Ananya M P
The confessions made in a romantic relationship are paradoxical as Derrida once remarked, when one says ‘I love you’, does it mean I love ‘who’ you are or is it actually that I love the ‘way’ you are? Here, both the notions are inherently flawed and conditional as the first implies a rigid and unchanging self while the second relates with only certain mannerisms of the ‘beloved’ which lacks self. Hence, it is difficult to say whether romantic love is unconditional or not. And there comes the love industry under capitalism which manipulates the conditions of love to its own advantage. This industry is largely heteronormative, monogamous and patriarchal, sidelining every other love story that challenges it. The love labourers have a market here, where they are recruited according to their skills. Once in the industry, they are made to do intensive love labour which is exploitative in nature. It is not easy to decipher the currency of love but surely, it is not evenly distributed. It is much like a corporate job sometimes, but without a weekend or a holiday.
Recruitment of the love labourers
Much like any job of the 21st century, love as an industry requires workers who have a market value. The men and women with certain skill sets are hired. However, these skills are not the same as their hiring demands are varied. Attractiveness, education and ‘independence’ appears as a requirement for both men and women. But mostly, the criterion for selection is that women should be less educated than men, but will have a powerful position. Fair skin will be accepted more than other skin tones and this is especially for the women candidates. Women should be modern but not so much that they can go against the system. In other words, they should be ‘lady’ enough and their male counterparts should be ‘man’ enough for the task.
Once these requirements are established, the candidates of love should have some motivation to go by. Jean Baudrillard’s concept of ‘simulacra’ explains this in the sense that love is represented in the world through certain symbolic characteristics and over time, these symbols become more real than reality itself. Valentine’s day, chocolates, red roses, marriage rings, the promise of ‘forever’ are some dominant ‘white- washed’ simulacra of love that the West has sold to us. This is reinforced through movies, songs, books and fairy tales. The attainment of these symbolic incentives become the motivation of the lovers.
The labour of love
The labour of love has a vehement physical and emotional aspect. Emotionally, women are supposed to be care- givers and emotional labourers while men are supposed to be less expressive. He should be attentive to her feelings but should follow an avoidant style which should make her do more. In 1983, Hochschild developed this idea of women as ‘emotional labourers’ but by that she meant in a professional relationship. But extending the same concept to intimate relationships also, the same pattern is observed where the woman should manage her own feelings and at the same time, interpret the emotions of her partner even though he may not say it explicitly. This is more accurately called ‘hermeneutic’ labour than emotional since it requires not only care-giving but also interpretation. Men in the love industry should be caring enough to gift a teddy bear on Valentine’s Day, fight for her with other men and maintain possessiveness over her and her body.
The physical labour also entails women to be objects of lust where men are more in an advantageous position. Capitalism also provides solutions to enhance the sex drive thoroughly but more to the benefit of men. This is not to say that men always subjugate women intentionally but it is true that this is the system and the system demands the lovers to be labourers and it is for the labourers to prescribe to the rules.
Alienation from self and exploitation of lovers
The biggest lie that capitalism sells in romance is the idea of a ‘better half’. That one is not inherently whole but needs another self for completeness is the love industry at work. This other, better half will be based on certain expectations. These days, this is facilitated through online dating platforms and marriage counsellors. But more often than not, these expectations crumble down when the love industry is in a crisis. This is based on the notion of ‘amatonormativity’, as used by Carrie Jenkins in the book ‘What Love Is’, which means the idea that romantic love is the ideal condition for human life and those who are not having romantic ‘fulfilment’ are imperfect or abnormal. Here too, not any romantic love but essentially it should be a heterosexual love affair which is required.
The lovers are exploited by enforcing upon them a monogamous, male-centric institution which eliminates their own preferences of sexuality or of living a life. Anything which goes against the hegemonic love industry gets sidelined in the process. Also, women are the objects of desire and have to ‘elevate’ themselves as per the changing love market. Men are also in fragile position to cater to the new trends of patriarchy but the vulnerability of women pushes them behind further.
‘Currency of love’
There is a book authored by Jill Dodd with the same name, which talks about certain topics relating to vulnerability of love and self-worth, though not completely upon the love industry. Pondering from there, for the labourers of love, for the lovers, what is the currency for the labour? In the capitalist framework, the currency of love could be attained physically, emotionally and socially. While the physical currency could be sexual gratification, emotional currency could mean validation and dependency. Socially, this can take many forms. The marriage institution and dowry, along with many other legal bindings could be a currency and for some, even children could be. Social status and the psychological feeling of ‘being wanted’ could also be a form of reward. There are many other currencies that the love industry provides one with and the economic realms of this are often intertwined with the marriage market. But whatever the currency could be, there is an unfairness in its distribution in this industry. Like any other industry demanding ‘equal pay for equal work’, the love industry also provides unequal wage distribution with women being paid unfairly compared to men for the more exchange value of labour extracted from them.
In conclusion, this is not to say that the narratives of all love stories are capitalised or that all the lovers pursue love as an industry. There could be many stories which are making a revolution. Also, not all love stories are lived for a currency as the process itself could be fulfilling. But the mainstream notion of love story that is sold to us will have a prince and a princess, where the princess will wait in agony for her prince, who is destined to save her. This love industry’s expectation contributes to inculcating selective traits in men and women since childhood. The patriarchal socialisation has a large role in this narrative of hegemonic white and male-centric love that capitalism has branded upon. The process of globalisation and intermixing of cultures made sure that the tradition will also mostly have at least some elements of this hegemony intertwined. Capitalism is not the first to bring about a male- centric idea of love but the commercialisation of this love is precisely the masterpiece of a love industry.
Reference
- Eva Illouz. (2012). Why Love Hurts: A Sociological explanation. Polity Press.
- Anderson, E. (2023). Hermeneutic Labor: The Gendered Burden of Interpretation in Intimate Relationships between Women and Men. Hypatia, 38(1), 177–197. https://doi.org/10.1017/hyp.2023.11
- Hochschild, A. R. (2012). The managed heart. https://doi.org/10.1525/9780520951853
- Levesque, D. (2023, November 1). The simulacrum of romantic love. Bad Philosopher. Retrieved January 30, 2025, from https://badphilosopher.com/love-and-simulacrum/
- Love according to Derrida: a plea. (2015, May 6). Footprints. Retrieved January 30, 2025, from https://footprintings.wordpress.com/english/love-according-to-derrida-a- plea/
- Jenkins, C. (2017). What love is: and what it could be. https://openlibrary.org/books/OL27227525M/What_love_is
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Ananya M P is currently pursuing final year Bachelor’s degree in Sociology from Tata Institute of Social Sciences. Her academic interests span across sociological themes, with a particular focus on gender, intersectionality, and capitalism.
