Preface
I think about human sexuality a lot, largely because despite having been human my whole life, I still don’t fully understand either my own sexuality, or sexuality in general. The specific thing I understand least about human sexuality is possibly the concept of romantic attraction. The fact that it is so confusing for me is making me increasingly convinced that I don’t actually feel it, but that hasn’t stopped me from trying, and failing, to work out what it is. This post is the culmination, for the moment, of my thoughts on romanticism.
Warning: as ever when I start thinking about human sexuality, this is extremely long, doesn’t really come to any firm conclusions, and is at best dubiously comprehensible.
I. Types of Attraction:
When people talk about orientation, especially in asexual and queer circles, you will often hear the model which goes something like this: sexual attraction and desire are just one form of desire, along with romantic, aesthetic, sensual, emotional, kinky and other forms of desire. Unfortunately, while the model itself is valuable, it suffers from a lack of coherent and agreed upon definitions. So, in accordance with xkcd’s prophecy, I shall do my best to add another set of conflicting definitions to the mix.
‘Sexual’
This is probably the easiest to define. It’s what most people mean when they talk about desire. Desire to do sexual things (PiV, anal, oral and manual sex, foreplay) with a person. This kind of desire leads to arousal. Can be triggered by, or require, some combination of sensual, emotional, and aesthetic attraction.
‘Aesthetic’
Aesthetic attraction is another easy one. It’s looking at someone and knowing they are ‘pretty’, or ‘handsome’. Not necessarily connected to any desire for emotional or sexual connection with a person, simply appreciating their appearance. Can, however, cause sexual desire — this is why ‘sexy’ can be used to describe someone’s appearance. By contrast with sexual desire, which is a wish to do sexual things with a person, aesthetic desire is a wish to look at a person, or otherwise appreciate their appearance.
‘Sensual’
Desire for non-sexual touch. Hugs, kisses (some of them, at least), massages, hand holding and so on all come under this category. For some people, this is so intimately connected with sexual desire that they cannot understand how people can hug or hold hands with those other than their partner. For others, notably people on the asexual spectrum, it is entirely divorced.
‘Emotional’
The desire to get to know someone on a personal level, to share feelings, and to be vulnerable to (and conversly protect) someone. Demi-sexual people often require this to feel sexual desire.
‘Intellectual’
Similar to emotional. Unlike emotional, however, where bonding is over opening yourself up to become vulnerable and share feelings, intellectual attraction is stimulated by admiration of intelligence, whether that manifests itself in quick wittedness, knowledge, polyglossia (why do you think being talked to in a foreign language is thought of as a turn on?), or simply ability to keep up with your own thoughts.
‘Kinky’
Desire for non-sexual kinky play — either domination or submission. Can manifest in the desire to be tied up, or beaten — or to tie up or beat someone else. Professional dominatrixes who refuse to engage in sex aim to satisfy their clients’ kinky, rather than sexual, desires.
‘Romantic’
The hard one. The AVEN FAQ, which one would think provides a useful definition here, unhelpfully and tautologically defines ‘Romantic attraction: Desire of being romantically involved with another person’.
It is usually accepted that romantic attraction is distinct from all of the foregoing types, with the possible exception of emotional attraction, with which it is sometimes conflated. Actually defining it, however, is surprisingly difficult. Many attempts at definitions end in the definers giving up and saying that, as Justice Potter Stewart wrote:
For example, there is this example post from the AVEN forums, saying at one point “I can just feel the difference between romantic love and other kinds”.
This is, however, not that helpful for people who are aromantic, and want to understand romanticism, or for those who are not sure whether or not they are romantic. In an attempt to find a more coherent and useful definition for romantic attraction, it might be useful to look at the definitions and descriptions that others who have attempted this have come up with.
Some have suggested that romantic attraction is defined by its contentless nature: that is, that it is attraction not to any particular quality, of for any particular reason, but generally to a particular person: “It’s not that you feel drawn to the other person because of some other thing, you just feel drawn to the person, full stop”.
Others have suggested that romantic attraction is a desire to be in what is in some way A Relationship, either in a way that is distinct from, or in a way that is somehow more than, an ordinary platonic relationship.
Many attempts at definitions include the desire to be near the object of romantic attraction, and to have attention from them, often exclusively. For instance:
“Becoming obsessed with a person”.
“For me, romantic attraction is wanting to be around someone, A LOT.”
Finally, there is at least one example of someone who claims that romantic attraction goes along with a desire to nurture and care for the object of their attraction.
II. Romantic Attraction: Working Towards A Definition
Let us look, then, one by one at the different proposed definitions and components of romantic attraction.
- ‘Friendship + Sex’
- The opposite of a platonic relationship
- the same as the desire for a platonic friendship, but more so
- Desire to be in ‘a relationship'(tm)
- Relatedly, the desire to be in a monogamous/exclusive relationship.
- Desire for physical closeness
- Desire for sensual non-sexual contact
- Possessiveness
- ‘Contentless’/’Reasonless’ attraction
At least some of these definitions are obviously flawed. ‘Friendship + Sex’ implies that friends with benefits are in a romantic relationship. This is inherently self-contradictory — friends with benefits, in conventional usage, refers to people who have a platonic relationship, and not a romantic one, and yet still have a sexual relationship. On the other hand, this definition would imply that those who are in a long term relationship and no longer have sex, whether by choice or medical necessesity, no longer count as in a romantic relationship — again, contrary to what popular culture would suggest counts as a romantic relationship.
‘The opposite of platonic relationship’ implies that romantic desire and platonic desire are mutually exclusive, which strikes me as a bizarre position to hold. Relationships are often built out of friendships, and it would be odd to say that friends who are now in a relationship are no longer still friends, and equally odd to say that they are still friends but no longer feel platonic attraction to each other.
‘The desire for a friendship, but more so’, seems to be, again, in contradiction to established usage — people use ‘romantic relationship’ to refer to something seperate to ‘friendship’. In addition, romantic attraction is often explicitly gendered — people talk of being ‘homoromantic’ or ‘heteroromantic’, but wouldn’t dream of only having friends of the opposite sex — although some people, regardless of romanticism(?) seem to think that it’s only acceptable to have friends of the same sex.
‘The desire to be in a relationship’ is a mostly useless definition. Either it refers to the desire to be in a romantic relationship with someone, in which case the definition is circular, or it refers to the desire to be in any kind of relationship (sexual, kinky, friendship-based) which is, once again, in contradiction to established usage. The desire to be in an explicitly monogamous relationship is little better — it excludes all poly people a priori, which seems premature. The desire to be in an exclusive relationship is perhaps a little better. Poly people can be included, fuckbuddies/friends with benefits are excluded, as are purely platonic friends. However, this definition excludes monogamish people, and those in an open relationship, or other forms of poly/non-monogamous relationships which are not exclusive.
The next three definitional components suggested: “desire for non-sexual contact”, “desire for closeness”, and “possessiveness” all seem to me to be more symptoms of romantic attraction than definitions of it. While people might feel desire for non-sexual physical contact, and desire for physical closeness, with romantic partners, they might equally feel the first about friends with benefits, and the second about family members. In neither of these cases does society consider the relationship to be romantic. Possessiveness and jealousy is a characteristic strongly associated with romantic, as opposed to any other, types of relationship, but I am by no means persuaded that it is universally felt: there are plenty of poly-type people in what they call romantic relationships in which they feel compersion much more than they feel possessiveness over their partners. Compersion can, of course, coexist wih jealousy or possessiveness, but by the same token it doesn’t always, and not all poly people who feel compersion but not jealousy consider themselves to be aromantic.
By process of elimination, then, we are left with only ‘Contentless, or reasonless, attraction’ as a workable definition for romantic attraction which is not trivially shown to be in contradiction to accepted usage of the term. If romantic attraction can be reasonably defined, this is the best suggestion I have yet heard.
Another possibility that one might suggest is that romantic attraction doesn’t really exist seperately from the other forms of attraction listed above, and that it is essentially the same as emotional attraction. However, it seems that it is perfectly culturally appropriate to be emotionally attached to close family members, whereas a romantic relationship between close family members would be seen as inappropriate. This suggests one of two things: either there is a difference between platonic emotional bonds and romantic bonds, or the fact that something is labelled as romantic, and the cultural expectations which go along with that, would be the problem, not the relationship itself.
Conclusions: True Romanticism is Incomprehensible
This blogpost has been lying around on my harddrive, in varying similarities to its current form, for months. Before that, I had had a similar attempt to work out what romanticism is lying around on a different harddrive for almost a year. In all this time drafting, re-drafting, deleting, and undeleting a definition of romanticism, not only am I still unable to clearly articulate what it is, I find myself even more confused by the concept than I was before I started writing this.
From this, we learn two things:
- People who don’t understand romantic attraction shouldn’t try to define it.
- I don’t understand romantic attraction.
1. From Stewart’s concurring opinion in Jacobellis vs. Ohio
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