Back to the beginning of swinging.
In the fifties the newspapers referred to it as “wife-swapping.” Today it’s named “swinging,” but regardless of its name this lifestyle seems to be growing in recognition among ordinary, adult married couples in USA. The popular media are paying increasing attention to the trend, regularly putting a encouraging spin on the effects which the lifestyle has upon relationships. The North American Swing Club Association (NASCA) claims there are structured swing clubs in more or less all states as well as Belgium, England, Germany, and Japan. These clubs are rewarding businesses which supply all levels of social activities for swingers including vacation plans, special vacation sites for swingers, and annual gatherings and seminars. Lifestyles, Inc., a swingers travel agency, booked 700 couples at a resort in Jamaica in January of 1997.
What exactly is swinging? Unlike “open marriages” of the 1970’s which promoted non-possessive love and broadmindedness of infidelity in their spouses, or “polyamory” - the love of several sex partners at once – swinging is non-monogamous sexual action, treated much like any other social activity, that can be experienced as a pair. Emotional monogamy, or dedication to the love relationship with one’s marital partner, remains the primary goal. Swinging is frequently done in the company of one’s spouse and requires the consent of both to the experience. Although swingers often become close friends with other swinging couples, there are rules restricting emotional involvement with non-spousal partners. While swinging involves having sex with people other than one’s spouse, its supporters claim that it enhances the relationship of the swinging couple both sexually and emotionally. By removing the secrecy and untruthfulness inherent in one’s natural wishes for sexual diversity, the couple can explore their fantasies together without dishonesty or guilt. By removing the need for dishonesty from the sexual life, a fresh height of reliance and sincerity about all of one’s feelings is supposedly achieved without the negative baggage of envy.
Swinging as an alternative lifestyle is of both practical and scholarly importance because the challenge to merge sexual non-monogamy with emotional monogamy is basically “deviant” from the western model of romantic love which assumes that sexual and emotional monogamy are mutually reinforcing and inseparable. It has yet to be demonstrated empirically whether this alternative lifestyle in fact strengthens or weakens marital relationships, but in an era where 37% of husbands and 30% of wives, sometimes so-called hotwives confess to having had at least one extra-marital affair, where divorce rates for first marriages are approaching 60%, and where family shakiness and parental neglect of kids has become a major national worry, any effort to redefine “love” and strengthen the marital relationship is worthy of our attention. If swingers have found a way to stabilize relationships, extend family ties, and improve the lives of couples we would be remiss if we did not take their lifestyle and their redefinition of monogamous love seriously.
It is concluded that swingers surveyed are the white, middle-class, middle-aged, church-going segment of the residents reported in previous studies, but when it comes to attitudes about sex and marriage they are less racist, less sexist, and less heterosexist than the broad public. Swinging appears to make the vast majority of swingers’ marriages happier, and swingers rate the contentment of their marriages and life satisfaction commonly as higher than the non-swinging population.
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