Love Quote by Gypsy Rose Lee

Trust a striptease star to translate theology into contract law. “God is love, but get it in writing” is a one-liner with a zipper-pull of a reveal: it starts in stained-glass sentiment and ends under the harsh lights of the real world, where affection doesn’t pay the rent and promises have a way of evaporating the morning after. The joke lands because it treats “God is love” as both cultural wallpaper and emotional bait - a phrase people invoke to sound pure, generous, unquestionable. Lee’s “but” punctures it, insisting that even the highest ideals don’t exempt you from practical self-protection.

The subtext is gendered without needing to announce itself. In Lee’s era, women were routinely asked to trust men, managers, studios, and “gentlemen” who trafficked in reassurances: I’ll take care of you, you can count on me, love will work it out. An entertainer - especially one whose labor was constantly moralized and whose earnings were often controlled by others - knows how quickly sanctimony turns into leverage. “Get it in writing” is a survival tactic masquerading as a punchline, a reminder that power respects paper more than poetry.

It also doubles as a sly critique of American religiosity: faith as a comforting slogan, deployed to soften negotiations and absolve bad behavior. Lee doesn’t reject love; she rejects vagueness. The line’s brilliance is its compression of romance, capitalism, and cynicism into a single, smiling demand for receipts.