Yeah its very damaging especially for young people the way media portrays “good relationships” as being constantly stimulating, always saying the perfect thing, very little in the way of arguments or disagreements, etc. So many young people are confused and feel like shit because they can’t come up with some new conversation topic or whatever. It’s okay to chill in silence around loved ones, really is very normal
for sure, although in another sense it’s kind of how it’s always been, except that the internal pressure of the fear of being known and accepted was countered by the external pressure of heteronormative social expectations, so that, even disregarding widespread domestic abuse, people would feel obligated to struggle for love, or at least security.
i think what we need has not yet fully been born.
