Do Monogamous Myths Undermine POTENTIALLY Successful Poly Relationships

edpsy77

New member
When you come out of the closet to potential partners who continue to practice monogamy, why do many of them express monogamy as a virtue rather than a preference? Why do they believe since they don't have sex with other people they are giving 100% in their relationship while we are giving a poor effort in our relationships because we either have a secondary boyfriend/girlfriend, friends with benefits or simply have sex with acquaintances?

I think pondering these questions are important in our application and theory of poly because some of us in the future may be involved in a poly relationship where our primary partner suddenly decides he or she wants to be mono again because of the taste of jealousy his/her poly experience. Ultimately they believe sexual/romantic jealousy signifies only an exclusive sexual/romantic relationship can cause two partners to give 100% dedication to one another while two poly primary partners can only give LESS than 100% dedication to one another because they are not truly "committed."

I think it is easy for former poly people (who lacked the wisdom to deal with jealousy) to be converted back to faux moral monogamy and preach monogamy is an objective moral standard of behavior in sex and relationships because of their experience of sexual/romantic jealous in poly. I notice many of them in the comment section of YouTube videos discussing poly. What do you think?
 
Last edited:
As far as jealousy is concerned, it is not a fun feeling but it is something that (almost?) all of us experience, both monogamists and polyamorists. When a monogamist feels jealous, do they throw up their hands about monogamy and become polyamorous? No? Then why when a polyamorist feels jealous, should they throw up their hands about polyamory and become monogamous? Is changing one's relationship orientation the cure for jealousy? I would say seldom if ever.

As far as commitment is concerned, that is somewhat a matter of semantics. It's true that if I have two (not one) partners, I will have to divide my time, energy, attention, and resources between the two. If you want to call that less of a commitment you can. Each partner is getting less (say 50%) of me than they would if they were my only partner. So it depends on how you define "commitment." "I can only commit half of myself to each of you." The thing to notice, though, is that I'm still committing 100% of myself to both partners combined.
 
The analogy I use is with children.

You have a child. You love him. Then you have another child. You love her too. Does this mean you love the first one less? Can the two children love each other? Can they be jealous of one another too?

And you bring a dog into the family that you all love in a different but still wonderful way and it adds to the total quantity of love everyone experiences. It does not detract from anyone even when you can get jealous or fight from time to time.

Many of the same things are true with people who choose polygamy, polyamory, some form of multiple partner thing.

It seems to me the general public likes to hear sensationalized stories, like religious cults where the guru is boffing all the little boys and girls. Or marrying off the 12 year olds as wives to the same guy her mother is married to, keeping them in isolation from the world, etc. It isn't polyamory when it gets to the point of brainwashing, coercion, and effective imprisonment, but rather polyamory gets associated with this kind of thing.

There's nothing wrong with monogomy. It might constitute a full 20% of relationships. You have half of them ending in divorce, and half of both the men and women admitting to infidelity while married. Depends on the survey but it isn't the cheaters paired off with one another meaning only cheating wives have cheating husbands.

The number of long-term marriages where both partners remained 100% sexually monogamous is very low.

I don't follow Youtube comments on polyamory. But monogamy is the official position of the majority religions, the law (meaning you can have two wives but only legally marry one for example), and our dominant media culture.

So of course their way is "objectively" superior morally. It follows from being God's chosen people, or from their infinite hubris and know-it-all status that in the dictionary when you look for morality, it's just their portrait.

I have learned to be diplomatic in the presence of royalty like that. But I do notice when I ask them where their authority to judge came from, to produce their Title of Nobility or the election results conferring authority over the matter - that they have real trouble with the documentation.
 
Everyone knows that not all Bible thumpers are God's chosen people, just the Jews. :p

It was a sad day the Hebrews gave up on Asherah, Yahweh's consort, even violently suppressed her worship. Any religion that denies the feminine divine is going to have trouble. I guess I'd love to see more focus on the Shekinah. Balance is so important.



edpsy, modern polyamory comes from feminism, from the slow crumble of the patriarchy. Christianity, in its orthodox form, is becoming obsolete. People are marrying later, or not at all. Women have control of their reproduction now, in the Western world at least (certainly not in many African countries, or Muslim areas, so far). Women can own property, hold jobs, inherit empires, limit the amount of offspring, choose not to reproduce, with limited social negative feedback.

Homosexuality is becoming more accepted. Women can choose to love, live with, and marry another woman. So can men, for that matter. Divorce is common and socially acceptable.

So the rise of polyamory, where women can choose to have multiple romantic/sexual partners of any gender, for any duration, for life or for a much shorter time, was inevitable. The first book of the ancient Judeo/Christian Bible states that the woman must obey her husband, and only have one husband. At the time that was written, men could have as many wives as they could financially support. Rules rose up around polygyny. A man could have multiple wives, even a preteen preadolescent wife was permitted. Rabbis wrote that a man could fuck a preteen preadolescent wife. Men couldn't touch pregnant or menstruating women, so a second or third wife was a benefit. Later the rabbis stated a woman could legally divorce her husband if he wasn't providing for her emotionally, financially or sexually.

Of course, there were downsides to polygyny. Wives could experience jealousy and envy. Or conversely, they could gang up together and make the one husband's life miserable. haha Perhaps sometimes the wives got along great and were even each other's lovers. This was not written against.

But in that time, as shown in the Bible and since then, women were not fully human. Women were considered to be owned by their man. They were chattel (related to the word cattle). Their power was extremely limited. Hence the rise of "feminine wiles," where you make your husband think your bright idea was actually his, and stuff like that. Doing things in a sneaky way, since you had no power to be upfront and truly respected.

In the present day, women have a LOT more autonomy (although we have a long way to go). Men are still threatened by a powerful woman. But increasingly, and especially amongst the younger generation, men are feminists too. And these young people are fine with alternative sexualities. Gay, straight, biracial couples, transgendered folk, polyamorous people. There is more awareness of domestic abuse, of rape.

It's all new, the acceptance of these preferences and identities. There are growing pains. There are many people who hate change and want to "make America great again" by keeping people of color down, by putting women back barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen, in an idealized 1950s housewife way.

And we have the spectre of the Handmaid's Tale hanging over our heads.

But in general, I think we are moving forward to a world where people can be equally in power, despite their gender, relationship status, sexual preferences, ethnicity or physical ability. It's a slow hard struggle, because old rich white men still run our American government. But you can see the ridiculousness of that daily in the news.
 
Interesting tidbit to add to this discussion...

I briefly dated someone last summer (I ID'ed as monogamous, but he expressed interest, I figured "what the hell, let's see", and now I guess the ID doesn't fit anymore, so monogamish? Anyway...) who really couldn't wrap his head around the poly dynamic of my relationship with Chops.

One of the comments he made was, "How can he do that to you?" (As in, be with other people if he's in a relationship with you)

At the time, I explained how the relationship worked, how I felt about it all, how it was consentual, yadda yadda yadda... I may have asked what he meant by that exactly, but to be honest, I forget.

It occurred to me later that I just should have said, "it's what I'd be doing to YOU if this dating thing works out. How do YOU feel about it? Do you think I'm pulling one over on you, or do you think I'm legitimately interested in you?"

But by the time I thought about it, he was into "this isn't going to work out, let's be friends" mode, so it was a moot point. It's now in my pocket in case it's ever needed again. ;)
 
Everyone knows that not all Bible thumpers are God's chosen people, just the Jews. :p

Ironic you should mention them.

Because it isn't well known that ancient Judaism arose in a culture of Polygamy, and for the vast majority of its history continued to practice it. Until surprisingly recent times.

But they had the same problem as the Mormons: they were an "island" in a sea of higher authority where polygamy was illegal in just about every country they lived.

A person can read admonishments against it, quote-mine material with bad intentions to deceive people about the history here. Yes, it is true that over many centuries it was gradually effectively ended. But it took far, far longer than the Mormons.
 
Why monogamists will tell you romance and child love is different

The analogy I use is with children.

You have a child. You love him. Then you have another child. You love her too. Does this mean you love the first one less? Can the two children love each other? Can they be jealous of one another too?

Unfortunately, the vanilla monogamists think that jealousy in romance points to a moral truth about romance which is void in parent-child love.
They would argue you have more energy to love more than one child while you only have enough time and energy to love ONLY one person romantically. This type of commitment is vital in romantic relationships and is non-vital in parent-child relationships. Furthermore, you are morally compelled to take care of your children while it is your choice to stay with one person.

Even though they are correct on all of these differences between romance and parent-child relationships. They claim (1 to 2) parent-child relationship is at least as time consuming as 1 monogamous relationship and requires at least the same degree of energy as 1 monogamous relationship. Nevertheless, most parents have more than 1 child and many of these same parents would frown upon polyamory. It is a contradiction but that is the intellectual depravity involved in their moral assumptions about monogamy rather than the practice itself.



It seems to me the general public likes to hear sensationalized stories, like religious cults where the guru is boffing all the little boys and girls. Or marrying off the 12 year olds as wives to the same guy her mother is married to, keeping them in isolation from the world, etc.

I think it plays a part but I don't think this is the primary horror story of polyamory for these monogamists. I occasionally hear these guys talk about people they know who tried polyamory and got dumped by their primary partner for a secondary partner. One of their major fears is that they will be replaced by another partner if they allow a poly relationship.

There's nothing wrong with monogamy. It might constitute a full 20% of relationships. You have half of them ending in divorce, and half of both the men and women admitting to infidelity while married. Depends on the survey but it isn't the cheaters paired off with one another meaning only cheating wives have cheating husbands.
Although monogamists attempt to discredit poly by claiming it "won't work", it is not their fundamental reason against polyamory. They believe monogamy or not having sex with others outside of a serious relationship is a moral standard and a vital virtue for Western civilization. In their world, you can only have true love romantically if you are sexually forsaking others regardless if you are having sex in your relationship or at the very least being monogamous. Failing to be celibate from other people other than your lover in their distorted eyes means you are breaking the hearts of many who want to be serious in romance while you are talking a cavalier attitude. You are just not DEDICATED to your relationship. So even if 20% of relationships were holy monogamous, the moral critic will say we have a moral collapse in our society rather than admit poly is ok. Even though the naturalistic argument is a decent secondary argument in arguing against anti-polyamory the primary argument against anti-poly is simply this:

"There is no valid argument against polyamorous behavior."

But monogamy is the official position of the majority religions, the law (meaning you can have two wives but only legally marry one for example), and our dominant media culture.
Religion is not the reason for monogamy. It is simply the justification. When people say God told them adultery is wrong, they really mean they are so convinced it is wrong, they think some imaginary being is motivating them. Jealousy/insecurity is the fundamental reason against polyamory.
 
They would say you are more exposed to jealousy in poly

As far as jealousy is concerned, it is not a fun feeling but it is something that (almost?) all of us experience, both monogamists and polyamorists. When a monogamist feels jealous, do they throw up their hands about monogamy and become polyamorous? No? Then why when a polyamorist feels jealous, should they throw up their hands about polyamory and become monogamous? Is changing one's relationship orientation the cure for jealousy? I would say seldom if ever.

To be fair, I think the moral monogamists would say that you are opening yourself up to be triggered by jealousy FAR more in polyamory. Jealousy in monogamy is reduced because there are no active situations that could trigger jealousy unless someone cheats on the vows. Vanillas would claim as long as we can trust that our respective partners will not "cheat", there is no reason for jealousy. Also keep in mind some of these monos boldly claim that jealousy is good if your partner has sex with someone else.

Furthermore they dismiss the fact that polys are more conscious in resolving their feelings of jealousy. The reason why they dismiss our psychological means of coping and dealing with jealousy in poly is because they believe it points to a moral truth of being unfulfilled This is complete nonsense but this is their type of thinking.
 
The main myth is that we can give 100% of our whole to anyone or anything. In order to give 100% of yourself to one person you wouldn't be able to have a job, children, pets, hobbies, or even thoughts. Yet we can be successful having all those things and nothing suffers. That is because, I believe, we can give 100% towards individual things without it taking away from the other things.
 
Re Great POint

The main myth is that we can give 100% of our whole to anyone or anything. In order to give 100% of yourself to one person you wouldn't be able to have a job, children, pets, hobbies, or even thoughts. Yet we can be successful having all those things and nothing suffers. That is because, I believe, we can give 100% towards individual things without it taking away from the other things.

Great point vinsanity. I think you summed it up perfectly. I think if I mentioned this in my continued debate with monos on the video "Can You Love Multiple people" monos will say this is generally true except in the area of romance where you must give 100% of yourself romantically. The only thing that affects the strength of romantic love in a relationship is sex and love with multiple people who are outside the meaningful relationship. This is utterly ridiculous because there is no proof that this occurs. The so called proof is the emotion of sexual jealousy.
 
The only thing that affects the strength of romantic love in a relationship is sex and love with multiple people who are outside the meaningful relationship. This is utterly ridiculous because there is no proof that this occurs.

Well, the "proof" is that monogamy-oriented people do experience that we can give 100% of ourselves to all endeavors except romantic relationships.
 
Not sure what you mean

Well, the "proof" is that monogamy-oriented people do experience that we can give 100% of ourselves to all endeavors except romantic relationships.

I am not sure what you mean. Are you saying there are some people who think they can give 100% of themselves to multiple people except people in romantic relationships? If that is the case, these are not the monos per se I am referring to. I am referring to monos who think NO one can give 100% of themselves to multiple people in a romantic relationship and everyone must be in at least a sexually exclusive romantic relationship to give 100% of their heart. Furthermore, according to these monos, if you are sexually abstinent from other people and in a sexless romantic relationship you can also be considered giving 100% your heart. So in reality we are not really referring to monogamy as the moral standard of loyalty in romance.

We are simply talking about any exclusive romantic relationship where both partners sexually abstain from other partners regardless if there is sex in the relationship. This is what many monos consider the essence of loyalty in romance. Although many monos are poly accepting and understand loyalty is subjective to the couple most monos consider any sex outside a serious relationship disloyal regardless if the sexual activity outside the relationship is agreed upon by both partners.
 
Clarification on Monogamous Myth

Hello Folks,

I just want to re-iterate the toxic myth behind monogamy again because some of you may misconstrue my thread or speeches elsewhere as being against monogamy. The fundamental myth of monogamy that I am opposed to is the claim that no one can give their full heart to someone in romance if they do not refrain from sex with other people and at most have sex ONLY with the ONE person he or she claims to love. Furthermore, sex is not required in this type romance but it is again required that you do not have sex with anyone EXCEPT the ONE you claim to love. People who are anti-polyamorous consider this the essence of dedication and loyalty in romance. This sentiment is an influential factor in shaming romantic or sexual variety in many regions of our society.
 
I suppose what those who hold to the myth are driving at is, that there is no loyalty without self-deprivation. Sure, I may *want* to take on a second partner, but that's just me being selfish and I should deprive myself (for the sake of the marriage). Kind of harks back to the old doctrine that priests should be celibate. I suppose polyamorists are relatively licentious, but I don't have a problem with that.
 
This sentiment is an influential factor in shaming romantic or sexual variety in many regions of our society.

Why are you engaging with those people? The internet is chock-a-block full of people who don't give a crap about who loves whom and how other people sex it up. Hang out with them. We're everywhere.
 
Where are the majority of the people you are referring to?

Why are you engaging with those people? The internet is chock-a-block full of people who don't give a crap about who loves whom and how other people sex it up. Hang out with them. We're everywhere.
I am trying to find these people. Where are they? I can only find one poly forum that discusses poly. The others are poly dating sites. Do you think most people find poly morally acceptable? I am sorry that has not been my experience.
 
I am trying to find these people. Where are they? I can only find one poly forum that discusses poly. The others are poly dating sites. Do you think most people find poly morally acceptable? I am sorry that has not been my experience.

Fetlife.com is another good place for poly discussions. But maybe you enjoy debating with the haters.
 
Thanks fetlife

Fetlife.com is another good place for poly discussions. But maybe you enjoy debating with the haters.

Thanks for the info. I don't enjoy debating with the haters per se. It is because haters make up a large segment of our society and their bigotry can influence legal decisions regarding polyamorous families. This is why I find it necessary to confront the blatant form of bigotry that is in every YouTube video which discusses poly.
 
I find it necessary to confront the blatant form of bigotry that is in every YouTube video which discusses poly.

I was in a poly relationship with a poly married man and was totally out about it. I live on the south shore of Long Island, which is a pretty traditional, conservative area full old old school Catholicism and solid working-class values. I have always been the neighborhood flower child, different than everyone around me, and yet I was never given a hard time about my poly choice, nor about much else that is so very different about me. Why? I think because I approach my neighbors with love and appreciation for who they are. I don't demand that they accept me or see my way of life as valid, I just live as I do. When I go into their homes, I am full of love for what they do. It's not my way, but I try to see why they choose as they do, even if it's "typical" and the seemingly easy choice. Love begets love, is my point. It works anywhere, even on Youtube. Of course if you feel called to take on the opposing views in YouTube comments, that is your prerogative, but especially when it comes to love, the old expression holds true: It's far better to light a candle than to curse the darkness. You'll get far more traction with all of those "haters," and much more enjoyment out of life, if you focus your energy on living a happy poly life rather than on trying to defend the concept. People are much more inclined to come around to acceptance when they experience a happily poly'ed person who lets her happy life do the talking. And when we focus on what we love instead of what we oppose, what we love springs up all around us in the fertile ground beneath our feet. There are indeed oodles of people who are fine with poly and you don't need to go to special poly websites to find them. Our experience of "Society" will always be what we think it is. If we see oppression and ignorance, then we will find it. If we see "live and let live," then we will find that everywhere, even on Youtube.

You may laugh and dismiss my comments as naive, but keep in mind that I'm pushing 60 and came of age during the Berkeley riots, the Civil Rights movement, the mass protests against the Vietnam War and Watergate. I'm pretty familiar with the concept of speaking truth to power and I don't dispute that social movements often involve raising our voices from time to time. My point is that when it comes to social acceptance, we're about as accepted as we perceive ourselves to be - and - people are much more likely to accept and even embrace someone who seems happy about who she is. A life well lived is the absolute best avenue to social change.
 
Back
Top