kissless virgin

i’m just curious like do you not love cats? like i tell my cats i love them constantly because they make me so happy and fulfilled and i would definitely also say they give my life meaning! to me, THAT is love! what is it to you, if not love?

oh hi! i dont check this blog much anymore, apologies if this is an older ask. personally, i would say that i do love cats- ive noticed that theres 3 things i mainly would describe as the feeling of love that i experience- my special interests, cats, and my very few squishes. admittedly i experience more love currently than when i made this blog, to the point of sometimes questioning if the label loveless aro still fits me. although its worth bringing up the other use of the label while i mention that, which is believing that no particular "thing" can be said to be what makes us human, and that trying to find something that is somehow *required* in order to be human is always gonna leave some obscure experiences out. in terms of why i personally ID as loveless, i would say its 3 things. 1 is that philosophy i just mentioned. 2 is the fact that although yes i experience some love here and there, its in minimal places to the extent that i find the label "loveless" to express something about me, and 3 just the fact that i dont and have never vibed with the word "love" for my experiences. obviously some of them i do label that way due to it feeling right, but for a lot of things, i just dont feel right calling it love, never have done, and its never been a problem for me to not call them love until people started trying to tell me that [xyz thing] is love/you must have love/love is everything and utterly important/love is what makes us human/etc etc. i think thats very important to note- this was never a problem in my life until other people made it one. the idea of love directly contradicts my experiences of life up until i was told they were, the idea that i need to count them as love directly contradicts my experience of life up until i was told i needed to. the idea that im losing something or that it would be a bad experience to not experience them as love is something that is contradictory to my experiences and has only ever been pushed on me by others who seem to think their experiences of life are universal.

and since your ask was originally loving cats and such, i would say that although i love cats, special interests, and occasional squishes like i said, i can easily imagine a life without those areas of love. based on other experiences of not experiencing love in there cases, i can cross reference and imagine what thats like, and imo i can imagine being fine with that.

you might also be interested in reading the results of this survey (link to part two, which i think is more relevant to this ask, but part one of it is also linked on that post) on loveless aros, which might give you some further insight.

additionally, i might be worth mentioning the lovequeer movement- the lovequeer movement is about fighting the idea that only romance counts as "love", by expanding the definition of the word love to include other things that those individuals genuinely experience as love. examples of things that lovequeer people might call love are platonic love, love for pets, love for hobbies, love for songs/music, happiness in general, or anything else they feel like they want to or benefit from calling love. this is a genuinely useful movement to the aro community, and loveless aros arent trying to fight or discourage that. if you find what i just said confusing, thats an indication that you simply dont understand the label "loveless aro" properly at all. this is an article from AUREA with 3 perspectives from loveless aros as well if youre interested in reading - i wouldnt say they address the concept you brought up, but i still think reading perspectives like these is important.

hm, interesting question. first of all i think the meaning of life is different for everybody; there is no grand, overarching greater meaning. everyone defines their own meaning. if you’re asking for mine specifically, then well, im still trying to figure that out due to a mix of mental health issues and terrible life situation. however, if i remember back to when i was a kid before i got ill, i dont think i needed a meaning. i just played. so thats interesting.

this is correct! it’s really good to expand the definition of love to things like friendships, hobbies, etc. but at the same time, there are people who don’t feel love (any kind) at all, people who feel love to such a small extent that they feel alienated from spaces that push love in general as a huge important thing, people who while they understand that love doesnt have to be romantic they still dont feel comfortable applying the word to their experiences because of bad associations, or people who have simply never felt the need to describe their experiences with the word love and dont want people telling them to because they’re fine as they are without doing that.

Additionally, even ruling out those people, upholding that a particular trait or thing is what makes us human, or suggesting that absolutely everyone experiences a specific thing, is always going to exclude someone. even if you don’t think it is, even if you can’t comprehend of how someone could not have x thing, just because you don’t understand it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.

i have not! ive not even heard of it