jaslco:

ok i have a question: why do people literally only mention having different romantic and sexual orientations when it comes to someone being aro/ace??

like. i don’t know how to explain this exactly but like.

asexuality and aromanticism both have their own separate flags. i’ve seen a bunch of posts that mention that the “a” in lgbtqia+ stands for both asexual and aromantic. if someone says they’re asexual, people usually don’t assume that they’re aromantic as well.

but all other romantisexual orientations have the same flag for the romantic and sexual aspects. i’ve never once seen a post mentioning that the “b” in lgbtqia+ stands for both bisexual and biromantic. if someone says they’re heterosexual, people usually assume that they’re heteroromantic as well.

and it’s just???? so weird to me??? because there are people who are biromantic and homosexual, people who are homoromantic and heterosexual, people who are panromantic and polysexual, etc. but i never see those people mentioned ever.

and like. the reason behind this absolutely is allonormativity. like, if someone says they’re ace people think “oh well maybe they can still feel romantic attraction”, or if someone says they’re aro people think “oh well maybe they can still feel sexual attraction” but when it comes to other romantisexual orientations it’s just like “oh well if they like guys sexually that’s probably what they feel romantically too”

and like. this is one thing that i feel like tumblr’s sj community really sleeps on and i really wish that would change. if you see a post saying “bisexual” when it means “biromantic” call it out. if you see a debate about the queerness of heteroromantic asexuals without mentioning heteroromantic bi/pan/homosexuals, call it out. if you see a post assuming that a person must be of a certain romantic orientation because of their sexual orientation call it out.

let people know that romantic orientations are things that exist separately from sexual orientations, and not just in the context of alloromantic asexual people and aromantic allosexual people.