With Valentine’s week in full swing and 14th February just around the corner, aroace people can feel left out. Navigating the day can feel both isolating and suffocating as an aroace person (someone who identifies as aromantic and asexual). Individuals who identify as aroace experience little to no romantic and sexual attraction. Valentine’s Day has had a long history of feeding into capitalistic expressions of love, and more specifically, romantic love. It is not an uncommon sight to watch couples scattered all around university campuses and various clubs hosting events and selling merchandise to celebrate the day.
HOW DO AROACE PEOPLE FEEL ABOUT VALENTINE’S DAY
However, with the glaring lack of awareness about asexuality and aromanticism among students, people forget that this celebration does not account for other forms of love like platonic love. The dominant narrative is one of amatonormativity and allonormativity. The former is the idea that romantic relationships are the norm, and everyone should be seen pursuing one – they become the most important relationship one has. Allonormativity is closely linked to amatonormativity and follows the idea that everyone experiences romantic and sexual attraction, also feeding into compulsory sexuality. This can lead aroace people to feel alone, and excluded from larger groups that talk about relationships, hookups and first times. It may also pressurise people from the community to forcibly try to ‘fit in’ by falling into a relationship, against their will, causing them immense discomfort, due to the lack of safe and comfortable space to express their sexuality freely.
HOW CAN YOU, AS AN AROACE PERSON, CELEBRATE
While university campuses have begun preaching and encouraging the practice of ‘self-love’ through events (such as giving a gift or postcard to a friend or writing a letter to yourself), there is still a long way to go for an inclusive celebration. As an aroace university student myself, here’s how I ensure not feeling overwhelmed and neglected during Valentine’s week and Valentine’s Day:
- Going on ‘solo’ dates: While the trend around solo/self-dating, or taking yourself out on a date, is picking up pace and is all over social media, I find that this works most effectively when I feel a sexuality crisis coming in, or when I feel on the cusp of feeling all alone. I have taken myself out on solo cinema dates because I love watching movies in the theatre. Based on your interests, you can take yourself out to places you’ve also never been before. Perhaps even familiar places in the city. If you love reading, making an entire day out of bookstore-hopping could be your best bet! A solo date also helps abolish the idea of always having a partner and can act as a refreshing change of space for you too.
- Spending time indoors: If you still don’t feel like going out (you might spot couples which you mostly might), you can always spend the day indoors by cooking yourself a hearty meal, watching, reading, calling a friend, or picking up a creative hobby like crocheting.
- Consuming media that is not romance-centric: Another activity that helps combat the “I’m probably just broken or there’s something wrong with me because I don’t have a partner” feeling is reading and/or watching media featuring aroace characters, or something that has no focus on romance at all. Well-done media representation will help you feel seen and combat the Valentine’s Day blues. Some of my favourites are the Heartstopper series on Netflix and the book Loveless by Alice Oseman.
- Spending quality time with friends and/or family: A romantic partner is not the be-all and end-all of this day and week. Get on call with your friends and/or family, or invite them over for a night of games, movies, and quality time.
- Talking and confiding to people in the community: While spending time with best friends and family helps divert attention from couples to other underrated forms of love, they might still not completely understand how you’re feeling. Talking about your hesitations and fears as an aroace person in various online communities and servers (on Tumblr and Discord) can help you feel seen by real-life people who identify the same. Pages like Aro/Ace Confessions on Tumblr and the Discord server, The Aro and Ace Cafe (which I am also a part of), not only provide a safe space for the community but also supply various resources to help people feel more secure in their sexuality.
And hey, even after all this, the week right after Valentine’s Day, from 18th February onwards, is celebrated widely among the aromantic community as Aromantic Spectrum Awareness Week. If that isn’t a
back-handed way to celebrate your identity and resist giving into overconsumption and amatonormativity, I don’t know what is!