The Ideal Relationship Myth: On the Ethics of Nonmonogamy, Continued.
Our expectations hurt each other, and in wielding them as either shield or spear, we are significantly damaging each other. This is another argument for nonmonogamy [Part 1 Link], but from a different angle. This isn’t a(n entirely) feminist argument, but an argument appealing to our desire to refrain from harming the people we purport to love, and to our desire to flourish as autonomous, authentic beings. This piece argues that harm is inherent to expectations of monogamy, even mutually agreed upon monogamy, because it inhibits flourishing, because it demands inauthenticity, and because it places self interest above compassion and altruism. But first, I want to tell you a story.
A boyfriend and I have been struggling, and during a disagreement about the ethics of nonmonogamy, he looked at me and said, “I don’t know that this is my ideal relationship.” Ideal relationship. The phrase got lodged somewhere deep inside of me, and as I thought about it more and more, I realized what he was trying to say: “I don’t know that you’re my ideal partner.” Well, I found that completely unsurprising, for ideal partners are nonexistent! Of course I’m not ideal. But what truly made me sad was that he felt the need to have one, singular, ideal partner — the partner who embodies all of the things which he imagines a partner should have. Furthermore, that’s a lot to live up to. I don’t want to be charged with the task of living up to anyone’s ideal. I want to be who I want to be.
You may be wondering what it is that he desired of me that I couldn’t provide. Well, I’ll tell you as he told me, “I want someone who only wants to be with me.” My failure is not that I don’t want him enough, not that I don’t love him enough, not that I don’t treat him like a partner, not that I don’t want to be with him, but that my desire isn’t singular enough for him. His ideal partner would myopically want him, she would have the appropriately directed desire, the appropriate mental state. So I sat there — back against the wall, wringing my hands in frustration — agonizing over the fact that what I’d done wrong had nothing to do with him, but had everything to do with that which is external to our relationship. I had tried my best, loved him to pieces, treated him well, did everything in my power to create a partnership with him, but it wasn’t enough. What we had didn’t matter if I desired to be with other people, if I didn’t exclusively want to be with him.
He hurt me very badly that night. I felt as though everything I am was nullified by my refusal to adhere to monogamy. The person that I am, what I do and say, the love, the bond, the commitments, all of it was meaningless if he couldn’t have the exclusive rights to those things. My love had to be his, my affections, my body, my future. I sat wondering how it could be that a desire for monogamy could nullify our history, and felt that, as Dan Savage famously said,
‘’It’s saying that one blow-job on a business trip should be given more weight and consideration and more importance should be attached to it than the 25 years you’ve spent together, the kids you’re raising together, the property you own together, the history you have together, the affection you still have for each other — all of that must be discarded. All of that weighs less on the scales.’’
The Harm of “The Ideal”
As women, we are bombarded by ideals, and by the ways in which we don’t live up to them. Our lives are saturated with the knowledge that we ought to be different from how we are. This is, of course, a force to resist, and we do. But it’s diminishing. The Ideal extends itself into our relationships by way of monogamy, for monogamy insists that we must be the ideal partner, we must be a soulmate. How could it not insist this? If you are to be with one person for the rest of your life, oughtn’t that person be the absolute embodiment of your ideal? Mustn’t they meet all of your specifications, needs, desires? If not, you’re merely settling, and something in the back of your mind will forever whisper, “you could do better.”
The harm of The Ideal is this: it demands that you be who someone else wants you to be. It demands that you embody every detail of someone’s perfect partner. Therefore, rather than existing in a relationship where partners love each other for who they are, accept each other despite their shortcomings, allow each other to decide for themselves who to be, monogamous love is always conditional, inherently so. Not only is it conditional, but it is selfishly conditional, demandingly conditional. It is an imposition.
Of course, some of you will say that this isn’t an indictment of monogamy, but perhaps of certain people who engage in monogamy. I disagree. I think it must be inherent to monogamy. Perhaps the partner who feels imposed upon will leave, or perhaps the imposing partner will leave in search of their ideal, but either way, harm has been committed. The imposing partner will go off in search of their ideal mate, casting aside those who don’t fit. Harm will continue as they pursue an idealized person, a fantasy. When they discover that their ideal partner doesn’t exist, if they settle and remain monogamous, the urge to seek out the traits missing in their partner will be overwhelming. This will lead to infidelity — to harm of both self and partner. If they manage to resist temptation, they will spend their life in an active state of resistance, of denying themself what oughtn’t be off limits in the first place. That is not living, let alone flourishing or living authentically.
What Love Is
We have to consider what it means to love someone. Of course, definitions of the word 'love' will always be subject to rejection, but I’ll offer you my own definition:
Love is a profound sense of caring for another being, resulting in the prioritization of this being’s flourishing over your own desires for, and of them.
This is what love is. It’s quite simple. Love is merely allowing someone’s desires for themselves, for their own life, to take priority over your desires for them. Even more simply stated, it is finding contentment and happiness in another being’s authenticity and autonomy.
But there is more to say about love. How can we claim to love someone while desiring to control them? Here you may say, “no, control is the wrong word. I simply want my partner to desire, of their own volition, to do, to feel, to act in accordance with my wishes for them." This, friends, is a desire for control no matter how you slice it. Again, this is idealization -- trying to match a human being to your own self interested desires. No love can be found here. No selves will flourish under these conditions, for love cannot be self interested.
I suppose I should talk about Levinas, for some of you can probably sense his philosophy seeping through. For those of you uninterested in the more academically-oriented philosophy, well, you should read it anyway.
Totality and Infinity
In Totality and Infinity, Levinas advances the claim that ethics is necessarily born out of our interactions with the other, and out of the responsibility we feel toward them. This is an interesting move because it distinctly separates Levinas from the two overarching schools of thought in ethical theory — deontology and utilitarianism. It is also interesting because it is human-focused. This is to say that it takes into account what deontology and utilitarianism do not — aspects of being human that are integral to our existence in society but which both schools of thought seem to brush aside in favor of a methodical, analytic system of prescriptions. Levinas appears to be aware of the lack of humanity in these theories, and proposes that we in fact act as ethical agents because the other, in a face-to-face encounter, compels us to act as such; the other demands it of us. The theory has a mystical quality, and more than a hint of essentialism, but it is compelling on an intuitive level, and this sets it apart from the rigidity of deontology, and the frivolity of utilitarianism. It is a human-focused theory which respects more than our ability to utilize sterile reason, and in this way, it is better suited for implementation in a society composed of emotional and intuitive, reasoning beings.
According to Levinas, we realize ourselves as free and ethical beings through our real-life interactions with the other. In this way, we transcend pure being and become truer versions of our selves. From Totality and Infinity:
To approach the Other in conversation is to welcome his expression, in which at each instant he overflows the idea a thought would carry away from it. It is therefore to receive from the Other beyond the capacity of the I, which means exactly: to have the idea of infinity. But this also means: to be taught. The relation with the Other, or Conversation, is a non-allergic relation, an ethical relation; but inasmuch as it is welcomed this conversation is a teaching. Teaching is not reducible to maieutics; it comes from the exterior and brings me more than I contain. In its non-violent transitivity the very epiphany of the face is produced.
Just as freedom needs its opposite to be freedom, I need the other — my opposite — to be my true self, to transcend my self of pure being. Transcendence for Levinas has been described “as a kind of pivot between the mechanism evident in Being and the supererogatory gesture of responsibility,” and he is explicit about the degree to which one must subvert themselves to the other. In no uncertain terms he says we must always subvert our needs so that the needs of the other may be met; we must feel completely responsible for the other. Levinas equates the feeling of responsibility to the other with love. In this way, we can view transcendence — the spontaneous feeling of responsibility for the other — as love, and it is through transcendence that we are able to self-actualize. Therefore, what is implicit in Levinas’ ethical theory is that only through love are we able to self-actualize.
What Ought We To Do?
We ought to love, in the real sense of the word, and allow ourselves to be loved, for this is the only means by which we can be authentic beings, and therefore, is the only ethical way to live. But to do this, we must reject monogamy. We must. It is inherently contradictory to love.
Levinasian love, nor my take on love, is the kind of thing present in most “love relationships.” The contract that two people enter into regarding a love relationship, more often than not, entails far more than just simple submission to the terms each sets for themself. Often, these contracts have within them implicit clauses reflecting the social norms of the culture. For example, regarding romantic love, it is normal for partners to expect sexual exclusivity from the other; however, more often than not, one or both members of the couple find themselves unable to remain committed in this way. Though infidelity is commonplace, the vast majority of romantic love relationships implicitly require monogamy. That sexual nonexclusivity is such a common problem in monogamous love relationships, a natural conclusion which could be drawn is that secretive sexual nonexclusivity is an authentic reaction to a restriction which requires inauthenticity. Many scientists and philosophers have expounded on the virtue of monogamous pairing. I will even concede that there are obvious benefits to such an arrangement. However, this says nothing of the fact that requiring sexual exclusivity of a partner may often be requiring them to live inauthentically, and this is just one of an infinite number of potential examples.
Almost all of us will claim that we wish not to cause harm to our partners, and that we wish to live fulfilling lives. Why, then, are almost all of us harming our partners, requiring them to live inauthentic lives, prohibiting their abilities to flourish, and retarding our own abilities to flourish as well? It is absurd! I want my partners to enjoy their lives to the fullest extent they can, and I want to do my best to enable them to do so. Our lives are so short — truly — and with that in mind, I want my partners to experience the best things life has to offer again and again and again. It’s so wonderful to fall in love, to develop deeply meaningful relationships with others, to experience different varieties of sex and pleasures of the body. I want these things for myself. They are what help give meaning to the project of human life. Because I recognize these things, I want them not merely for myself, but for my partners, for anyone I love.
