The article has a great quote by Dan Savage: “If you are expected to be monogamous and have one person be all things sexually for you, then you have to be whores for each other,” Savage says. “You have to be up for anything.”**
I am one of the few people I know, who thinks - or at least, who openly admits - that sex is inherently objectifying. Even within the context of a loving relationship, where sex can be an expression of your affection for each other, there will be moments when it is also about using each other as objects for sexual pleasure - these two aspects of sex are not mutually exclusive, and can both happen at the same moment.
So part of monogamy means accepting that objectification part of sex - if you want your partner to go to someone else for fetishes you feel are objectifying, then that's fine - it's just not monogamy.
I think its important to discuss fetishes before you get married. If you have fetish A, and it does not turn the other person at all, is that a fetish you'd be willing to give up on? Could you be reasonably sexually satisfied without it?* Could you watch porn about it to turn you on, and then go and have non-fetish sex with your partner?
Most people do not want to have that conversation before entering into a long-term monogamous relationship because there is that fear: What if this person is so grossed out by that fetish that they just stop being sexually attracted to me? This is a reasonable fear: Many people are grossed out by fetished they do not have. But if you really have a fetish you do not think you would be able to give up on even for monogamy and true love, then you have to have the conversation or risk either a) your being sexually unsatisfied for life b) your cheating and hurting the person you love.
I think especially in Orthodox Jewish society, where men and women are expected to be celibate before marriage, and do not necessarily discover each other's tastes before making that lifelong commitment, pre-marriage candor about definitions of cheating, and about sexual fantasies, etc., has to be encouraged, so couples can at least know a little bit about each other's potential tastes. On the other hand, if couples are not sexually active, even this might not be so productive because one might fantasize about something extensively, only to discover that in reality they can't stand it. I have long said that threesomes are one of those things that are amazing in theory, but don't really work in reality. (Of course, they do work for some people - but the number of people they work for is much smaller than the number of people that fantasizes about threesomes.)
I do think however, each person in a couple should be encouraged a) to define cheating b) to think if there is a sexual fantasy/fetish etc. that they don't think they'd be able to live a sexually satisfied life without (even if it's something they have never tried in reality). If there is something that fulfills that criteria, than they should be encouraged to discuss it with their future spouse, before that person becomes a spouse. I also think that chatan and kallah classes should include not just sex ed, but also, sex tips. (Modern Orthodox schools do give sex-ed in highschool, but it's usually more "This is what sex is. These are the disease you could get" - an explanation of the car and what the parts are for. But before marriage, you need the how-to-guide - you need the car manual.)
One can't not educate people about sex, and then expect them to magically figure it out for themselves. Many people do - but some don't, or if they do, it can be a long and painful process. The woman in the Unconsummated blog, for example, while highly intelligent and educated, was never given proper pre-marriage prep when it came to sex, and that had very negative consequences for her married sex life: http://unconsummated.blogspot.com/2011_05_01_archive.html
If people are interested in Dan Savage's column: http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/SavageLove?oid=8847525
His "It Gets Better" video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IcVyvg2Qlo
President Obama's "IGB" video (!!!):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HzcAR6yQhF8&feature=relmfu
* I used the word fetish in a layperson way. In psychological lit, if you can get turned on without it, it does not count as a true fetish. Thanks Dr. Noonberg, whose abnormal psych course I learned that in.
** I also thought this observation by Mark Oppenheimer in the NY Times Mag article was interesting, though I am not sure I agree with it 100%: "here is one subculture in America that practices nonmonogamy and equality between partners: the sizable group of gay men in open, or semiopen, long-term partnerships. (A study published in 2010 found 50 percent of gay male couples in the Bay Area had sexual relationships outside their union, with their partner’s knowledge and approval.) But it is unclear if gay habits, which Savage thinks can be a model, will survive the advent of gay equality. Historically, gay men have treated monogamy more casually, in part because society treated gay coupledom as unthinkable. Now, however, gay men are marrying or entering into socially sanctioned partnerships. As they are absorbed into the mainstream of connubial bliss, they may lose the strong friendship networks that gay men once substituted for nuclear families — friendship networks that, according to Coontz, can make infidelity less threatening. In other words, as they take out joint mortgages and pal around with straight parents from the PTA, they may become considerably more square about fidelity. Living in their McMansions, they, too, may decide that the walls of their marriages must be guarded at all costs."
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