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In the fifties the journalists referred to it as “wife-swapping.” Today it’s named “swinging,” but regardless of its name this lifestyle seems to be increasing in recognition among mainstream, grown-up married couples in the US. The popular media are paying increasing interest to the fact, often putting a optimistic spin on the effects which swinging has upon relationships. The North American Swing Club Association (NASCA) claims there are organized swing clubs in about all states as well as Belgium, England, Germany, and Japan. These clubs are productive businesses which provide all levels of social activities for swingers including vacation plans, special retreat sites for swingers, and annual gatherings and seminars. Lifestyles, Inc., a swingers travel agency, booked 700 couples at a resort in Jamaica in December of 1999.
What precisely is swinging? Unlike “open marriages” of the 1970’s which promoted non-possessive love and acceptance of betrayal in their spouses, or “polyamory” - the love of several people at once – swinging is non-monogamous sexual activity, treated much like any other social activity, that can be experienced as a couple. Emotional monogamy, or commitment to the love relationship with one’s marital partner, remains the primary focus. Wife swapping is usually done in the company of one’s spouse and requires the involvement of both to the practice. Although swingers often become close friends with other swinging couples, there are policy restricting emotional involvement with non-spousal partners. While swinging involves having sex with people other than one’s spouse, its advocates claim that it enhances the relationship of the swinging couple both sexually and emotionally. By removing the secrecy and untruthfulness inherent in one’s natural desires for sexual variety, the pair can discover their fantasies together without deceit or shame. By removing the necessity for deceit from the relationship, a brand new level of reliance and openness about all of one’s feelings is supposedly achieved without the destructive baggage of jealousy.
Swinging as an alternative lifestyle is of both practical and academic interest because the attempt to combine sexual non-monogamy with emotional monogamy is fundamentally “unusual” from the western model of idealistic love which assumes that sexual and emotional monogamy are reciprocally reinforcing and inseparable. It has yet to be demonstrated empirically whether this alternative lifestyle actually strengthens or weakens marital bonds, but in an era where 36% of husbands and 29% 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 shakiness and parental neglect of kids has become a main national worry, any attempt to redefine “love” and fortify the marital relationship is worthy of our attention. If swingers have found a way to stabilize relationships, prolong 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 section 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 gladness of their marriages and life satisfaction in general as higher than the non-swinging population.