It seems that where relationships and in particular gay relationships are concerned, there is an awful lot of dogma attached to certain views about the whole monogamous versus open relationship thing.
In fact, I'd go so far as to say that many people have such incredibly strong views on this whichever camp they fall in, that they are pretty unmovable when it comes to being willing to think a little more outside of the box in terms of what actually we are talking about here.
There does seem to be quite a few pre-conceptions when it comes to 'acceptance' or otherwise of people's choice to have sex outside their relationship:
* Gay guys always want sex and therefore find it hard to have monogamous relationships
* If you're in a relationship with one person and you think about having sex outside that relationship then you shouldn't be in that relationship in the first place
* You can't love each other truly if all you want to do is have sex with other men
* There's obviously no trust there if that's what you want to go and do
* What my partner doesn't know won't hurt him
* After a while in a relationship the sex gets too samey we play away to keep the spice going
The list could go on, but I reckon we should spend a little more time trying to actually understand the dynamics of relationships both gay and straight and be more willing to allow people to decide what works best for them.
I'm not going to advocate that one way is better than the other or that one side is more morally or ethically right than the other.
What I am saying is that, particularly in today's society, we should all take a long look at the way we are almost pre-programmed sometimes to accept things for the way they are (and supposedly always have been) it's doesn't mean that it's necessarily the 'right' or 'best' way.
Here then is my, somewhat long-winded attempt to 'think outside the box'.
Along with, it has to be said, a lot of help from a certain Dan Savage - the American columnist of Savage Love' who wrote a book called 'Skipping Towards Gomorrah (a great book to read by the way) in which he spent time looking at the seven deadly sins and how it effected American Society today.
One person for life or sex when you want it?
Putting aside the whole 'if I'm in love with someone, I only want to be with that person - period' argument for a second (not that I'm trivialising it because it does work for many people, but is only 'part' of the whole relationship thing), I think the whole idea of the 'monogamous' relationship stems from the societal concept of marriage.
As gay people, I think we quite often try and 'define' our relationships in the same mould as the rest of society ie in the form of some kind of monogamous 'marriage'.
I think we, and in fact society (but that's an even bigger topic for right now), should take a real step back and think a little more openly about this and look at how relationships work and what are the REAL healthiest circumstances for gay relationships to be in and not just fit it into something we've 'learned' from society (and particularly heterosexual society) saying that this is the right thing to do.
Firstly, I should say that in reality, it will be different for everyone so one of the first things we should all do is understand that different things work for different people and if we don't agree with one person's way of thinking, we shouldn't 'judge' them under our own ideals. If it works for them - fantastic, that's all we need to worry about.
In his book, under the 'lust' sin, Dan pointed out that in fact the heterosexual sanction of monogamous marriage wasn't working in the way that society represents it ie as the ideal form of coupling for today's' 'straight' society.
Although carrying out the role of monogamous relationships, they just weren't and aren't able to continue this indefinitely in other words, they needed something more.
Many, many Americans were actually indulging and incorporating their desire for 'lust' into their marriages by committing 'adultery'. Not in the form that you and I automatically think but in a very different form one that both parties agreed to.
He noted that, according to research carried out, of the 54.4 million married couples in the US today, 1.1 million of them (that's over 2%) were 'actively and openly' engaging in the Swinging movement - ie playing with others while in a relationship' and that it was growing at a phenomenal rate - the number has actually doubled since the 70's.
"These 1.1million 'Swingers' aren't potential nonmonogamous married couples but ACTUAL nonmonogamous heterosexual married couples who are setting a supposedly very bad example for other heterosexual couples.
In fact there's a huge industry sector opening up for precisely these couples- organised mass adulterers.
He equates that to the number of gay men who could potentially 'marry' if they were allowed to and observes:
"There are as many actively swinging, nonmonogamous straight couples as there are potential gay married couples".... and if anyone is setting a bad example for purely monogamous relationships, it's the growing number of straight couples who are 'playing' and not the 'promiscuous' gays that conservatives accuse of "recruiting, cheating and living a 'lifestyle'".
If 'fidelity' is essential to marriage (and thus by definition, to any couple, gay or straight), why then has there been such a growth in straight couples for whom wife-swapping and open marriage ie committing 'adultery' are the absolute rage.
So what's the relevance here?
Well, I was using it as an example of how more and more people, gay and straight, are questioning whether the whole monogamy, fidelity, marriage ideal that society seems to want to instil in everyone, is actually the 'right' way of doing it.
What if there were other ways of looking at it? What if we weren't so quick to condemn people for managing their relationships in a way which wasn't necessarily the way we ourselves believed is the 'right' way?
