Stephanie Coontz, Anjula Razdan and Lewis Lapham, show in their articles how western consumer culture has affected ideas about love. Western culture had commoditized everything to do with our existence including the concept of love. Stephanie Coontz’s articles “From Yoke Mates to Soul Mates” looks at marriage and family life as it progressed from the Middle Ages. Marriage was primarily for reproduction, property and lineage. By the 18th century people married whoever they wanted and started their own household. Marriage became a private relationship without interference from the Church or State. Previous values attached to marriages were no longer relevant. Critics felt that the values of free choice could easily spin out of control. According to Coontz, household and gender roles were also changing. The advent of a cash economy in the 1950 saw husbands becoming the sole breadwinner, the wife the homemaker losing her economic contributory value. Women could work part time to also fulfil their personal needs as they were solely dependent on marriage for survival. In Coontz’s article “The Era of Ozzie and Harriet: The Long Decade of Traditional Marriage," as the ideas of capitalism spread so did the desire for modern conveniences, with the media portraying that an emancipated woman is one whose time and energy was saved by modern appliances (Coontz 232). Razdan, in her article “What’s Love Got to Do with It?” discusses arranged marriages. Her parents and her are products of arranged marriages. Razdan was reluctant for her parents to arrange a marriage for her as she quips “but what could they possible know of real love” (Razdan 69). She says when her parents married they barely knew each other but they shared values, beliefs and family background similar to the situation in the Middle Ages. Today fifty percent of all marriages end in divorce. Razdan asks if we could really choose our own mates (Razdan 70). My answer