Fridae

Monogamy is a heated word. It is a patriarchal construct for some, and the corner stone of relationships for others. Some gay men think monogamy and homosexuality are polar opposites. While for some lesbians, these two words are practically synonymous. Some queer activists say monogamy is a devise used by homophobes to invalidate gay culture. Other queer men eroticise chastity by putting a lock on their private parts and giving the key to their lover. In America, violating the monogamous code can lead an average guy to have his member cut off, or a president to face impeachment. How many people we sleep with is apparently a very big deal.

Monogamy has quite different meanings in gay and straight societies. In gay society, monogamy usually means sexual fidelity to one's boy or girlfriend. In straight society, it means each man can only marry one woman - marrying two or bigamy is illegal in many countries. The heterosexual definition of monogamy, strictly speaking, need not include sexual fidelity, as long as the girlfriend stays out of sight. To be fair, analogous things can be said of gay monogamous relationships. The most extreme definition of monogamy comes from the Christian church, where each person is expected to abstain from sex until marriage, and then till death do they part. This means the church's definition of monogamy is to have sex with only one person in your entire earthly existence (and sparingly, only to produce children, never for fun).

Speaking of the church, someone should tell them that monogamy is unnatural. Most animals are not monogamous, even when they form a permanent pair. Scientists have found that the offspring of many supposedly monogamous animals have genes from, ahem, shall we say, third parties. And don't forget to tell them about lesbian lizards and gay penguins in nature too, but I digress.

Walking down the street of Castro the other day, I saw a guy wearing a T-shirt that said: Define 'Boyfriend'. When a question like that appears on a tight T-shirt in the gay capital of the world, you can be sure it is the burning question of gay society today. So, how would a gay man define 'boyfriend'? Someone he has slept with more than three times in a roll? Any man that he's still seeing after three weeks? Someone with whom he is (gasp) monogamous for more than three months?

Jokes aside, with the advances in gay marriage all over the world, gay monogamy is becoming a serious issue. It is only a matter of time before gay men start to sue each other in court for divorce on grounds of infidelity. Like one cartoonist says: legalise gay marriage and let them suffer like the rest of us.

It is hard to write about monogamy without cracking up because this word is just so dripping with moral overtones. But being a generally serious writer, I do have a serious point, and I'll get to it now.

The world is mistaken in thinking that monogamy is a moral good. You can decide, by an act of will, to be monogamous to your partner. That does not mean the desire for sex with others is no longer there. You can make the denial of that desire as the foundation of your relationship, as in, if we love each other enough, we will control ourselves. But what kind of love is it anyway if you need to cage each other's sexual energy? Do you really think caging each other will make you love each other more?
Monogamy is neither moral nor immoral. It is something quite different. Monogamy is a relationship indicator.

I'll explain what this means. I have a gay couple friend here in San Francisco who had been together for 14 years. As they get to know each other more and more, the love and devotion between them grow as well. They know each other's body so intimately that increasingly, sex with strangers just cannot come close to the intimacy and sexual compatibility that they share. Eventually, without deliberately trying to be monogamous, they realise that they would rather have sex with each other than with anyone else. When there is no moral anxiety over monogamy, its appearance in a relationship becomes an indicator that the relationship is working.

Long-term monogamous relationship among gay men is unusual for many reasons. I would go out on a limb and suggest that one reason is because we jump into monogamy too early, thinking that by promising to be faithful to each other from the start, we can create a loving devoted relationship. For some, that might in fact work. But for many others, what happens instead is that after a few years, both start to get bored and itch for something more exciting outside. Monogamy is more real as the natural result of a devoted loving relationship, as opposed to its starting condition.

If we can start thinking of monogamy as an indicator rather than a moral value, we will save ourselves a lot of trouble. No more icky arguments about cheating, no more sexual frustrations within 'monogamous' relationships, no more strategising about whether to choose an open or a monogamous arrangement, no more game-playing. And without all these yucky stuff, we can better concentrate on building strong loving relationships and show those clueless heterosexuals what marriage is really about.