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What’s it Like Running an Aphobe Hot-takes account?

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Greetings! My internet is absolutely crap right now so I just wanted to do a quick post and the easiest topic I can throw together is about running @Aphobehottakes on Twitter. It’s actually not very exciting.

TW// aphobia because I will be showing some screenshots. yay. Fingers crossed that all of my screenshots still load after I hit “Publish”
(TW is short hand for trigger warning)

I definitely wouldn’t be able to run a similar account for Gender Critical Hot-takes (thankfully somebody else already does) or anti-vaxxers and keep my sanity. I don’t know if I’ve been desensitized to aphobia or something, but it helps that the content is very repetitive. The process is for finding content is easy; I just throw “asexuals” into the Twitter search bar and that usually gives me enough content for the day. Other people also send me screenshots of aphobic Tweets they encounter and I have a list of usual suspects, i.e. regular sock puppets like @proudaphobe (subtle right?)

One thing that I do that I haven’t seen other hot-take accounts do is I intentionally make the screenshots searchable by adding keywords (KW) and I’ll include excerpts/summaries above the screenshots. It’s been very helpful if I need to go back and add to a thread or repost or recall an old screenshot for reference or an example. I originally made the keyword system on the fly, but it’s worked out pretty good so far. I base what I use/accept for content off of GalopUK’s info pages on acephobia and online hate crime factsheets. I highly recommend bookmarking those factsheet links and looking them over if you haven’t done so yet.

Here’s my keywords with some typical-day screenshot examples:

KW: “aphobic and proud”
This is my most used tag and is kind of a catch-all, but I use it for people who show open disdain for aces and/or aros not just general ignorance.

KW: “not lgbt”
This is the next most common tag I use for Tweets that claim that asexuals and/or aromantics aren’t inherently lgbt or need to be SGA or trans to be considered “real” LGBTQ

KW: “just wanna be oppressed”
Pretty self explanatory, people like to claim that asexuals aren’t oppressed or oppressed enough to “claim LGBTQ status”.

KW: “arophobia”
Since aromantic is still a relatively unknown orientation, I actually have a hard time searching for content and usually rely on submissions.

KW: “free diagnosis”
This is actually my favorite tag because it can sometimes be hilarious how armchair “experts” will bend the rules of logic until both ends meet in an attempt explain away or explain how they think asexuality is caused/cured.

KW: “by definition”
Not quite aphobe and proud, I use this tag for people who use the wrong or outdated definition of “asexual”. Screenshots under this tag might not always be malicious because people are sometimes just confused.

KW: “threat of violence”
Not a fun tag. Twitter is also very bad about responding to threats targeting asexuals.

KW: “SAM edition”
This is the tag I use for hate/misinformation about the split attraction model(s). This most common one I see is that SAM was created for aces/aros (lol, that’s a lie) or is only for ace/aro use because it’s harmful to the LGBT community.

Other tags as required:
If I notice a trend I’ll usually add a tag like “racism”, “queerphobic and proud”, “catfish aphobe”, so those posts will be linked with similar keywords. There’s actually a LOT of them so I won’t be listing them here because bigotry is a lot like potato chips, you can’t just have one.

It’s not elegant, but if running the account helps gets the word out and brings attention to the daily barrage of aphobia on Twitter I think it’s time well spent. My favorite thing about running the account is the comments because aces are are absolute sass-masters and it’s very reassuring to have people there to point out the hypocrisy, false logic, or the blatant projection of aphobes.


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