Life is weird sometimes.

What is love?

Posted: March 4th, 2004 | Author: admin | Filed under: LJ | 13 Comments »

If someone on the street came and told you they loved you, what would you think?

If your best friend of the same gender as yourself told you they loved you, what would you think?

If your best friend of the opposite gender told you they loved you, how would you react?

This is what I have observed in America:

It seems that most people wouldn’t think twice if a random person told them they loved them, and they would probably laugh it off nervousily and think that person is crazy, kidding, or just trying to get a rise out of them.
Most people would react happily to their best friend of the same gender telling them they loved them, knowing that their best friend wouldn’t say such a thing without really meaning it. It also would likely have NO sexual undertones of any kind (barring certain situations).
Yet, try telling a person of the opposite sex you love them. They’ll immedietly think sexual thoughts. If they feel such thoughts towards you, there will be a drive to either have sex or to “date.” If they do not feel sexual thoughts for you, they are likely to think that you are, and that you have some sort of desire to be intimate sexually with them.

Therein lies the underlying problem: the word love is really a few different emotions, covered by the same word in our language. There are three separate emotions I have identified, that the word “love” covers:

  1. Sexual-Based love, such as that between 2 people who have engaged in intercourse, or other sexual based activites with each other. Example: A boyfriend of 6 months is struggling if it is the right time to tell his girlfriend that he loves her. He knows that the word “love” has a huge social meaning to the female, and to their relationship, and he knows that doing so will project the relationship further closer.

  2. The love between a family member, or a close longtime friend. This kind of love is based upon relationships and sometimes obligation. It stems from longterm intimacy (NOT sexual intimacy, just plain intimacy) Example: A child to his/her mother: “I love you Mommy”

  3. Universal Love. My kind of love. The love one feels for their fellow beings, mankind, animals, plants, etc. This kind of love is not often felt by the general population, at least from what i’ve observed. It’s the love you feel when you realise that everything on earth is connected in the most intimate and special way. It is also my experience that the more of this love you feel, the more you get back. Example: St. Francis of Assisi spent a large amount of his life outside and in nature. He truely LOVED the animals and all mankind.

I don’t know, maybe I’m the only one who feels this, but I think our society really has a problem with love. At the minimum we should have 3 separate words for the different kinds of love. I would be willing to bet that there are many other cultures that have separate words for all these kinds of love, and kinds I can’t even describe with our language.

Anyone have thoughts on this? I’m curious to see what other people think.

13 Comments on “What is love?”

  1. 1 misterkleen said at 10:11 pm on July 31st, 2010:
  2. 2 misterkleen said at 8:38 am on March 4th, 2004:

    Love is a lie spawned by the eternal spring of human hope. A desperate need to find others to fill the hollow chasms of our own lives.

    Fuck love and all of it’s lies.

  3. 3 misterkleen said at 9:18 am on March 4th, 2004:

    …sorry about that. Thinking more calmly and rationally though, I still have a difficult time believing in the existance of love at all beyond family.

    BTW it’s good to hear from you after so long.

  4. 4 about_that said at 11:31 am on March 4th, 2004:

    Not true with the whole opposite gender thing. I have a few really close guy friends that have said “I love you” to me, and that never led any sexual thoughts to come to mind at all. The only time I believe that to be true, at least from this female’s perspective, is if you are already attracted to the guy that says that.

    But everyone knows males and females are quite different when it comes to scenarios such as these. For the most part.

  5. 5 morganogrom said at 2:25 pm on March 4th, 2004:

    You’re absolutely right.

  6. 6 roxy99ed said at 2:33 pm on March 4th, 2004:

    I agree with all of that.

    It’s funny how a word can be so confusing, and have so many different meanings.

  7. 7 kitten9i6 said at 2:37 pm on March 4th, 2004:

    this is interesting. in my sociology class we were talking about culture and the importance of symbols and language. some other cultures have many different words for love. i can not remember where but in one country they have like ten words just for bananas. here in America however, which things do we have a million words for? sex, alcohol, and food. only ONE word for Love. hmmm.

  8. 8 dowathowi5 said at 2:48 pm on March 4th, 2004:

    in japanese and greek there are 3 words for love… i dunno the japanese, but greek is filia, eros, and agape. familial, sexual, and love for god. it’s funny that the only word out of those three that most english speaking people know is “eros” because freud popularized it.

  9. 9 dowathowi5 said at 2:56 pm on March 4th, 2004:

    you forgot “OMG i love those shoes” (Brave New World Love), the love of the unchanging.
    i think universal love is for people on drugs like diazepam, no offense.

  10. 10 roxy99ed said at 6:01 pm on March 4th, 2004:

    In the Philippines :)

  11. 11 misterkleen said at 6:30 pm on March 4th, 2004:

    Ah-haha!
    Brave New World love.
    That’s clever. You make that up?

  12. 12 kitten9i6 said at 5:11 am on March 5th, 2004:

    that’s right.. you must have been listening to Elaine Leeder! did you know that there are blogrings about her? she’s one popular chic

  13. 13 roxy99ed said at 5:26 am on March 5th, 2004:

    She is fucking awesome. But blogrings?? Where are those at?

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