Two Lovers Beneath an Umbrella in the Snow, Color woodblock print; chuban. 27.2 x 20.2 cm. Held at the Art Institute of Chicago
The current discourse among many young heterosexual women largely revolves around reasons not to rely on a man, reasons to find a wealthy partner and prioritise financial gain over fidelity, reasons to believe that good men do not exist, reasons never to settle, reasons not to believe in love at all. That having a boyfriend is embarrassing, that centering your life around a relationship makes you a bad friend, and that caring deeply for a man is naïve because he might cheat, or he will not earn enough, or he will not contribute equally to domestic work. The conclusion often drawn is that, under patriarchal society, there is no such thing as a good man.
“How could men be unsuccessful in a world designed for them?” has become a popular phrase on TikTok — one that has been widely circulated and tends to generalise the complex social, economic, and personal barriers people face in attempting to achieve success in contemporary society.
On the other hand, men also have a great deal to say and it is much darker. Some argue that hiring women as sex workers is preferable to marriage because it generates income and, they claim, women do not want marriage anyway. Many of these ideas were popularised by figures such as Andrew Tate, who gained influence by spreading these views on dating and women across so-called “red pill” male-dominated online spaces.
In other corners of the internet, particularly on Twitter, men are advocating for AI girlfriends and predicting a future in which women become obsolete to men, hence the world as they see it. We see rhetoric that drags us back decades and dismisses progress altogether — insisting that women are less intelligent than men and exist only for cooking, cleaning, sex and reproduction. We have the most popular OnlyFans creators looking younger and younger, and those who hit 18 and join the site are the most popular. We also have continued sexual assault allegations and appalling cases coming out, particularly after the #MeToo movement, reports of men murdering their wives and increased domestic violence, and pedophilia. In countries such as Afghanistan, Iran, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and others, severe atrocities against women continue to occur. In some places, girls are denied education while, in others, children are forced into marriage and subjected to sexual violence. Much of this unfolds while the wider world watches, often appearing indifferent, allowing perpetrators to continue these abuses with little to no consequence. As the release of the Epstein files shows, many were involved but not arrested.
Yes, the men’s side of this may be darker than the women’s, but what does not change is this: the distance between the two — and the love that is lost in between.
Sandro Botticelli, The Birth of Venus(c. 1484–1486).
172.5 cm × 278.9 cm (67.9 in × 109.6 in). Uffizi, Florence
I can only speak about cisgender heterosexual relationships in this article, as they are the ones I know most about, both personally and academically. This is therefore not an attempt to paint everyone with the same brush. I do, however, want to turn to the past, though not to suggest that violence against women or the desire for a wealthy partner did not exist before; these dynamics are ancient. That can be explored in the future.
I want to begin with one thing we can all agree on as humans, no matter where we are from or what we are doing: there is something that exists in its purest form and has the power to make us better people — and that is love. There are ancient texts that accurately describe the feeling of having a crush on someone in detail from periods of time before proper toothbrushes were invented. And, in this article, I’d like to make us fall in love with love again through philosophy and ancient tales.
Diotima of Mantinea was an ancient Greek philosopher who lived in 440 BC Greece; her theories and philosophies are where the word “platonic love” comes from.
Her theory of the ladder of love is best described in Plato’s Symposium, written between 385–370 BC, a dialogue between various Greek philosophers and thinkers at a banquet discussing the meaning of love. To visualise Diotima’s ladder of love theory, the following diagram can be used:
The way I’d like to use the ladder of love is to see which “stage” you are at in any relationship. Firstly is an attraction to one beautiful body – thinking that someone is attractive, then seeing everyone as beautiful. Many people are currently in relationships or dating and have never reached this first stage. This is the same idea of seeing the world through rose-coloured glasses. You see everybody as beautiful, as you’ve reached a more divine idea of beauty itself, not a surface-level idea of beauty. No matter what trends come and go or how much someone ages, you still see beauty within and around them. This amount of love is what we mean when Greek philosophers say “love,” compared to nowadays, when some people throw the word “love” around lightly, when what they really might mean is that they are simply attracted to someone.
As you can see, the next stage of the ladder is that of beautiful souls; this is when we say someone loves you for who you are, your intellect and who you are on the inside. After that, there is law and institutions; this is where both of you respect society and its structures. The way that some can interpret this is that you both conform to the idea of “good citizens” under Plato’s theory. The final stage is loving the Form itself. According to Plato, Forms are eternal, unchanging, and perfect realities that exist beyond the physical world.
Everything we see around us is only an imperfect reflection of these higher Forms. Thus, when he speaks about loving the Forms themselves, he means loving it in its pure, abstract, perfect essence, not just a beautiful person or object, but Beauty as a universal and timeless truth. This is the stage in which lovers turn to philosophers and is, to Plato, the key to unlocking the truth of philosophy through dialogue and conversation with the person you love.
They are “deep talks,” as modern society likes to call them, but do not assume that these deep talks mean sharing trauma and discussing your feelings. No, that is probably in the stage of beautiful souls. This is when you and your lover actually question and understand the meaning of life itself. The Forms are the true reality behind the physical world, so when the last stage speaks of loving the Forms, it means engaging in truth and philosophy and achieving what life means with your loved one.
Another theory of love is that of the Roman poet Ovid, born in 43 BCE, who is arguably the founder of some very popular misogynistic ideas. However, despite his rude comments about women’s appearances, there’s one part of his text about pleasure and sex that speaks to how a man and a woman both need to achieve pleasure in the bedroom.
“Let the pleasure be mutual; let the joy be shared alike by both. I hate the act that does not satisfy both alike.
When you have found the spot where a woman loves to be touched, let no shame prevent you from touching it.
Let the climax come together for both; then is pleasure complete.”
Ovid (1929) The Art of Love and Other Poems. Translated by J. H. Mozley. Loeb Classical Library 232. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Book II, lines 683–732.
Mosaic showing Neptune and Amphitrite in the House of Neptune and Amphitrite, Herculaneum, Ercolano, Italy.
This comment is in line with the theories within the Kama Sutra as well. The Kama Sutra (Sanskrit: Kāmasūtra) is a classical Indian treatise on love, sexuality, and relationships traditionally attributed to Vatsyayana. Most scholars date it to around the 3rd–4th century CE (approximately 300 CE). The Kama Sutra, Part II, Chapter 1 (“On Sexual Union”), discusses differences in sexual temperament and explicitly refers to simultaneous climax as the ideal outcome. A key passage (translation adapted from Sir Richard Burton and modern scholarly editions) states:
“When both the man and the woman obtain pleasure at the same time, then the union is perfect.”
It’s fascinating how this was the standard back then within love theory and dating, yet now it is a rarer occurrence for a woman to gain pleasure from penetrative sex. In September 2021, a survey in the UK found that 61% of men reported orgasming every time they have sex compared to just 30% of women (YouGov).
The root of a lot of issues within relationships is tied to sex and desire, since it seems the majority of men seem to care about pleasuring themselves, while women, scared to hurt men’s egos, fake orgasms. As a result, men can easily seek or fall for other women as the idea of pleasure is replaceable, and women would want to sleep with someone who pleases them. However, numbers do show that men still cheat more than women. Additionally, women cheat for emotional reasons compared to men who, reportedly, cheat for sexual pleasure. A 2023 survey by British GQ reported that 60% of male respondents said they had been unfaithful in their relationships compared to 32% of female respondents. Psychologically, many surveys show that men are more likely to engage in sexual infidelity due to sexual motivation, while, for women, the reasons are more emotional.
Love in the bedroom, according to the ancient philosophers, was, in both the East and West, pleasure for both parties involved. For both men and women, not being pleasured or being comfortable with not pleasuring your partner is a temporary fix for desire rather than a foundation for a lasting relationship in which all aspects of that desire are fulfilled. This could point to why modern relationships don’t last, as, according to YouGov, the top reason reported by men in the UK for infidelity is sexual dissatisfaction or unmet sexual needs. Hence, it’s obvious that the current methodology around sex is no longer applicable.
Musée du Louvre - James Pradier, Satyre et Bacchante, Marbre, 1834
A love story that speaks powerfully to commitment and unwavering devotion is Layla and Majnun (c. 1188) by Nezami Ganjavi, the 12th-century Persian romance that tells of two lovers kept apart by family and society, yet bound by a constancy so absolute that years of separation only deepen their fidelity rather than diminish it. The idea of devotion and commitment reigns supreme in dating in Ancient Persia, with Persian poets describing love as something divine, connected to one’s soul.
Examples of this can be found in texts such as Masnavi (c. 1258–1273) by Rumi, a renowned Perisan poet and mystical philosopher, where he describes love as a force that transforms and spiritually binds two beings, and in the Divan (14th century) of Hafez, whose poetry present devotion as unwavering, even in the face of distance, rejection, or social pressure.
A miniature of Nizam’s narrative poem. Late 16th-century illustration.
“The lover is a slave to the beloved.”
— Masnavi, Rumi
The amount of devotion, commitment and surrender to the beloved in Persian poetry depicts monogamous and spiritual values that also represent the depths in which one feels and acts when one is in love. In contemporary society, Persian poetry can teach us about that aspect of spirituality and emotion, the idea that love goes beyond reason and that it does not require words or explanation; it can be purely feeling. It also deconstructs one’s ego and completely surrenders you to the beloved, something a lot of people currently cannot do in modern dating.
“My heart is bound to the curl of your hair.”
— Hafez, Divan
Here, Hafez uses the curl to symbolise entanglement. Persian poets wanted us to know that love transcends law, politics, religion, reason and ego. It is the most powerful force of mankind.
The Knight of the Seven Kingdoms - still - HBO
And then we move on to knights, tales of knights and princesses. With the rise of KnightTok and the popularity of TV shows such as The Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, one could say there is a medieval comeback. Floris and Blancheflour, a medieval romance story created in c. 1160–1170, tells the story of Floris, a noble prince, and Blancheflour, a Christian princess raised with him from childhood. When their families separate them — fearing the intensity of their bond — Blancheflour is sold far away to prevent their union.
Floris refuses to forget her. Believing her lost or even dead, he sets out on a long and dangerous journey across kingdoms to find her. After enduring trials and disguising himself to enter a guarded tower where she is held among other maidens, he reunites with her. Their devotion survives years of separation, political opposition, and distance, and they ultimately reconcile and marry. The romance became widely translated across France, Germany, Scandinavia, and Spain throughout the 12th and 13th centuries, reflecting a medieval ideal of singular, patient love rewarded after prolonged trial.
And now, unbelievably, we have people waiting for a simple text message. The thing is, in our consumerist culture, we are sold the illusion of countless options. Everywhere we swipe, from social media to dating apps, it seems there are endless opportunities and people we could be attracted to. As individuals present themselves like brands, we forget to consider that perhaps one person is truly “enough.” This constant messaging distances people from obtaining true love.
Woodcut with Floris and Blancheflour in an edition of Jan van Doesborch(ca. 1517)
Furthermore, encounters with “fate” have become increasingly rare, as social media has made people more withdrawn and less present; we are often too absorbed in our devices to engage with one another. The online world has most definitely shifted the way Gen Z and millennials date. The idea of patience, prolonged waiting, defying the rules, and going through trials, difficulties, and challenges to be with your love is one that people might call unrealistic, untrue, or even bothersome; hence, people do not believe in true love stories. One could argue, well, you’re also quoting stories — but the difference is, these stories reflected and influenced reality. Back then, it wasn’t advertisements, big corporations, media companies, and influencers influencing behaviour, but stories. These stories, many of which inspired in real people and stories, can be seen reflected in real-life accounts of enduring devotion — such as the decades-long correspondence between poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Robert Browning before their marriage in 1846; the profound attachment between Queen Victoria and Prince Albert; and, in the Eastern tradition, the historical devotion of Mughal emperor Shah Jahan to Mumtaz Mahal, for whom he built the Taj Mahal as a monument to their enduring bond.
And here we are, the generation that goes against love, doesn’t believe in it and finds relationships draining. The reality is that, with all the stories above, I hope we can learn about what unites humans. These stories came from different periods, empires, cultures, religions, and ideologies, yet they all seem to point to the same concept: that love is a divine feeling of devotion towards a person, with the complete intention of care and admiration, a commitment for life. The issue with society currently is not that people are incapable of love, but that they misunderstand it, and that the following stories are no longer taught or recalled. Instead, we scroll and scroll for our own needs, validation, egos, and anxieties. Love, therefore, needs to be reminded; media, education, and the communication channels we engage in need to stop showing us options and instead show us the philosophy and history of love from our ancestors.
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© perediza 2026
