Let’s talk about the concept of ethical nonmonogamy.
I spend a lot of time thinking about words. When I’m creating a rough draft, the goal is to tell the story as quickly as possible, and consequently I don’t spend too much time on any single word. But prior to publication, every word included in my manuscript will need to justify its existence.
I’m not one of those people who will demand you never use adverbs to describe an action, and I certainly wouldn’t tell you to avoid adjectives. However, I would likely edit, “Mary slowly drank her brown coffee…” to the snappier, “Mary sipped coffee…” Sipping is a form of drinking always done slowly, most people only drink beverages belonging to them, and it’s reasonable to assume the reader knows what color coffee typically is. (Although I acknowledge that if they’re reading in some post-apocalyptic world following a coffee extinction event destroying society, then this may have been a mistake.)
I mention all this to give you a context to understand why I see the words “ethical nonmonogamy” and object to the inclusion of “ethical.” What purpose does it serve? And while you’re thinking about that, how often have you seen someone reference unethical nonmonogamy? Not often, right?
When people feel the need to clarify that the particular case of nonmonogamy under discussion is ethical, they’re feeding the prejudice that this isn’t the default. Personally? I practice nonmonogamy and don’t see any more reason to tack a superfluous “ethical” in there than I would if I were practicing a healthy and mutually agreed upon form of monogamy.
There are ways to be unethically nonmonogamous, such as any time one party is forcing their will upon other parties like we frequently see in harem romances (see my rant on those if you missed it), but those are the cases we need to be clear about. It’s unethical nonmonogamy that is the rarity, so let’s stop implying it’s the standard. Pretty please?
