"[M]illennials and Gen Z in particular seem wedded (old monogamy alert!) to the idea that the 'normal' way of doing things is almost always oppressive and must be either reclaimed or disavowed."

"Especially in the sexual realm, anything that could be viewed as traditional or average is passé. As the lecturer and essayist Phil Christman wrote in a Substack post, his students 'have a bias, so strong that I wonder if it’s hard-wired, to believe that complexity itself is new. In the past, people were drones who acted on the tenets of Religion, or Society, or The Way Things Were Then, whereas now people think about what they do.'... So for generations coming of age today... unprotected sex becomes the appropriately mysterious (if vaguely nauseating) 'fluid bonding.' If you need an emotional bond to want sex with someone, it sounds more inscrutable, and thus tolerable, if you call yourself 'demisexual.'... And monogamy, the most old-fashioned arrangement of all, must be smuggled into acceptability via the label 'radical.'"

Writes Christine Emba in "How radical is ‘radical monogamy,’ really?" (WaPo). 

She's bouncing off this Vice article by Nick Levine, "What Is 'Radical Monogamy'?" Levine tells us there's "reflexive monogamy" — "blindly accepting that it is somehow morally superior to have just one sexual partner" — and then there's "the more informed and conscious choice" of monogamy that gets the spicy label "radical monogamy." 

Levine quotes an activist, Jericho Vincent, who declares that the "old monogamy of our parents and grandparents [that] doesn’t really work today.... because it is often predicated on heteronormativity and misogyny and very frequently breeds boredom, disloyalty and stagnation."

“Radical monogamy works for me because I've always wanted a gigantic love. I wanted to be one person’s joy and delight and I wanted them to be mine,” they say. "Then I grew up and I was told that was ridiculous, unrealistic and unhealthy, so I gave up on monogamy and practised polyamory. But now I’ve come around to believing that all those other people’s messages were wrong. If approached with intentionality, effort and a willingness to grow, it is possible to have a love that’s big and magical.”

I spent some time trying to figure out who "they" referred to before realizing that Levine was still quoting Vincent and Vincent must use "they" as their pronoun. That was confusing! Apparently, the notation that an individual goes by "they" is now dispensable. That was boring! Vice has moved on to demanding that the reader step up and figure it out. 

But about the substance of that indented quote. It made me laugh because of the way it ended with the dream of "a love that’s big and magical." In the end, for all that straining to be radical, it comes back around to a puffy romantic vision. 

I don't want realism. I want magic! Yes, yes, magic! 

It's okay, you can still have your "intentionality." The intentional pursuit of magical love!

"Reader, I rolled my eyes. I know that’s not the kind or constructive thing to do when someone is brave enough to come out, but I’m afraid I couldn’t help it..."

"... my old gay eyes rolled involuntarily....When I came out, 20 years ago, I wasn’t worried that people might think I was declaring myself queer because it was cool – it was decidedly not cool... Last time I checked, demisexuals weren’t exactly an oppressed minority fighting for equal rights. They are just people who aren’t sexually attracted to others unless they form a strong emotional bond with them first. (Congratulations, some of you may suddenly have realised that you are not actually the boring hetero you thought you were – you are an exciting demisexual! You even get your very own flag!) Acting as if needing to get to know someone before jumping into bed with them constitutes a marginalised sexual orientation that needs a flag seems to play into the hands of rightwingers who are desperate to argue that liberals are narcissists with a victimhood complex."

From "What does the dawn of demisexuals tell us?/How sex-drenched society has become" by Arwa Mahdawi (The Guardian). Mahdawi is reacting to Michaela Kennedy-Cuomo's announcing that she's "demisexual."

"Why do people feel the need to label their sexuality with such specificity? As if a 'demi-sexual' is a thing you are and always have been and always will be."

"So short-sighted. Why pressure people into fitting into a sexual 'tribe'? Once we label, we sort ourselves, and then we're in a tribe, and then we reinforce tribal culture within that tribe. So if you join the 'asexual' tribe, then your asexuality will be reinforced and you'll stop going through the normal changes that most of us experience over our lives. Once you classify yourself, you ossify yourself."

Asks PatHMV, emailing me about yesterday's post about "Platonic" — sex-free — marriages. 

I myself was critical of what I called "picky terms" — like "asexual, aromantic, pansexual, demisexual" — but PatHMV elaborates some of the problem with this pickiness, this specificity. How do you know that's what you are — as a type of entity — as opposed to it's just your effort to express what you feel now? And I really wonder — when we are talking about life partners who don't have any sex at all — is this really who they are or is this a way to arrive at mental peace when you've found yourself in a relationship that has some but not all of what you want? 

In one of the updates at yesterday's post, a reader named Peter spoke of his long marriage that has turned into a sexless marriage in recent years. This is something that happens — a lot, I presume — and I don't think it would be accurate to think that Peter or his wife discovered that he/she is asexual.... or would it?

PatHMV said — pithily — "Once you classify yourself, you ossify yourself." But in cases like Peter's, it seems that both had classified themselves as heterosexual, but at least one of them morphed into asexuality. But — no! — we don't talk about it like that. It's conventional to think that both are heterosexual, but they just got older or more jaded and sex became unimportant. They're still heterosexual. If so, then these picky specifications aren't really sexual orientations.

And yet, if people like thinking of these various concepts as their sexual orientation, well, that's an intellectual orientation. If it makes your circumstances in life more pleasurable or more tolerable or more exciting or more rational to you, then go ahead — What's the harm? To classify is to ossify? But you can reclassify. 

And maybe staying put once you marry is an important commitment to your mate. If you present yourself as heterosexual, your mate is counting on that — counting on your being ossified! If you say, you've come to the realization that your true self is asexual, that's going to be a disappointment. But if you find yourself to have become asexual, must you — should you — continue to play the role of a heterosexual? Put yourself in your spouse's position: If you knew your partner wanted no sex at all, would you want him/her to provide sex for you anyway? If yes, would you prefer that with the truth hidden or revealed?

***

There is no comments section anymore, but you can email me here. Unless you say otherwise, I will presume you'd enjoy an update to this post with a quote from your email.

"There are no statistics about the number of platonic, best-friend marriages, and many people who are in them aren’t open about their situation."

"But chat boards on Reddit and within smaller asexual and aromantic communities have popped up recently, suggesting this could be a larger portion of the marriage population than numbers portray.... Many of these relationships... begin because the couple wants their family life separate from their romantic lives, as they don’t find their romantic lives to be stable. Others may be disenchanted with love, and feel that longstanding friendships with a history of resolving conflict may feel like a safer bet... Platonic marriages have been prevalent since marriage became an institution, while marrying for love is more of an oddity in human history.... In the United States, where marriage is incentivized with tax breaks and other couple privileges, getting married to someone with whom you are not romantically attached affords multiple benefits... 'Meeting people is hard, getting a bond and romantic feelings is hard, and more and more young people are starting to realize that there are other benefits to marriage other than romantic love: I mean, isn’t the point to marry your best friend?... So why can’t it be your literal best friend?'"

From "From Best Friends to Platonic Spouses Some people are taking their friendships to the next level by saying 'I do” to marriages without sex'" (NYT). 

The article discusses a lot of individuals and throws around a lot of picky terms — asexual, aromantic, pansexual, demisexual — but one thing stands out: They're all women! Maybe I missed a man in there somewhere, but come on, NYT, if it's all women, discuss why!

And as for those picky terms women are using to describe their experience of sexuality, "demisexual" was a new one for me. The NYT says: "Demisexual is defined as only being sexually attracted to someone with whom you have an emotional bond." I guess that means you never feel sexual toward anyone you've just met. You have to fall in love (or something) and then sexual feeling may emerge.

For the record: I think a Platonic marriage is a fine idea. You're forming a household, taking advantage of various laws that privilege marriage, and perhaps raising children. You want a family, a home, a feeling of stability and you don't need or don't want sex as part of that relationship. You either get your sex somewhere else or you don't want sex at all. That's a perfectly legitimate choice to make in life, and good for the women who've found that kind of lifelong friendship.

FROM THE EMAIL: Peter writes: 

Or a platonic marriage can happen over time. As it did in our case.