I admire Mo’Nique a lot. I think she was fantastic in Precious. I admire her ability to buck traditional standards of beauty, especially in Hollywood, and refuse to shave her legs. And I admire the fact that she has spoken publicly about the fact that she and her husband have an open marriage. Monogamy is not the only relationship model. There are other ways to have relationships, and there are many ways to have open relationships. There’s non-monogamy, swinging, polyamory, and a whole host of other ways to engage in relationships. What works for one couple doesn’t work for every couple.
That’s why I was disappointed to read a post on the Psychology Today blog condemning Mo’Nique for her open marriage. The authors say:
We are sorry Mo’Nique but you are sending a terrible message to those who are married – to those who are in love. Trust us when we say this – you are plain wrong and your message is not supported by any research on successful marriage!
What “research” are they referencing? Because I know that I’ve read plenty of accounts from non-monagamous couples that have very strong, happy, successful marriages.
In our thousands of interviews over the years, happily married couples have told us repeatedly and with passion – they would never engage in infidelity, they would never cheat on the one they love. The key core elements of the best marriages are trust, respect, truthfulness, togetherness, and kindness. There is no getting around these core conditions and still have a successful marriage.
How does having an open marriage negate elements of trust, respect, truthfulness, togetherness, and kindness? Monogamous relationships do not guarantee that these elements will exist, so why would a non-monogamous relationship guarantee that they won’t? In my experience, couples with open relationships tend to have more trust and more truthfulness than those that do not, because they don’t feel the need to hide things. This is a generalization, of course, but open relationships actually require a great deal of trust and communication for them to be successful. And how does non-monogamy take away from kindness or togetherness? Couples with open relationships are suddenly unkind to each other? They don’t spend time together? Says who? What kind of baseless assumptions are those?
The problem is because of Mo’Nique’s “celebrity” status, based upon her Academy Award nomination for the movie entitled Precious, people listen to her irrespective of her expertise or knowledge base about what makes for great marriages. Bad idea!
People like Mo’Nique are not only delusional about what is required for a successful marriage, they do a great disservice to people who are in love and who are contemplating marriage… you do not “sleep around,” cheat on your spouse, or engage in “flings” and stay happily married.
No, people like the authors of that blog post are the ones that are delusional about what is required for a successful marriage. Maybe they don’t “‘sleep around,’ cheat on [their spouse], or engage in ‘flings’ and stay happily married,” but that doesn’t mean that other people can’t (also, if the couple has an open relationship and has agreed to the terms of it, then it’s not “cheating”) and don’t. Monogamy is just one relationship model. It may be the most common, but that doesn’t make it the only one or the best one for every couple.
This is an example of people enforcing their morals, values, and norms on other people and thinking that they know best. There is no “right” or “wrong” way to have a marriage or a relationship. Each couple is different. However, the authors are right about one thing: trust, respect, truthfulness, togetherness, and kindness are necessarily elements for successful relationships. What they’re wrong about is the fact that monogamy is necessary in order to achieve those things.
I'm Britni, a snarky bitch and generally awesome person. I write about sex, love, and bullshit. If sex-positivity, discussions about BDSM and kink, queer issues, and topics that are completely inappropriate by society's standards make you uncomfortable, then this blog is not for you.
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27 Comments
That article just makes me so sad. It seems to me that by berating open relationships, the author is actually the one doing a disservice to monogamy.
Thanks for this piece.
As a married polyamorous woman, I am thrilled to know that Mo’Nique is poly! I have no idea how I didn’t know this before. And shame on Psychology Today for shaming poly relationships. Clearly their arguments are not based on anything factual but only on some strange idea of what an open marriage is and none of it is true. Since becoming poly, my husband and I communicate more and better than we ever have. I take extreme offense at the insinuation that my husband and I lack trust, respect, truthfulness, togetherness and kindness. That is pure bullshit.
Very well said! I completely agree with you, just because something doesn’t work for you doesn’t mean it won’t work for others.
Me and my gf have talked about having an open relationship, but right now it’s not the right thing for us. We feel like we need to be way, way more stable before we can think about it again. But that doesn’t mean we will never think/speak of it again or that we look down on people who are stable enough to make it work.
The results of social reasearch – embedded necessarily in a certain social context, generally “mainstream” – are a different matter than the politics non-monogamy. As far as I know, not being a specialist, but being in the field, it is entirely true that research shows that infidelity is correlated with unhappy or bad marriage. And this should be taken to show that – given that we trust the various researchers – in general, among all the population, not “sleeping around” is good for your marriage. Flat out denial of the results of research is hardly ever a wise path to take.
Instead one should consider the following:
1. Polyamory, swinging & open marriages/relationships are a niche phenomenon that is practiced by very few people. If anything, the numbers that should matter in this discussion is whether or not those non- monogamous couples are more or less likely to be happy with their relationship. That is: how many non-m. relationships are happy, how many are not? What feature are correlated with either the success or failure of non-m. relationships? How long do they last? Is persistence even a success category for non-m. relationships? Or are they instead good if they last as long as the emotion is strong, then dissolve? Maybe what makes for a good non-m. relationship is very different from what makes for a good m. relationship.
In general, that is mainstream marriages, having sex with someone else is correlated with bad marriages. But keep in mind that we are talking about marriage here and for 99% of the population, marriage just implies monogamy. So in the vast majority of cases, if a married person has sex with someone not their marriage partner, that will be cheating, with all that implies.
Now, most of what Britni says seems to fit with the anecdotal evidence of pro-polyamory people, who usually successfully practice polyamory and share their views on the matter. What it is not is the result of sociological or psychological research. It is entirely possible that in 75% of all cases opening a relationship either leads to or is a symptom of a dissolving relationship and by bias selection (only those who like something will go and advertise for it unless paid) we never get to hear that side of the matter. Hell, it could be 99% for all we know. We do not have that data.
And while I do understand that in particular the know-it-all style of the quoted writer is offensive to people who have their moral horizon (as it pertains to relationships) at a different place, the fact is that he has research results on his side and you don’t. All you have is your personal feelings, clouded personal judgments and anecdotal evidence from failure-prone memories. Which is not a good ground to argue from.
Therefore, do not attack the advice they give, that people in a marriage should keep sexual fidelity. That might be very good advice for most people. Keep in mind that you are a rather small minority, even if your whole social circle is part of that minority. Finally, it is best to question the generality of the research results, pointing out that what such research shows is dominant (no pun intended) relationships between feature in the mainstream of a population, not essential relationship between features in the world: That most marriages are bad if the partners have sex outside the marriage does not imply that there is a deep or essential connection between sexual fidelity and good relationships. What it does imply is that in general, that is for most people, those two things are connected. And that is a much more fruitful place for speculation (on why and how that is) than just feeling a moral outrage against mainstream psychologist speaking against your own values.
You’re defending their “research,” yet they never produce the “research” they refer to. They’re just making blanket statements that it exists, and that they conducted it and came to these conclusions. What method did they use to conduct this research? How do we know that it’s valid or reliable? We don’t. Research can be, and very often is, flawed. And you can manipulate it and design studies in order to support whatever it is that you’re hypothesizing.
You’re also making a large number of assumptions about “mainstream” marriages. We don’t know how many people practice non-monogamy, because so many couples that do don’t talk about it, because it’s still not very socially acceptable. And, mainstream marriage is flawed itself, and if mainstream marriage means monogamy, as you’re implying, and monogamy is necessary for successful relationships, then why do so many marriages end in divorce? Obviously, monogamy isn’t working out as well as it’s supposed to.
As an addendum, I think the best approach would be to suggest that:
1. “Sleeping around” is not the same as cheating. Cheating is “sleeping around” + breach of trust.
2. It is breach of trust, not sleeping around, which has a negative impact on marriage.
3. Most people do not make that distinction consciously.
This of course is only a set of assumptions, but they seem reasonable and it should be possible to test them scientifically. Also: No anecdotal evidence (aka “it works for me and my friends”)
One word: TILDA!
Well said Britni, even if @Eisnach doesn’t fully concur. Tho’ I do agree with @Eisnach that the negative implications on any relationship are the lack of trust rather than “sleeping around” per se. I happen to be in a monogamous marriage (of 30 years). Yes, early on I did have an affair, but one which my wife knew about (in advance) and even took part in! It didn’t last long and I like to think it did a lot to cement our trust and our relationship. I also like to think that if either of us needed to “play away” again the other would be supportive and we would be able to talk about it openly – neither of us is good at (or wants to) keep things hidden from the other.
Monogamy is just one relationship model. It may be the most common, but that doesn’t make it the only one or the best one for every couple.
It also doesn’t de factomake monogamy right. Monogamy is only right because any number of patriarchal religions say it is. Where is the evidence that monogamy is biologically the right model for Homo sapiens? It is increasingly being shown that the monogamy model breaks down even in animals where it is supposed to be de rigueur.
We need to get away from this societal model that patriarchal religion sets all the rules; people have to be trusted to manage their own lives and their own sexuality – but that requires people to trust and respect each other, something which appears to be sadly lacking amongst the populous at large. If you want to dip your toe in the waters of why this needs to change then see my Body Comfort & Sex Education.
I agree with Eisnacht.
While what the author of the article said is offensive because of the overall condescending tone, he does have a good point. Mostly that people look to Mo’nique as a credible role model because of her celebrity status. Her simply being public about she and her husband being in a poly/open relationship is a bit dangerous for the relationships of the general public. A whole lot of people have absolutely no idea about the very important details when it comes to maintaining an open relationship, or rather, they don’t have a clue what an open relationship is. All they hear when Mo’nique says she and her husband practice it is “They think it’s okay to have sex with other people.”
There is no stressing the importance of communication in open relationships. While it’s not her responsibility to educate the world on it, people will still take her advocation and participation as they would any other product endorsement.
But the thing is, it *is* okay to sleep with other people because that’s what Mo’nique and her partner have agreed on. I think it’s great that she isn’t telling the public that they have to conform to a specific concept of marriage. I have ideological issues with marriage, so every time someone decides to redefine marriage it makes me very happy.
Mo’nique isn’t advocating an open relationship for everyone, she’s just telling people what works for her and her partner.
It’s only okay to sleep with other people if that’s what you and your partner have agreed on. Marriage or not. An open relationship takes a lot more than just being okay with having multiple sexual partners.
But just the fact that she’s discussing her open relationship, as a celebrity, is a GOOD thing. Because it normalizes it, and brings awareness to the fact that there are other ways to have a marriage. Non-monogamy is still very taboo, and many people don’t even consider it as an option because we’re taught from day one that marriage=monogamy. Many, many people are unhappy with that model. If they weren’t, the divorce rate wouldn’t be so high. I think that her talking about it brings attention to the fact that there are more ways of doing this.
And by her saying that, she’s implying that yes, they can have sex with other people, but they’re clearly aware of that. Who’s to say that someone doesn’t bring up the discussion with their partner after reading that these are two people that have talked about it?
A whole lot of people have absolutely no idea about the very important details when it comes to maintaining an open relationship, or rather, they don’t have a clue what an open relationship is.
A whole lot of people have absolutely no idea about the very important details when it comes to maintaining a monogamous relationship, either, nor do they have a clue what a functional, healthy monogamous relationship entails.
You’re right, but the more people that get involved in a relationship, the harder it gets to figure those things out. Not everyone knows what an open relationship is. For those people it normalizes ‘cheating’ because that’s all they understand of it. Her publicizing her open marriage has good and bad implications.
And the more people who discuss this subject, whether or not they understand what any type of relationship actually means/requires, the better. If Mo’nique has done nothing else she has clearly got some more people talking about relationships. And the more of that is done the better, because only by doing that (a) will people begin to understand the implications of monogamy or an open relationship and (b) will we start to break down our collective barriers and taboos about talking about sex, relationships, bodies, etc. Any discussion in this area has to be a good thing – just don’t expect everyone to agree with you (whoever you are) or to be able to understand, but give them credit for trying.
@Eisnacht: I have a masters in sociology and this was my thesis topic (so while it may not by *your* field, I feel confident in saying from an academic perspective it is indeed *mine.*) You are correct that there are is yet to be data on long-term, large-scale population studies of non-monogamous relationships (though there is much research… find it here: http://www.jstor.org/pss/3811714 and here: http://www.jstor.org/pss/583034 and and excellent article here: http://polyinthemedia.blogspot.com/ ).
This does not, however, mean that the statistics being used in the Psychology Today blog are accurate. You may call it “flat out denial of the results of research,” others may call it focusing on a data set that best lends to the researcher’s initial hypothesis, or what’s better known in social science as “cooking the books.” Perhaps in chemistry we can say that “if A then B then C,” but we cannot always do this so clearly in social science. There are just SO many other factors involved that may affect the final “C” result.
The blog bases it’s final “advice,” as you put it, that “people in a marriage should keep fidelity” if they hope to remain happily married and/or avoid divorce. I’m not even going to discuss the morality judgments at play here, but instead focus, as you have, on the scientific validity of this findings. And from a social science perspective, it is horribly flawed. There are many, many reasons why marriages dissolve (and as you have more accurately stated later, it may be the breech of trust that is at the heart of the erosion, which can happen in monogamous or non monogamous relationships, via cheating or via non-cheating).
Fact is, fifty percent of marriages end in divorce. The current model (of which are 99% monogamous -which are your words and your assumption, and an inaccurate one at that, by the way) that we have currently been replicating in our culture for decades is clearly flawed. It is not irrational to want to explore other models which may lead to better (“better” in this case, meaning a lower divorce rate and a happier partnership) results.
Finally, your advice to Britni to “therefore, do not attack the advice they give, that people in a marriage should keep sexual fidelity” because it is based on “data” is entirely unscientific in itself. All good scientists should attack advice and data, over and over again, in fact. Any good researcher would invite criticism and rethinking of such findings to best get as close to the Truth as possible, even if it takes some retooling of the process. This, my friend, is called the scientific method.
So challenge on, my friends. Never stop questioning the status quo.
Dude, I had no clue that was your thesis! Awesome. And thanks for the links; I plan on checking them out. I actually have a few more posts coming up that are similar in nature, or moreso discuss the societal push towards forcing monogamy as the norm, so I’m curious to see your thoughts on those!
So challenge on, my friends. Never stop questioning the status quo.
Absolutely right @BlowJoy in every and any field. Our current norms, and “society’s values” are only the “average” of all our individual opinions — or at least those opinions as expressed by the people we permit to speak on our behalf (politicians, religious leaders, etc.). It is only by people like us all here questioning, pushing the boundaries and breaking the taboos that we will eventually move society’s “average” position. This is called progress and is generally held to be “a good thing”. So yes, we have to keep challenging and questioning – but it ain’t always comfortable.
To clear that statement of field up: I do sociology, but have not worked on monogamy. I mostly agree with you and I certainly cede that you will know the numbers better than I do, but I do want to focus on the idea of questioning research.
This is not a scientific conference stuffed with social scientist who know their methodolgy, have insight into what the researchers did and the necessary theoretical background to arrive at some kind of justified judgment on those things. I think it is good practice to accept research prima facie and if you think that something went wrong with that research, you should indeed go out and challenge it. By analysis of what those researchers did or by doing your own research. But merely discounting research because it does not fit with your own moral stance or your own anecdotal evidence or personal experience is not advisable.
So: question and be critical by all means. But for the right reasons and in the right way. And moral resentment of a minority position towards the mainstream is not the right reasons and citing anecdotal evidence is not the right way.
As to mainstream marriage being problematic, I agree. It does not follow that what polyamorous people personally feel is good for them is good general advice for everyone.
Non monogamous relationships can be as varied as each relationship. The question seems to be is sex with one person enough? Experience tells me for some people the answer is no and there should be NO shame in this, just as people who need no sex should not be shamed. The couple should talk about why they need it and what they need to let the other person have it.
Selflessness, Communication, Respect, Accountability, Open mindedness, Self confidence; all these things are needed for a non monogamous relationship IMO.
I have been on both sides of the jealousy coin and frankly either I or the other person did not try to relive it and instead let it separate us. Jealousy and insecurity are not the same thing. We all need to feel special and know what our partner’s intentions are.
I want intimacy and I want to feel like I am the most important thing in another person’s life and that they are willing to do what it takes to keep me. For me, Poly and open relationships could work but don’t fill the bill completely. I have essentially done these through dating, cheating, and swinging with weak relationships. My ideal is not a split intimacy. I end up being somewhat close to many people and not totally invested and connected to anyone. In the end that is a very lonely place, no matter how much good sex I have.
I have seen many swinger couples split when they finally found someone else who got their socks off and a level of naturally intimacy ensued, under the guise of being open with the permission of their partner. I can imagine the ability to be open would change with the status of the relationship if you want to keep it. Swingers I know that DO work often take breaks. Accountability, being able to be told no to an opportunity, letting it go. Having the discipline to tell others no and break it off if you feel intimacy that threatens your existing relationship. All this takes great maturity, openness and honesty.
For me I want to have excitement and connection. I want to feel like the man. It is unrealistic to think I am always going to be the best lay in the room. However if I feel part of that pleasure, involved in it, I am so pleased in my partners happiness. Tell me how it felt after, while we play alone. Bring that intimacy back to ME. Tell me what you liked about watching me with her. Communicate it, make it ours. Make it something that makes us tighter.
This sounds crass but I don’t want to share the person I love, I just want human sex toys because nothing beats the real thing. (I do give gift cards for a good review of my ‘sex toy’ bloggers, haha)
Though I agree that it’s ridiculous that this article criminalized Mo’nique for talking about how her marriage works in a way different from the “norm”, I highly disagree that monogamy is the reason for such a high divorce rate. The high divorce rate, IMO, is caused by people who rush into marriages too quickly, people who don’t take marriage seriously (as evidenced by the scores of celebrities who get married & divorced quickly & often), people who are selfish and immature and don’t think about the implications of a marriage before they enter into one. If people are not OK with monogamy, they should either not get married or they should make sure they find a spouse who would like to have a non-monogamous marriage as well.
Monogamy isn’t the problem, isn’t the cause of divorces. There are some people who want only monogamy in a relationship but still end up cheating. It’s the people who enter into marriages & their choices that cause divorce.
Which exactly supports the theses being aired above. Monogamy itself isn’t the problem. The problems are (a) society’s expectations (see my comment above) and more importantly (b) understanding, communication and trust in how relationships work. IMO no-one will have a successful, long-term, intimate relationship unless there is communication, respect, trust etc. To have this in turn means the relationship has to operate on a number of levels, with each partner at times playing diefferent roles: there is child-child, adult-adult, parent-child (both ways round), friend-friend, lover-lover, etc. IME strong relationships have all these levels, although the mix will vary from time to time and one will flip dynamically between roles according to circumstance. The right role in the wrong place makes for great fun (think sex in the elevator) as long as you both are OK with it. The fewer of these roles there are in a relationship the weaker it is. Lover-lover isn’t enough unless all one wants is purely ephemeral hot lust – nothing wrong with that but it doesn’t make a long-term relationship. Relationships fail when they lose too many of these levels. More at http://www.zenmischief.com/relate.htm.
Actually, both Britni and BlowJoy postulate that monogamy is the reason for such a high divorce rate, and it was to them I was responding. I completely agree with everything that you are saying, but you saying that “monogamy isn’t the problem” goes against what Britni and BlowJoy had said.
@Panda … You’re right, because I didn’t actually say whose arguments I was supporting. I am saying that monogamy isn’t the problem. Monogamy will work for some people, but not all. Just as poly-anything will work for some. What the ratios are I don’t know and I doubt anyone does. Monogamy works if it works for you; if not it doesn’t. The problem as I see it (and I may be wrong) is the expectation placed by society is that monogamy is “the only right way”, that all have to conform to it, and that we all feel pressured into trying. What this implies is that to make any meaningful change in the monogamy failure rate we have to either reduce the level of monogamy or increase peoples’ abilities to communicate their feelings and beliefs. Neither of those is going to be easy all the time “society” keeps up peddling its current taboos. But we must try; if we don’t we certainly won’t make progress. And I think that’s what we’re all trying to do, in different words and different ways: to break down the taboos and make progress.
Sarah – I don’t understand your point. Celebs shouldn’t be expected to only share things in their lives that are right for everyone. Should Brangelina not talk about adoption because adoption isn’t the right choice for all of is? Should celebs not talking about being pregnant because I don’t want to have kids?
My problem with that article is that it is putting a blanket, one size fits all, diagnosis on all relationships and life doesn’t work like that. People aren’t one size fits all so relationships certainly wouldn’t be.
Open relationships work for some people. No, they don’t work for everyone. No, they don’t work for the majority of people.
You know what else doesn’t work for the majority of people? Dating me. I’d end up stabbed with a high heel if Brit and I were dating. I’d end up tied up and tossed into a large body of water if I was dating Profligacy.
I don’t think I’m impossible to be with. I think I need to find the right person, who matches me well. It’s the same with the type of relationship. You need to find the one that works for you.
Celebrities, for whatever reason, serve as role models for our society. Whether they want to be or not, they are. They have chosen a career path that puts them completely in the public eye. Every. single. thing. that they do is streamed via TMZ and other media outlets with little regard to context or how private it should be. This means they have to be careful about what they do, which is why so many celebrities hire PR agents.
This can be good (for companies looking to get their products more exposure) or it can be bad (i.e. celebrity couples divorcing after having their relationships constantly scrutinized by everyone with an asshole). Everyone has an opinion on everything and there are a whole hell of a lot of people who form those opinions with the least amount of information available. While it’s nice for people who practice poly/open relationships to have someone so mainstream say “Hey, we do it too.”, (we all want to feel ‘normal’), it’s not necessarily sending the best message. Which is evidenced by the article Britni linked to. The majority of people in our society practice monogamy. Our little sex-positive circle of bloggers may understand full well what Mo’nique is talking about, but the average person doesn’t.
I don’t mean that celebrities should only talk about what’s right for everyone. That would be ridiculous because every single person is different. I mean that celebrities, if they choose to put their personal lives in the spotlight too, need to be careful of the things they say. Anything and everything they say is under constant scrutiny from the general public.
Even when they -do- fully explain themselves, as Mo’nique did in her Barbara Walters interview where she stated that they were okay with each other having sex outside of the marriage, even though they haven’t. She said to her an open marriage means “let me tell you my every secret, my fantasies, my thoughts so that way there are no surprises.” Yet the commenters to the interview Brit linked still have no concept of what the term “open marriage” means. They think Mo’nique is getting a bad deal, that it’s just an excuse for her husband to have sex with other people (even though she says she could as well) and that she’s just pretending that she doesn’t care if her husband has sex with other people.
When I go to my swinging website and I see that there are 9500 new members this week and its only Wednesday, it leads me to think that swinging and poly relationships is not as rare as some would like to think. I think that each couple needs to find their own path with out the shaming. I think that would drive the divorce rate way down.
Thanks for this, Britni. What really bugs me about the Psych Today post is not just what they’re saying, but that they’re using the false backing of “research” and “science” to moralize. I’m glad you’re calling them on it.
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[...] night I read Britni’s post about monogamy. I was fine. The discussion in the comments today has prompted some bad thoughts though. While [...]