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A Poly Rant
Oct. 22nd, 2008 09:52 am"Man, you got 2 girlfriends? And one of them is married? I've been trying to talk girls into that forever, how do you do it?"
"Your profile says 'polyamory', that's like, friends with benefits, right?"
"I couldn't do that, it's too complicated"
"I don't understand how you can love two people at the same time"
"I don't get it, how does that work?"
::bangs head on desk::
I'm going to say this very slowly...
POLYAMORY. IS. JUST. LIKE. MONOGAMY. ONLY. WITH. MORE. PEOPLE.
First, the obvious thing, the sex. OK, monogamy (in the more modern usage, not the literal translation) means having sex with one person. Except, upwards of 34% of people (or more, depending on what study you're looking at) don't have sex with just one person at a time and a vast majority of people don't have sex with just one person in their entire lives. A large number of people have multiple sexual partners over their lifetime. Even within the confines of religious conservatism, a widow or widower is allowed to remarry.
AND...
Poly people don't have significantly larger numbers of sex partners in their history than the average Serial Monogamist! Plus it's not very common for a polyamorist to have more than 2 or 3 sexual partners that includes intercourse or fluid-transfer. Some poly people might have play partners, or smoochie friends, so it might appear as though they're fucking everything that moves, but that's just simply not the case.
Next, speaking of fucking everything that moves ... polyamory is about the RELATIONSHIP, not the sex. That doesn't mean that there is no sex, or that sex isn't important. It means that the sex is WITHIN THE CONTEXT OF A RELATIONSHIP and it is the relationship AS A WHOLE that is the important part to a polyamorist. Just like many monogamists, sex is an important aspect of the romantic relationship, but the relationship is not ALL ABOUT SEX.
And, just like monogamous people, poly people *do* place restrictions and limitations on their sexual activities for the physical and emotional health of those affected. We just don't rule out ALL physical activity on the faulty assumptions that sharing sexual activity with others is either unsafe or a sign that we don't love our partners. But we do self-limit ourselves according to our individual understanding of basic safety and consideration for our partners.
Sex is not a poly issue, it's a people issue.
As for the complexity, unless you live under a rock, your life is pretty complex too, what with spouses, children, best friends, and family cluttering things up. Ever try to organize a Christmas Dinner with a large family? Perhaps one with a domineering mother and maybe a crazy aunt that no one likes but you have to invite anyway? And those bratty kids of Cousin Lester, who doesn't believe in "discipline"!
Or maybe you've thrown a party, but before sending out the invitations, you had to mentally review the guest list and possibly even remind certain people not to mention the party in front of Jay, since you just don't have the money to supply enough booze for him and your TV never fully recovered from the last time he got drunk at your house. You also have to remember who has a boyfriend or girlfriend that you should invite, who has kids that you have to tell not to invite, and field requests for additional guests as your friends start dating new people or have family visiting from out of town that night.
How about those of you who have a couple of roommates? You've never tried to work out who should pick up his own damn laundry and who has to buy the dish soap? How about devising those subtle "signals" (like a sock on the doorknob) to tell your roommates you have company, or even setting up a date-night schedule so everyone gets a chance at the apartment all to himself?
Polyamory is no more or less complicated than anyone else's life. Seriously, once all the safe sex rules are in place (which are pretty much the easiest thing to lay out, as it's pretty easy to just pick out activities and say yay or nay to), it's all the same issues that monogamous people deal with. Who takes out the trash, whether or not to invite crazy Aunt Patty, how to handle Jay's alcoholism and Lester's kids. Things can be simplified by making smaller families and social circles, whether you're poly or mono, but as long as you're dealing with PEOPLE, things can get a little complicated.
Dealing with schedules and personality conflicts and making people happy is not a poly issue, it's a people issue.
And for jealousy ... monogamy doesn't have such a good track record for managing jealousy either. Many times, jealousy is even considered a SIGN of True Love! Monogamous people have been known to go out of their way to instigate jealousy in order to receive the reassurance they want from their significant other! Other people may not try to inspire it intentionally, but if their SO is insecure in any fashion, you may not have a choice. Anything you do could be suceptible to jealous scrutiney with an insecure partner, monogamous or not. Managing the jealousy by placing limitations on your partner's behaviour without working on the underlying insecurity does not make jealousy go away. It only makes the list of rules longer, more complicated, and harder to remember. Monogamy does not make people immune to jealousy.
My cousin, for example, gets extremely jealous of my sister's friends. My cousin and my sister are the same age and grew up together. They're very close. But if my sister goes out dancing and doesn't invite my cousin, oh, there's hell to pay! One time, my sister moved away, then came back for a visit. My grandfather organized a family BBQ to celebrate her visit. All the family was told, including my cousin. But my cousin did not hear about it from my sister directly, she heard about it from another family member. Since my sister didn't specially invite her in person, my cousin called her up, yelled at her, and refused to go to the BBQ. Nevermind that my sister didn't personally invite anyone in the family - it was my grandfather's plan, after all.
My cousin felt that, because of the nature of their special relationship, my sister should have personally invited her to an open, family event. She needed to be reassured that her relationship with my sister was Special, and that she was given treatment that was different from, or better than anyone else, to show the world that she holds this Special place in my sister's life.
Being family, my cousin and my sister are not romantically involved with each other, and they're both straight besides. Yet, my hetersexual, monogamous family members, both of whom are in long-term romantic relationships, have not managed to avoid jealousy and its nasty effects on their relationship.
Jealousy is about being insecure, and personal security does not come from without, it comes from within. It doesn't matter what kind of relationship you're in, monogamous, polyamorous, romantic, familial, or platonic, work-affiliated, if you are not secure in your relationship, you will have to deal with jealousy. Being in a polyamorous relationship does not automatically inspire insecurity, just as being mongamous doesn't automatically inspire security.
Some poly people are just not prone to jealousy. They get their sense of security from somewhere internal, rather than external actions. If you never doubt that you are lovable and worthy of love, then you have no reason to doubt when your partner says "I love you", even when that partner is fucking someone else.
Some poly people's jealousy simply manifests in different areas than monogamy. Rather than sex being the trigger, some other action might set it off, like Hubby making his famous Souffle du Jour for his new sweetie when he previously only made it for you.
And for everyone else, when a poly person feels jealous, the goal is not to put a bandaid over it, which is what restricting your partners' behaviour does, but to treat the root cause of the jealousy, so that even when the partner does that thing again, it won't trigger the jealous feelings. A monogamous person might make rules to prevent feeling jealousy in the future. A poly person attacks the jealousy itself to ensure that there is no NEED to feel jealous in the future. Just as in monogamy, there is a range from people who don't feel jealous, to people who do but who work on it, to people who let their jealousy control them.
Jealousy is not a poly issue, it's a people issue.
Now, about loving multiple people. Monogamous people do that ALL THE FREAKIN' TIME! Let's start with the obvious ... children. Before you ask me "how can you love him too, aren't I enough?", imagine your oldest child looking up and asking you "how can you have another baby, mommy, don't you love me? Aren't I enough?" As a parent, you know that's an absurd question. Of COURSE you can love both children! There's the biochemical reason, which is a relase of hormones associated with the bonding process during childbirth. And there's the more ephemeral reason, which is just that love grows to as much as its needed to encompass all one's children.
Next up is parents. I'm going to assume two parents, because it's not like anyone has any other style of family, right? I mean, two parents, married, living together, with 2.5 kids and a dog is the ONLY way a family can function, right? None of you were raised by 4 parents because of divorce and remarriage, or assisted by grandparents or had single parents with a string of girlfriends or boyfriends? There is only One Right Way to form a family, yes? Ahem, anyway, two parents ... you love both of them, don't you? Well, how did you find enough love in your heart for both a mother and a father? And then later, where did you come up with the extra love for your grandparents? Siblings? Step-parents?
To illustrate both the multiple loving and jealousy issue in a monogamous context, I refer you to a previous post of mine: This Is Not A Poly Issue.
Loving people is not a poly issue, it's a people issue.
Before you chime in with "but I'm not having SEX with my children or my parents!", let me point out that so-called monogamous people fall in romantic love ALL THE TIME with people other than their spouse. Right now, the only societally-acceptable way is for the spouse to die first. Yep, the only convenient way out of loving two people at once (think Pearl Harbor) is if your spouse dies first. How fucked up is that?
But aside for widows getting remarried while still proclaiming to love their first spouse, monogamous people STILL fall in romantic love all the time with people other than their spouses. They have 3 options when this happens. 1) Ignore it. Ignore all those happy, giddy, makes-you-feel-like-floating feelings. Avoid enriching your life with the presence of this wonderful person out of your sense of duty and love to your existing spouse. 2) Cheat. Break the vows and agreements that you made with the person you profess to still love in order to experience this amazing, soul-touching bond with the new person. Cause pain and suffering to the person you promised to never hurt. Or 3) Break up. Leave an otherwise-functioning relationship, leave a wonderful person, possibly the parent of your children, who has been with you for years, through thick and thin, to be with the new person.
Monogamy does not stop people from loving more than one person at a time. Even romantic love. Monogamy merely denies us the expression of that love, but it doesn't stop people from feeling it.
Romantically loving people is not a poly issue, it's a people issue, even though we try to pretend it's not.
Monogamous people behave as if poly people are aliens, that we're doing something so completely unusual and different that they can't even wrap their brains around it. Monogamous people interact with others all the time. Monogamous people LOVE people all the time. Monogamous people have complicated schedules and conflicting personalities in their social circles and families. Monogamous people have to manage jealousy.
It's really not that different. What is different is that we choose not to ignore it.
"Your profile says 'polyamory', that's like, friends with benefits, right?"
"I couldn't do that, it's too complicated"
"I don't understand how you can love two people at the same time"
"I don't get it, how does that work?"
::bangs head on desk::
I'm going to say this very slowly...
POLYAMORY. IS. JUST. LIKE. MONOGAMY. ONLY. WITH. MORE. PEOPLE.
- Poly relationships span the spectrum of relationships, from casual to lifemates ... JUST LIKE MONOGAMOUS RELATIONSHIPS.
- Poly people have all the same emotions and feelings ... JUST LIKE MONOGAMOUS PEOPLE.
- Polyamory requires effort, work, care, and consideration in order to reap the benefits of relating to someone ... JUST LIKE MONOGAMY.
- Polyamory does not prevent jealousy ... JUST LIKE MONOGAMY.
- Poly people have to balance schedules and feelings and conflcting personalities ... wait for it ... JUST LIKE MONOGAMOUS PEOPLE!
First, the obvious thing, the sex. OK, monogamy (in the more modern usage, not the literal translation) means having sex with one person. Except, upwards of 34% of people (or more, depending on what study you're looking at) don't have sex with just one person at a time and a vast majority of people don't have sex with just one person in their entire lives. A large number of people have multiple sexual partners over their lifetime. Even within the confines of religious conservatism, a widow or widower is allowed to remarry.
AND...
Poly people don't have significantly larger numbers of sex partners in their history than the average Serial Monogamist! Plus it's not very common for a polyamorist to have more than 2 or 3 sexual partners that includes intercourse or fluid-transfer. Some poly people might have play partners, or smoochie friends, so it might appear as though they're fucking everything that moves, but that's just simply not the case.
Next, speaking of fucking everything that moves ... polyamory is about the RELATIONSHIP, not the sex. That doesn't mean that there is no sex, or that sex isn't important. It means that the sex is WITHIN THE CONTEXT OF A RELATIONSHIP and it is the relationship AS A WHOLE that is the important part to a polyamorist. Just like many monogamists, sex is an important aspect of the romantic relationship, but the relationship is not ALL ABOUT SEX.
And, just like monogamous people, poly people *do* place restrictions and limitations on their sexual activities for the physical and emotional health of those affected. We just don't rule out ALL physical activity on the faulty assumptions that sharing sexual activity with others is either unsafe or a sign that we don't love our partners. But we do self-limit ourselves according to our individual understanding of basic safety and consideration for our partners.
Sex is not a poly issue, it's a people issue.
As for the complexity, unless you live under a rock, your life is pretty complex too, what with spouses, children, best friends, and family cluttering things up. Ever try to organize a Christmas Dinner with a large family? Perhaps one with a domineering mother and maybe a crazy aunt that no one likes but you have to invite anyway? And those bratty kids of Cousin Lester, who doesn't believe in "discipline"!
Or maybe you've thrown a party, but before sending out the invitations, you had to mentally review the guest list and possibly even remind certain people not to mention the party in front of Jay, since you just don't have the money to supply enough booze for him and your TV never fully recovered from the last time he got drunk at your house. You also have to remember who has a boyfriend or girlfriend that you should invite, who has kids that you have to tell not to invite, and field requests for additional guests as your friends start dating new people or have family visiting from out of town that night.
How about those of you who have a couple of roommates? You've never tried to work out who should pick up his own damn laundry and who has to buy the dish soap? How about devising those subtle "signals" (like a sock on the doorknob) to tell your roommates you have company, or even setting up a date-night schedule so everyone gets a chance at the apartment all to himself?
Polyamory is no more or less complicated than anyone else's life. Seriously, once all the safe sex rules are in place (which are pretty much the easiest thing to lay out, as it's pretty easy to just pick out activities and say yay or nay to), it's all the same issues that monogamous people deal with. Who takes out the trash, whether or not to invite crazy Aunt Patty, how to handle Jay's alcoholism and Lester's kids. Things can be simplified by making smaller families and social circles, whether you're poly or mono, but as long as you're dealing with PEOPLE, things can get a little complicated.
Dealing with schedules and personality conflicts and making people happy is not a poly issue, it's a people issue.
And for jealousy ... monogamy doesn't have such a good track record for managing jealousy either. Many times, jealousy is even considered a SIGN of True Love! Monogamous people have been known to go out of their way to instigate jealousy in order to receive the reassurance they want from their significant other! Other people may not try to inspire it intentionally, but if their SO is insecure in any fashion, you may not have a choice. Anything you do could be suceptible to jealous scrutiney with an insecure partner, monogamous or not. Managing the jealousy by placing limitations on your partner's behaviour without working on the underlying insecurity does not make jealousy go away. It only makes the list of rules longer, more complicated, and harder to remember. Monogamy does not make people immune to jealousy.
My cousin, for example, gets extremely jealous of my sister's friends. My cousin and my sister are the same age and grew up together. They're very close. But if my sister goes out dancing and doesn't invite my cousin, oh, there's hell to pay! One time, my sister moved away, then came back for a visit. My grandfather organized a family BBQ to celebrate her visit. All the family was told, including my cousin. But my cousin did not hear about it from my sister directly, she heard about it from another family member. Since my sister didn't specially invite her in person, my cousin called her up, yelled at her, and refused to go to the BBQ. Nevermind that my sister didn't personally invite anyone in the family - it was my grandfather's plan, after all.
My cousin felt that, because of the nature of their special relationship, my sister should have personally invited her to an open, family event. She needed to be reassured that her relationship with my sister was Special, and that she was given treatment that was different from, or better than anyone else, to show the world that she holds this Special place in my sister's life.
Being family, my cousin and my sister are not romantically involved with each other, and they're both straight besides. Yet, my hetersexual, monogamous family members, both of whom are in long-term romantic relationships, have not managed to avoid jealousy and its nasty effects on their relationship.
Jealousy is about being insecure, and personal security does not come from without, it comes from within. It doesn't matter what kind of relationship you're in, monogamous, polyamorous, romantic, familial, or platonic, work-affiliated, if you are not secure in your relationship, you will have to deal with jealousy. Being in a polyamorous relationship does not automatically inspire insecurity, just as being mongamous doesn't automatically inspire security.
Some poly people are just not prone to jealousy. They get their sense of security from somewhere internal, rather than external actions. If you never doubt that you are lovable and worthy of love, then you have no reason to doubt when your partner says "I love you", even when that partner is fucking someone else.
Some poly people's jealousy simply manifests in different areas than monogamy. Rather than sex being the trigger, some other action might set it off, like Hubby making his famous Souffle du Jour for his new sweetie when he previously only made it for you.
And for everyone else, when a poly person feels jealous, the goal is not to put a bandaid over it, which is what restricting your partners' behaviour does, but to treat the root cause of the jealousy, so that even when the partner does that thing again, it won't trigger the jealous feelings. A monogamous person might make rules to prevent feeling jealousy in the future. A poly person attacks the jealousy itself to ensure that there is no NEED to feel jealous in the future. Just as in monogamy, there is a range from people who don't feel jealous, to people who do but who work on it, to people who let their jealousy control them.
Jealousy is not a poly issue, it's a people issue.
Now, about loving multiple people. Monogamous people do that ALL THE FREAKIN' TIME! Let's start with the obvious ... children. Before you ask me "how can you love him too, aren't I enough?", imagine your oldest child looking up and asking you "how can you have another baby, mommy, don't you love me? Aren't I enough?" As a parent, you know that's an absurd question. Of COURSE you can love both children! There's the biochemical reason, which is a relase of hormones associated with the bonding process during childbirth. And there's the more ephemeral reason, which is just that love grows to as much as its needed to encompass all one's children.
Next up is parents. I'm going to assume two parents, because it's not like anyone has any other style of family, right? I mean, two parents, married, living together, with 2.5 kids and a dog is the ONLY way a family can function, right? None of you were raised by 4 parents because of divorce and remarriage, or assisted by grandparents or had single parents with a string of girlfriends or boyfriends? There is only One Right Way to form a family, yes? Ahem, anyway, two parents ... you love both of them, don't you? Well, how did you find enough love in your heart for both a mother and a father? And then later, where did you come up with the extra love for your grandparents? Siblings? Step-parents?
To illustrate both the multiple loving and jealousy issue in a monogamous context, I refer you to a previous post of mine: This Is Not A Poly Issue.
Loving people is not a poly issue, it's a people issue.
Before you chime in with "but I'm not having SEX with my children or my parents!", let me point out that so-called monogamous people fall in romantic love ALL THE TIME with people other than their spouse. Right now, the only societally-acceptable way is for the spouse to die first. Yep, the only convenient way out of loving two people at once (think Pearl Harbor) is if your spouse dies first. How fucked up is that?
But aside for widows getting remarried while still proclaiming to love their first spouse, monogamous people STILL fall in romantic love all the time with people other than their spouses. They have 3 options when this happens. 1) Ignore it. Ignore all those happy, giddy, makes-you-feel-like-floating feelings. Avoid enriching your life with the presence of this wonderful person out of your sense of duty and love to your existing spouse. 2) Cheat. Break the vows and agreements that you made with the person you profess to still love in order to experience this amazing, soul-touching bond with the new person. Cause pain and suffering to the person you promised to never hurt. Or 3) Break up. Leave an otherwise-functioning relationship, leave a wonderful person, possibly the parent of your children, who has been with you for years, through thick and thin, to be with the new person.
Monogamy does not stop people from loving more than one person at a time. Even romantic love. Monogamy merely denies us the expression of that love, but it doesn't stop people from feeling it.
Romantically loving people is not a poly issue, it's a people issue, even though we try to pretend it's not.
Monogamous people behave as if poly people are aliens, that we're doing something so completely unusual and different that they can't even wrap their brains around it. Monogamous people interact with others all the time. Monogamous people LOVE people all the time. Monogamous people have complicated schedules and conflicting personalities in their social circles and families. Monogamous people have to manage jealousy.
It's really not that different. What is different is that we choose not to ignore it.
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