Compersion: When your wife tells you another man makes her feel like a giddy 16-year old girl and you’re happy for her.

Recently I was reading a polyamory message board I subscribe to and came across a post from a couple just introducing themselves to the group. This couple is looking for a poly relationship but have been discouraged because as they put it: “All that’s out there is swingers and polygamists”.

Wow. This is a stark reminder of the constant battle and differing views between swingers and polyamorists, both thinking the other is “wrong” or “unethical” or “immoral”.

See, many swingers get their panties all in a wad at the mere mention of feelings and intimacy developing between play partners. They recoil like a surprised snake ready to strike back. And often they do. I can’t tell you the number of times Mrs. Scribbens and I have been on the other side of a scared swinger loudly proclaiming that if feelings were ever to develop between their spouse and someone esle how it would end right there and yadda, yadda, yadda.

Of course this reaction is based solely in fear and insecurity. It’s the fear that if feelings develop they may get left for the other person or not be number one in their partner’s life or that their partner may only love them half as much.

On the other side is the polyamorists. Some seem to think they are an evolved species, far above the lowly, morally bankrupt and unethical swinger because they “love” their partners, not just have sex with them. It’s an arrogant and self-righteous stance taken by some to justify having sex outside their primary relationship; it’s okay because they are “in love” with their third.

Of course this reaction is based on the concept that only sex within a committed relationship is permittable, so they seek and develop several committed relationships to justify having a sexually open relationship. It’s also based in their deep-rooted beliefs from their upbringing that what they are doing is not right, so they proclaim their “correctness” loudly and proudly, demoting some in hopes of elevating themselves in the eyes of others and thus justifying their beliefs to themselves.

The fact is that there is quite an overlap between swinging and polyamory. Imagine if you will two circles, overlapping at one side. In one circle you have the pure swingers and in the other you have the pure polyamorists. However in that overlap area are the swingers that are open to polyamory and the polyamorists who are also open to the purely recreational sex that swinging provides.

Mrs. Scribbens and I fall in that overlap.

We see many other couples in this overlap also. Swingers who become “exclusive” with another couple or a single for quite a while (say 3 – 12 months) and polyamorists who practice what I call “serial polyamory” where they are in a committed relationship with another single or couple for a while (say 3 – 12 months) than move-on to another couple or single. The swinger couple won’t admit they are practicing polyamory in even it’s basic form and the polyamorists won’t admit that they are swinging in even the loosest meaning of the word. But the fact is they are both doing the same thing, just calling the same horse by a different name, and in some case throwing rocks at each other for doing it the way they do because it’s “wrong”, “immoral” or “unethical”.

Mrs. Scribbens and I subscribe to the idea that “Whatever gets you through the night’s alright.” Any form a happy, healthy, loving adult relationship takes is “right” because it’s right for the people involved. Nobody has a right to throw rocks at the other proclaiming that their way of living and managing relationships is any more right than someone else’s. And the people that do so are just as bad as the “traditional” relationship folks that anger them so for judging their alternative lifestyle.

For us, Gus from My Big Fat Greek Wedding sums it up best: “Here tonight, we have, ah, apple and orange. We all different, but in the end, we all fruit.”

So today I am catching-up on my MySpace messages and such and a sponsored link on the right side of my screen is for AffairMatch.com. “Affairs Made Simple” proclaims the headline, and it goes on to advertise: “Married Men & Women Seeking Affairs. Discreet Online Forum. Free Sign Up”

Now on MySpace such an ad doesn’t really surprise me since so many people use MySpace to hook-up with other people, and one of the most commonly asked questions I see on Yahoo! Answers is “I found my partner has a secret profile on MySpace and their relationship status is ’single’. What do you think that means?” Plus, Mrs. Scribbens constantly gets emails from supposedly single guys on her MySpace, and nowhere on there does it elude to the fact that we have an open relationship. Both our MySpace profiles are totally vanilla and non-sexual in nature to protect our secret identities. But I guess these guys still think “What the fuck, it doesn’t hurt to ask, right?” And the correspondence to her always go the same route:

Stranger: Are you married?

Mrs. Scribbens: Yes

Stranger: Are you HAPPILY married?

Mrs. Scribbens: Yes

Stranger: Woud you like to meet anyway?

And it just goes down hill from there.

But MySpace actually allowing advertising that promotes it’s usage as a free cheater’s dating site just rubs me the wrong way. Especially since so many teenagers use it and could see the same sponsored links. What is this saying to them? What it’s saying is “It’s okay to lie and cheat, but not to be honest and open with your partner about your feelings, wants and needs.”

Does that surprise me? No. In my experience I’ve seen that most people can not be honest and open with their partner – the one person in the world they should be able to be the most open and honest with – because of the fear of their response: jealousy, anger, resentment. So they will be more honest with complete strangers than with their own partner. No wonder so many people say things after many years together like “I don’t feel I really even know you?”; “Why won’t you let me in?”. Well, experience has taught them that being honest and open with their partner about their fantasies always causes problems. They become insecure, jealous and defensive – “WHAT?! AM I NOT ENOUGH FOR YOU?!” And the fighting and hurt feelings start from there. And then they bitch to their friends about it:

“Why won’t he/she open-up to me? Why won’t he tell me his dreams and feelings and fantasies?”

Well, let me tell you why. Because whenever they do you become all insecure and butt-hurt and then at a later date use what they opened-up to you about to emotionally kick them in the balls whenever you are feeling insecure and butt-hurt again!

So it’s easier to just say nothing until years down the road a couple drifts apart because “they don’t really know each other” and they the find someone new and start the same destructive cycle all over again.

The funny thing is, according to virtually every study nearly 35% of women and 40% of men cheat on each other. And according to one study (I wish I could find where I filed it so I could reference it for you) 60% of women and 70% of men think about cheating and probably would if the opportunity arose and they knew they would never be caught.

So based on this fact alone, nearly 40% of couples do have an open relationship, just one member of the relationship is unaware of it.

So how many really do have open and honest open relationships of one nature or another? It’s hard to pinpoint a figure. I my experience and research the number that pops-up most commonly is 20% of all committed couples dabble in, or have an ongoing open relationship. This can be anywhere from trying a one-time threesome to dating others openly, swinging and polyamory.

Add this figure to the number cheating on each other and you find that 60% of all committed couples have an open relationship of some sort, and another 20% to 30% would if they thought their partner would go for it or they thought they could do it behind their partner’s back and get away with it.

In the meantime, I’ll just keep on living in bewilderment of those that would judge our open relationship while all the while cheating on, or thinking about cheating on their partner.