We are the Builders

[mesotablar]

This is my entry for February Carnival of Aros which I was hosting :)
The topic was 'Community'

We are the Builders

Communities might have buildings or spaces where they happen. They might have logos and mottos and flags. Gatherings, advertisement, events, vocabulary, celebrations, rhetoric, songs, information, symbols and statistical data.

But without individuals they are nothing.

Community is the connection we feel to the people around us. Even on the internet, if my word pixels can be next to your word pixels; If I can read experiences, thoughts and opinions then I know that there is a person behind those sentences, then we are connected. You share with me and I share with you. This is both a very fragile and a very powerful thing. In the best of times it can bring healing and empowerment! In the worst of times it can undermine your sense of self and make you feel hunted.

We as individuals make the choice to make our communities supportive or restrictive, welcoming or not.

I count myself as lucky to have discovered aromanticism and found that I can join in the ranks of all the other wonderful aro-spec people out there. By the nature of things, I only have a connection to my aro community through virtual spaces, and for me those virtual spaces have been places of empowerment. I try to give back the bounty you all have gifted to me by sharing your knowledge, experiences and opinions, of offering your connections.

I have found communities to belong in on Arocalypse, Dreamwidth, Wordpress, Tumblr, DeviantArt, Reddit and LiveJournal, even on AO3! In tiny blog posts and in sites that boast members into the hundreds. I have found stories like mine and those that are different, and with each of those stories I see an individual with a life, and my world becomes a bit richer.

But I know through pain of experience that to tie my identity to one community is a great risk, so in almost all of the places I feel I belong I use a different name. I don’t mean to be duplicitous, I just fear to be singled out and cut off from the people, the communities, that have given me so much self-awareness and healing.

I guess my little message for you dear readers is please keep striving to find new places to connect and treasure the communities you have found.

This is just the first few coins of the treasure that is out there, but here is a linkspam to give you some new places to explore:

For the Visual and Readers:
Agressively Arospec
A Carnival of Aros (list of round ups from previous months)
Agressively Arospec Week AO3 Collection
Arospec Fanworks Week AO3 Collection
Aromantic Writing Month AO3 Collection

For the Commenters:
Arocalypse
r/aromantic
r/aaaaaaaarrrrro

For the Makers:
Gen Freeform Exchange
A Carnival of Aros
Aromantic Official
Aro Worlds Tumblr
AUREA Create Pride

Link to another linkspam:
ysabetwordsmith's Follow Friday: Asexuality and Aromance special
The Aromantic and Asexual Characters Database