No matter how much you love to hate Newt Gingrich, I have one thing to say to this man. Thanks. Only in this very specific instance, but thanks nonetheless. Thanks for making Tristan Taormino’s Opening Up sell out on amazon.
The week following reports of Newt Gingrich asking his second wife, Marianne, for an open marriage gave us a spattering of fascinating articles about open relationships, from the New York Times to the BBC to the Guardian. I was so pleased to see how many articles featured people who were legit sources on the topic (Dan Savage, Jenny Block, Tristan Taormino, etc!) The amazing thing about it all was everyone was on board saying, “Newt couldn’t have approached it more wrong, but there is actually a right way to do it.”
Obviously six years into an illicit affair is not the time to say, “hey honey, do you think we should open this marriage up?!” Not a soul who supports open relationships would say that is an appropriate tact to take. No one would deny that Newt is a slimy, cheating, lying and downright grody man. All I am saying is, it has opened up a dialogue about open relationships in some really fascinating ways. It could have gone disastrously and tainted the good name of loving, honest and consent based open relationships, but instead it created a space for making them acceptable. So yay.
If only every disaster that man created could end in something compelling.
