Love has always been a profound theme since ancient times, its manifestations have had variations and trying to define it involves a historical journey crossed by the predominant political ideologies. At the same time, it has been a lethal instrument that capitalism has appropriated to establish a social order to determine what lifestyles should be and how we should relate to constitute erotic-affective bonds.
Proof of this… How many times have we not heard the declaration of “love can and overcomes all” surely many, as they are statements juxtaposed by the proliferation of ideas associated with traditions resorting in the name of love to moralize and establish guidelines for how to live in society; However, have you stopped to think about the psychosocial consequences it has had on couple relationships today?
Many feminists have managed to delve into the idea of romantic love as a social construct within critical gender studies, exposing it as an analytical category to redefine the way in which we relate erotically and emotionally by making visible the chaotic consequences within the heteropatriarchal regime.
In this month of love and friendship, it is advisable to continue disseminating many of the precepts that underpin romantic love to make visible and invite reflection on these heteronormative styles that impact subjectivities and that even generate violence by continuing to establish the logic of conventional gender.
What is romantic love?
Romantic love is what we see in traditional stories, soap operas and media programs; It is the current belief that we have about love by internalizing these conventional stories that have transcended from generation to generation, making it a cultural and popular belief by imposing certain lifestyles, however, it is part of a cultural framework. Have you wondered why?
Many believe that romantic love is a universal, immutable, eternal, ahistorical and only heterosexual feeling; understanding that they are the only premises to found and make a “functional” couple, exclusive and mutually dependent in society by asserting that two people are in love and that it will be that way for the rest of their lives.
In addition to this, asymmetric and hierarchical roles between men and women are expected, establishing supremacist beliefs: The average orange, the fidelity, the monogamy, passion eternal; until ideas normalized that they go since “yes no me cela no me wants”. However, it has antecedents and ideas formed from Western, courtly, Christian, bourgeois and Victorian love; all related to the geopolitical and historical context that underpins the sex-gender system.
Although romantic love is a belief that operates in the social imagination where it must go through the entire Judeo-Christian institutionalization process (being in love they must marry and procreate to continue preserving the species), it is one of the main problems that have caused humiliation and deaths in society.
For understand the context….
Graciela Hierro in her book the ethics of pleasure had denounced the problem by maintaining that despite being a widespread ideology, it is much more attributed to women* unlike men, which is the libertarian ideology which gives them greater social mobility without having catastrophic consequences such as the role of gender violence and which has even culminated in femicides.
Effects harmful of the love romantic:
A study carried out by Incháustegui analyzes several keys to try to understand the problem of socialization and policies in Mexico on the issue of feminicide, asserting that 40.5% of femicides are due to a couple breakup. On the other hand, a study carried out by Rodríguez Salazar, T., and Rodríguez Morales, Z which helps us analyze the impact of communication technologies on contemporary relationships, where if ha seen how since the homogenization cultural ha affected drastically all the correlates: the flirt casual, the courtship, the communication affective, etc; Consequently, although it has stimulated the liberation of the search for a partner by diversifying and facilitating encounters, levels of violence have also increased through the restriction and control associated with supervision, surveillance and suspicion.
Possibly you had not questioned the association that exists between the role of romantic love with the current violence that is experienced, since we have internalized and normalized these honeyed and dramatized ideas of a life “together” and “happy” forever, at the same time stimulating the traditional and asymmetrical gender roles.
Taking this background into account, it is important to reflect on the ways in which we relate erotically and emotionally without producing many of these violences that are based on the name of love and look for signifiers that imply emotional responsibility. Before finishing, it is worth highlighting that, although there are many other ways of relating in the name of love, it is important to question the ways in which we have replicated the stories we have been told and give it this twist that we need in these times and there is no better context than this day of love and friendship.
