Arospec headcanon: Daniela Velasquez from Sense8

I headcanon Dani as aromantic and allosexual. I have also always felt like the show failed to properly explore her character and how she forms relationships. So here is a very short exploration of that headcanon:

Dani clearly sees romantic attachment as leverage, something she can use. Of course, this fits well with her career in show-business, but she seems surprisingly happy to forego any romantic attachment once she settles into her friendship with Lito and Hernando. In the same way, she seems to be using her sexuality to navigate her relationships: she cheats on Joaquin as a way to try and escape their relationship, then immediately tries to have sex with Lito in order to cement their relationship and gain protection. There's some self-destructiveness in her behavior, but I also feel like this shows someone who feels in control of her sexuality, whereas she has a much harder time using the codes of romance to her advantage, even if she tries to.

I've always been sad that the development of her relationship with Lito and Hernando was never explicitally explored. I guess relationship negotiation doesn't make for good television? Still, there are some definite hints that they have a non-traditional friendship, which could be interpreted as a queerplatonic relationship. There's some ambiguity in the series about Dani's photos of Lito and Hernando, but I've always felt as though the two men weren't actually surprised at the existence of the photos, and only afraid of the risk of them being leaked. This makes me feel as though Dani's part in their sexuality (the way she watches and masturbates as they have sex), is something that's been acknowledged and accepted by the two men. They certainly make space for her in their domestic lives when they all move in together, in a way that goes way beyond just protecting Dani and all of their reputations.

I want to read Dani as allo-aro. I want to see her as someone who's been enduring what people have called “love” because she thought that was necessary to get what she wants (sex, safety, affection,...) I want to grieve for the way she's been traumatized by an abusive relationship, in which someone could call violence and obsession love and no one would correct him. I understand how, for someone like her, Lito and Hernando's relationship could be a safe heaven. Lito is someone who does not feel attracted to her, but who still acts caringly towards her and can offer her the protection she needs. More than that, Lito and Hernando's relationship is an example of truly caring love, one that can help her heal from her trauma but which – very importantly – doesn't need her to put her boundaries on the line to do so. She doesn't need to fall in love to learn that love can be kind. She doesn't need to fall in love ever, because she no longer needs a romantic relationship in order to not be alone. I think this reading is much kinder to the character, instead of the way the show brushes off her connection to Lito and Hernando as “gay fetishism” in the first season (while simultaneously also asserting that Hernando genuinely cares for her as a friend.)

In the end, headcanoning Dani as aro is important to me because she's not alone. Her relationship with Lito and Hernando goes against the narrative that it's normal for romantic love to isolate you (inside your closed off couple bubble), which leads to the idea that it's normal for arospec people to be left behind, to always be treated as second best. Instead, we see Hernando break off his relationship with Lito based on how the latter treats Dani. And I want every arospec people to get what Dani gets: relationships that are mutually supportive and which are open to intimacy even if they aren't romantic.

Harry Potter and “why the fuck is everybody obsessed with dating all of a sudden?”

I wanted to have a ficlet ready for this year’s edition of #AggressivelyArospecWeek over at @aggressivelyarospec, but I’ll guess that will have to wait until next year. In the meantime, here are some headcanons about Harry Potter and Luna Lovegood, AKA my two little arospec babies.

I headcanon Harry Potter as quoiromantic, and pretty much romance-indifferent. During his first years at Hogwarts, he’s too young and much too busy to be thinking about romance at all. It first starts with the Yule ball during his fourth year, and the necessity to find a partner to go with. People start making a huge deal of it, asking out their crushes, discussing options with their friends...

Harry is a bit confused by the principle of the whole thing. He understands people asking others they’re already romantically involved with, people they’re close to but haven’t been able to ask out, or even people they’ve been pining about for a long time. But then he hears some of his friends ask out people they’ve barely talk to or been interested in before, and somehow the expectations are still romantic ones. It seems a bit silly. Still, he had been interested in knowing more about Cho Chang since the previous year, since they sometimes exchanged a few words at Quidditch matches, and she was pretty. She was pretty and he wanted to talk to her, so Harry assumed he had a crush on Cho, and asked her out. She said no, and Harry felt disappointed, but also mostly frustrated he would have to find another date.

Things didn’t get really crazy until his sixth year, when suddenly love potions started being spread throughout the whole castle. He would barely see Ron anymore because of him spending all his time with Lavender, and Hermione would spend all her time talking about Ron or how much she hated having caught Cormac’s eye.

And then there’s Luna. Luna Lovegood, who watches all of the craze go by her with a level-headed gaze. Luna, who he invites to Slughorn’s party, because she’s cool, and because he knows she won’t read more into it than he wants her too. Luna, who he one day complains to, and who tells him she believes some sort of invisible monster has been releasing abnormal amounts of pheromones this year and that’s what’s making everyone act weird. Luna, who explains to Harry that she isn’t affected because she’s aromantic, because she’s never experienced romantic attraction and doesn’t really want to.

And Harry feels like he can talk to her. He can talk to her when everyone else is too busy talking about their dating lives, and he can talk to her whenever he just wants to. He can even talk to her when he starts thinking that he might have feelings for Ginny, but isn’t sure if that’s just due to them having become closer friends now that Ginny is a bit more mature.

Basically, Harry and Luna have half-secret hangouts where they talk about nothing and everything and Harry can vent his frustration at loosing his best friends to stupid romance problems, and it is Good and Pure.

Agender!Kate Bishop though.

Agender!Kate Bishop who has her Big Realisation Moment at 6AM on a Tuesday and immediately runs to Clint’s appartment where she shakes him awake by shouting “Clint! Clint! Gender isn’t real! It’s a social construct. Clint! Wake up!” in his sleep-deprived face.

Agender!Kate “It’s Hawkeye, not Lady-Hawkeye” Bishop.

Agender!Kate who kicks the butt of some bigots, then exits the room shouting “Gender’s for losers”.

Agender!Kate who gets made fun of because “if she doesn’t want to be treated like a girl maybe she shouldn’t wear a catsuit in a girly color” but can always count on Clint barging in with the most ridiculous purple uniforms to inform people that no, purple is not in fact a girly color.

(It’s a little bit of a girly color, but who cares, GENDER ISN’T REAL CLINT)