the #Jughead mess masterpost

this post marks the last time i’ll be responding to asks about / reblogs of the post i made about the fight for Jughead’s correct portrayal on the CW’s Riverdale. after 3 days of responding to nearly 15 asks / posts on the topic and the anxiety that that has caused me on top of everything else going on in my life, i’m calling it quits on that post. while i still stand by the admittedly unclear point that i was attempting to make, i do apologize to those who were hurt by my unclear wording. i’m also done with talking about asexual representation in general or fandom-related anything anymore. while i appreciate the kind words of encouragement i received, it’s not worth the cost to my mental health to talk about even my own representation anymore.

this post serves as both a future point of reference on the mess that took place on this blog and as a “self-serve” response to the future questions, accusations etc i’ll inevitably receive.

if you’re seeing this post because i linked you to it instead of actually responding to you, sorry not sorry. i’ve already tried my best and am now out of “best” to give. chances are the answer to your question(s) / response to your accusations can be found here. help yourself.

original post: what you mean is “keep Jughead true to character”

questions / accusations / responses:
(quotes are not always direct)

1. “jughead is aro too holy shit.”
2. “i understand what you’re saying, but i’m upset because Jughead won’t be asexual.”
3. “…you trying to act like aces (and aros) are reacting to these news wrong bc they are not rejecting the idea that asexual ppl can’t do romance at all is honestly nonsense bc jughead is not only asexual, he is aromantic…”
   ie. why i chose not to explicitly refer to Jughead as aromantic & why my post was only about (his) asexuality.
4. “I appreciate that you voiced the separation between ace and aro…”
5. “it makes sense to shorten [keep Jugehead true to character] to “keep him ace””
6. “My main concern is that the media is really bad with asexual representation, so my immediate thought is that since they’re giving him romances, it’s less of a “find yourself” journey and more of a “he’s straight now” situation.”
   ie. i also think CW is probably going to fuck up and portray Jughead as heteroromantic heterosexual.
7. the submission to Fuck Yeah Asexual by the anon i pissed off
8. “it is CLEAR from his wording that he means aromantic asexual and yet here you are, trying to strip this rep from us. you couldn’t have chosen a worse character to talk about while raising your flag of diverse ace rep, you arophobe.”
   ie. my usage of “character” was not meant to treat Jughead’s sexuality as a personality quark and i understand that aromanticism can be an intrinsic part of a person’s asexuality, but why does that forbid me from talking about only one section of that intersectionality?
9. “So what if aroaces want to conflate asexuality with aromanticism? How dare you demand that I be two pasted together orientations, actually.”
   ie. i still don’t understand how i did this and would still love to get some clarity on this (i suspect i understand, but?), but at this point am calling it quits on this particular post.
10. “how can you say aro aces have plenty of representation compared to romantic aces??? When have aces ever been explicitly aromantic in the media???”
11. “I’m not fighting for any “One True Asexual Narrative”, I’m fighting for Jughead’s Asexual Narrative. I am fighting for the narrative that could allow others to empathize with me, and give me something to relate to so I don’t feel like shit about my asexuality after watching too much TV. Please don’t attack us for wanting to see people like ourselves on TV, thanks. There is a huge difference between wanting to see someone like yourself and wanting “one true asexual narrative”–I honesetly do not understand how you came to this conclusion, this is one example, and there really are not any others in this medium? so how is there a pattern?”
    ie. yeah, fucked up and should have been clearer and not suggested that people are of a hivemind and are all fighting for a singular thing for a singular reason. that said, the pattern i spoke of does exist and here are some examples of it.
12. “You have no right to be upset, no one even did the stuff you’re claiming. Your reaction to Jughead’s erased aromanticism is “and?” You didn’t even care and that really hurt and made me feel attacked. I see the pattern you spoke of, but that has nothing to do with Jughead because he is canon ace and all those other examples are headcanons. Aces fighting for an already ace character to stay ace (in a way that includes his aromantic tendencies) is nothing like your examples.”
    ie.  ……once again, no matter how intersectional your or Jughead’s asexuality might be, my post was about one thing and one thing only and that was not aromanticism. it’d be nice if people would acknowledge that. also, there is a pattern with Jughead that ties into what i spoke of and the pattern affects more than just asexuals.
13. “It still sounds a lot like you honestly think romantic aces are the ones being erased. My problem with this is that aro aces and especially allo aros are erased so much of the time in ace communities, yet when aro aces make something about them romantic aces scream erasure while completely ignoring the context.”
    ie. i do not think that romantic aces are “the ones” being erased. i was attempting to point out that more than one group of asexuals can be hurt by something, that the response to something hurtful can in and of itself also be hurtful to others if we are not careful. nothing i said was even about aromantic vs romantic aces and aces aren’t even the only ones being hurt.

or you could just browse my entire #Jughead tag in chronological order.