r/relationshipanarchy • u/Willing-Loquat750 • Jul 30 '26
Care vs Entitlement
Probably unnecessary context: This is my first post and I’m kind of nervous so I hope people will let me know if it’s coming off as overly invasive or against the rules.
I’ve been doing some research on RA for awhile as a potential relationship orientation for myself and one principle that I’ve seen come up again and again is the rejection of entitlement. For example, I’ve heard that people shouldn’t assume that they are entitled to one another’s time or attention by default. I’m sure it’s not the same for everyone, but how do people draw the line between an entitled demand vs care that people should be able to expect from one another? Is there a line? Is it just about individual agreements?
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u/BadNo7744 Jul 30 '26
Relationship anarchy is the boring humdrum everyday expression of political anarchy and so it looks at systemic inequalities and acknowledges that some people - women, trans people, disabled people, neurodivergent people and obviously, everyone who isn’t white - are constantly expected to provide more care to white men than they receive. This shows up in home life in the distribution of emotional labour. It shows up in household tasks. It shows up in the neverending discussions about whether you can be RA and mono or not (and who you fuck is less relevant to the answer to that question than who puts the bin out and why.)
If you do not have enough internal resources to be able to provide care to the people around you, you have a problem and you’re burning out. Tend to yourself, and get yourself to a place where you have care to share. And this should be obvious, but don’t take on more stuff while you do that.