My jaw dropped when I saw the article in the New York Times by Dan Savage on the “Virtues of Infidelity”. Instead of encouraging monogamy, the author advocates “tolerance for pornography, fetishes and a variety of partnered arrangements, from strict monogamy to wide openness”.
I suspect that many people will like his article, since it condones their perversion of choice. He did acknowledge that monogamy is tough. I agree with him on that. It is in marriage that we learn how to deal with people, we learn how to love and we learn how to reduce selfishness. The lifestyle he promotes is filled with selfishness, and self-gratifying. Such a lifestyle may be fun at first, but it ends up destroying one’s soul, mind and brings a hardness and insensitivity.
Instead of such lifestyles, we need couples to stand stronger together. We need them to improve their relationships. The stronger the marriage relationship, the stronger the family relationships. The lifestyle he condones weakens families. It may initially reduce some tensions in the short run, but few can afford the long term cost of such lifestyles. In some ways it is an application of the Ashley Madison mindset. The world has seen enough of such mindsets with the Wiener episode, the Tiger Woods episode and the financial infidelities of Bernie Madoff. When self-gratification begins in one area of your life, it does not stay there. It spreads to other areas. Eventually it becomes sadistic, in the sense of do whatever you want to people because you can. The Marquis de Sade saw this years ago. It is not surprising that many of the self-seeking power brokers are often caught up in the sadistic and masochistic lifestyles. It was the natural progression of self-gratification.
Having a healthy marriage requires the opposite. We need more self-sacrifice, more love, more intimacy. Intimacy is not what you get with fetishes and pornography. You obtain just the opposite. You have intensity without intimacy.
I encourage you to not fall for the promotion of such selfishness. If you want to save your marriage, you may have to trash the popular columnists who encourage you to “do what thou wilt” and instead learn how to love your spouse, how to keep your promises, and how to strengthen your marriage.
Best Regards,
Jeffrey D. Murrah
2 Responses
Maybe your link points to the wrong place. I used your link and it took me to an article called “Married, With Infidelities” and it was by Mark Oppenheimer, not Dan Savage, but it wasaabout Dan Savage. I googled the title you gave with “Dan Savage” and those links took me to Oppenheimer’s article too. It’s an interesting article but I don’t think it discourages monogamy. It discusses monogamy versus nonmonogamy in a non-biased way. Nonmonoagamy, being a relationship that is more open with the knowledge of both partners.
Oppenheimer did say this:
“The view that we need a little less fidelity in marriages is dangerous for a gay-marriage advocate to hold”
Rollercoasterrider,
Thanks for getting back to me. That is the article, which discusses Dan Savage and his column. I am glad that you read the article. I was concerned with some of the ideas presented. He did present many of his points in a non-biased way. I admit, I have trouble with nonmonogamy. There are so many threats to marriage and family these days, and people need to wake up to them. I would have liked article to have taken a stronger stand toward monogamy, since the strength of society hinges on the strength of marriages.
I appreciate your comments. We need more discussions of marriage and what it will take to strengthen them and thereby reduce the likelihood of infidelity.