The Twenty-First Rule of Dating: Cheating With Permission; The Open Relationship

The word oxymoron comes to mind when reading the subtitle of this article. From Facebook to SixDegrees (which was by definition, the first social networking site), people have captioned on their profile the words open relationship. Now if this were a young wo(Man) curiously looking to play the field with the permission of a partner that’s well and good, but for a more mature focused person, that spells trouble.

The concept of open relationships was probably fabricated into existence by a faction of the Mormon Church that wanted to continue to enjoy the liberties associated with having multiple partners after the main church suspended polygamous marriages indefinitely. It’s no secret that many men would chance the opportunity to change partners periodically without getting into trouble over it. Undoubtedly there are women who would like to mould their partner into a specific type of man and failing to do so, their plan B would be to date guys that have the traits of the ideal man. Their solution? Open relationships.

It is possible to be open in a relationship, it is also possible to open yourself to the idea/possibility of being in a relationship, however, in the truest sense of the words, an “open relationship” does not exist. It is a phrase manufactured by the literally challenged to allow themselves wiggle room in which to explore their dating options while firmly clutching on to their partner. Legalized cheating would be a more appropriate term. On the scale of falsities in relationships, these participants would rank lower than cheaters. Cheaters know what they’re doing is wrong, “openists” for their part refuse to acknowledge that.

There are numerous groups in Ottawa that facilitate all sorts of interesting behaviours and relationships. One such misadventure is the Polyarmory Discussion Group which supports unnatural disasters or as they put it “members of a committed relationship who have secondary partners in a loving and open relationship.

If you want to see your relationship ultimately end in distrust or worse, recommendations are for engaging in an “open relationship”. Very often (and not because of any particular weakness on their part) the partner faced with the decision to choose between agreeing to an open relationship or not (the not probably leading to a break up or cheating) may sometimes agree to it in order to hold on to someone they fear to lose. This practice, like many other unsavoury types of behaviour exposes you to few benefits but twice as many of the concerns of monogamous relationships.

The next time you’re getting into a relationship (for those not already chained down), the moment you decide to do more than kiss someone on the cheek, things are getting serious, and a conversation should take place. Along with all the questions about the relationship’s identity should be “are you now, or have you ever participated in a quote unquote open relationship”. If the answer is yes... run!