My heart was broken again recently, when I heard the story of still another single person (I’ll call him Sam) who really wanted to stay single but could not get past the feeling that doing so would mean there was something seriously wrong with him.
Sam and many other people whose best life may well be single life are up against a formidable obstacle: the couple norm. That’s the belief that being romantically coupled is “the normal, natural and superior way of being an adult.” Sasha Roseneil, Isabel Crowhurst, Tone Hellesund, Ana Cristina Santos, and Mariya Stoilova documented it and defined it that way in their book, The Tenacity of the Couple Norm.
The couple norm needs to be sent to the trash heap of historical embarrassments. Until it is no longer part of the conventional wisdom that being romantically coupled is the normal, natural, and superior way of being an adult, too many people are going to be held back from living their most fulfilling and most meaningful lives.
Other norms that once seemed unshakeable are already on their way out. For example, the hetero norm – the belief that it is abnormal or unnatural to be anything other than heterosexual – has come tumbling down. New laws and policies, such as the legalization of same-sex marriage, have created a more welcoming world for people who aren’t heterosexual.
Meanwhile, the couple norm remains largely uncontested. In their study of Bulgaria, Norway, Portugal, and the United Kingdom, Roseneil and her colleagues found that:
“Living outside the couple-form, or in non-normative couple-forms, is made harder, economically, legally and socially, by the laws and policies of states.”
One of the most intriguing arguments the social scientists made was that the yearning to be coupled can feel natural when in fact it isn’t. Instead, that longing is shaped in large part by the power and pervasiveness of the couple norm, and the pressures and expectations that are part of the package.
Economists are also questioning the naturalness of life choices
The gender gap in wages is longstanding, and one explanation for it is discrimination. Alternatively, some have argued that women just naturally prefer the kinds of work, including caring for children, associated with less pay. There’s nothing to be done about that, it was believed. It’s what women want.
At a recent session of the Allied Social Science Association Meetings, the economists Shelly Lundberg and Nancy Folbre challenged that way of thinking. Folbre said, “we should stop taking preferences as a given, and think more about how they are shaped.” Lundberg described how girls and boys are treated differently very early on, in ways that nudge them toward different kinds of pursuits. By the time they are old enough to be making occupational choices, they have had a lifetime of differential socialization. The discrimination does not just happen when women are hired or not hired for certain jobs or paid less than men. The choices women make as adults may seem to reflect their supposed essence as women, when in fact those choices have been powerfully and relentlessly shaped by social norms.
In analogous ways, the couple norm weighs down on just about all of us, from a very early age. By the time we are adults, we might think that romantic partnership is our preference. It is, we believe, what we have chosen. It seems normal and natural to want that. What we don’t realize is how much of that preference may be a product of normative pressures and expectations.
Lundberg and Folbre described a number of ways that gender norms influence choices. Each instance seemed relevant to the ways that the couple norm pushes people to choose to be coupled. Here are some examples.
The enforcement of norms “can include social exclusion of individuals who deviate from accepted behavior.”
Social exclusion is painfully familiar to many single people. Maybe Sam once had a group of friends who socialized together, but now some of them are coupled and gravitate to other coupled people. Maybe they reach out less often, and when they do, Sam finds that he has been demoted from dinner to lunch, or from weekends to weekdays.
The exclusion process is not limited to friends. Social events are routinely organized by the couple, as, for example, when ticket prices are advertised as $100 per couple, with no mention of individuals, or with individuals charged more per person than couples.
Being coupled is treated as “the normal, natural and superior way of being an adult” when a person with a spouse or romantic partner is invited to bring a plus-one to an event, while a single person is not.
Because coupling is regarded as normal, natural, and superior, Sam and other singles sometimes feel self-conscious (like the third wheel or the fifth wheel) with they are with couples and don’t initiate as many get-togethers themselves.
When single people get excluded over and over again, will some of them who actually like single life (except for the exclusions and other kinds of singlism) start to think that maybe they really do want to be coupled? Will they think that what they want is the relationship, when in fact what they want is to be treated fairly without having to unsingle themselves to qualify?
The enforcement of norms can make it emotionally difficult for people to defy those norms
The couple norm, like the “ideology of marriage and family” that Wendy Morris and I described, insists that coupled people are superior. They are the ones who supposedly are happier with their lives. It doesn’t matter that more than a dozen studies show that people who marry do not become lastingly happier than they were when they were single. The issue isn’t the facts, it is about a powerful way of thinking.
Single people are not supposed to want to be single, or to maintain that they are happily single. Several studies have shown how that norm is enforced. Single people who choose to be single are judged more harshly than single people who are pining for a partner. Other people refuse to believe that they are as happy as they say they are, and sometimes they even get mad at them for saying that they want to be single.
Will single people who like their single lives, but keep getting judged for it, come to doubt themselves? Will they start to think that maybe they really do want to be coupled?
“Discrimination skews choices.”
For decades, Shelly Lundberg has been arguing that discrimination shapes choices and preferences. For example, “You aren’t likely to invest in skills and traits suited to activities that you are discouraged from participating in.”
Beginning in childhood, individuals are encouraged to develop skills and interests relevant to romantic coupling. “Is he your boyfriend?” is not considered a ridiculous question to ask a five-year-old. In their adolescence and then in their adult years, people are pressured to put themselves out there, to figure out how to make themselves appealing to potential romantic partners, and to learn from their supposed mistakes if a romantic relationship doesn’t last. A whole industry of books, articles, podcasts, and coaching programs is on offer to single people, so they will believe that there is always more they can do and should do in order to have the skills and strategies they need to end up successfully coupled.
What’s not encouraged? The skills and strategies that make for a successful single life. Valuing and prioritizing friends. Learning how to spend time by yourself. Developing the confidence to walk into a room full of couples and feel proud of yourself rather than self-conscious. Planning for a single life that will be fulfilling for as long as you live.
We need a whole new mindset about what it means to be single. And, of course, we need laws and policies that benefit and protect everyone, not just those who are legally married.
[Notes: (1) The opinions expressed here do not represent the official positions of Unmarried Equality. (2) I’ll post all these blog posts at the UE Facebook page; please join our discussions there. (3) For links to previous columns, click here.]
About Bella DePaulo
