Love at Valentine’s

The reason I love my wife is entirely selfish. And I’ve told her this, many times. Despite being told so often that only selfless love is valid, it’s what my wife does for me that causes me to love her (as, I’m reliably informed, is the reason she loves me back). The way she looks, [...]

February 11, 2007

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The reason I love my wife is entirely selfish. And I’ve told her this, many times. Despite being told so often that only selfless love is valid, it’s what my wife does for me that causes me to love her (as, I’m reliably informed, is the reason she loves me back). The way she looks, acts, talks; these things evoke love from me because I enjoy them – not for any philanthropic reason whatsoever. I’m not loving her because I feel any moral virtue in treating someone the way I treat her; I’m loving her because of what she does for me. If she didn’t please me to my standards, I wouldn’t love her. And – believe me – I want her love for me to be as selfish as mine is for her: the idea of her loving me out of compassion or any other selfless reason is repellent to me. Who wants love out of sacrifice alone? I want her to want me for her own selfish reasons, or not at all. That dynamic makes me feel good.

Although I’ve always thought this way about my relationship with my wife, I’d never heard anyone else say it… until tonight. Dr. Gary Hull (Ayn Rand Institute, The Ayn Reader) has written a wonderful little article for Valentine’s Day which says exactly that, and constitutes an Objectivist (or egoist) approach to love:

“You would be indignant to learn that you are being ‘loved,’ not for anything positive you offer your lover, but–like any recipient of alms–for what you lack. Yet that is the perverse view of love entailed in the belief that it is self-sacrificial. Genuine love is the exact opposite. It is the most selfish experience possible, in the true sense of the term: it benefits your life in a way that involves no sacrifice of others to yourself or of yourself to others.”

Read the rest of this great article here, and have a happy and self-centred Valentine’s Day.

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10 Comments

  1. Phil Chichester on February 12, 2007 | Permalink

    I love how the objectivists go for the dichotomies! I agree with this and I think it’s among the more realistic ways of looking at things like relationships, and you mention the word egoist, I think that’s a good way of looking at human relations, they are inherently self-centric and I’m not sure that’s a bad thing.

  2. Stephen on February 12, 2007 | Permalink

    John:

    Damn you! I was going to blog about this!!!

    Anyhow, you are right. No one loves anyone selflessly. You love someone because you find them attractive, they interest you, you enjoy their company, you love being with them. Who ever got married solely for the benefit of the other party? And how long would such a marriage last? And, isn’t it terribly patronising?

    This notion of love isn’t unromantic or debasing. It’s the highest compliment you could pay your wife – no one else in the world but she meets your standard. No one but she “does it” for you.

    Stephen

  3. John Wright on February 12, 2007 | Permalink

    Stephen- Sorry to preempt your article! We, unfortunately, occupy a world in which the virtue of selfishness (also the title of a great book on the subject) has come under attack from those who think the only virtue is in self-sacrifice rather than self-interest. Selfishness is regarded as tasteless and anti-progress by the Left and is regarded as immoral by the Right, yet it holds the key to making society work. If my wife was sacrificing herself to love me, it wouldn’t be the kind of love I would want.

    The funny thing is; everyone knows this, instinctively. It would be the end of any relationship to find out that the real dynamic of that relationship is compassion for the other, or pity, or even guilt, sorrow or empathy. Instead, people relish being loved for what they “do” for the other. As Phil comments above, this is a true dichotomy; it isn’t a mixture of selfishness and selflessness. The entire arrangement is selfish. And that’s what’s so great about it. That’s what makes it work.

    In any case, please feel free to expand on this in a blog this week: it’s a topic I love (for selfish reasons of course).

  4. Helen on February 12, 2007 | Permalink

    Oh how bloody romantic of you two. “I love you for me.” You’d get a smack round the mouth if you tried it with me.

  5. Anonymous on February 13, 2007 | Permalink

    C’mon boys, in your own cases, surely love was more a case of ‘wow – I found someone with low enough standards to sleep with me!’

  6. John Wright on February 13, 2007 | Permalink

    Helen says- “You’d get a smack round the mouth if you tried it with me.” Perhaps, dear, that’s why we’re not trying it with you, or anything else, for that matter.

    Anonymous- You sure seem to know a lot about me to make that assumption. You’re not disagreeing with the article then?

  7. RP on February 13, 2007 | Permalink

    But when I give a Valentine’s gift, are you saying that I’m just giving it so I can get one in return? That isn’t the case at all, and especially it isn’t the case when I or my husband just bring something to one another without any reason at all, just to make the other happy. That is selfless love, and it certainly is better than what you’re suggesting here.

  8. John Wright on February 13, 2007 | Permalink

    RP- No, not at all! But when you give a Valentine’s gift, you’re giving it so that you can gain the happiness involved in seeing the look on your partner’s face and knowing that they’ve enjoyed it. It is your love in general that is selfish: what you give, with the appearance of selflessness, is ultimately not given to a complete stranger or someone you’ll never contact again. It’s given so that the rewards of it (happiness, joy, gifts, warm fuzzy feelings, sex, reciprocal love) will return to you. If seeing your partner happy makes you happy, and you act in such a way as to cause that to occur, then your actions are self-serving. The reason you’re reacting against that is that our society has denigrated selfishness as an evil. I would argue that it’s the only moral we have, and that makes it not only justified but wonderful.

  9. Anonymous on February 13, 2007 | Permalink

    Valentines day another capitalist racket.

  10. S Quinney on March 1, 2007 | Permalink

    Anonymous, the great thing about capitalism is that you are entirely free not to take part in Valentine’s Day, unlike socialism where force is the tool of the system. Give me capitalism anyday, and God help us if people like you ever get your way.

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