I’m saying all of this as an “out” bi poly guy with a boyfriend (of sixteen years). It’s crucial to the cause that we poly folk reach out to the LGBT “community,” and begin to create bonds of common ground and support. “The cause” is larger than the concerns of poly folk; and it’s larger than the concerns of the LGBT “community”. The cause is what I call “relational freedom”. The freedom to love whom we will, as we will, is what is at stake. It is foolish to maintain a schism or fracture down the middle of the Relational Freedom cause, with our potential allies being enemies instead. And let us not forget that it was the GLBT “community” which coined the term “the closet,” which applies so well to the majority of poly folk, and with the same sad social and political (and psychological) consequences. And it was the LGBT “community” which wisely recognized the power of coming out as a tool of general liberation.

Power to the people!

No one is trying to exclude anyone from anything. Sex is wonderful and yes many polyamory people are highly sexual and have numerous partners. I am all for relationship choice, sexual choice and freedom. I was rather trying to address polyamory (pol being many and amory being love) specifically. People who go to swing parties for recreational sex are in a sexually open relationship but they may or may not be polyamorous.

There was no intention to be condescending but rather to look at how this is different from that. I am polyamorous, I am polysexual and I do not swing or go to play parties. One of my closest friends is polyamorous, polysexual and a swinger. Her swing partners are just that and her polyamorous partners are a more connected and emotional interactions. I have friend who swings and thinks polyamory is weird. They also do not face the same issues since their sex/play partners don’t come over for a family Thanksgiving dinner. Polyamory people often have to make tough choices with those they love regardless if it is new relationship a short term one or a lifetime commitment. It is not about right or wrong, good or bad, short or long, just different. As such we can deal with some different issues and many that are the same.

Definitions just help us to put things in context so we can explain it to others. At the core of all of this is the enormous shame around sexuality that plagues our culture. Education on all these different options are crucial to changing these attitudes.

“Many in the polyamory movement worked hard to educate the public about polyamory and build an understanding of the desire for of polyamorists to form long term loving relationships with two, three or more people,” writes Robyn Trask. She argues that these efforts have “been undermined by the challenges of sexuality and sexual openness not being acceptable.”

Well yes, so they have. To the extent those efforts do not also include working to educate the public about the legitimate desires of many, if not most, polyamorists to be slutty, then they *deserve* to fail! Sexuality does not have to be “romantic” in order to be valid. Nor does romantic love does happen only in the context of long-term relationships. It happens in the contexts of one-night stands, torrid summer affairs, connections between sex workers and our clients, etc.

We know that society has lots of hang-ups about sex. Even in 2012, many people still see it as dirty or wrong unless it comes in the appropriate package. Sex in relationships is socially honored — sexual liaisons not expected/intended to lead to long-term relationships are not. This is the unfair stigma that many embrace polyamory in order to escape.

Just because we often prefer to spend many hours joyfully frolicking in the river of new relationship energy, loving more people for shorter periods of time rather than restricting our sex lives to the same small group of people for longer periods of time, does not mean our sexual interactions are “casual”! I find the use of that term condescending and demeaning toward ethical sluts, and I believe it is a product of the societal biases in favor of monogamy and long-term relationships.

Telling the mainstream, “Hey, we’re no more promiscuous than you are, all we’re looking for is maybe another person or two in the mix” is *so* reminiscent of the assimilationists in the queer community who insist, “Hey, we’re just like you, only with same-sex partners instead of opposite-sex partners.”

Take note: Those people tend to want to exclude poly people from their movement and their civil rights advances the same way Trask apparently wants to exclude promiscuous people from hers. And I think the motivation in each case is that we’re standing on a lower rung of the societal acceptance ladder.

Let me be blunt — You do not get to throw under the bus those of us who like sex, and like to have it regularly with multiple different partners, by defining us out of the polyamory movement just so that you can get your mainstream respectability fix!!!

How can I say this with such confidence? History. Social-change movements are unstoppable once they have taken firm root with an entire generation and are passed on to the next.

Such has been the case with gay lib; it’s now been two entire generations since the movement began with the Stonewall Uprising in New York’s Greenwich Village. There are now two entire generations of out-of-the-closet gay men, lesbians, bisexuals and transgenders and the third generation will soon be coming of age.

So it will also be with the polyamory movement. Forty years — two generations — from now, the poly community (which, lest we forget, includes many polyamorous LGBT people — particularly bisexuals) will be where the LGBT community is today.

Nothing can stop generational change.

Thanks a lot for writing this great post about the situation with polyamory in the current times. As the climate around sexuality and sexual freedom changes polyamory seems to be getting more coverage in the mainstream media and on the internet and in popular culture and society. Still, I am grateful that you are awared of the possible consequences of that new age.
I am glad that Loving More exists and that it’s working to help polyamourist move on with their lives of loving more. And I certainly hope and pray that you folks get the necessary funding so that the work that you do can become available to a much wider and diverse community or population.
Blessings.