Back to the beginning of ”the lifestyle”.
In the fifties the newspapers referred to it as “wife-swapping.” Today it’s named “swinging,” but in any case of its name this swinging lifestyle seems to be rising in recognition among mainstream, middle-aged married couples in America. The popular media are paying increasing attention to the trend, often putting a positive spin on the effects which the lifestyle has upon marriages. The North American Swing Club Association (NASCA) claims there are structured swing clubs in just about all states as well as Switzerland, England, Germany, and Japan. These clubs are profitable ventures which provide all levels of group activities for swingers including vacation plans, special holiday sites for swingers, and annual conferences and seminars. Lifestyles, Inc., a swingers travel agency, booked 700 couples at a resort in Jamaica in February of 1998.
What exactly is swinging? Unlike “open marriages” of the 1970’s which promoted non-possessive love and tolerance of unfaithfulness in their spouses, or “polyamory” - the love of numerous sex partners at once – swinging is non-monogamous sexual activity, treated a lot like any other social activity, that can be practiced as a pair. Emotional monogamy, or commitment to the love relationship with one’s marital partner, remains the main goal. Wife swapping is typically done in the company of one’s spouse and requires the approval of both to the practice. Though 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 adherents claim that it enhances the relationship of the swinging couple both sexually and emotionally. By removing the privacy and untruthfulness inherent in one’s natural desires for sexual variety, the couple can discover their fantasies together without cheating or shame. By removing the need for deceit from the sexual life, a brand new level of confidence and sincerity about all of one’s feelings is supposedly achieved without the harsh baggage of jealousy.
Swinging as an alternative lifestyle is of both practical and intellectual importance because the effort to merge sexual non-monogamy with emotional monogamy is fundamentally “unusual” 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 actually strengthens or weakens marital relationships, but in an era where 37% of husbands and 30% of wives, sometimes so-called hotwives admit to having had at least one extra-marital affair, where divorce rates for first marriages are approaching 60%, and where family instability and parental neglect of children has become a main national concern, any attempt to redefine “love” and strengthen the marital bond is worthy of our interest. If swingers have found a way to stabilize relationships, extend family ties, and enrich 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 population. Swinging appears to make the vast majority of swingers’ marriages happier, and swingers rate the happiness of their marriages and life satisfaction commonly as higher than the non-swinging population.
Tags: echangistes, hot wives, milfs, polyamory, swingers clubs, swingers in Canada, swingers in France, swinging, the lifestyle, wife swapping