Love bombing, gaslighting, and the problem with pathologising dating talk

When we don’t have the words or when our words are overly broad, we run into misconceptions.

Healthy people don't want an unshakable intensity that requires self abandonment to maintain. Media perpetuates this narrative.

"Lose yourself in love.

Go crazy in love.

Do anything, for love. ""

Boundaries? A sign of shaky conviction, surely. Boundaries are for losers.

He introduced me to an idea I hadn’t heard before—a concept named “cruel optimism.” This is when you take a really big problem with deep causes in our culture—like obesity, or depression, or addiction—and you offer people, in upbeat language, a simplistic individual solution. It sounds optimistic, because you are telling them that the problem can b

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“I have been forced to hear again and again the message that self-love is the ‘pinnacle of self-actualization’ and that craving a romantic relationship is a sign of weakness,” says maya finoh, a human rights advocate and model based in Brooklyn. But is our fear of appearing weak just feeding into rampant individualism in the dating climate and, in ... See more

As awful as all this is, the workarounds themselves are often delightful and clever, testaments to the wit and grace of marginalized communities. For example, sex-workers call themselves "accountants." Homophobia is called "cornucopia" and "LGBTQ" becomes "Leg Booty."

This creativity isn't limited to people I admire or agree with: anti-vaxers have a... See more

whatever happens to be the latest term for pathologising your life experience. Everything is flattened, simplified. I worried that being immersed in it was making me think this way too.

- Not so long ago, there was a oppressed tribe of people, scattered throughout a larger population, whose very existence was seen as so taboo, so immoral, so illegal, they had to invent their own language to talk with each other, hidden in plain sight. - Because on the other side of that lay the real threat of not just discrimination, but ostraciza... See more