Is it okay not to be monogamous? Part 1
Philosopher Justin Clardy thinks so. Part 1 of a 2 part series...
Justin Clardy is a philosopher at Santa Clara University who works on ethics, the philosophy of love, and social and political philosophy. He’s also the author of Why It’s OK to Not Be Monogamous (Routledge, 2023).
In it, he argues that, well, it’s okay to not be monogamous.
I argued something similar in my book with Julian Savulescu called Love Drugs: The Chemical Future of Relationships (Stanford University Press, 2020), which I just noticed is half off right now, if you get it direct from the publisher.
How random and fortuitous that I should notice that!1
Despite our broad agreement on the ethics of non-monogamy (at least, we both agree it can be permissible), Justin and I seem to disagree on the ethics of monogamy. In short, Justin thinks it is morally impermissible to put what he calls “intimacy confining constraints” on one’s partner in terms of who else they can interact with and how.
Since monogamy, on some views, just is an agreement to abide by (ideally, mutually imposed) intimacy confining constraints—that is, “a categorical restriction on having additional intimate relationships”—Justin’s thesis ends up seeming pretty radical.
Put it this way. Not only is it “okay” to not be monogamous (as Justin puts it in his book title), but it is, in fact, not okay to be monogamous—a much stronger claim. A claim I bet many would find outlandish.
(Actually, in a 2019 paper, Professor Clardy goes further: even in the context of polyamorous relationships, he thinks, it is wrong to put intimacy confining constraints on any of one’s sexual or romantic partners … a recipe for relationship anarchy?)
In part 2 of this series, I’ll explain why I think, contra Clardy, it can sometimes be okay to be monogamous, including through the (carefully qualified) use of intimacy confining constraints … which apparently puts me on the conservative end of what some philosophers of love are arguing these days. Not a position I’m used to occupying!
(I’ll discuss three other philosophers, besides Clardy, who argue that monogamy—as it is normally practiced, at least—is morally impermissible.)
In this post, however, I want to let Professor Clardy speak for himself: namely, by sharing an interview I did with him about 2 years ago, shortly after his book came out. The video is below (and also an edited transcript for paid subscribers), but first let me set things up a bit more.
I was already a fan of Justin’s work after reading his paper “‘I Don't Want To be a Playa No More': An Exploration of the Denigrating Effects of ‘Player' as a Stereotype Against African American Polyamorous Men.”
That paper was published in 2018, and it shaped some of my thinking when I was working on the Love Drugs book with Julian (we cite it on page 209). So was I thrilled when he agreed to sit down with me for a chat about his ideas around love and relationships.
My conversation with Justin ranged widely, from the history of monogamy to the way cultural scripts shape what kinds of relationships count as “serious.” What follows are a couple of key themes and then the video, so you can check it all out for yourself.
When most people hear “non-monogamy,” they think cheating. They picture betrayal and broken promises. Justin’s work pushes back against that assumption, exploring how loving and engaging romantically with more than one person can, if pursued properly, be ethical.
One of the simplest but most striking points Justin makes is that most of us are already non-monogamous in parts of our lives. We don’t expect a best friend to be our only friend. We don’t forbid them from confiding in others. We don’t panic if they form other meaningful connections. And yet, when romance enters the frame, many people suddenly switch into “control” mode—they start to monitor and police one another’s behaviours, and even see such surveillance as evidence of their love.
Clardy shows how romantic love as we know it has been entangled with patriarchy, whiteness, and the politics of respectability. In the Black community, for example, polyamory is often dismissed under the stereotype of the “player”—a word that pretends to be playful while quietly reinforcing stigma (see his paper on this from 2018). The effect is that people end up enforcing romantic norms that were never designed to serve them in the first place. Respectability becomes its own kind of trap.
And then there’s the worry about jealousy. Isn’t non-monogamy just “unworkable” because humans are jealous? Maybe—but humans are also competitive, and we’ve managed to find relatively healthy ways to harness that competitiveness, for example, when playing games. And when people are competitive in destructive ways, we don’t see it as inevitable, or a virtue.
The point isn’t that jealousy vanishes in what are nowadays often called “ethically non-monogamous” or ENM relationships. But jealousy can be acknowledged, negotiated, and managed. For Justin, what matters is not swapping in a brand-new moral code but sticking with the virtues we already owe each other in any context: honesty, dignity, respect for one another’s autonomy, mutual care, and kindness. The real leap isn’t from monogamy to non-monogamy; it’s from unethical relating to ethical relating.
We dipped into culture along the way—what counts as a good portrayal of non-monogamy on screen, why shows like The Bachelor are basically non-monogamous until the finale (even if no one calls it that), and how language in pop music has both reflected and reinforced problematic romantic norms.
We also found ourselves talking about identity more generally: how being with someone can alter who you are, how you see the world, and what you value. (Similar to some themes in my conversation with Laurie Paul about love and transformative experiences.)
There’s a lot more in the conversation than I can capture here. If you’d like to watch, the video is below. I’ve also posted an edited transcript for paid subscribers (see below the video), along with a repeat link to Justin’s book. I think you’ll find it a thought-provoking exchange.
Watch the conversation:
Transcript (for paid subscribers): Coming Soon.
Justin’s book: Why It’s OK to Not Be Monogamous
You can also get Love Drugs at Amazon and other places, but I know that some people are not keen to buy from Amazon if they can help it. Nevertheless, if you do buy it from Amazon — where I see it is currently 24% off in the US — please leave a nice review.
I find it peculiar that a position like “sometimes it’s okay to be monogamous” is regarded as conservative in academic circles. To me, it has always seemed like a sign of moral progress that, at least in many societies, we’ve adopted a more laissez-faire attitude, no longer framing preferences about love or intimacy in terms of strict moral duties (permissible versus impermissible), but at most in terms of what might be morally less ideal or morally preferable—the strongest kinds of claims I’d still feel comfortable making.
Great stuff, Brian. Relatedly, have you seen Splitsville yet? I just saw it last night and thought it gave a pretty realistic, albeit limited perspective on “open relationships” (which, in the movie, they distinguish from polyamory). I would say it wasn’t the best representation, in that it didn’t do much to show what can be good/successful/fulfilling/interesting about non-monogamy. But it did show, I think, how many of these forays into non-traditional relationship styles do not stem from the best motives.