriages. A marriage that doesn't involve sex or where the partners don't have all the trappings of romance with each other (eg don't live together, don't sleep together, have sex with other people, or just generally don't have the right body language around each other) could be mistaken for a marriage purely for immigration purposes.


There are many cishets who can't live openly with their partners, whether they're aromantic, asexual, or neither. A cishet white woman from a conservative family would probably be pretty hesitant to introduce that family to her black boyfriend. A cishet man dating a woman who isn't cis would face a lot of obstacles when introducing her to his friends. An abled cishet person dating a disabled person might face assumptions that they are only dating their partner out of pity, or that their partner is incapable of sexual agency and therefore unable to consent. A polyamorous cishet person would face stigma and judgment for introducing their partners to people. A cishet dating a bi or pan person might face judgment, too, as would cishets in interfaith relationships, cishets whose partners are sex workers, and cishets who are dating intersex people.

But none of these people are oppressed for being cishet, and neither are cishet aces or aros.

There are also many cishets who might be targeted by misdirected homophobia. There are cishets who are dating trans, nonbinary, intersex, or gender nonconforming people. There are cishets who are intersex or gender nonconforming themselves. There are cishets who are mistaken for gay when they're with their friends. There are cishet women who have been in relationships with trans women and cishet men who have been in relationships with trans men, before the trans person in question came out.

But they're still cishet. I'm not obligated to care about them or soothe their hurt feelings just because they've been mistaken for gay. In the same way, I'm not obligated to care about cishet aros, cishet aces, or cis aroaces either.

Also, QPRs can sometimes be used to ignore internalized homophobia, meaning that that "heterosexual" aro that Ettina mentioned might not be heterosexual at all.

And polyamorous people aren't oppressed. They might face stigma, but not oppression. Not for being polyamorous. Receiving anti-polyamorous sentiment doesn't mean you don't have straight privilege.

Anti-incest sentiments? Honestly, I'm not even going to touch that one. I'm not even sure why she listed it.

Now, to quote Ettina, to the legal side. There are many cishets, whether ace, aro, or neither, who don't want to get married. I had a Spanish teacher in high school who dislikes marriage and instead lives with her boyfriend of several years; they only plan to get married if one of them discovers they have a terminal illness, because they want to collect on the insurance money. I have an aunt who also doesn't like marriage and prefers to just have boyfriends. They can't access the legal privileges Ettina has mentioned, but that doesn't mean either of them is oppressed.

Then there's me. Like I said, I'm not sure if I'm aro, but let's assume for right now that I am. I do want to get married, for a number of reasons. Now let's say that I get married to my QPP. In this situation, I can access financial aid for married college students (which at this point would mean that I wouldn't have to pay for anything college-related out of my own pocket, would have no student loans, and would still have money leftover), tax and insurance benefits for married couples, and next-of-kin rights for hospital visitations. My spouse might even be able to use some of the privileges that come from my military ID, which kind of bothers me but also would grant both of us security that we might need.

And if I freely agree to marry my QPP, does that mean I'm no longer oppressed for being aro? I mean, regardless of my relationship status I'm oppressed for being bi (I'm going with bisexual as a label) and face biphobia and homophobia. But I can't think of a single instance in which I would face any kind of oppression for being aro if I were married.

So clearly, stigma against not wanting to get married doesn't affect all aros. And it doesn't only affect aros, either.

Not to mention, if not wanting to get married makes you oppressed, and I do, does that mean that I'm privileged over my teacher and my aunt? But they're cishets and I'm nonbinary and bi, so it doesn't make any sense that I would be privileged over them just because of my hypothetical relationship status.

Ha, it makes no sense. Yeah well, neither does believing in aphobia or allo privilege.

Now for the immigration thing. First of all, if it weren't for the existence of white supremacy, nationalism, and xenophobia, immigration marriages wouldn't exist in the first place. Second, Ettina's assuming that all "allo" couples act the same, do the same things, and have the same relationship with attraction. There are "allo" couples who don't have sex; many people lose libido with age, many neurodivergent people find sex overstimulating, and many rape survivors are repulsed by sex. There are "allo" couples in open or polyamorous relationships. There are "allo" couples in which one or both members are hypersexual and have sex with other people for that reason. There are "allo" couples who keep separate residences for financial reasons or because they just like their space.

And Ettina wouldn't say that these people are automatically LGBT. So why are aces and aros?


Talking  about  your relationship  and  the projects,  vacations,  and  family  planning steps  you  and  your  partner  are  working  on.

As an asexual, aromantic prospective single parent, I've found that my discussions of my plans for motherhood often get detailed with questions about whether I'm married, how I plan to get pregnant, and so forth. I also feel afraid to explain my situation fully with people who may be opposed to single parenthood or ART. An aromantic person who is coparenting may have difficulty explaining the nature of their relationship with the other parent(s), or why their relationship doesn't have the trappings of romance. For example if their coparent lives in another residence, or has another partner, they can either let people assume a divorce or breakup is involved or else have a lot of complicated explanation.
A heteroromantic asexual in a relationship would have a more superficially typical situation than me, but if their relationship is sexless or has very infrequent sex, this complicates family planning. They may need to do at-home artificial insemination, or have sex more often than they'd like during the female partner's fertile period. The asexual partner could suffer feelings of burnout or frustration with how frequently they are having sex. All of this issues would be very difficult to discuss without having to get into explanations about asexuality.

There are plenty of cishet women who don't want to date, have sex, or get married and don't identify as aromantic or asexual. Maybe they're rape survivors and are repulsed by sex or abuse survivors who are repulsed by romance. Maybe they just don't want to date because of emotional exhaustion from misogyny. Maybe they're celibate for personal, religious, or political reasons.

Some of these women, undoubtedly, want children. They will likely face the same challenges and questions that Ettina does regarding their plans for motherhood. That doesn't mean they're oppressed.

Some of these permanently single or celibate women, undoubtedly, want to co-parent. They will also likely face the same assumptions that an aromantic in the same situation would.

As for a heteroromantic asexual...let's assume that this person, for whatever absurd reason, is not straight.

Okay, now how are their challenges different than those of a cishet woman dating a trans man? What about a cishet man dating a woman with PCOS? What about someone who was left infertile because of cancer treatment, but still wants a child? What about an older couple who are dealing with the onset of menopause? What about someone who is infertile because they've had mumps? What about a cishet couple where the man is impotent? Are these people not straight either, just because they have trouble with family planning or can't have biological kids?

There are also many people who don't have straight privilege but don't have any trouble with family planning. There are bi and pan people. There are nonbinary people who aren't straight or sga, and who are in relationships where they are able to get pregnant or to impregnate someone else. There are gay trans people and their partners. These people don't suddenly have straight privilege just because they can make babies without a problem and a hetero ace can't, so obviously difficulty with family planning isn't inherently tied to lack of privilege.


Expressing pain when a  relationship  ends, and  having others  notice  and  attend  to  your pain

This is a tremendous issue for aromantic people. The end of a QPR can cause grief on par with losing a romantic relationship, and yet QPRs are frequently mistaken for friendships - even by the QPPs!
The situation of one person (usually aromantic) viewing a relationship as a QPR while the other one (usually alloromantic) sees it as a typical friendship is very common, and can easily lead to hurt feelings for the one who feels more strongly about the relationship.
Many aromantics grieve when a 'friend' (who they have a one-sided QPR with) announces that they're romantically involved or getting married, because it's generally expected that a person in a romantic relationship will devote less to their friendships. Expressing this grief can lead to perceptions that they're romantically attracted to that person.

My response to this is that not all aros want QPRs, and many people who aren't aro do. So obviously, this can't really count as an example of aromantic oppression.

As for the one-sided QPR where one person took it less seriously...I'm sorry your friend hurt you, but interpersonal betrayal and rejection in friendships doesn't automatically mean that you're oppressed. 

And perpetuating the idea that it does can be really dangerous, leading to entitlement and emotionally abusive behavior. If you really care about someone and love and value them that much, you will recognize that they don't owe you anything. They're allowed to reject you and to care about other people. They don't owe you shit. If you can't recognize this, you probably don't deserve their friendship in the first place.


Not  having to lie  about attending  LGBTQIA social  activities,  or  having  friends  in  that community

So far I haven't heard of people getting verbally or physically attacked for their connection to the aromantic/asexual community, except by aro/acephobic LGBT people. However, more subtle discrimination probably occurs. I know of a person who had her work with asexual visibility on her resume while applying for jobs, and applied for many jobs without any offers. When she deleted mention of her advocacy work, she was hired almost immediately.

I've been involved in asexual and aromantic visibility before. I've also applied for probably dozens of jobs, had five interviews, and now I've been working for five months.

Not once while I was looking for work did I mention my asexual and aromantic advocacy to a potential boss. Why? Because it's unprofessional. You don't tell your boss about your levels of sexual attraction or your relationship with sex. And the fact that Ettina's friend was rejected for doing so doesn't mean she's oppressed for being ace.


Kissing/hugging/being  affectionate  in public  without  threat  or  punishment

This is definitely an issue for people with QPRs that would be stigmatized or unacceptable romances. My brother and I are very close, and I consider us to be in a QPR, and someone at our church put in an anonymous call to the police claiming my brother was sexually abusing me. It was cleared up fairly easily, but it really frightened us. My best guess is that she took our hugging, cuddling and general comfort with touching each other as a sign that we were romantically and sexually involved. (The fact that she assumed my younger brother was a sexual perpetrator, as opposed to me being a perpetrator or us having a mutual relationship, is clearly sexism at work.)

That person was absolutely right to be concerned and call the police. She saw a situation that she very reasonably believed to be incest and took action to protect a perceived victim in the best way she could.

And honestly, Ettina's comparison of her fellow parishioner's concern about potential sexual abuse and incest to the harassment and violence that sga couples (or couples that are read as sga) receive for being open about their relationship is incredibly homophobic.

Dating  the  person  of  the  gender  you  desire in  your  teen  years

Dating is a big challenge for both asexuals and aromantics, even if they're attracted to the opposite sex. For romantic asexuals, dating frequently involves being pressured to have sex they don't want, or feeling inadequate because their partner detects and is bothered by their lack of enthusiasm.
Many aromantics are romance-repulsed, and being in a romantic relationship makes them feel trapped or suffocated. A break-up feels relieving. Before discovering aromanticism, they often have a string of short-lived relationships, all ending because they weren't romantic enough or rejected romantic overtures from their partner.
In seeking friendships, many aromantic people described getting 'romance-zoned' when a friend gets romantically interested in them and can no longer see them as just a friend. This often leads to the end of the friendship.

I have a cousin who is cishet and doesn't identify as aromantic or asexual. She's turning twenty in a month and a half and has never dated or had sex. She's a conservative evangelical Christian who plans to wait to have sex until her wedding night and to wait to date until she meets someone she can see herself with forever. She has never dated anyone of the gender she desires, so does this mean she doesn't have straight privilege?

I also have gay, bisexual, and pansexual friends who dated in high school. Some of them have even had several partners by now. Since they, as teenagers, dated people they were attracted to, does that mean that they now have straight privilege?

Does that also mean they have privilege over my Trump-supporting, anti-choice, massively homophobic and transphobic, evangelical fundamentalist Christian, Republican cousin? You should tell Mike Pence. I'm sure he'll be glad to know that LGBT people are oppressing cishet Christians by falling in love.


Dressing  without  worrying  what  it  might represent  to  someone  else

I don't know if this is more of an ace or aro issue, but as a sex-repulsed aroace, I consciously try to pick clothing that doesn't show off my body, to reduce the likelihood that someone will be attracted to me.

So what you're saying is that you're a woman who doesn't want to be sexualized or deal with male entitlement to your body? Like millions, if not billions, of other women of all sexualities, all over the world? Wow, I wonder what all those women could have in common...suffering under misogyny and rape culture? No, it's clearly just an ace and aro issue, even though there are many aros and aces who enjoy sexualized clothing and many "allos" who don't.

Increased  possibilities  for  getting  a  job  or being  promoted

As described above, I know of a person who feels that she was hired in part because she'd removed the mention of her asexual advocacy work. I also know of a sex-repulsed ace who was fired for being unsociable to her coworkers because their constant discussion of sex made her uncomfortable. (Particularly her one coworker who liked to brag about her boyfriend's penis size.)

What that sex-repulsed ace experienced was sexual harassment. If her co-workers were making her uncomfortable by talking about sex in front of her, she told them so and asked them to stop, and they continued to do so anyway, she was being sexually harassed. And sexual harassment can happen to anyone, not just aces.

Also, I've noticed that most of the aces Ettina has talked about in her post are women, or at least use she/her pronouns. Which should be a pretty good indication that most aphobia, rather than being an axis of oppression by itself, stems from misogyny.


Receiving validation  from  your  religious community,  and  being  able  to  hold  positions in  your  religious  leadership  ranks

As I described in my post on asexuality and religious prejudice, someone who doesn't have a 'proper' sexual marriage can experience negative judgment from many Protestant conservative churches.
Aromantic allosexuals have it even worse, because they tend to prefer friends with benefits or other non-romantic sexual relationships, which are very much frowned upon by most conservative churches, especially for female aro-allos.

Speaking from experience as an aromantic bisexual who comes from a family largely composed of conservative Christians, someone being judged for not having a "proper" sexual marriage doesn't necessarily constitute a lack of straight privilege. 

First of all, if you're a cis m/w couple, there's no way they'd even know just by looking that you don't have one. Second, Christianity has a huge problem with misogyny, toxic masculinity, gender roles, and cissexism. A man being shamed for not doing his "duty" as "spiritual leader of his household" by fathering children for the glory of God is probably suffering from this, as is a woman who is shamed for not getting pregnant or not providing sufficient sexual labor for her husband. Third, someone being in a "proper sexual marriage" doesn't necessarily mean that they have straight privilege either. If I were to marry a cis man, I would likely be praised for having a "proper marriage" - but only out of homophobia, transphobia, and misogyny, in the sense of my gender being disrespected and in the sense that we'd probably receive assumptions that he's saving me from my Sinful Sapphic Desires(TM) and that I'm Repenting And Accepting the Good Lord into My Heart(TM). Regardless of my relationship status, I face discrimination and oppression as a nonbinary bi woman that cishet ace women and cis aroace women never will.


Christianity also has a huge problem with purity culture, which harms people of all sexualities. I already addressed this. I won't do it again.

Adopting or foster parenting children 

Aces and especially aros are more likely to be single parents if they choose to be parents at all. Single prospective parents are at a disadvantage for fostering and adoption, especially prospective single fathers. In international adoption, many countries have explicit rules against single parent adoption or single father adoption. In US and Canada there are no explicit rules against single parent adoption or fostering, but private adoption is subject to the prejudices of the birthmothers, and the foster care system appears to place greater scrutiny on single foster parents - again, especially for single foster fathers.

Like most examples of acephobia and arophobia, this doesn't affect all aros and aces. Quasiplatonic partners can co-parent a child together. Aces and aros can both date and get married. And many "allos" are single or don't want to get married.

There's also no way for the foster system to know you're aro or ace unless you explicitly tell them, whereas they can very easily find out you're gay, bi, or pan by meeting your spouse, investigating your past relationships, or learning it from the unsuspecting foster child who has met your partner and doesn't understand why you wouldn't want someone to know.

Raising children  without  threats  of  state intervention

Single fathers, especially of girls, are at a higher risk of being accused or suspected of sexual abuse. When you look at lists of signs of a pedophile, lack of interest or difficulty with dating adults is often listed as a sign. Ace or aro men are therefore more likely to be seen as potential pedophiles than het-het men.

This doesn't really bother me, as a future social worker. If I believe that someone who has access to children might be a pedophile, I will absolutely do everything in my power to investigate this. And if this hypothetical single ace or aro father is even remotely a good parent, he should be fine with this because he should realize that we have the same goal: to protect the child in his care.

Receiving equal  benefits  for  you  and  your partner

QPRs are not legally recognized, so aromantic people either have to get married to a non-romantic partner (if they can) or else miss out on benefits.

Legal marriage, which includes:
Public recognition and support of your relationship
Joint child custody  
Sharing insurance policies at  reduced rates Access to a hospitalized loved one 
Social expectations of longevity and stability for  your relationship 

A QPR has none of those rights, unless it can be disguised as a marriage.

There are aros who date, aces who have sex, and QPPs who get married.

Besides that, there are "allos" who don't want to get married, but this obviously doesn't make them oppressed.

I think that's everything, but I might edit this later.


*There are, actually, aroaces who are inherently LGBT. Obviously, any aroace who isn't cis is LGBT. I've also met two aroace lesbians. One was aromantic due to lack of empathy, and identified as gray-ace due to her sexuality being complicated by sensory issues, dysphoria (she's woman-aligned agender), and a past abusive relationship (with a man). Another was asexual and had a hard time differentiating between romantic and platonic love, but wanted to kiss other women anyway. However, when I say "aroace" on here, I almost always mean someone who experiences no romantic attraction and no sexual attraction.