A-tastic

What is the Aspec Glossary?

The SAM (split-attraction model) is a model used in psychology and in aspec spaces that treats sexual and romantic orientation as two separate and distinct things. Under this model, while many people's sexual orientation and romantic attraction are aligned, not everyone's does.

Using the split-attraction model, someone could be:

aromantic asexual (aroace) - experiencing little to no romantic or sexual attraction

alloromantic asexual (alloace) - experiencing typical romantic attraction, but little to no sexual attraction

aromantic allosexual (aroallo) - experiencing little to no romantic attraction, but typical sexual attraction

Furthermore, someone could be panromantic and homosexual, or homosexual and biromantic, or any other combination of sexual and romantic orientation.

The split attraction model is primarily used by people who are on either the aromantic or asexual spectrum, but it is not exclusive to aspecs, and not all aspecs use the split attraction model.

For some people, their romantic and sexual orientation are interlinked, while for others they are distinct things.

Here’s a hug (or a high-five if you prefer) for everyone who is deeply interested in sex as a topic but not as an activity. 

Maybe you are interested in sex from a biological or psychological perspective (sexual health, relationship dynamics, cultural differences etc.) or from a creative standpoint (reading, writing, drawing, watching sex scenes), or maybe it tickles your collectors brain (in a „I’d like an itemized list of all sex positions, no I do not want to try any of them, I just like lists“ way) - but in either case, you are not sexually active and you do not wish to be. 

People who are not interested in having sex are often assumed to be immature, as if it automatically means you are a 7 year old in their „eww kissing gives you cooties“ phase. You are assigned a childlike innocence, you are presumed to have no understanding of how sex works or that it even exists…  But in reality you may actually have more theoretical knowledge on sex than your peers do! You just happen to not want the hands-on experience. 

People may also automatically assume you’re disgusted or even deeply afraid of sex and feel like they need to tip-toe around the topic with you - which can create a really unpleasant disconnect between your internal self-image and the way others treat you. In reality, you may love to talk about sex and wish you could discuss it with others freely without having to fight assumptions. There’s a loneliness in this. 

„Interested but not personally participating“ is not as strange a combination as people may think. People really do that with lots of activities! People can be super into watching sports but not play any sports themselves. People can love to learn about dogs but would personally never get one. It shouldn’t be that surprising that it can apply to sex too. 

There’s nothing wrong or weird about you. You basically just love basketball but do not play it. A fully normal, valid thing. 

With all my love, 

Am I welcome on this blog, even though I’m also ace? I’ve been reblogging posts from here because I recently realized I was aro and wanted to engage with & explore that side of my identity, but if as many aro people as they indicated don’t want aroace people around in their aro spaces, would it be better to just… leave the aromantic tag and blogs altogether? I don’t want to take away from people who are aroallo. I’ve seen it done time and again and don’t want to be some kind of… invasive species or something.

(sorry this was so long and rambly.)

Exclusionary mindsets seem more common than they are when they are so loud and painful.

Being called awful things for being aro but not ace, aros being automatically equated to aces (which is a problem for both groups), aces hating on aros, etc etc. is sadly pretty common, and it can send people into a very toxic protective mindset.

None of this is an excuse of course. It's not right to be so hateful towards a group of people because of the things you've experienced either from them, or people who aren't even aspec.

I'm sorry you're feeling so down over this. This blog is an overall aspec blog that welcomes all aspecs of you wanna give me a follow as well. Flood your feed with positivity and compassion!

I'm trying to make a point to myself