Love Knows No Hierarchy: Decentering Romance in an Amatonormative World

But that’s how grave I truly felt about it. Looking back, I realized my grief was disenfranchised. I was feeling ashamed of the profundity of my pain and finding it difficult to share it with anyone with the fear of being told, “Get over it. It’s not that big of a deal.”

I would have escaped the stigma if this was a romantic falling out. At least, people would easily understand how I have been feeling.

Why am I taking this so hard? Why am I acting as if I have lost a significant other? What even constitutes people that we consider our significant others? Why does it feel like my hurting is not and should not be as equally heartfelt as splitting up with one’s love of their life?

The answer came to me in memories of friendships drifting off as soon as one becomes partnered, moments of friends fixated on finding “that” person that will make them whole and be everything to them, and my mom telling me and my siblings how she understands that once we build our own families, she’s crossed off the priority list.

It is in the media we consume, in tales of happily ever after and marital idyll. It is in the air, electric with untold promise. “Poor you, you must be so lonely. Let me set you up. There’s plenty of fish in the sea.”

This widespread disproportionate prioritization of romantic connections above all else is called amatonormativity. ‘Amato’ pertains to romantic love, while ‘normativity’ describes what is considered societally typical.

Coined by American philosopher Elizabeth Brake, amatonormativity is the culturally embedded belief that having a central, exclusive, and amorous relationship is essential to one’s well-being. It perpetuates the assumption that having a romantic relationship is universally aimed for and desired.

Amatonormativity puts romance on a pedestal such that in elevating some relationship categories over other kinds, it relegates interpersonal bonds that do not qualify as “romantic” steps below.

In enforcing the notion that other forms of love are only secondary to romantic love, people that do not put romance at the center of their lives, such as those who prioritize other types of relationships (friendships, family, community, etc.) or people that do not fit into its patterns—single people, aromantic individuals, and those who reject relationship hierarchy, among many others—may feel isolated or discriminated against.

It romanticizes the idea of romance in such a way that it harms uncoupled individuals by making us feel flawed and inadequate as another day goes by that we are not someone’s object of desire.

Isn’t it frustrating how society stigmatizes being single?

From hearing, “Uy, binata/dalaga kana. May jowa kana?” in family or social gatherings to memes about growing up and dying alone, there is so much pressure for single people to seek romantic love. We become so uncomfortable with being single that we get into relationships because of the fear of being alone or stay in unhealthy relationships at the cost of our happiness.

Not only does amatonormativity affect individuals that do not satisfy its checklist, it hurts those that do as well.

With romance elevated to an unattainable ideal, we set unrealistic standards for the people we have romantic connections with. We expect our partners to be everything to us: our best friend, confidant, lover, cheerleader, caregiver, homemaker, and the person to live and have kids with all in one package.

It sets us up for disappointment. Oftentimes, we keep breaking up with people one after another in chasing the perfect person.

Overly romanticizing and centering romance distorted our expectations on relationships and human connection.

Tied to other kinds of social ‘normativity’—cis, hetero-, mono-, and sexual normativity—psychotherapist and gender, sexual, and relationship diversity specialist Dr. Meg-John Barker said in an interview with BBC Bitesize that these frameworks reinforce each other to uphold the overall ‘norm’ of being “in one gender yourself, to fall in love with someone of the opposite gender, and to form a monogamous relationship with them where you have sex and get more and more committed over time: getting married, having a family, and trying to stay together for life.”

These patriarchal constructs intersect in maintaining the formation of a nuclear family unit as the ultimate goal of romantic coupledom. And under capitalism, the nuclear family is the ideal basic economic unit, as its structure aligns well with the capitalist values of property ownership, consumption, and self-reliance.

By centering the nuclear family, other forms of kinship are marginalized. As other support structures such as friendships, chosen families, and communities involve mutual care and resource sharing, they are less profitable and are more difficult to control and monetize.

According to The Ace and Aro Advocacy Project, the resulting isolation of couples and nuclear family units from a wider community network erodes community efficacy as a result of weakened alternative support system structures, leaving people unable to organize for mutual aid or activism purposes and promote social solidarity.  

In making community support hinged on a hierarchy of blood family and romantic partnerships, it keeps the poor and the working class from effectively organizing themselves and reliant on the system enforced by and for capitalism.

Marriage as an institution is claimed to be the cornerstone of community. However, the consequences of undivided attention marriage demands prove otherwise.

Rhaina Cohen, in her book The Other Significant Others, explored how marriage is a “greedy institution,” as it often strains community ties in lieu of cultivating them, citing a study involving an analysis of large national surveys of Americans from the 1990s to 2000s by sociologists Naomi Gerstel and Natalia Sarkisian.

Gerstel and Sarkisian found that people who are married were less likely than those unmarried or divorced to live with, visit, or call their relatives; were less likely to take care of aging parents than unmarried adult children; socialized less with neighbors or friends; and were less politically involved.

Not only is marriage a greedy institution in the sense that once people marry, their relationship consumes almost all of their time and attention, but the legal privileging of heterosexual marriage disenfranchises people who are in same-sex relationships, queerplatonic partnerships, non-monogamous relationships, and the like.

Certainly, marriage equality would grant same-sex couples the same legal rights and privileges as heterosexual couples.

But assimilation into oppressive structures reinforces inequality rather than dismantling it.

It betrays the promise of queer liberation and constrains queer people in subscribing to an inherently heteronormative and problematic institution.

Paula Ettelbrick, a prominent legal figure in the queer movement, maintained that same-sex marriage denies justice to a fuller range of people as it “would set an agenda for gaining rights for a few, but would do nothing to correct the power imbalances between those who are married (whether gay or straight) and those who are not.”

We advocate for the establishment of a legal foundation for same-sex couples to have the same benefits that are gatekept for straight couples, like rights to property, adoption of a child as partners, the right to decide for one's spouse in critical situations, and many more. 

But fundamentally, the privileges heterosexual married couples enjoy should not even be tied up into marriage.

How about those that are in committed queerplatonic partnerships, polyamorous relationships, or queer people cohabiting or co-parenting but do not have plans of getting married? Isn't their love real and genuine as well? Aren't they deserving of the same rights too? 

We should stop determining who among us is only allowed to get matrimony. True equality constitutes everyone enjoying the same rights and privileges, regardless of race, gender, sexuality, and social standing.

So what now? Does this mean that we should all abandon romantic love? Should we replace romance with an alternative form of love?

No, and no.

Romantic relationships can be fulfilling, especially when authentically desired and sought out. Having a partner where you both consensually and mindfully navigate goals of cohabitation, getting married, and having children is absolutely fine too.

Just as Bernadette Soriano eloquently illustrated the essence of LGBTQIA+ liberation in an ExplainedPH column, “the aim is not to invert the hierarchy, to crown queerness as norm. It is to dismantle the very premise of normativity,” the same goes for decentering romance.

Love need not be stratified. It is not in putting romantic love at an inferior position in the love hierarchy that we challenge amatonormativity. It is in destroying the pedestal altogether.

Valuing one form of love over another chains us to a fabricated belief of the “scarcity of love,” when really all forms of love and types of relationships are equally fulfilling and nourishing. 

It’s about acknowledging that although love can come in diverse shapes, each one is as important and valuable as the others. 

Relationships should be designed based on trust, commitment, and mutual agreement, not entitlements. And love should not be defined by labels and hierarchies. It must be felt, expressed, and appreciated just as it is.

Love as it is.

In its purest form, free from idealized notions and societal expectations, love knows no hierarchy.