(Part 2 of 2)

Also, to challenge your idea that people are "trying to be special" or "stand out", I (and many others who use some of these labels) primarily use these labels privately. They are useful for me, mainly for helping me to understand my own sexuality and romantic feelings, my attractions and interests. I very rarely tell people that I am gray-aromantic or allosexual; usually I only do when the topic comes up, like when someone else brings it up, as you have here.

Also, I don't feel constrained by labels. I used to identify as a straight male, when I was younger. Then I realized I was also sometimes attracted to men. Then I realized I didn't identify as fully male, in part when I discovered terms like "genderqueer" and "nonbinary". So the labels I used evolved and changed. But they aren't there to constrain me in a box. Rather, I find a lot of them liberating. For example, for me, "nonbinary" helped me to realize that I didn't need to feel the need to answer a question of: "Am I a trans woman?" in a strict "yes" or "no" way. In some ways my experience is similar to that of trans women, and in other ways it is similar to that of cis men, and in yet other ways it might be different from both. I don't assume either that other people will feel similarly to me about gender, just because they also wear the "nonbinary" label.

If you don't like labels, then don't use them for yourself. The point of them is that they are empowering for some people. They are useful to help people understand themselves, they are useful to help people communicate useful information to others, and they're also useful to help people connect with communities of people who share certain experiences in common with them. All of these are valid, constructive uses, and you would do well to acknowledge these reasons in how you talk about the use of such labels.

You are critical of "stereotyping" and "us vs them", yet here you have engaged in your own negative stereotyping of people who use labels, saying negative things about these people. I would strongly recommend examining how you are approaching this, whether you are living by the values you claim to want to promote here.

(Part 1 of 2)

I strongly disagree with your assertion that people using any other labels are "trying to be special" or trying somehow to redefine who they are or stand out.

I can think of several reasons for this. One of them is the use of heteroflexible or homoflexible, which communicate primary interest in one gender but occasional or some interest in other(s). This label is useful for people who might technically qualify as bi/pan, but don't want to use these labels because they do have a strong preference or tendency for attraction for one gender. This can be useful to avoid criticism of "But you're not really gay / straight, because you dated such-and-such person." while avoiding getting a lot of unwanted attention from the gender you are less interested in.

Another, completely different reason, is that sexuality is more than just what gender(s) you are attracted to. There is the whole phenomenon of the asexual spectrum and the aromantic spectrum. And this gets at yet another reason for the additional labels, which is that in some people, sexual and romantic orientation don't always line up.

For example, it's relatively common for people to be sexually interested in both women and men, but only desire relationships with one gender. These people can then describe themselves as bisexual but either heteroromantic or homoromantic. Again, it serves to communicate clearly what types of connections a person is open to. It's useful to avoid unwanted attention as well as to locate and connect with the people you want to connect with, while communicating clear expectations to them.

I also think that labels are not inherently tied to an "us vs. them" mentality. I personally abhor this sort of mentality, but I still use labels. I don't use them to say or imply that I will relate better to people who have similar labels. In fact, this isn't even true. For example, I'm allosexual (not on the asexual spectrum) but I find that I relate really well to asexual people and other people on the ace spectrum. I'm also on the aromantic spectrum, but have generally been fine with dating alloromantic people.

Haha...that's how I feel when I try to describe how someone looks.

I also avoid this word for the same reason...it has too many different interpretations. I've had it be misconstrued before.

I think our society also has it worse than the language alone would make it be, because there are subcultures (both religious and various non-religious social movements) that use the word "love" heavily, in a non-romantic way, but people in society have varying degrees (from none to intense) of involvement in these subcultures.

I don't think I really got this until now.

Only as long as they don't screw it up! Maybe Sylvia could make it into an animated film?

Apologies, it was baboons, not chimps:
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/13/science/no-time...

My experience has been that different individual humans vary greatly in the degree to which they desire and/or are comfortable with monogamy (which are two separate issues too: some people want it, but aren't comfortable with, it, and others vice versa).

I don't find it particularly accurate or empowering to make generalizations about humans being or not being naturally monogamous. When you look at the individuality of all the different human relationships out there, and the way different people and different cultures have different boundaries, you realize that monogamy isn't an "either/or" distinction, but rather, that different people and cultures have different beliefs and practices about relationships, and there is a great deal of gray area.

This is also true of other animal species. For example, in species of birds, mating / breeding systems often change in response to constraints, like availability of resources, structure of their environment, population density, etc. It also can be due to culture (even in animals); I recall reading a study some time ago in which the "alpha males" of a group of chimpanzees were inadvertently killed when they all ate poisoned meat that they had hoarded for themselves and not shared with others. But the new social order that arose, rather than having new "alpha males", didn't have alpha males at all and was less top-down structured, more egalitarian, and more welcoming of outside males, and that this new social order seemed as stable as the old one.

Haha...wow...I love how this one gets into the weird sort of indirect drama that could only exist in situations involving a mind-reader.

This is interesting, until this comic, I never really thought about how, although Brian can read minds, he cannot necessarily anticipate how someone will react ahead of time to something he hasn't said yet. So he's still able to put his foot in his mouth just like everyone else. Maybe this explains his somewhat reserved personality, where he often remains silent so he can listen to other people's thoughts. Maybe there's a lesson here in how to better communicate with other people, even for those of us who can't read minds.