If I haven't succeeded in capturing your attention with one of these words, then you may not have a pulse. Sex is everywhere. It's in our pop music (Britney Spears' song "3" or Katy Perrys' "I Kissed a Girl"), our advertisements, our news articles, and our classrooms. It's either all you can talk about, or the one thing that makes you get all clammy and nervous.
In case you've been living under a rock somewhere, there's a new generation of sex that's on the rise: Swinging. If you don't know what that means, it's simply that couples that are married "swap" to have sex with other people in an attempt to "spice up" their love lives. The craziest part is that swinging has been around since the 60s, when the idea of "free love" hit the culture. Today, it is a multi-million dollar industry whose popularity is on the rise from major cities to the suburbs.
Why, might you ask?
Most people have a bad taste in their mouth when they hear that ugly relationship word: cheaters. They have happened to all of us, or we have been one ourselves. The results are devastating. We lose trust not only of our partner, but of anyone we have a future relationship with. We doubt ourselves and our abilities as a mate. And more often then not, our relationship with that cheater doesn't survive the fallout.
Insert swinging.
I have read multiple articles in the last few weeks about swinging. One article came up while I was at the gym. I was reading Self magazine, and they had a 6 page spread all about the health benefits of swinging, and how it was the new thing for everyone...even the soccer mom. It went on to talk about that when you swing, you and your spouse have a better relationship because you are communicating with each other and increasing your trust bond. (I may or may not have thrown the magazine across the gym)
Even more recently, CNN.com had an article written about a mistress...mistress...from Australia who had been paid to be what she called a "full-time mistress" for about $1000 a week. She would be your "play wife" in the idea that she would cook, clean, have conversations, and perform sex for anyone that wanted what their wives at home apparently couldn't provide. Last I checked, this was a glorified prostitute. She did this for about a year and then wrote a book on her encounters and what she apparently "learned" about men and women. Her conclusion was that married women will never be able to satisfy their husbands, so to give them permission to have sex with other women would keep their marriages together and healthy. Any person in their right mind would not only be deeply offended by this, but find it completely absurd that a prostitute was offering relational advice.
I cannot even describe to you the feelings that I felt as I read these articles. I was deeply offended that prostitutes were giving advice to wives to let their husbands sleep around because they were not enough. And I was offended on behalf of all the men out there who are thought of as nothing more than sex addicts who can't ever seem to get enough. I couldn't believe that people actually thought that having sex with other people, per their spouses' consent, was even remotely healthy. To top it off, many of these people have children. Do they not understand that a non-monogamous relationship is never healthy? That this kind of life is never fulfilling because it's not the way that we are wired? The emotional ramifications of this kind of lifestyle are devastating. Jealousy, boredom, and dissatisfaction can creep in and destroy. This is the new generation of what will eventually be considered normal. And quite honestly, it scares me.
As Christians, we have been afraid of the topic of sex for so long that things like swinging and other forms of promiscuity have crept in. Some of you might even be upset that I would be so bold as to discuss this topic publicly. But the truth is that it's out there and can destroy us quickly and quietly. We need to have discussions about sex with our kids before their view of it is shaped by the likes of Lady Gaga. If you're married, talk with your spouse about what the bedroom should be for you as a couple. Take time and effort to make it healthy. (other people and things are not healthy.) Don't let your marriage fall apart because the spark has died out in the bedroom. And don't let the new generation of sex intimidate and pressure you. You are enough, and you are enough just the two of you.
