The Catherine & Cheating Saga, Pt 34

remnomicon:

lamattgrind:

Part 2 of my post from yesterday. If you haven’t read it, this won’t make as much sense. I said that I would write about “how I see love, why I say that Brittany “cheated” on me with an emphasis on the quotation marks, and why I have no problem with it.” Read on if you’re interested, and if not, you probably hate me by now. Sorry!

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NOTE: THIS IS UNEDITED AND MAY BE OFFENSIVE AND/OR POORLY WRITTEN

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Okay, I’ll admit that I still check your tumblrs and although I’m trying to keep a low profile… I really have to reply to this.
I guess this is partly because I don’t like your point of view but mostly because it’s just an interesting subject.

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Hmmm, where should I start?

Well here’s something, it’s pathetic to be selfless.
I mean this and if you don’t already know why, you should by the time I’ve finished explaining myself.

You’re losing if you’re being selfless, you’re worse off, you care more than they do, etc.
I’ve never really had a good relationship that involved me being selfless, and by the looks of it, neither have you.

A relationship is more like a mutual agreement; you have something to offer them, they have something to offer you. This isn’t love, this is just my definition of a relationship.

Now, if you’re being selfless in a relationship, guess what? You’re losing, you’re with them because you love them, not because of what you can get from them.
You need that person to feel the same way about you for you to be on even ground.

A good relationship is a balanced one.
All in moderation.

Here’s where it gets complicated.
Love is a fickle and difficult thing, it’s difficult to control and it usually has awful timing. To put it simply, love is a mess.
You don’t want to take love lightly because it’ll bite on you on the arse as soon as you throw it off balance.

This is why you can’t be selfless, the most emotionally invested will be the most hurt by the end of it. Selflessness is the path to self destruction.

(I’ll write more on this if you ask me to.)

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This is the part that sickens me. The fact that you could accept being cheated on, the fact that you’d let this shit happen to you.
I really wonder if you have any pride at all, you never seem to show any backbone and that’s one of the reasons why I never particularly made an effort to talk to you.

Y’know what? I don’t think I can talk about this subject without getting biased or angry. I guess I’ll write more (if you want to see it) when I can be sensible about it.

The difference here is that you’re looking at relationships as something game theory calls “zero sum” - in order for one person to gain, another person has to lose. Wikipedia’s example is cutting a cake - if one person gets a larger piece, then someone else gets a smaller piece. On the other hand, I see it as a “nonzero sum” situation - essentially a win/win situation. If I say something nice to cheer up a friend, I haven’t lost anything by giving them a bit of happiness. Which sounds dumb because you can’t give happiness but shut up. Anyway, now that I’ve introduced the idea of nonzero sum situations…

        What, exactly, do you lose by helping someone? You say that as if it’s a totally obvious conclusion. And caring about someone more than they care about you is only a problem if there’s a massive difference (i.e. they hardly care about you, while you’re under the impression that they are the love of your life) or you think that caring about someone entitles you to get something out of it. The thing is, whether you’re friends or more than that, having a good relationship with someone probably makes your life better. You enjoy talking to them online, or hanging out, or whatever. So you’re getting something out of the deal by default.

        Not to mention you aren’t entitled to anything. You don’t “deserve” to have someone love you, or stay in a relationship with you. You earn that. They could leave at any moment, so don’t take them for granted. They probably won’t, but so what? You shouldn’t treat someone badly under the assumption that you can make up for it later.

        There’s a fundamental problem here in that you say all of these things as if a relationship has to be zero sum. It doesn’t. I’ve become friends with Vael over the past two years, and not only has it not cost me anything to have great conversations with him, we’re both better off for it. Why would a romantic relationship be any different?

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        It needs to be said that love isn’t binary - you’re not 0: in love and then suddenly 1: in love. When you kind of like someone, you definitely shouldn’t place their happiness above your own yet. When you’re starting to love them a little, you should think twice before doing something that would hurt them. Then when you love them a lot, you’re really, truly in love, that’s when you should be selfless. If you’ve come that far, they probably feel the same way. Ideally, they’d treat you equally well.

        If it’s a romantic relationship, and you break up, then whoever made that choice probably has good reason for doing so. A lot of the time, the other person probably still cares about them, and is naturally pretty hurt by that. But then, if your feelings for each other were mutual, why would you be breaking up? Of course the person who still cares will be hurt. So I don’t think it’s right to judge the end of a relationship the way you have. Alternatively, you’re judging entire relationships based on how they end, which is equally wrong.

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        Two things that should be disgusting to anyone with a heart: basing a relationship on what you can get from someone, and basing a relationship on the need to possess. Granted, we all have acquaintances we only talk to when we need notes for a class we skipped missed, and other small things like that. I’d understand if people have a problem with being used that way - because, yeah, if you’re that person then you’re being used. But I’m not going to get worked up over something like that. Now, if someone only talks to you when they want to borrow large amounts of money, should you be ok with that? No, definitely not. But that’s different from giving someone your notes, or only being asked to hang out in specific situations.

        The second, then - the desire to possess. This is supreme selfishness, and it’s something a lot of people wind up in without realizing it. Love isn’t based on the desire to possess someone as an object, for them to be yours, and yours alone. Are you upset that your partner is leaving you because you care about them and think they’d be happier if you were together? Or are you upset because you’ve lost a thing that is yours and it makes you happy, which is what really matters? It’s one thing to be hurt, because something that made you happy is gone. It’s another thing to want it back only because it made you happy. When your happiness makes someone else unhappy, that’s a zero sum situation, and you should generally feel bad about that. If it’s someone you care about (or think you care about), you should feel especially bad about it, and doing so is proof that you care.

        So I ask you, what would having pride have done to change my situation? Should I have been proud to possess such a great thing, one that makes me happy all the time? Should I have been proud to have a girlfriend, simply because I did good things for her and her gratitude was confused for love? I’m proud to have done the right thing, even though it hurt. I’m proud that we managed to work things out in the end. I’m proud that I had the strength to pull through it all. I’m proud of the things that I can do, the good fortune I’ve had to lead the life I have, and the relationships I’ve forged along the way.

        I have enough of a spine to stand by what I believe, but not so much that I become a massive, bony dick who stands stubbornly by things that are proven wrong, and insults others because they disagree and not because they deserve such unkind words. It would sicken me to see someone act like that, and I could never live with myself if I were to act that way. Luckily, then, those kinds of people tend to be unaware of their true nature. I can only hope that someone would show me the truth, if I became so despicable.