I’ll talk about this video in a minute, but first, some background.
Gene Simmons’ OLTR with his non-wife, Shannon Tweed is a model for one of the types of long-term relationships that actually can work in the modern era. They live together, they love each other, they raise children together. He financially supports Shannon and their children and does so happily. They are not legally married, and Gene can go fuck other women all he wants as long as he doesn’t bring it home to the family. And he does fuck other women. A lot. But he doesn’t love anyone else, he’s emotionally and financially devoted to Shannon and no other woman. With other women, it’s just sex.
It’s a perfect arrangement, with a few glaring problems that I’ll get to in a minute. So much so that a few years ago, Gene Simmons entered my personal lexicon of terms, the “Gene Simmons OLTR” (vs. the swinger-style OLTR, which is a different kind of OLTR all together). If/when I actually move in with a woman full-time, the arrangement will be very similar to Gene’s and Shannon’s. Similar, but not identical.
Now, there’s trouble in paradise. Now that the two kids are grown up and out of the house, Shannon suddenly, for the first time in 28 years, has a problem with Gene fucking other women. Shannon’s big reason for tolerating the open relationship, her kids, are suddenly a non-issue, and now she’s putting her foot down. (Or this could all be an elaborate realty TV publicity stunt. Time will tell.)
I happen to know a little something about this “waiting to get mad” issue. I was married to a woman who wanted to stay married to me in a marriage that was not working until both our kids were grown up and out of the house. Then, according to her, getting divorced would be “okay”.
The problem with that thinking is A) the mental well being of children and parents of spending an additional decade in a dysfunctional marriage, B) the fact that financial damage to me would have been much, much worse had I waited another decade to get divorced. (Without a doubt, the most depressed men I have ever spoken to are guys who get divorced in their 50’s. It’s horrible. Not only does it make it impossible for them to retire, it forces them to start all over. At age 50.) And C) as if the man (or woman) is not going to eventually to cheat in a marriage like that. C’mon.
I was lucky, since all of this became a moot point when we got divorced a little later over a completely different issue. Regardless, my ex-wife’s opinion was very similar to a lot of women, apparently including Shannon. That is: Put up with all kinds of things you hate for “the good of the children” for decades, building up all kinds of repressed anger and resentment, then as soon as the children are out of the house, explode. Then bail out on the guy who’s been paying your bills for 30 years.
That’s great.
Now let’s talk about my main man Gene, who has really fucked up here. (As usual with these kinds of marital problems, it’s not one spouse who is at fault, both have fucked up badly.) If you haven’t yet, watch the video above. In it, you see the hypocritical Chelsea Handler, who if you read her books will happily talk about how she’s fucked MOUNTAINS of guys and who clearly has used sex on high-powered executives to get sweet TV deals that would have been impossible otherwise.
Poor sweet innocent little Chelsea is hoppin’ mad. How DARE Gene fuck those two girls at the restaurant last month like he has for 28 years! Doesn’t Gene know that women have a right to instantly change their minds on significant and long-standing arrangements whenever the hell they feel like it? What an asshole!
However, like I said, Gene’s fucked this one up. Now that you’ve watched the video, imagine what would have happened if instead of this “Please Shannon don’t leave me!” stuff, he handled it a little differently:
Chelsea: How could you hurt her like that???
Gene: I love Shannon very much and I obviously want her to stay with me. But if she doesn’t like how I live my life, she’s welcome to leave me whenever she wants. It’s her life, not mine, and she needs to decide that for herself.
Instead of making a stupid joke about how he’s a jealous hypocrite who doesn’t want Shannon to fuck other men, what if he had handled it like this:
Chelsea: Oh, so I assume Shannon can have sex with other men, right???
Gene: Of course she can. As long as the guys wear condoms, she can fuck anyone she wants, whenever she wants. I love her very much, so of course I get jealous sometimes, but fair is fair, and a little jealousy sometimes is better than suffering all the drama, compromise, and pain of monogamy, where you would be occasionally jealous anyway.
BAM! Just by saying those two little things, Gene could have deflated everything Chelsea was bitching about. If she kept bitching at him (which she probably would, since logic doesn’t stop an angry woman from being angry) she would have looked like the idiot, not him.
But alas, a giant has fallen. Gene has surrendered to the twin devils of male existence: oneitis (“Don’t leave me Shannon!”) and obsolete biological wiring, specifically caveman-level territorialness (“I can fuck other women but she can’t fuck other guys! I’ll get mad!”).
Wow. It’s amazing how fast Gene went from ultimate Alpha to ultimate puss. Even if Shannon ends up staying after all this, for the first time in her life she’s going to turn the betaization screws down on him hard, and he will not be the man he once was.
How sad.
