My daughter was chatting with me about someone flirting with her online when she casually dropped the term: “arrow ace.” Aroace. She explained it meant she felt little to no romantic or sexual attraction, and she wondered out loud if it had something to do with her complete lack of interest in porn.
I didn’t dismiss her feelings. Unwanted flirting is uncomfortable, especially from some random guy online. And in today’s flood of explicit content, it makes sense that a thoughtful, sensitive young woman like my daughter might look at the hypersexualized environment around her and think, “That’s not for me.” To be perfectly clear, it wasn’t her lack of interest in sex that caught my attention. It was the speed with which she reached for a ready-made identity label to explain it.
What she was describing — relating to other people primarily as people, not as potential romantic or sexual partners — used to be considered completely normal. For decades and probably much longer, that was simply how many adolescents experienced the world. You had friends, pals, teammates, and classmates. You formed real bonds without the constant overlay of “Is this heading somewhere?” Romance and sex could wait. They usually did. It wasn’t a special orientation. It was just being a kid.
Today, that ordinary developmental stage has been turned into its own sexual category, complete with flags, communities, and TikTok explanations. Complete normality has been rebranded as a niche identity. That inversion is disturbing.
Normal Versus Aroace
For the vast majority of human history, what we now call “aroace” wasn’t an identity. It was part of growing up.
Most adolescents went through a long stretch during which romance and sex were not central to their lives. They related to other people as, you know, people: friends, classmates, teammates, study partners, fellow band members, or church youth group kids. You had intense, meaningful friendships (including deeply affectionate same-sex relationships) without anyone assuming it carried romantic or sexual weight. And it didn’t; it was completely innocent. Crushes might come and go, but they weren’t mandatory. Many teens simply weren’t that interested yet, and that was fine, even expected. The culture provided space to develop as whole persons before the romantic script kicked in.
There was no pressure to self-define your sexuality. Porn wasn’t in every pocket. Social media wasn’t broadcasting hypersexualized relationships as the baseline for normal teenage life. “Just being pals” wasn’t considered a lack — it was a healthy stage of development. Attraction, when it arrived, often came gradually, in the context of real-life interaction, shared values, and growing maturity. For some people, it arrived later. That variation was normal, too.
Today, that same natural disinterest or delayed interest gets its own flag, special color, and acronym. A thoughtful teenager who looks at the oversexualized landscape — the porn, the hookup culture, the constant romantic pressure — and says “I’m not feeling any of that” is no longer allowed to simply be a normal kid figuring things out. She is invited to declare herself “aroace,” join a community, and adopt it as a core part of her identity. What was once the unmarked default has become a marked minority status.
This is a disturbing symptom of how thoroughly the social world our kids navigate has been sexualized. When early and constant exposure to explicit content becomes the assumed norm for preteens and teens, then opting out of that world looks like a special condition instead of a healthy response.
The Danger of Leading with a Label
I know how easy it is to turn a single aspect of your life into your entire public identity — because I did it myself.
Years after my own experience of sexual abuse, I led with that story in almost every new friendship or acquaintance. It was not quite my opening line, but it came early in the conversation. It was my shield, my explanation for who I was. Hi, I’m the girl who was molested. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I was using the trauma as armor. It kept people from looking too closely at the rest of me. I genuinely believed that was the most important, defining thing about me. Everything else felt secondary.
A wise friend who was also a therapist finally called me on it. “You’re using this as a shield,” he said, “so no one needs to look any further. You don’t think the rest of you is worth sharing.” I recoiled at first, but realized almost immediately that he was right. And once I stopped leading with the frozen, unchanging description — “the abused girl” — and started showing up as a full person in motion, my relationships became deeper and more authentic. I had far more to offer than that one painful chapter. I simply had not realized it.
Similarly, “aroace” offers a clear, ready-made explanation for why unwanted flirting feels off-putting and why porn holds zero appeal to some people. It provides community, language, and a sense of identity in a confusing world. But it also risks becoming the same kind of shield I once used. When a teenager declares “I am aroace,” she may unintentionally close the door on exploring the rest of who she is: her curiosity, her humor, her talents, her changing feelings over time. The label becomes the headline rather than a passing observation in the long, unfolding story of a growing and developing human being.
Verb vs. Noun: Freezing the Normal
Sexuality and attraction were once understood as verbs, actions, and experiences that move and change. You feel attraction (or you don’t). You develop an interest. You respond to people in different ways at different times. These things shift with age, confidence, experiences, environment, and simple maturity. They are fluid because human development is fluid.
Modern identity culture turned them into nouns. “I am aroace.” The label freezes the current state as a fixed trait, a core part of who you are. It stops being “I’m not really interested in romance or sex right now” (or “with you”) and becomes “This is my orientation.” Once it’s a noun, changing your mind later isn’t just growth, but it feels like erasing or betraying part of your identity. The people around you often treat it the same way.
The aroace label is especially seductive for thoughtful teens today. In a world drowning in porn, explicit content, and premature romantic pressure, it offers a complete and respectable opt-out. But that completeness is the problem. It freezes what should remain open. A girl who currently has no interest in porn or online flirting isn’t broken or uniquely wired. She may simply be developing at her own pace, the same pace that used to be ordinary. By turning that ordinary pace into a permanent identity, we rob her of the freedom to change naturally, without drama or self-doubt.
This is nothing new. Over twenty years ago, right after my husband Clark and I got engaged, I called a liberal friend with the news. His response was telling: “Oh, my word. Wow. Now I need to build Clark a new box.”
He had long insisted gamers don’t commit. When Clark defied the box, my friend didn’t simply say, “Huh, I was wrong about him.” He needed an entirely new category. Old box discarded, new box installed.
That moment has stayed with me because it shows how easy it is to reach for rigid categories — to reach for an easy-to-parse digital version of reality rather than the rich but complicated analog it really is. Today’s teens are doing the same thing on a much larger scale, using labels like aroace to turn ordinary developmental stages into fixed identities.
Related: Eliminate Toxic Masculinity, Ladies — Marry Men and Have Kids
Make Teens Normal Again
My daughter’s emotions are justified. In a world that bombards young people with porn, explicit imagery, and relentless romantic pressure, it is understandable, even healthy, to push back and say, “That’s not for me right now.” Her disinterest is not the problem. The problem is the culture’s insistence that this disinterest must be named, flagged, and frozen into a permanent sexual identity.
We do not need to turn ordinary adolescent development into a clinical category. Being more interested in people as people — as friends, companions, and fellow humans — rather than as romantic or sexual prospects used to be a normal and respected stage of growth. It still should be.
What I want for my daughter is the freedom I eventually gave myself: the freedom to move beyond any single label or shield. To let her attractions, interests, and feelings develop at their own pace without declaring them a fixed destiny. To build her sense of self around what she does — her inquisitiveness, her generosity, her humor, her talents, her evolving relationships — rather than what she currently does not feel.
The most radical thing a teenager can be today might be… normal.
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