I will respectfully disagree outside of the selfish DNA mentioned above. I don't know what any kind of love would look like on her face, but I don't see her having love for Joffrey as a person, or as the specific son he is. Glory of her heritage and the Lannisters in general, sure. He is indeed her golden boy. But I just don't feel anything personal there, mostly that he is an important piece in her plans and heritage.

I see your point. I guess I was thinking, "isn't that protecting your DNA thing a (warped) kind of love?" And while, in a way, it might be, I think you might be right that the real answer is, "No, not really." Not for Joffrey as an actual person, rather than a symbol for something else.

I don't think love means the same thing to any five people in one room, to be honest. My definition of loving my kids includes raising them to become kind, responsible, capable people, so Cersei already failed there.

My yardstick is always going to be what the person doing the loving or not believes about the way they feel, and I think if you asked Cersei if she loves Joffrey, she would say absolutely.

I think if you asked Cersei if she loves Joffrey, she would say absolutely

Too much possibility for unreliable narrator (or even within the framework of the story--fear of death) for me--I read him as her best possible tool to achieve her goals. A tool of her creation, but there's enough fear and understanding of the vile, dangerous, piece of shit that kid is that there's no there there--no cherishing, fondness, warmth, attachment, etc--I don't get those coming off her where Joffrey's concerned.

But that -- "no cherishing, fondness, warmth, attachment" -- might not be what love means to her. And she's really the only person that it matters to -- if I were Sansa, pre-Margery for example, knowing that Cersei loves (or hates) Joffrey isn't going to change how she tries to manipulate him, and what consequences that will have for Sansa.

Ideal love, platonic or maternal or romantic, is supposed to be selfless, but it's very often not. And love is something that I don't think can be strictly defined.

I get that you don't think Cersei loves Joffrey. I just disagree.

Isn't there a point at which if you diverge to much from the dictionary or general societal understanding of a word, then you've got to use another word in order to usefully communicate?

You saw where I said I disagree with you, right? It's really not that important to me to keep arguing about it. It's opinion, not scientific fact.

I think Cersei loves the way that she knows how to love which I would agree maybe doesn't line up with the warm and fuzzy mother love we generally think of, but I don't think it has to. I don't even think it could given the way that she grew up and how she learned to love in her family. We haven't really seen on the show yet how much of a relationship, if any, she had with her own mother before she died giving birth to Tyrion, but we do know Tywin Lannister and if you learned about love from him, then your conception of love is going to be royally fucked. I think there's always a self-interested aspect to love for Cersei, even with Jamie. I think she loves Tommen and Myrcella, who are not monsters, and I think we saw that when Tyrion had Myrcella sent off to Dorne. And yet, I don't think she'd hesitate for an instant to sell Myrcella off to the highest bidder, just as her father traded her, if she thought it would advance her interests or secure greater power to the Lannisters. That's the way love goes (Oooh, Cersei singing That's the Way Love Goes now in my head and it is funny. Ha!) for her. I guess I gotta agree with Amy. I don't question that in her way she loves her kids. It's certainly not the way that I would hope to love my hypothetical kids, but I'd also hope that my kids didn't turn out to be psycho killers, so there's that . . .

On the flip, I don't imagine that Joffrey loves her, but I don't think he loves anybody.

I actually do think there's a universality to parental love where most people want their kids to grow up to be like them, only better. And unfortunately for Cersei, she's a pretty terrible person, and so she raised her beloved Joffrey to be the worst person. And it's only within the timespan of the show (a year, more or less?) that she's gone from bursting with pride to quietly horrified to seething with jealousy of his fiancee.

a self-interested aspect to love for Cersei

She consistently says things like, "If I were a man, I'd be Jaime." And, even in that relationship, it doesn't actually seem very...affectionate.