Deconstructing Amatonormativity - Recognising and Challenging the Pressure to Prioritise Romance
We all have experienced the omnipresent questioning about whether we’re seeing anyone and whether it’s serious (ie is the person you’re seeing “marriage material”?) or even just the assumption that we are married and/or partnered. This isn’t even one of those topics where I have to acknowledge that not everyone has the same experience because it is so pervasive in our society. This is at the core of amatonormativity. Amatonormativity is the name given to the societal assumption that everyone is “better off” when they have an exclusive, romantic, long-term coupled relationship and that pursuing such a relationship is a prominent goal for us all. And this is the topic of today’s article - examining amatonormativity, the impact it has specifically on aromantic people and what we can do if we decide to reject amatonormativity. I have briefly mentioned amatonormativity before in my aromanticism 101 article where the connection between amatonormativity and the prejudice and discrimination against aromantic people is drawn. Today we’re going to explore it further.
First, we need to properly explore what we mean by amatonormativity. Elizabeth Brake defined amatonormativity as being the assumption that “a central, exclusive, amorous relationship is normal for humans, in that it is a universally shared goal, and that such a relationship is normative, in that it should be aimed at in preference to other relationship types”. What we are talking about here is not the individual’s desire for a monogamous romantic and sexual relationship; it is the social expectation that everyone wants this and is prioritising getting and keeping a monogamous romantic and sexual relationship. Amatonormativity is focused on social norms surrounding romantic relationships. The norms that tell us a romantic relationship will give us the ultimate fulfilment in life and have thousands upon thousands of stories demonstrating this with the “And they lived happily ever after” endings. These norms position romance and romantic relationships as superior to other types of human connection and encourage the centering of the romantic union in our lives. This is the driver behind people not spending much time with their friends once they enter into a romantic relationship. The idea that our romantic partners are our “everything” and that they “complete” us is rooted in amatonormativity. This is seen in our songs, fairy tales, myths, stories, TV and film. Two people fall in love and “become one”. People search for and find their “other half” or their “soulmate”. We are told repeatedly from multiple different sources things like “there’s someone out there for everyone”, “the greatest thing is to love and be loved in return” and that we “just need to find the right person” - oftentimes being told we need to kiss a lot of frogs in order to find our prince/princess.
This type of thinking is behind the questions we get asked (and ask others!) about their relationship status, whether we’re seeing anyone etc etc. It is also why our society affords legal, social and financial privileges to married couples. The number of people I know who have entered into a marriage over maintaining a committed, non-married relationship because it “makes financial sense” or on account of other benefits that marriage grants them access to is significant and very telling. This is part of the relationship escalator. I won’t go into the details of the relationship escalator now as that can be done another time. But it is important to outline that this is the term given to the socially prescribed road for happy, committed romantic relationships. We start off with the initial stages of seeing each other, going exclusive, dating more seriously as partners in a monogamous romantic and sexual relationship, planning for the long-term, moving in together, getting married, buying a house, having children. There are ways we escalate within some of those as well as between them, but the escalator is clear that it’s one-directional and to get off the escalator is to break up and no longer have a relationship together. It’s a powerful example of amatonormativity at work and we can likely all relate to the idea (regardless of our own thoughts and desires) that there is one “normal” and desirable way for a relationship to progress. This focusing of our energies on the continual progression of our romantic relationship towards the top of the escalator is the amatonormative prioritisation of romantic relationships over and above all others. So while we’re ascending up the relationship escalator, we are investing less and less time into some or all of the following: our friendships, our chosen family, our family of origin, our work, our hobbies and ourselves. I’m confident that we’ve all had at least one friend who drifted away when they entered into a new relationship - we may even have been that friend! It hurts us all when this happens. But for now, it’s just important to hold the concept of amatonormativity - this societal push to prioritise romantic relationships and simultaneously to devalue the others.
The inescapable pressure of amatonormativity for people to pursue and keep romantic relationships can easily lead to people feeling inadequate and broken for not living up to this expectation when they actively want to be in a romantic relationship but struggle to either find or maintain one. This negative impact is often amplified for those who are aromantic and have an aversion to or a more complicated relationship with romance than alloromantic people do. Amatonormativity creates a hierarchy of our relationships with monogamous, romantic and sexual relationships at the top and other connections like friendships, chosen families and families of origin being devalued. This devaluation means that friends, chosen family and family of origin are all seen as less than the romantic/sexual monogamous partner. Less important, less significant, not as rewarding, not as worthy of our time. It can ultimately isolate us within monogamous, romantic/sexual relationships because the thinking is that only this person really gets it, only this person’s opinion really matters, only time with this person is going to really be fulfilling and meaningful. This difference in how relationships are prioritised results in a lot of pressure being put on the people in a romantic/sexual relationship to live up to the ideal. When we combine this with the expectation amatonormativity brings of each person in a romantic relationship “completing” the other, it can become really clear that the pressure to get a romantic relationship is just the beginning. There is a lot of pressure to conform to the prescribed roles and ideas of things like soulmates, two people completing each other, the relationship escalator, spending less time with friends and family (of origin or chosen) in favour of the romantic partner, doing ‘couple things’ all the time and forging a ‘couple identity’ while neglecting interests, hobbies, connections with others and individual identity from before entering into the relationship.
As you may be beginning to see, this whole approach to human relationships makes it difficult to navigate alternative approaches and non-normative relationship structures. These include chosen families which are a close-knit group of people who are unrelated and share love and support in a way reminiscent of how we understand families ‘should be’. Other types of non-normative relationship structures or alternative ways of approaching human connection which get invalidated by the pervasiveness of amatonormativity are polyamory and other ethical non-monogamous relationship structures, relationship anarchy and queerplatonic relationships. Queerplatonic relationships are something I’ve touched upon before, but put briefly, these are deeply committed and loving relationships which do not include, for the most part anyway, romance and/or sex. It takes courage to step out of the status quo, the prescribed approach to human relationships, and to pursue something different. For aromantic people in particular, it can be essential. The prescribed monogamous romantic/sexual relationship which follows the progression of the relationship escalator doesn’t honour the experience of someone who is either neutral about or repulsed by romance. So aromantic people can find themselves exploring alternative approaches and non-normative relationship structures as they search for people they can connect with in the deep and meaningful ways they like who will also be understanding and accepting of their aromanticism. But due to the pervasive nature of amatonormativity and the success it has had in making people see alternatives as less desirable or even deviant and dangerous, it can be difficult to find people who you click with and who genuinely are open to non-normative relationship structures and different experiences of romantic and/or sexual attraction, interest and desire.
There is a genuine and significant personal cost for individuals living with such omnipresent societal pressure. Being subjected to this enormous pressure of amatonormativity from all sides when you know you’re aromantic is hugely invalidating. For those who are aromantic but haven’t realised it yet, it can be the cause for immense amounts of internal conflict and frustration as they try to force themselves into inauthentic and potentially unhealthy dynamics. Those feelings of inadequacy and being broken can get very loud indeed. The way our amatonormative society views this desire for romance as universal does, however, mean that aromantic people don’t just feel broken, they will have people telling them that they are as well. Those who do desire romantic relationships can struggle under the heaviness of amatonormativity too. This can show up as feeling inadequate or like they are “falling behind” when they aren’t meeting the same relationship milestones as their peers. Examples include moving into adulthood without having had a relationship or having had sex yet, having relationships but for various reasons (eg breaking up with someone you’re incompatible with, your partner dying, breaking up because your career paths take you in different directions etc) not progressing up the relationship escalator at the same rate as your peers or as society says you should. It’s even there when someone, typically women and those society perceives as women, is nearing their late 30’s and hasn’t had children yet - regardless of whether they want kids or not, people will be asking about when they’ll have them and with whom. That pressure to have a long term, monogamous, romantic/sexual relationship that, let’s face it, satisfies the expectation of heteronormativity before getting pregnant is insidious. It absolutely is amatonormativity to hold this relationship set up as the default, the norm, the only desirable option for having children. And it intersects with heteronormativity when the expectation is that the parental couple, ‘unit’ or ‘team’ is made up of one man and one woman. The biological clock is a genuine experience for some people, but it is not for everyone, and while genetic material is needed from more than one person to make a baby, the insistence that children are had within a monogamous romantic/sexual relationship is the workings of this pervasive societal assumption around which types of human relationships are better. These experiences clearly demonstrate that amatonormativity's societal assumptions create significant pressure on all individuals. Whether one is alloromantic and desires romantic relationships, or aromantic and de-prioritises them, failing to follow the prescriptive amatonormative script and relationship escalator often leads to feelings of inadequacy, being broken, undesirable, and abnormal. This universal negative impact underscores that such pressure is far from positive.
You may be thinking as you read this about your own thoughts, assumptions etc. Maybe you’ve spotted that you judge your worth as a person on whether you’re in a romantic/sexual relationship or that you spend less time with your friends when you’re in a romantic/sexual relationship and more time with them when you’re single. You might also be wondering how to recognise some of the less obvious ways your thinking and interactions are shaped by amatonormativity.
Well, the good news is that you are already on your way to achieving this! By learning about what amatonormativity is, you are giving your brain the knowledge needed to spot the signs in the future. Brains are naturally great at spotting patterns so by bringing things like the societal pressure to have a romantic relationship, the exaltation of romantic relationships over other kinds of interpersonal relationship, the sidelining of non-romantic relationships and equating being in a romantic relationship as being worthy as a person to your attention, you are providing it with the template of what to look out for. We can learn more through resources like those linked through the Relationship Anarchy Discussion Library which is sure to provide a range of articles or zines that offer up different perspectives.
Other ways you can become more aware of amatonormativity in your own life involve looking critically at how you feel about and what assumptions you’ve made about people in your life or characters in works of fiction (eg films, shows, books etc). Some example questions you might ask yourself here are:
What have I just assumed about them based on their relationship status that I don’t have clear evidence for?
What is this narrative saying about romance and relationships?
Might I feel differently if they were/weren’t in a romantic relationship?
Does my relationship status impact who I am more likely to spend time with?
How much focus do relationship status and dating get in my conversations with friends and family?
How do I feel about the presence or absence of romance in a story?
What weighting do I put on romantic, sexual, familial and platonic relationships? Is this impacting how I behave with and treat different people in my life?
Have I ever experienced a friend drifting away when they enter into a romantic relationship? How did it feel? Did they come back at all? Regardless of whether they did or didn’t, how did that feel?
Journalling can be a great way to give this kind of exploration some definite shape. When we get things like this out of our heads and into the ‘real world’, we can explore and process it in different and fuller ways.
Be prepared for how you experience amatonormativity to intersect with different aspects of your identity. Some examples are:
Gender - eg you might find men are expected to be “playing the field” more as teenagers and young adults before settling down while young women are expected to be monogamous, date more seriously and settle down sooner
Sexuality - eg feeling pressured to progress up the relationship escalator in the wake of legalised marriage equality, amatonormativity feeds into the stereotype of U-haul lesbian relationships where the pressure to form an exclusive and committed romantic couple is intense, compulsory sexuality/heterosexuality is intertwined with amatonormativity etc
Cultural background - eg pressure to only settle down with someone from specific cultural groups, a difference in how it shows up between individualist and collectivist societies (eg it might be less pervasive and less all-encompassing in societies where a person’s connections with family and community are held with high esteem than in individualist societies), romantic love might be expected to develop in different ways and at different points across different cultures.
Of course, the way amatonormativity shows up is influenced by more than these. Disability, religion, class, nationality and racial identity are among the other aspects of your experience and identity that can affect the way and degree to which amatonormativity impacts you. When we look at our intersectional identities, we can get even clearer about how it plays out in our lives and psyches.
Seeing where you have internalised some amatonormative ideas and appreciating how it has informed your experiences are vital aspects to consider and it’s important to also reflect on your own values and desires around interpersonal relationships. This reflection is needed because some things that we connect to amatonormativity, like monogamy and prioritising certain relationships over others, are not inherently bad. It’s the universal assumptions and pressures of amatonormativity that cause harm so careful consideration as to whether things like monogamy are in line with your genuine personal values and desires helps to identify and recognise where your autonomy lies vs conforming to a societal norm.
When we are talking about and looking to challenge amatonormativity, the goal is to make it possible and to create the space for all types of relationship to be seen as equally valid. It’s about creating the space and attitudes that value one person’s monogamy equal to another person’s deeply committed platonic relationships and another’s polyamory or ethical non-monogamy. Amatonormativity says there’s a hierarchy where these all sit in relation to each other and challenging that isn’t about negatively judging monogamous romantic relationships, it’s about recognising that other types of relationship are just as valuable and just as worthy of respect and esteem as monogamous romantic ones - regardless of how we personally want to structure our relationships.
Seeking out and supporting narratives that highlight a variety of relationship dynamics is another way to challenge amatonormativity. This is as much about spotlighting dynamics where people enjoy deep platonic connections over romantic/sexual ones as it is about paying attention to ethically non-monogamous and polyamorous relationships. I read a wonderful true story recently about a man who lived in Scotland, worked hard, performed stand-up and then progressed to performing as a drag queen while fundraising for his local community. He was constantly encouraged and expected to date and marry with some going to the lengths of pointing out the logistical benefits of having a wife to cook and clean - but his response to at least one of them of “as long as she went home after” shows he just wasn’t interested. There are plenty of these types of real life accounts, as well as fictional ones, of people who have gone on to prioritise different types of relationships/relationship structures, work, creative pursuits and/or activism over monogamous romantic relationships. Exposing yourself to more of these will support any goals you have of challenging amatonormativity.
We can also challenge amatonormativity by choosing to place more priority and investing more effort into non-romantic connections. Whether this is addressing a dear friendship that has not received the attention you might have liked to give it, explicitly committing to doing more with someone in your life who means a lot to you in a non-romantic way or something else, it’s a wonderful way of building the life you want for yourself. Being invested in clear communication with others as to your values, what you want, what you can offer and what your boundaries are helps you to challenge amatonormativity in your life too. If you would like to, the relationship anarchy smorgasbord is a helpful resource in having some of these conversations as it offers a structure to what can feel like an anxiety-provoking experience. Finally, building some connections with others who are taking this path and looking to challenge amatonormativity and/or other systems of oppression as they show up in interpersonal relationships is invaluable. These may be people you meet in-person or it might be an online only type of connection/community. Either way, having people you can discuss things with is key.
In a nutshell, amatonormativity is the name for the societal expectation to prioritise having a long term, exclusive romantic/sexual relationship and to value this above all other connections and/or activities. We’ve explored how this is different from simply being monogamous and alloromantic with the weight and pervasive nature of this societal expectation being harmful to everyone. The feelings of being inadequate, broken and lacking in self worth associated with singlehood under the influence of amatonormativity are real, affect everyone and are especially harmful for aromantic people. Furthermore, aromantics are at great risk of forcing themselves to exist within dysfunctional dynamics in efforts to not be seen as going against amatonormative ideas before they fully embrace their aromanticism. Amatornormativity can be challenged in a number of ways, including but not limited to reflecting on when you are witnessing and/or expressing amatonormative ideas, seeking out depictions of a variety of different relationship structures and learning more about amatonormativity, aromanticism, relationship anarchy and other types of relationships.
If you are finding yourself wanting to get some support on navigating life outside of the assumed default that amatonormativity, heteronormativity, allonormativity etc state we should be striving for or you just want to get some support from someone who already understands these things and can help you build a life that truly aligns with your values, you can contact me to book a consultation call here.
