A better definition for alterous attraction

[otachi]

I've found this term and I identified with it, but I think its definition is too broad and can be confused with other terms, such as quoiromantic/wtfromantic.

 

In my understanding, alterous attraction is not entirely platonic or romantic, but a desire for emotional closeness. That means not seeing a difference between romantic and platonic, and treating all relationships as equal. I am aware of the term "relationship anarchist", but I personally think "alterous" is better - it's shorter and can be better understood, since most people think of the word "anarchist" as solely political.

 

This is supposed to be a brainstorm topic, so reply with your ideas for a better definition!

[Salemlovesfog]

As someone who identifies as panalterous, I get where you're coming from. I'd just like to say that I know I'm not wtfromantic since platonic feeling and feeling alterous attraction / squishes has a different sensation to me. As far as an idea for a more specific definition I don't have any ideas. 

[Moon6Shadow]

Hi, quoialterous here.

 

For me, the '-alterous' isn't about the 'quoi-' or rather not just about the 'quoi-'. It's more to do with feeling discomfort with the '-romantic' aspect of 'quoiromantic' and the relationship being defined in terms of romance since I tend think of relationships in terms of emotional depth instead (well that's the simplified explanation for it.) So I totally agree with alterous being about the emotional relationship and emotional closeness.

 

https://aromantic.wikia.org/wiki/Alterous

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Someone can be both alterous & romantic &/or platonic & can have varying degrees on attraction, ultimately feel discomfort / unease / or just a sense of inaccuracy in calling it wholly romantic or platonic.

 

There is a, now closed, thread on 'What is the difference between Quoiromantic & Alterous?'

https://www.asexuality.org/en/topic/133124-what-is-the-difference-between-quoiromantic-alterous/

and a lot of the stuff is just... nothing like I would think of it. So I think the misunderstanding of what quoi- actually means might be part of the problem in separating -alterous and quoi-

 

Although the last person on that thread does gets closer, at least in regards to how I think of -alterous, and included a link to the original definition:

https://arospecawarenessweek.tumblr.com/post/108521451012/idk-if-youre-still-interested-in-coined-terms

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alterous - experiences attraction that can only be described as a desire for emotional closeness because neither romantic or platonic attraction is accurate*

is intended to be used in place of romantic or platonic. for example someone may identify as bi-alterous, poly-alterous, homo-alterous, etc.

*note: a person who IDs this way may experience varying degrees of attraction that is identifiable as romantic or platonic but ultimately feel discomfort / unease / or just a sense of inaccuracy in calling it wholly romantic or platonic 

As for what they said (see thread link above):

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...alterous [...] only means a desire for emotional closeness. Desiring anything more is not alterous. The person's feelings may or may not be between romantic and platonic, its just that for whatever reason they don't want to actually call it one or the other. So because of its vague definition it can be five seperate things, all of which already have terms, and none of which should be mistaken for eachother.

...

1) a desire to further know/befriend someone; this desired bond can vary from friends, to close friends, to best friends, and can include nervousness

(a squish)

2) not being comfortable with calling things romantic or platonic

(a relationship anarchist-- if i understand the term right)

3) desiring or having closeness/importance stronger than the best friend norm

(a type of QPR or queerplatonic crush aka queerplatonic squish)

4) having romantic attraction, but the desires for the relationship are close to platonic/sparcely romantic

(hyporomantic or gray-romantic)

 

I'm not as familiar with the terms above so I'm assuming they are correct and I do like the idea of -alterous being a word for multiple things at once since points 1-3 ring true for me (point 4 tweaked a little in regard to romance in my case) however they stumbled at the end in regards to quoi-

 

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5) someone who can't tell the difference between romantic attraction and platonic attraction; which can possibly be fixed by better explanations

(quoiromantic aka wtfromantic)

 

'Attraction and attraction' when it should be talking about 'attraction and orientation.'

 

Which doesn't seem to be explained in the list of orientations thread since they say it's a romantic orientation then switch to talking about romantic attraction:

https://www.asexuality.org/en/topic/119238-a-list-of-romantic-orientations/

On 5/25/2015 at 1:06 AM, Amy Ghost said:

Quoiromantic - Is someone whose romantic orientation is on the aromantic spectrum that describes people who cannot differentiate between platonic and romantic attraction, cannot define romantic attraction and therefore are not sure if they experience it, experience attraction somewhere between romantic and platonic, or want to be in a queerplatonic relationship. It’s also known as WTFromantic or Whatromantic or Platoniromantic.

If someone says they are 'biromantic' they are 'bi-' and '-romantic'. Their romantic orientation is 'bi-' and their sexual attraction is '-romantic'. It's the same for 'quoiromantic' the 'quoi-' is their romantic orientation. Except in this case their romantic orientation is a question. I can't remember who said it now but someone described it as 'questioning so long that the question itself becames the identity' which... isn't exactly correct but the visual may help. To be more specific (and less specific) 'quoi-' could be defined as the question 'What is romantic attraction? and by extension what is your romantic orientation?' Simply does not compute. Ask and you will be met with the blue screen of death as the person simply stalls.

 

For those less familiar with thinking about romantic attraction and romantic orientation etc. (like my quoi- self) basically think of asking someone what gender they are attracted to and them giving you a blank look, the question just doesn't compute. The 'confusion' isn't just about romantic attraction it extends to what gender they are attracted to as well because of the confusion over what is romantic attraction. The confusion doesn't just suddenly clear up when trying to figure out what gender you are attracted to if romantic attraction itself confuses you in the first place.

 

Then again confusion may not even be the best word to describe this, to quote the person who originally coined the phrase:

https://epochryphal.tumblr.com/post/106762907052/a-note-on-quoi

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I see a lot of folks defining “quoi-” as meaning “can’t tell the difference between two attractions”

And like, I get it, that’s kind of close (although I have criticisms). And there’s been a lot of people redefining it to mean that. Ok. But…like…

 

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My brand of greyness/quoi is “wtf even is sexual attraction am i experiencing it RIGHT NOW uhhhhhhh oh my god this doesn’t make sense.” I rather disidentify with sexual attraction/orientation as sensemaking for me.

Like, if you told me “oh, so you can’t tell the difference between sexual and platonic attraction?” my response would be “do I even experience sexual attraction??? why are you assuming I do?? the point is I can’t tell??”

It's sort of like wondering 'What is my romantic orientation? Do I even have a romantic orientation?' but it's not a lack of, or pan or whatever, it's just '.....' doesn't compute.

 

To quote someone in terms of quoigender:

https://theacetheist.wordpress.com/2016/04/19/quoigendering/

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Chris
December 25th, 2016 at 11:04 pm

Well I mean, as someone who identifies as quoigender I’m a little biased, but this is where I stand on this.
For me, being quoigender is less ???? about my gender and not that I am agender, but that applying gender to me doesn’t make sense.

Coyote has created a Quoiro Infographic that defines the word, shows the history and issues it's had here:

https://theacetheist.wordpress.com/2016/03/21/quoiro-infographic/

 

But getting back to the difference between 'quoi-' and '-alterous':

 

First off 'quoi-' is an orientation and '-alterous' is an attraction type. However while -alterous is only used to describe attraction, quoi- describes your orientation, and attraction type to a certain extent, if used in a -romance, -sextual etc. context.

 

Long story short, there has been a lot of confusion about the term quoi- because of how hard it is to define, but perhaps this gives you a better idea as to why? and hopefully shows why there may be confusion between Quoi- and -alterous being similar when they are not.

 

As for a better definition for -alterous, or as I would suggest Quoi-, I recommend following the Quoi- links above and exploring, however as mentioned before Quoi- can be difficult to wrapping your head around but perhaps including the orientation aspect in the definition could be a good first step since that tends to be the way it most makes sense to me when trying to define it. Although I'm not sure how others would define it beyond a lot of '... doesn't not compute', which happens a lot in the original definitions. There is reason it was originally called 'What The Fuck romantic' it's the creator of the label throwing up their hands in despair at ever describing it. XD but the above is my take at least, so hopefully it helps.