I need folks to understand that when I say “Enemies to Lovers” I don’t mean Oppressor/Oppressed or Enslaver/Enslaved.
The dynamic where opponents, equal in their power and threat to each other, requires equity that doesn’t exist between oppressor and oppressed.
Two house alike…
#Romancelandia
The dynamic where opponents, equal in their power and threat to each other, requires equity that doesn’t exist between oppressor and oppressed.
Two house alike…
#Romancelandia
Comments
One side attacking and enslaving the other isn’t equal unless both sides are doing the attacking and enslave.
That’s not what’s occurring under colonialism or chattel slavery.
Native Americans weren’t enslaving and forcing religion on white settlers.
That’s specific form of chattel slavery is the most prominent example of enslavement for most of the world.
Thus all modern fictional depictions of enslavement are rooted to it.
An enslaver can absolutely be the enemy of the enslaved, but by virtues of how enslavement works the enslaved will only ever be an object to the enslaver.
Someone you own isn’t an enemy or a lover. They’re a possession.
A rapist doesn’t see their victim as a partner or equal. They’re an object, to be disposed of once it’s no longer useful or appealing.
That’s not a relationship between equals. It’s parasitic.
Inequity is key in that trope because the power dynamic switches, the powerful is rendered powerless by love.
It’s often a subtext for class.
Though these media that depict this rarely label themselves as kink that’s what it is.