Let's Fake Love

Emotions of love are of course a very natural and important part of life. But it is the ideas of what love is and should be that vary in large degrees. These ideas, which begin shaping us from a very young age, are crucial to how we approach future intimate relationships. How were your images of love and romance were formed? When love is modeled in an unhealthy, impractical way it is misguided and will result in unrealistic expectations and ultimately unhappy relationships.

As a direct result of repeatedly watching telenovelas, Cleófilas has a horribly distorted idea of love. Cisneros writes, “You or no one. Because to suffer for love is good. The pain all sweet somehow. In the end” (45). Cleófilas, being fed the idea that love is all about emotional passion and that love must therefore be surrounded with drama, irrationally wants to “suffer” for love. Love portrayed in entertainment will by its very nature of “entertaining” focus solely on the dramatic parts of relationships. This is what will entertain most people the easiest; however, the effects on the viewer’s “real life” relationships can be devastating. This twisted conclusion Cleófilas has acquired is all too inclusive of her perception of love. Because her view of love is highly distorted, she sets herself up for unhappiness in any and all romantic relationships. Everyone shares a desire for loving and being loved but by exposing one’s self to dramatic fictional relationships, excluding the “normal” and “healthy” parts where resolve and rational behavior take place, we open our minds to a misrepresentation of love. Love, of course, is not meant to be all bliss and all euphoria, but it is also not healthy to be encompassed in suffering. A relationship between two mature ...

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...ionable adolescent mind, their view of marriage takes an unfortunately precarious turn for the worst.

Our desire for love drives a mountainous sized industry. With billions of dollars being made each year from capitalizing on the longing for companionship people share collectively. Media plays an enormous role in this perversion of love. It does so though such avenues as movies, television, books, and music. By overhyping love, displaying it as all-gratifying, dramatic, dreamy and obligatorily painful, romantic expectations become twisted. In these misguiding models for love, distorted Cleofilas’ view of what she desires in a love relationship.

Works Cited

Beattie, Anne. Snow. 1986.

Cisneros, Sandra. Woman Hollering Creek and other stories. New York: Random House, 1991.

Wilson, Brian and Tony Asher. “Wouldn’t It Be Nice.” Pet Sounds. Capital Records, 1966.