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In the fifties the newspapers referred to it as “wife-swapping.” Today it’s called “swinging,” but not considering of its name this sexual performance seems to be increasing in popularity among typical, grown-up married couples in America. The popular media are paying increasing attention to the fact, regularly putting a optimistic spin on the effects which the lifestyle has upon marriages. The North American Swing Club Association (NASCA) claims there are organized swing clubs in just about 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 retreat sites for swingers, and yearly conferences and seminars. Lifestyles, Inc., a swingers journey agency, booked 700 couples at a resort in Jamaica in January of 1998.
What exactly is swinging? Not like “open marriages” of the 1970’s which promoted non-possessive love and broadmindedness of unfaithfulness in their spouses, or “polyamory” - the love of several people at once – swinging is non-monogamous sexual activity, treated a lot 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 major goal. Swinging is frequently done in the presence of one’s spouse and requires the approval of both to the practice. 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 apologetics claim that it enhances the relationship of the swinging couple both sexually and emotionally. By removing the secrecy and dishonesty inherent in one’s natural desires for sexual diversity, the pair can discover their fantasies together without deceit or shame. By removing the necessity for deceit from the marriage, a brand new level of confidence and openness 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 intellectual importance because the effort to merge sexual non-monogamy with emotional monogamy is fundamentally “deviant” from the western model of idealistic 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 36% of husbands and 31% of wives, sometimes so-called milfs confess 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 kids has become a main national concern, any attempt to redefine “love” and fortify the marital bond is worthy of our attention. 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 population reported in earlier studies, but when it comes to attitudes about sex and marriage they are less racist, less sexist, and less heterosexist than the common public. Swinging appears to make the vast majority of swingers’ marriages happier, and swingers rate the gladness of their marriages and life satisfaction generally as higher than the non-swinging population.