The politics of intimacy
I’m a social anthropology student, this essay grew out of one I wrote for a module on the anthropology of kinship, gender, and sex.
I loved the topic and wanted to step outside the academic frame to think more personally about how capitalism has entangled itself in love.
Why Intimacy Is Political?
It feels harder than ever to meet someone, to fall in love, or to sustain a meaningful connection.
Love has become transactional, marked by the rise of situationships and the endless ‘talking stage.’
Even if you find someone, it’s a fleeting download of affection: glitchy, performative, never quite real.
People are more isolated, distracted, and lonely than ever.
This isn’t a failure of individuals or of personal effort: it’s political.
The structures, priorities, and pressures of contemporary life shape who we love, how we love, and whether love even feels possible.
It’s not you, It’s the system.
Just as politics permeates every dimension of our social lives, intimacy too has become deeply political.
Intimacy isn’t personal anymore, capitalism shapes it, markets it, and monetises our connections.
For clarity, I understand intimacy as the degree of closeness between individuals, while the political refers to the ways intimacy is bound up with contemporary capitalism.
The role intimacy plays in capitalism is twofold: on one hand, it is commodified (turned into a product we consume, trade, and sell).
On the other, intimacy can be an act of resistance: a quiet refusal to let connection be reduced to market logic.
The Reality TV Version of Love
Consider the global obsession with reality dating shows:
The binge worthy spectacles that dominate our screens: Love Island, Love Is Blind, MAFS.
I’m not here to debate the value of reality TV, and I’m certainly no reality-TV Scrooge.
Beneath the chaos and drama there’s a lot to learn about emotional intelligence from these shows.
The problem is these shows promise love, but what they really package is a marketplace.
Contestants are edited into storylines, their intimacy crafted into consumable arcs that drive advertising and social media buzz.
Reality love shows have become dystopian: people go on for careers, brand deals and fame. Love Island no longer discovers Billy from the local pub, but discovers the next influencer.
Maybe these shows once started out with genuine intentions, but the underlying logic is unmistakable: Love is competitive. Affection is a prize. Connection is content.
When millions tune in, these scripts seep into our cultural bloodstream. They teach us subtly but powerfully that intimacy is something to be won, displayed, and consumed.
Swiping Through People
Dating apps have done something similar. On the surface, they connect people across cities, continents, and social circles. But look closer, and the architecture of the apps mirrors the logic of consumerism.
Profiles become products. Matches become transactions. Desire is filtered through metrics of efficiency and optimisation.
Anthropologist Eva Illouz points out that relationships in consumer culture are increasingly subject to the same logic as shopping:
if one partner isn’t perfect, there’s always another “better” one a swipe away.
Zygmunt Bauman calls this the “liquid” nature of modern love: relationships feel temporary, provisional, easily replaced.
No wonder so many of us feel intimacy has never been harder to sustain.
Capitalism makes love a moving target. You can use this as your get-out-of-awkward-questions card at Christmas dinner: “Grandma, it’s not me, it’s neoliberalism.”
Another factor is that capitalism feeds individualism.
When people are focused on personal growth and self-development, there’s little energy left for intimacy.
Relationships move too fast, priorities lie elsewhere, and love isn’t productive.
When People Become Commodities
According to Marx, commodification is the process of assigning market value to goods or services that previously existed outside the market.
In today’s world, the commodification of intimacy mirrors this idea. Under capitalism, even personal connections are increasingly shaped by market logic.
Relationships are commodities to be exchanged or consumed. This frames intimacy not just as personal, but as inherently political.
In an ethnography of Japan’s host clubs, young men deliberately remake themselves as commodities: selling not sex, but companionship, fantasy, and affective labour.
They style themselves in designer suits, craft charismatic personas, and monetise flirtation.
Their work embodies neoliberal ideals of self-entrepreneurship: to succeed, they must not only sell intimacy but brand themselves as the product.
Meanwhile, global marriage markets have flourished online. Brokers offer “mail-order brides” and cross-border partnerships in a system that openly markets human closeness as a purchasable good.
Love is advertised, packaged, and distributed like any other commodity.
Here, intimacy isn’t just shaped by capitalism. It is enlisted into its very machinery.
Intimacy Against the Grain
And yet intimacy is not entirely captive, it can take unexpected forms, even within constraining systems.
In Cuba, after the fall of the Soviet Union, queer communities carved out new ways of connecting amid economic collapse and social discrimination.
For them, forming relationships and building chosen families became acts of care and solidarity in a world that sought to fragment and erase them.
In Japan, some women in the sex industry describe their work as “healing work.”, providing not just sexual services but also companionship and emotional care.
While these moments can offer a form of agency, they exist within a system shaped by patriarchal norms and economic pressures.
This highlights a critical debate: agency in sex work is meaningful only when it is freely chosen, and for many, structural constraints complicate the line between empowerment and exploitation.
These examples remind us that intimacy doesn’t just reflect capitalism and social hierarchies.
It can also be shaped in ways that challenge, negotiate, or momentarily subvert them.
Even small acts of care, connection, or mutual recognition push back against a system that treats relationships and people as disposable.
In a culture of Nonchalance, be Chalant 💌
It’s tempting to see these examples: host clubs in Tokyo, queer enclaves in Havana, global marriage brokers as distant curiosities.
But these dynamics play out in our own lives every day: the swipe, the binge-watch, the way we show up or don’t for each other. These are political acts.
Every time we refuse to treat intimacy like a commodity, we push back against a system built on disconnection.
Every time we choose care over convenience, depth over disposability, we reclaim what intimacy really means.
In a world that treats love like a transaction, take your time.
Value connection over speed. Depth over endless choice.
Resist the swipe culture that whispers there’s always someone “better,” and don’t let capitalism close your heart.
Care is radical: listening, showing up, tending to others: these acts don’t create profit, but they create meaning.
Question the scripts around you. Notice how TV, apps, and algorithms shape what you think love should look like, and ask who really benefits.
Stay human in the marketplace. See people for who they are, not how they perform.
Be vulnerable it’s terrifying, messy, but it’s where intimacy starts. In a culture of nonchalance, be chalant: show up and let connection matter.
Capitalism thrives on isolation, competition, and disconnection. Choosing real connection is not just personal, it is profoundly political
