The Importance Of Love In Susan Faludi's 'The Naked Citadel'

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It has always been part of human nature to form a bond with another person. These bonds may be as trivial as friendship or as strong as love. Love is very complex; it takes a lot of effort and insight to form love with another person. As complicated as love is, why people form these bonds is even more complicated. There is the more biological reasoning, supported by Barbara Fredrickson in “Love 2.0”, that says people need it to survive. As seen in Susan Faludi’s “The Naked Citadel”, love can also be formed to either replace an old love or guide one or both people. Continually, in Sherry Turkle’s “Alone Together”, people form bonds of love because they love what they nurture. Since love is ingrained in human nature, there is often little choice …show more content…

The cadets at the Citadel feel this loss of love when they leave their mothers behind at the gates. Over the course of a few months, the boys change so much in their love with the upperclassmen that “‘Mothers can’t even tell their sons apart’” (Faludi 98). The Freshman’s new and harsh experiences make them want to latch on to their mothers, but the only people around are the other boys. As a result, they make connections with the upperclassmen because they want the love that they are being deprived of. While the love they form is like the one they had with their mothers, it is not a perfect replacement. Love can also seem unhealthy here because the boys are simply sustaining a love they cannot have. However, their relationship still opens them up for connections with these other boys they may not have had before. The boys need this love so much that it is better to replace it, even if it is not perfect, than to fall into a pit of despair without it. On the other hand, love is not always so easily replaced in the way the cadets replace their mothers. The children in “Alone Together” find that “They don’t like having a new creature in the same egg where their virtual pet has died. For them, the death of a virtual pet is not so unlike the death of what they call a “‘regular pet’” (Turkle 466). To them this love is not replaceable, if it is not the same it is not good enough. However, what makes love so amazing is that people do not need to have the same love with each person. It is why the kids can pick up different Tamagotchi toys but not reset the same one. If they reset the same one they expect the same type of love. Although, if they get a new one, they are simply replacing that love because they want to feel love in general. Replaceable love does not always have to involve the person but it can revolve around changing the type of love they had.

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