I find it interesting that it is often the man who drags the woman into the lifestyle. The woman might be rather reluctant at first, but once exposed to loving intimacy and perhaps sexual variety in safe, caring groups, they often become the strongest supporters of the lifestyle. Then, lo and behold.....we find out that it is often the man who has to potential to become more possessive and jealous.
That's a fairly sweeping generalization.
I dragged him into this lifestyle.... and now he's happy here
It is a sweeping generalization, but I think that it does have at least some truth to it.
If I had a nickel every time I heard of some guy dragging his girlfriend to poly and the girl ending up much more into it than the guy was, I'd be typing this message from my Alienware laptop..in Amsterdam..in a coffeeshop..that I bought...with my "walking around" money.
There seems to be an awful lot of "dragging into" going on. That would seem to suggest that quite a few people who "are" poly are not really that enthusiastic about it.
I just envisioned a bunch of poly cavemen, with big clubs...
Wow you know a lot of poly people :O
and have good taste in laptops
There seems to be an awful lot of "dragging into" going on. That would seem to suggest that quite a few people who "are" poly are not really that enthusiastic about it.
I can't speak for anyone else, but you hit the nail on the head for me. At the best of times I think of being poly as the "Peace Corps" of relationship structures("The Toughest Relationship Type You'll Ever Love").
Would be interesting to go on a site like okc and do a survey. That might give you a decent snapshot...hmmmm Too bad no one has time for that kind of thing
It is unfortunate. I wish more people, when things were going ok to well, would stick around. I wonder if they realize how much that would help people
I always thought it was about loving PEOPLE, not loving "types of relationships"... maybe that's what is lost on the people doing the "dragging" and being "dragged into".
I am sure that does make a practical difference but I'm not quite sure how. From my understanding poly is about loving more than one person in a romantic way. If you love that style of relationship then you are signing up for loving more than one person(or at least setting that as your goal).
I know what I think you might mean, but I won't guess and risk putting words in your mouth.
Why don't you just say what you think I mean and ask me if that is what i mean? The word for that is "communication". It's only "putting words in my mouth" if you go around saying I said something I never said.
I did not say to myself "Gee I want [this type] of relationship, therefore I must resign myself to the fact that I will have to love more than one person in order to achieve that goal." Instead, I experienced the reality that I have been able to feel the feeling for more than one person in the same time frame. It does not disappear for one person in the presence of the other. This has nothing to do with having a "goal" to achieve a particular "relationship style". I am not making concerted efforts to "be poly" or to "be in a polyamorous relationship".
There seems to be an awful lot of "dragging into" going on. That would seem to suggest that quite a few people who "are" poly are not really that enthusiastic about it.
I think that the ability to love more than one person at once is actually not that rare(monastics do it all the time) and that the ability to do so does not, necessarily, make one poly(a loving person, yes, but not poly).
I think that it is that ability plus the willingness to make the necessary sacrifices to engage in a romantic relationship with more than one person at the same time that makes people poly.
I use "dragging" in the cheekiest sense.
Well, of course. I wasn't talking about the love I have for my cats, or the love I have for platonic friends. I was talking about it in a sexy-romantic way. That ought to be a given. This isn't a forum for monastics, it's a forum for polyamorous people and those who are involved with polyamorous people. If I were to suddenly switch to using the term "love" in an all-inclusive sense, I would have specified so. I'm not going to put footnotes every time I use the word "love" saying "in the polyamorous sense, not the monastic sense". That's just absurd.
What sacrifices are you referring to?
Just because someone loves more than one person at the same time doesn't mean that they are poly any more than thinking about painting makes someone a painter.
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To me that is like saying you aren't gay unless you actively involved with someone of the same gender. It implies that the default is monogamous and you have to be involved with people to actually be poly. It makes it an action based "label" as opposed to a "nature" based one. I see poly and mono as orientations for many people. Now the idea of a "functioning" poy person is different. Just because you can love more than one person at a time doesn't mean you can manage more than one relationship...that's where actually needing to act on the ability comes into play for me.
They just are a poly person with rotten luck, inadequate skills, or whatever it is that is keeping them from being with more than one person at the same time.