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Underground > Head Shop >

Polyamory

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Tryphena Absent

16:16 / 31.12.03

I think location is immensely important with regards to any talk about culture but specifically in this frame of reference. If we take polyamory as being the cultural norm in London's gay scene and monogamy as the norm in London's straight scene then it's going to be entirely different from those same things in Devon (to pick a place randomly out of a hat). Talking to a guy at work who's gay I got the sense that polyamory was accepted as usual in the London gay scene but in addition there was nothing of subculture about his words. To put this a little more clearly I'm not sure that his culture is working within straight dominance as it might in an area with a smaller gay community. I don't doubt that polyamory emerged as a conflicting culture within a dominant culture but whether the same goes now is a far more complex question. I'd like to suggest that this comes down to two conflicting norms working against one another? This provides us with certain difficulties that have been partially outlined in the thread already because this clearly isn't a simple competition between two types of conduct within sexual relationships and in fact polyamory maps across straight and non-straight relationships but is more acceptable within one culture. So the growth of polyamory in the gay scene as acceptable could really be quite important to anyone straight who wishes to practice it or views themself as absolutely polyamorous.

06:32 / 02.01.04

May, I have to ask again about your post -- what is this "spread thinly"? Is two people too many? Is one person guaranteed to have it spread thickly enough over hir, as long as there's just one? Why is there this scarcity idea about love, like there's only a bit of love in a tiny jar, and if someone else has some, then there's less to go around? I don't agree with that at all, not least of all because I'd like to think my heart is bigger than that. And re: my "evolved" comment, I am all for the idea of Head Shop threads making progress in understanding, my point was the "Nyah! We're better than you because you _____." Anyone positing hirself or hir relationship as "more evolved" strikes me as making that kind of remark. That's what I find divisive.

As Haus's remarks suggested to me, regarding "growing out of," I don't think it's right or fair to waltz up to someone -- monogamous or otherwise -- who's partner(s) are well informed & c., and say "Oh, _you_, you'll get over that." People like different things. It seems to me that there is no particular "power" (i.e., resonant meaningfulness) in choosing one way of life over the other -- but there is enormous "power," in terms of being allowed to keep your children, your job, & c. in choosing monogamy. I think, however, that polyamory could be just as bad if it were the mode in charge.

Bubblegum Death

15:28 / 20.02.04

In regards to gay marriage(which I am for), is there a legal argument against polygamy? Some of the arguments for gay marriage could also be used for polygamous marriages, and while there's hopefully a chance that gay marriage will soon be legal; I think that the odds of this are greater if people were convinced that it would lead to polygamy.

Bubblegum Death

18:14 / 20.02.04

I meant to say wouldn't lead to polygamy.Oops.

20:49 / 20.02.04

I live in Toronto, and gay marriage became legal here last year. The polygamy argument came up at the time, but it seems to have died down quite quickly. I attribute it, in part, to an issue of paperwork - there are only two places for names on a marriage licence application, and if you're already on file as being married at present, your application does not go through. That said, since the legal definition of marriage here maintains that it is a union between two people, tacking on a third or a fourth is a much stickier issue than having two parties of the same sex. Since the gay marriage issue quite often comes down to one simple idea - do I have the right to marry the person I wish to marry? - as opposed to a much more complex issue - do I have the right to marry as many people as I wish to marry, and if so, what are my legal obligations to them and to any offspring of that marriage, and do those obligations have an order of ranking based on whom I married first or with whom I have the most children?... - well, I guess you can see where I'm going. One appears to be a much more complex legal issue than the other, and that in itself would likely stimy any attempts to go forth with legalized polygamy for many years to come.

*

00:39 / 22.02.04

General remarks on the topic:

I've been involved in closed polyamorous relationships, open polyamorous relationships, monogamous relationships, and have been the victim of polyfuckery in bad faith, so I've got some experience here. The center of the best polyamorous relationship I've had, and incidentally the best and longest-lasting relationship I've had, my ex-lover and now my roommate (yes, that's working out fine, thanks) says that the limiting factor of polyamorous relationships is not love, but time. It is difficult, but not impossible, to devote equal and sufficient time to all your loves, including yourself.

People who have grown up in a monogamy-normative society experience jealousy when they feel something is being taken from them which is rightfully theirs, like time with a lover. Jealousy is prevented when everyone's needs are met. When I notice jealousy, I assume someone's needs aren't being met and work to address the situation. However, a person's needs may include exclusive access to a lover, in which case that person is not suited to polyamory and should not be drawn into such a relationship.

Polyamorous relationships require exponentially more work than monogamous relationships with regard to communication, good faith, and dedication. There is one other MAJOR drawback to polyamory, one that not many people think of right off hand, and that is that one can be forced into the situation of ending multiple long-term love relationships in a short period of time. This is highly stressful and is a risk not to be undertaken lightly. I didn't undertake it lightly, and I don't regret it now, but had I not walked into the situation with both eyes open, I would probably be speaking now as a strident voice advising against the practice of polyamory. That I am not, speaks to the incredible rewards of a successful polyamorous relationship.

Polyfuckery in bad faith is not something I am willing to defend or condone, however.

09:50 / 22.02.04

do I have the right to marry as many people as I wish to marry, and if so, what are my legal obligations to them and to any offspring of that marriage, and do those obligations have an order of ranking based on whom I married first or with whom I have the most children?... - well, I guess you can see where I'm going. One appears to be a much more complex legal issue than the other

Actually, all those issues are already raised by serial marriages: yes, people already have the right to marry as many people as they wish to marry, and complex situations regarding financial obligations, offspring, contact, 'ranking' of multiple families, etc, already arise. I suspect that legal polygamy would actually make at least some of these situations simpler, as you're not starting off from the assumption that husband #1 is no longer living with wife #2, etc.

07:55 / 01.05.04

There was a woman, or was she inocently indiferrent to seduce the boy?
There was a girl or was she seduced by a...

Ok, speaking of which man male are in general plygamous yet they follow the one image created or being of process of creation of many such encounters wher one has many woman. Same is the fe male man or rather woman as it properly defined in English.

why then someone tall me when on altering mentality substances the one who accpts projection of many of the partners in one projects it onto one and then experiments with outcome?

I once and again know the girl who enjoys sexual polygammy and that is in her mature of any other woman who wants to be her.
Then a prostitute in syncronicity of Earth has all man and woman together in a short perioud of say an orgasm she may get if such ever occurs.

All of you are wishing to have many whiloe you never had yourself. All of you are mostly whores who are getting more and more for such as securing ones image through the attention of other many but not your.

And then in all of that you use a situation of conferring to yourself the stupidity of assumption of being wanted and desired

what for?

to share a physic and ? and what?

answer first what is the orgasm for you if you had it ever or will

19:52 / 04.05.04

I wish I understood that last post enough to comment. There's tantalizing talk of psychic orgasming that cruely eludes my ability to parse.

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