joreth | It's Not ALL About The Sex

Pet Peeve: I hate it when people argue against the phrase "it's not all about the sex" by talking about those times when it is about sex. That phrase does not *exclude* being about sex. The keyword there is "all". It means that polyamory is not ALL about sex, it doesn't mean that it's NEVER about sex. It means that the sex is not the single, sole, or only criteria. That's what that word "all" means - all, only, single, solo, there is no other. It means that out of the list of criteria, every single criteria option available is "the sex". Which, of course, means that polyamory is not all about the sex.

That phrase doesn't exclude sex, it only removes the limitation to sex. Which means that yes, sometimes, polyamory is about sex in exactly the same way that monogamy is about the sex. In other words, some relationships are more sex-centric than others, and some situations or contexts within individual relationships are more sex-centric than others.

Monogamy is an extremely widely varied category. There are people who get together pretty much because they have amazing sexual chemistry and not much else. There are people who have emotional or spiritual unions and sex may be a small, or non-existent part of their connection. There are people that have waxing and waning elements of sexuality within their relationship over time.

Newsflash: polyamory is the same thing because we're talking about romantic relationships involving people who have different personal definitions of "romantic" and different sexual needs and identities. Which means, by definition, that it's not all about the sex. Tacking on an addendum like "but sometimes it *is* about the sex" is redundant and a red herring distraction because no one ever said it wasn't about sex.

It's kinda like someone trying to explain that football isn't all about touchdowns, because there are also field goals and strategy and passing and gaining / losing ground and camaraderie and sportsmanship and life skills and leadership skills and teamwork and ... and ... and...; and then someone comes along and says "hey, sometimes it IS about the touchdowns!" Well, yeah, if there weren't any touchdowns ever by any team or any player in any game in existence, then it wouldn't be football. But it also wouldn't be football if the only thing anyone could do was score touchdowns and no one could block or tackle or make a 40-yard pass.

It doesn't contribute anything to the conversation to declare opposition to the statement "it's not all about the sex" because that statement doesn't exclude sex so it's not actually in opposition. Sure, we should be talking about the sexual element in polyamory. It's just that the statement isn't saying that we shouldn't. Contradicting the popular phrase with "it IS sometimes about the sex" is actually a Straw Man argument because no one is saying that it's never about sex and it redirects the conversation to where someone who is trying to talk about the complexity of polyamory or perhaps the distinctions of polyamory now comes across as sex-negative or slut-shaming when, in fact, discussing the multidimensional nature of polyamory is often a very sex-positive position.

So what I'm saying is, that it's really fucking annoying when people don't pay attention to language and then seem to deliberately or willfully muddy the waters by arguing shit that no one is disputing.