Love & Politics
This article was co-authored with Jessica Swerbilow
Love is accepting people as they are. It is the space to be yourself and allowing others the space to be themselves. In this sense, love is freedom.
Love is treating each and every human being as an end in themselves, not as a means to something else. Love is beyond duty, obligation, and force.
All of this is obvious in our personal lives.
In marriage, we want someone to love us for who we are, rather than from a sense of duty or obligation or because they were pressured to. It’s love as a choice, not as a “should.” We don’t want to be forced to marry someone.
In work, we want an environment that supports who we are. We want the work we do to be what we love — work that is an expression of our deepest self, not what we “should” be doing. We don’t want to be forced to work somewhere.
In day-to-day living, the space to be yourself means associating with whoever you want. To travel where you want. To read and study what you want. To listen to the music you want. To watch the films you want. To eat and drink what you want. To say what you want. To believe in what you want. We don’t want to be forced to do anything that we don’t want to do.
All of that is love expressed as an individual. What is love expressed as a society? In other words: as politics?
The political expression of love is creating the protections (boundaries) that allow people the space to be. It’s not forcing anything. It’s not imposing a duty, a debt, or an obligation upon anyone.
Love is treating each and every human being as an end in themselves, not as a means to something else — no matter how noble the intentions may be.
Love is a society beyond force.
Love is a free society.
