For those of you who don’t know, amatonormativity is basically the idea that having or desiring a close, exclusive, romantic relationship is the default, normal setting for EVERYONE. It’s problematic because it invalidates a whole slew of people who may not desire such a relationship, including but not limited to aromantic people, celibate people, or single people who are just fine with being single for whatever reason they might have.

People live their key caring relationships in a multitude of ways, be this within or outside marriage. In the interests of justice, neutrality, equal opportunity, and equal respect, the liberal state should not continue to privilege amatonormativity and thereby marginalize other forms of adult caring relationships.

Amatonormativity, she argues, results in "the sacrifice of other relationships to romantic love and marriage and relegates friendship and solitudinousness to cultural invisibility."

To which I reply, Let's all be amatonormativity busters! Brake even offers a few examples of violations of amatonormativity: "dining alone by choice, putting friendship above romance, bringing a friend to a formal event or attending alone, cohabiting with friends, or not searching for romance."

Despite changing demographics, law and society still often take monogamous marriage as the foundation of the family. Even when marriage includes same-sex couples, family status depends on a dyadic, exclusive partnership. However, restricting social recognition and legal status to such partnerships benefits romantic, monogamous relationships at the expense of other caring relationships. I call the focus on marital and amorous love relationships as special sites of value 'amato-normativity' and argue that it wrongly devalues other instances of care.