HIGH GEAR

The Open Relationship

By LEON STEVENS

Can an open relationship work? "You betcha," says Gore Vidal. Appearing recently on C.B.S. TV's "Sixty Minutes," Vidal outlined his political and sexual philosophies. His controversial cosmology is familiar to many Americans through his novels, poetry, essays and lectures which often feature gay themes. The unabashed author declared to a slightly embarassed Mike Wallace that he had a male lover for close to twenty-three years, a record to be envied by many more conventional straight couples. He added however, that his is also "avidly and enthusiastically promiscuous." This further relation, no doubt, surprised some gay viewers as well as straights.

Sexual exclusivity is a powerful norm in our society which few dare violate. A great number of people fear that experimentation in a relationship can only open a tachments. sensibilities and emotions. Those monogamists who are not classical spouses, are at least captives of the American Bandstand syndrome of "going steady." One-to-one linkage is not in itself a powerful force in our Europeanbased society, and probably could not have survived had it not been fused with a force that is powerful indeed, namely, sex. Under enormous Judaeo-Christian cultural conditioning, few people can successfully differentiate between sex and emotional attraction or attachment. In fact, before the twentieth century, neither "sex" nor "emotional involvement" were in common use. Instead, the very familiar word "love" was incorporated to identify both. One finds it difficult to "love" a peer and not imply both sexual and emo tional attraction. Furthermore, one finds it difficult to "love" two peers concurrently without being "disloyal" to one or the other.

Mike Wallace was somewhat taken aback in the aforementioned interview when Vidal announced that "there is no such thing as love." He subsequently explained that it is entirely possible to maintain a "Platonic" relationship plus sexual activity with the same person, it is also possible to have either one or the other with one or more other people. Since the in-

terests and personalities of gays are as widely diverse as those of society in general, and since gays constitute a minority, it is not easy to locate a lover who shares several common interests and is compatible in a number of other areas. If one suceeds in landing his "ideal" lover he may be considered fortunate. To be sure, having a lover is neither reactionary nor archaic. A lover is someone who reciprocates physical and emotional affection, provides abiding companionship, understanding, support, intellectual stimulation etc., and is irreplaceable for enriching the quality of life. He need not, however, function as a private "sex machine."

Due to the artificia! aura of mystery, fear, disgust, shame and danger that has been assigned to sex over past millenia by Western culture, few people realize that it is a relatively simple instinctive response not unlike eating, sleeping, or urinating. Like objects of eating, objects of sex can saturate the consumer over a period of time. No matter how much one "loves" his lover, and no matter how physically attractive that lover may be, one eventually familiarizes himself with every detail of his comrade's physique. No matter how dear or earnest a sexual partner may be, he is bound, over an extended duration to lose his initial physical mystique. Granted, sexual exploration and innovation can prolong primary infatuation, but sooner or later even if one exhausts all of the suggestions in The Joys of Sex, he will face the disconcerting reality that one can have too much of a good thing. Chocolate sundaes, sodas, splits or cones do not change the essential taste of Chocolate, even if it is one's favorite flavor, and one is likely to tire of chocolate ice cream if one never samples other flavors. Thankfully there are no social injunctions against mixing flavors of ice cream, so that even if one eats chocolate much or most of the time, other flavors in various combinations.

Sadly, "sex" has been sutured to the rather propagandist word "love" so that to have sex with someone other than one's lover might wrongly suggest that one is beginning an exclusive sexual and emotional involvement with that other person at the expense of the

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lover. Sexual saturation is the leading cause of divorce in heterosexual marriages. Inability to satisfy one's mate sexually is the major threat to straight matrimony, and the most frequently expressed fear or complaint of married couples. It is also an almost universal legal ground for divorce. It is too tragic that our culture ambivalently deifies and bedevils sex so that the value of people, ideas and relationships is measured in terms of it. How absurd that two physicists, two actors or two lawyers with a virtual cosmos in common should feel compelled to separate because one spouse had sex with the mail man while the other tricked with the next-door neighbor.

There is nothing "natural" about monogamy.Quite a few cultures are happily and comfortably polygamous, while others add promiscuity as an honored and respected institution. In numerous Eskimo societies, for example, it is a standard and gracious custom to offer one's mate to someone else for the purpose of having sex. Open relationships are doubtlessly far more common among gays than among heterosexuals. Since there are no ceremonial or lega! bonds to cement the majority of gay relationships, it is easy for gays to modify and expand their unions. Although gays may not choose polygamy or promiscuity from deep philosphical motivations, they are certainly likely to do so as the path of least resistance. Those who are not at ease with their promiscuity, are probably so because of pressure exerted by a monogamous environment. Less enlightened friends (or enterprising "vultures") can inspire doubt or insecurity in an open relationship by remarking, for example, "doesn't it bother you when he does that" or "I can't believe you let him get away with that." Well-adjusted polygamists are largely immune to programs of this sort against their spontaneity and calculated innocence, and regard monogamous naivete with sympathetic condescension. There is nothing beautiful about jealousy, suspicion, competition," envy," possessiveness, brokenheartedness, vengeance, spite,

August, 1975

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inadequacy, doubt, tension, conspiracy, disrespect, betrayal, coldness, unfulfillment, anxiety, contempt and other typical monogamist baggage.

Polygamy may not be the archetypal gay life-style, but it is an absolutely valid and useful one. Of course, polygamy has practical limitations. One can only share a significant and spectral portion of his experience with only a very few people. Digamy and trigamy are surely the only manageable polygamous genres. Promiscuity, on the other hand, is an inexhaustible, exciting and thoroughly legitimate suplement (or alternative). There is nothing coarse or disreputable about exposing oneself to all the variety of stimuli and insights which life has to offer. And life is far too short to cloister oneself in the stuffy Victorian monasticism afforded by monogamy.

My lover and I are close, dear and much needed by each other, but we also value our relations with others, be they sexual, intellectual or otherwise. We are the pride but not the property of each other, and we share ourselves with others who share themselves. The human form and the human mind are inventions of extraordinary beauty. Certainly no one can argue with Marlene Dietrich when she says, "Should something as beautiful please only one, when everyone posesses the stars, the moon and the sun?"