It was a dark and stormy knight...

YES aroaces can be in relationships(like me!). YES aroaces can be in love. YES aroaces can do/be interested in romance/sex. they are STILL aroace, as it is a spectrum. however, NO you can not use "but aroaces can still date/have sex!" as an excuse to shove aside their identity for your allo ships.

I also feel like Week 2 made a great commentary about critical thinking regarding "popularity" vs "quality"... Appreaciating the heart put in a project, instead of just a shallow content, understanding that if you do thing with love and a soul is more than a content that everyone can replicate, this exemplified by Ken Doi and the Prince, versus Makoto.

And while I understand that TWEWY, as any other game, it's a product meant to sell and entertain, I feel like the game has this ideals that might differ with the mainstream market in comparison. No shade to other games like Persona, but if you compare them their difference is astounding. TWEWY does not rely on fanservice, or "romance simulator" routes where the main character gets all the ladies, and it doesn't milk "shipping" as a way to gain an audience. This differs a lot with mainstream games who get an audience for these reasons and I highly doubt the fans of this games would be interested on a videogame like TWEWY with all I mentioned.

Going back with Neku and the characters. It's interesting to notice that even when Neku canonically has reasons that explain his character, including his trauma. But the game still calls him out, and how it was just making him drown into misery and making him unable to explore his true potential, potentially becoming someone egocentric. And the same thing applies to Shiki. Higashizawa calls her out on her fake presentation as a disguise to her low self esteem, and how her jealousy was consuming her, to the point of doubting if she wanted to go back to life. (This might be an "unpopular" opinion here, but this is why I feel like Shiki's face not being shown most of time was a good choice... Because Shiki was more than just her appareance, or an image she intended to present. Neku doesn't need to see her face to care for her and appreciate her real self.)

While I'm personally not that fan of "character gets told by everyone they're wrong and that makes it automatically good writing", TWEWY does a great job in this case.

Interestingly enough, people only started to associate the word "fit" with the meaning of "athletic" or "healthy" after the phrase "survival of the fittest" was coined.

If identifying as asexual makes you breathe a little easier...

If it feels like a weight being lifted off your chest and shoulders...

If it feels like it just makes sense somehow...

If it makes you happy...

If it sounds right in your head...

Then use it. Claim it. Make it your own. Even if only for a day. A week. A month. A couple years.

Like I could hop onto an ace community and it's almost all sex-repulsed aces or sex-favorable aces, both insisting they have barely any representation online. Like yeah, both of those groups have little reps... but also that all they talk about and they practically feud with each other.

In arospec spaces, I see mostly aroallos talking about how it's okay to be aroallo and not really saying anything else--or aroace media which is, quite frankly, quite tiresome to see when it's all you see.

[ survey.gendercensus.com ]

The 13th annual international gender census, collecting information about the language we use to refer to ourselves and each other, is now open until 13th August 2026.

It’s short and easy, for most participants it takes 5 minutes or less.

After the survey is closed I’ll process the results and publish a spreadsheet of the data and a report summarising the main findings. Then anyone can use them for academic or business purposes, self-advocacy, tracking the popularity of language over time, and just feeling like we’re part of a huge and diverse community.

If you think you might have friends and followers who’d be interested, please do reblog this blog post, and share the survey URL by email or at AFK social groups or on other social networks. Every share is extremely helpful!

Survey URL: https://survey.gendercensus.com

The survey is open to anyone anywhere who speaks English and feels that the gender binary doesn’t fully describe their experience of themselves and their gender(s) or lack thereof.

Thank you so much!

[ Link to survey ]

PS: You can see some regularly-updated statistics about incoming data here, with lots of demography and graphs to peruse!

• Feels like a performance, or you are copying things you have seen in other relationships

• When people comment on or ask about your relationship, it makes you uncomfortable

• After having sex, the more intimate touches/cuddles do not feel as good

• Wanting more independence or time alone

• Thinking if your partner cheated on you, you wouldn't care

• Being scared that you might cheat despite having no desire to be with anyone else

• Words like "partner, boyfriend, girlfriend, etc" all feel wrong, and you don't like them being applied to you

• Not having a strong feeling of missing your partner like you're "supposed" to

• Questioning your sexuality/preferences despite being confident in who/what you're attracted to

• Feeling like you're lying if you appreciate gifts or affection from them, even if you really do appreciate it

• Saying "I love you" feels fine, but it holds the same weight when you say it to anyone else

• Not wanting to tell anyone about your feelings because you're afraid you will be misunderstood

Anyway, that's all I got. I hope it helps someone out there. I'm still struggling too, but I think we will all be okay! <3

The issue is this, people are assuming that asexuality is a descriptor of a individual’s sex drive, when the reality is that asexuality is a label for understanding the context in which an individual experiences sexual attraction and how emotional connection may be tethered to their experience(s) of sexual attraction.

So a person who rarely experiences sexual attraction, but is very sexually active once they do experience sexual attraction can still label themselves asexual. Just like a person who has casual sexual encounters simply for physical pleasure can still label themselves asexual, BECAUSE IT’S A SPECTRUM.