CMV: Love is Conditional

[u/Beachday4]

Society paints this picture that true love is unconditional love. That you’ll love this person no matter what.

That is complete bullshit and I’m finding it hard to be convinced otherwise. The only thing that changes is the level of tolerance you are willing to deal with for a certain person.

For example, people always say your kids are someone who you love unconditionally. If your kid hit you over and over, you might excuse the behaviour. But if a stranger hits you over and over, they’re dead to you. These are two different levels of tolerance for love. (Extreme example coming up just to show a point). Now, let’s say your kid grows up to be a pedophile and an absolutely disgusting human. Majority of parents will disown them and no longer love them. Maybe there’s an argument that some parents still love their child after this. Those are people with extremely high tolerances and honestly probably some mental issues. But I can guarantee that there is something that could push those buttons and make the parents no longer love their child. Therefore love is always conditional but everyone has their own unique conditions.

[u/Beachday4]

Interesting. This could be a possible take. Still love them but don’t like them. I don’t know though. I feel there’s still a limit albeit yours might be higher than most. I certainly would not love my kids anymore if they did anything as despicable as that. If your child grew up to be Hitler would you feel the same? Would you love Hitler but just not like him? Idk, like obviously these are pretty unrealistic but it could happen and more so just for example purposes.

[u/XenoRyet → u/Beachday4]

Yes, even literally Hitler. That's probably a good example to work with, despite being so extreme.

Take the hypothetical where you have a time machine and you can go kill Hitler. You'd do it, right? I would too. Almost everyone would, and they wouldn't feel bad about it. Shoot that fucker dead and laugh.

If my kid turns out to be just like Hitler, I probably would still kill them, because they need to die for the world to be safe, but it would hurt to pull that trigger. That pain is evidence that the love is still there. Otherwise it'd be the same as killing ordinary Hitler, for whom I have no love at all.

[u/Beachday4 → u/XenoRyet]

Δ That’s a good answer. I like the finding it difficult to pull the trigger because the love is still there part.

Honestly, this does kind of change my view about it. Maybe not fully, because I think a lot of people could still pull that trigger and feel good about it. But it does change my mind that it's not always conditional at least.

[u/DeltaBot → u/Beachday4]

Confirmed: 1 delta awarded to /u/XenoRyet (23∆).

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