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Good question. I'm going to go against the grain here and say that infatuation can equal love, as both are ambiguous. Reason: we don't have to know somebody, personally, to love that person. Just look at the way fans , worldwide, view certain stars like Elvis, Michael Jackson, The Beatles, The Stones, Princess Diana, etc,. People go nuts and cry over them.
The majority of people are looking for an eternal dopamine high. Thence they equate the substance of chemical attraction to love. Reason #213 most people divorce and those who don't divorce stay together for reasons OTHER THAN they are "IN love". What a punitive way to go about life eh? And as somebody who is amicably divorcing because the wife fell out of love and the effort required to honor the union was too much in her estimation to not end up resenting one another, I can tell you "loving but not being in love" is a much more cruel construct than the puritans lead you to believe. I am glad my spouse leveled with me on that front. I honestly didn't find her eventual infidelity as much of a transgression and it didn't really bother me, when juxtaposed to the much more emotionally shattering transgression of sticking with me because I was a decent meal ticket and a steady rock (constant) to come home to, in spite of the fact my presence did not do it for her anymore, "fun and attention" (dopamine) wise. And people do this chit all the time, for decades and eternity. And then people wonder why a 20+ year marriage dissolves just as nonchalantly as my 7 year relationship. Dopamine and our insistence on wanting to have the cake and eat it too.
At some point, the need for a constant in companionship should be left at that, companionship. Everybody would be better off emotionally. It shouldn't have a fishing line tied to the trigger of a revolver pointing at your proverbial (to keep it gender neutral) ^^ck on one end and the other end tied to said ^^ck, as the candy store of dopamine we call "the rest of the world" is paraded in front of you for the rest of your life....just sayin'.
But such progressive view of sexuality would lead to our children growing up screwed up, according to the prude voting block that put the politicians in place that created the punitive marriage laws we enjoy today. Newsflash: these children grow up to be the very adults who end up re-hashing these very conflicts on internet message boards; you could have saved $9.99 by foregoing the disney movies and the earmuffs...ergo maybe the kids will be alright if you smack 'em early with the "mommy and daddy love each other but don't find each other hot anymore, and we both want to be happy, you'll still get to go to soccer practice so finish your homework, you still gotta get a job after college, love or no love..." bit. Juuussst sayin'....
"True love is like ghosts, which everyone talks about and few have seen."
-FD
"Who ever loves, if he do not propose
The right true end of love, he's one that goes
To sea for nothing but to make him sick."
-John Donne
Infatuation is the dream of the possibility of loving another.
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