Love can be a beautiful thing. For many couples, their relationship is strictly between the two involved people. However, the construction of a monogamous relationship has proven to have several problems.
Bryan R. Weaver and Fiona Woollard discuss the idea of relationships in the article “Marriage and the Norm of Monogamy”. They used secondary research in order to analyze the problems and values of monogamy, and the value of non-monogamy.
The term “monogamy” in this article is erotic love that is shared between one single relationship, while non-monogamy is the rejection of such. As stated in the title, this would make monogamy the norm, and the norm is what is widely accepted. Erotic love in the article is emotional feelings for a person,
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If there was to be a non-monogamous relationship, it may feel as though one of the original partners is being “replaced” or not given the attention and erotic love they had in a single partner relationship. However, monogamy is not the guaranteed fix to help you be “saved” from replaced by your partner. Another reason why monogamy may be valuable to partners who feel as though a relationship is stronger when there is something you cant have. When a person gets into a brand new relationship, lets say the “talking” stages, they are so infatuated with their partner for the first few months that they see no reason to have erotic love with anyone else, even if there is no sex involved. When you first fall in love, you want to only be with that person, and you want that person to only be with you. Monogamy works because when you invest your time and erotic love into one person, that allows the relationship to be strong, and when value one person more, this is what ensues a successful monogamous relationship. Of course there are other factors that play into having a successful relationship. So, when a couple connects sex and emotions, the erotic love for the other is all the erotic love they feel they need, and they value the relationship in a way that the restrictions of monogamy aren’t a problem, the relationship will be a success.
Woollard and Weaver’s study makes a lot of sense. There are certain factors that ensure that people will have a successful monogamous relationship, and if those aren’t there, then the reasoning for a monogamy may be seen as a meaningless agreement that ties you down and doesn’t allow you to get your full potential and satisfaction out of erotic love or