On the Many Slippery Meanings of “Love”

“Love” is a word that has been used in many, many different ways. We may choose to emphasize some meanings over others, reject some entirely, or bring different ones into focus at different times, but at each step of the way, I think it’s important to maintain an awareness that you are making a selection — a choice — out of many possible choices.

Content note: in order to cover a broad range of examples, this post discusses some heavy topics, including conflict with family, religious commentary, and quotes/links/examples including overt racism and attempted suicide. Mostly these are brief and possible to scroll past, but I want to give people a heads up that this post does touch on topics of that nature.

[Crossposted to Pillowfort. Preview image: Banana Peel by Glenn, licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0.]

I want to believe you

You want to have a conversation about the valorization of “love”? Great — I hope you mean it.

[Crossposted to Pillowfort. Preview image by Tristan Chambers, licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.]

Equating Sex with Love is Rape Culture

I came to a startling realization the other morning.

It’s long been acknowledged in the asexual community that romantic relationships don’t have to feature sex, that people shouldn’t be censoring the f-word with the word “love” as a replacement, and that loving someone doesn’t necessarily mean having or wanting to have sex with them.  However, it seems like whenever the false equivalence between love and sex is criticized, it’s usually pointed out as simply inaccurate rather than as wrong.

This is not a post about how aces (esp. in the context of romantic relationships) feel pressured into having sex, a subject which has been covered well by others elsewhere.  This is a post about “love” as rape apologism.