I agree - it doesn't seem popular at all. I do know a couple of people who are poly.
I am disappointed there were not better stats in the article. So about 50% say open marriages are acceptable, and about 20% say they've experimented with non-monogamy. But how many are actually in a poly relationship? How does that compare to the past?
They list a lot of movie references to poly relations, but what does that have to do with anything? Is it popular for people to become John Wick, Rambo, etc in real life? I think not. Perhaps they enjoy the idea of being a bad ass, vigilante, etc and watching those movies, but many people understand the downsides and that some fantasies should stay fantasies. The same thing for how many things in porn are great as a fantasy, but not things that the person wants to do in real life. There are many similarities to fantastical ideas that many have of non-monogamus relationships.
I think it would have been more accurate to say that ethical non-monogamy (ENM) has become more popular. The only statistics I've seen seem to support that conclusion. I've not seen any statistics that seem to indicate polyamory specifically is dominating that trend though.
Unfortunately the data seems to be limited, and quite poor, at this time.
I'm guessing this probably stems both from under reporting due to societal stigmas and due to a lack of research. However, I found the following meta-analysis that appears to indicate an increase in interest over the past decade and a half.
You may be able to access these articles through you're local library for free, or if you have a subscription. I do not have a subscription at this time so I'm unable to retrieve the full details. I previously looked into this topic in 2011 when I was still a psych undergrad, there appears to be more research since then.
Personally, I'd agree that the idea or interest in it is more common or more openly discussed today. I'm just really curious how some of the trends compare through different parts of history (free love, less puritanical countries, or bigomy, etc). I would guess prior data would be even more biased by cultural stigma.
Pretty common in the Tampa area, but it's definitely an iykyk type of thing. If you don't pass the vibe check it's not something that will be brought up in casual discussion.
This has been my experience. I used to be in a particular industry, within which I was introduced to the concepts of polyamory, swinging, and general ethical non-monogamy.
It was fairly common within areas of that industry, which is ironic because it could be rather conservative generally, but there were little bubbles where it seemed the “free spirited” would gravitate toward.
iykyk is shorthand for "if you know, you know", and I just mean that groups tend to grow around or inclusive of certain subcultures. So people in a given lifestyle are more likely to associate with other people who are at least familiar with that lifestyle. Imagine it like a Venn diagram. I don't go out of my way to spend time around, or make friends with, people who would judge me for my lifestyle.
Statistically, you've met many. So either they just didn't feel the need to bring it up, or they felt a specific need to avoid the subject in front of you.
What statistic? A national one? Because the variation from place to place would be drastic, like comparing rural to urban, and the various politics and cultures that have more hold over different cities. I wouldn't say that a national statistic could say much about one single place or person's experience.
I've met a few, but they're always in weird dysfunctional relationships in which one of them is very sexual and wants more than their partner, and their partner is hopelessly in love with this person and will do absolutely anything for fear of losing them. It's vaguely abusive.
This is my ancedata as well. It’s usually used as a proxy to prevent divorce. Those who are actually poly it’s a lot of over communication and a lot of syncing of calendars.
I know two couples who are in long-term, serious, open relationships.
The couple I’m closest to does a lot of therapy style processing (weekly) which sounds like it might make the whole thing more trouble than it’s worth. But they seem happy and stable so who am I to question?
Fwiw,I live in the Boston area, and I think I can count the number of monogamous people I know, who aren't my family, on my fingers. I was talking to a friend recently about how few people in our social circles are monogamous, and named the two monogamous couples I've been socializing with them most over the last year, and she informed me that she had been dated one person in each of those couples in the last 6 months. As it turned out I assumed they were monogamous because they are more of my idea of a traditional monogamous couple when ove hung out with them, but they both date and play with other people.
It’s popular compared to 20-30 years ago. I have a number of friends who are poly, one of my siblings was for a few years before meeting a partner who wasn’t.
But folks may not mention it to you until you’re at a certain level of friendship. I remember a couple I knew who disclosed after a few months.
I wonder why people search for reasons other than some people find poly relationships more suited to them, end of story.
I’m married, I’m not looking for a poly arrangement - but I can totally understand the idea that a mono relationship just isn’t what someone wants. I think it’s possible to love more than one person, romantically, or that a successful relationship doesn’t have to mean until one person dies.
Yes, probably. I'd say between 5 and 10% of the people i've met have been at least once in a non-monogamous situation. I used to be too, but it did not last long. Probably the numbers are at least twice as high, it's not something you just tell people.
Doesn't that support their point? If its mostly just more popular in a relatively small, famously progressive area, then has it really gotten that much more popular?
IMO we're still at the stage where the localized waves of ENM could see a heavy backlash as a lot of the participants who are pressured into it start to reverse course and leave those relationships. I myself know one Midwest couple with an open marriage, and it's pretty clear from speaking to them that it was a one sided deal.
Note: I am not saying all ENM relationships are based on pressure, but frankly many are, and that's not sustainable.
While not polyamory, a locum nurse at my daughter's first vaccination spent a lot of time telling us about the weird inseminatory/co-parenting setup he and his husband had with a lesbian couple. Like, a lot more time than the actual vaccination we turned up for took.
As is typical of British health care we'd waited a good 45 minutes after arriving on time for our appointment (at 9 AM), and I really couldn't help wondering if the delays were down to him.
TL;DR I am often tempted to think the very vocal nature is the intention, rather than the subject they're vocal about.
Cool to see this getting some spotlight. It’s important to remember that just because you haven’t seen it doesn’t mean it’s around you.
IME you’ll rarely just stumble upon someone poly. There’s usually some community involved which helps keep out bad actors and cool people safe.
Older people tend to be of the swinger variety (which technically isn’t poly iirc) and a little more hush hush.
Younger people in cities are often more open about it. And I’ve seen it more in explicitly queer-friendly spaces. If you come to a certain city in the PNW it’s everywhere.
I tried it for a few years. There’s pros and cons. It’s ultimately not for me.
This is going to be another big fight for marriage equality. New terms will be thrown around but the fight is all the same. Legalize (consensual) love.
Polyamory will never become popular. I'm not going to judge anybody for what they do in the privacy of their own bedroom, but I will say that very few people are going to be okay with their partner having sex with other people, and you need at least 3 such people for a polyamorous relationship. Also, maintaining a normal relationship is hard, and the number of relationships between 2 members within a polyamorous relationship increases quadratically as the number of members increase linearly. If even one of those inter-relationships go sour, I imagine that it could lead to serious consequences for the entire poly relationship. Again, good for you to any poly people reading this that happened to make it work, but the odds are stacked against poly relationships.
You're operating under the incorrect assumption that a polyamorous relationship links all partners involved directly. I believe it's more common in polyamorous relationships that each individual in the relationship has their own partner(s). For instance A has partners B and C, but B and C are aware of each other but not interested in being partners. B and C may also have their own individual partner(s), and so on. I believe it's a less common occurrence that all partners are partnered with one-another. (One example of that might be a "thruple")
"kitchen-table" polyamory does not imply that partner(s) are intimately involved with one-another. Just that they can amicably share the same space at times, whether that be a birthday party, a friendly dinner, or board game night. Personally I would hope that any partner(s) feel comfortable speaking to one another and being in the same space if the situation merits it, but it's not for everyone.
Good luck partnering with a member of a family without getting embroiled to one degree or another with kids and the other partner though (but maybe this gets better after the kids are older than mine? Time will tell...).
I think if you raise your kids to be aware of different relationship styles and types, that being in a polyamorous relationship would be no different than dating as a single or divorced parent. You're not going to overshare with your children in either situation and your partner is not going to have a parental relationship with your children.
Polyamory is on the rise, and divorces are at a 50-year low[0]. This isn't a coincidence.
Where a couple would have divorced in the past, it now is financially infeasible in many cases. Living with a partner you're no longer compatible sucks, but not being able to afford rent sucks worse. So couples are pulling out all the stops to be not-divorced, including looking for other partners and keeping a marriage-in-name-only.
That's a fairly dark view and I think a misunderstanding of what polyamory is. Couples looking to non-monogamy to solve their relationship issues is not what polyamory is, that's not healthy. Non-monogamy != Polyamory, ethical or otherwise. While polyamory takes many forms, all of them include mutual respect and communication between partners. Polyamory is having love for one or more individuals and actively being in a relationship with those individuals. I don't think you can ever expect one person to be everything, and I think for some polyamory is an alternative to leaving needs unfulfilled.
You're gatekeeping a lot here. I realize that some poly people are much more dedicated to the lifestyle and truly believe in being able to maintain multiple partners. But there's no way to distinguish between that and the "we've been married for 3 years but we're turning poly" case, nor do you or I have the authority to say that's not really polyamory.
"Sanctioned infidelity" is not a stigma, it's a reality. While a select few may practice as they preach, most would rather a license that enables them to cheat without social consequence. The NYTimes marketed polyamory-as-cheating in a highly visible article way back when: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/11/magazine/is-an-open-marri...
It appears that you're simultaneously admitting that the article excluded information that did not fit the narrative they wanted as well as using it in your own narrative? It sounds like the article has issues like the threads article.
I believe stigma is a function of societal views and norms. In America anything besides the nuclear family with a married male and female parent is still stigmatized. I believe we can largely thank religious influence for that. Stigma is a reality, and the stigma I was referring to was that anything besides that male<->female relationship is often deemed incompatible with "moral" living.
Also childless families. Without children a marriage has very little value. You can experiment as much as you like and the only risk is to what? Loose your appartment? It’s not even remotely comparable to the drama of the divorce with kids
I'm deeply cynical that polyamory is "popular" outside of select corners of the Internet. Why? I'm just going to be blunt and say it: very few men are going to tolerate a situation where their wife or girlfriend is having sex with several other guys and they aren't having sex with several other women for long. Given how supply and demand for casual sex works, that's going to be what happens, more often than not. This is the sort of situation that could turn very explosive, very fast.
And that's before we to whether most people are temperamentally suited to the emotions of "sharing" something this intimate, or the child-raising angle. Just because it can work for some doesn't mean it'll work en masse for most people.
Bertrand Russell came to mind when I read this. I remember reading some story featuring a flustered Russell at the dinner table with his wife Dora, her baby (by another man), and the other man. Now Russell had gone preaching and practicing free love for a long time but now he was on the receiving end.
A society of emasculated males will tolerate the situation. It’s possible we’re watching patriarchy molt into matriarchy or some bonobo monkey thing. TBD, but as for OP, my perception is that the media conglomerates are leading indicators and not trailing indicators. They introduce these subjects to normalize them.
Worse than that, he left her for another woman over the situation (contrary to his progressive claims)
> but upon Dora becoming pregnant with another man’s child, the marriage seemed to fall prey to its own progressiveness.[10] The weir of liberal thinking gave way to intense jealousy and bitter resentment, resulting in Russell’s writing of boastful letters describing his youthful conquests across the Atlantic, and his eventual leaving of Dora for their children’s governess, Patricia.[11] He abandoned the campaigns he and Dora had together founded (including their beloved boarding school) and threw himself into the next chapter of his life with bags haphazardly packed.
The private desire to please oneself motivates apathy to any strict morality forbidding that self-pleasure. I suspect more so than any supposed rationality; see atheists and religion.
The article on Russell is actually quite relevant to the overall discussion on polyamory & unfaithfulness. The final quote by Russell on his realization of what eluded him in his life, nails it.
Through the long years
I sought peace
I found ecstasy, I found anguish,
I found madness,
I found loneliness,
I found the solitary pain
that gnaws the heart,
But peace I did not find.
Now, old & near my end,
I have known you,
And, knowing you,
I have found both ecstasy & peace
I know rest
After so many lonely years.
I know what life & love may be.
Now, if I sleep
I shall sleep fulfilled.
> I suspect the private desire to please oneself motivates apathy to a strict morality forbidding that self-pleasure. More so than any supposed rationality; see atheists and religion.
That theory of yours has legs, imo. (see below ;)
> Through the long years
Russell is borrowing heavily from king Solomon here .. /g
I thought this issue was settled in the late sixties and seventies. As "hot" as threesomes sound, the result of polyamorous consequences was once considered settled when the early '80s struck. i.e., Drug-resistant STDs and the emergence of HIV. Monogamy can turn into a boring gated garden whereas a threesome is a potential vector threat if not an emotional threat as well.
Arguably hook ups / one night stands drive STDs more and always have.
Anecdotally every poly person I know is (relatively speaking) quite diligent about STDs, getting tested way more than most, informing partners etc etc. Sometimes it seems to me like poly is actually a spreadsheet fetish with relationships on the side.
I think polyamory is more threatening to "traditional" values due to emotional risk / complexity and impact on family structure, parenting etc. One of the gnarlier problems is wealth transmission.
In many countries you are de facto with someone after just 2 or 3 years, this is already crazy, you get in a relationship with someone and a few years later you owe them half your house. Bring poly into the mix and if you a) have assets and b) cohabit then things can get messy real fast.
Very basic stuff like welfare and taxes haven't really caught up with this either yet, practical things like what do you put in the "partner's income" box on many government forms. The bureaucracy is really not set up for this.
Complexity and risk are the real things to watch out for. If everyone involved isn't emotionally stable, it can be a nightmare for other partners and children.
Each person carries some chance of carrying an STI. Some people aren't aware of their status or may deliberately hide it. For those two probabilistic variables alone, while the absolute risk may be small, it's still at least double that of 2-people relationships. If someone is more likely to enter a 3-person relationship after leaving another 3-person relationship, you have added network effects increasing the risk. How could it be true that the risk isn't different? What have I missed?
You're assuming ceteris paribus, but that isn't a given.
People in poly relationships tend to know their status better than monogamous cohorts. Thus, even if one partner has an incurable STI, they're usually aware that they have it, and keep their viral load undetectable (which prevents transmission), so the factors round the risk down to the same very low range, despite more people involved.
Polyamory requires communication and consent, a healthy polycule is no different than a healthy monogamous relationship when it comes to the expectation that your partner(s) will care for their sexual health and make decisions with you in mind. In one way you are correct, more people involved means an increased possibility that someone will be dishonest or take risks that will expose you. However, in the same way that bringing an STD into a monogamous relationship has consequences so would bringing an STD into a polyamorous relationship. You risk damaging your standing in the relationship.
Maybe on a per member basis, or theoretically. The risk in a monogamous relationship is if a member acts outside the relationship. The more people you add to a relationship, the more that risk increases.
I think people are confusing poly with open. Open is just consensually fucking other people typically without any commitment. Poly is basically a serious relationship with multiple people. The biggest challenge to real poly is dealing with legit feelings of jealousy, commitment, loyalty, authenticity… I think they two are confused often.
It doesn’t help that the article itself mixes in the concept of threesomes with poly. One is, in the usage I have encountered so far, refers to a sex act with three people, while the other is a relationship type.
You can have a poly relationship without ever having more than two people in the same bedroom at the same time. And of course you can have a threesome without being in a polyamorous relationship.
Mixing the two concepts does not help clarity at all.
Open relationships seem extremely common. I've met loads of people like this and they seem happy and the relationships last. I've only met one proper poly person and it didn't seem to work that well. They have now gone back to a typical open couple relationship.
I wonder how middle-aged couples deal with the sexual desires. Numerous reports, let alone anecdotes and shows, mentioned that couples with each other for many years lost sexual desire towards each other, while their libido still flowed free. To quote one of such publications: "Sexual arousal and desire appear to decrease in response to partner familiarity and increase in response to partner novelty".
I guess it's a little price to pay for a stable marriage?
That's more or less what got my wife started in it, not lacking attraction to one another, but wondering about others. We loved each other to bits (still do in fact!) but we'd only ever had each other in that way. We were curious. Started as swinging, but eventually we settled more into poly with a dedicated side piece for each of us that we have strong feelings for too.
For us at least, it's completely normal to be madly in love with two people at the same time. Maybe even more to be honest, but we're happy with what we have and don't want to rock the boat further. We're still #1 for each other both emotionally and legally, and always thought we'd only ever be that connected to one another. But when it became obvious for both of us that we had "caught feelings" to use the phrasing the kids use, well, we were still madly in love with each other and had less than no desire to split up and all the emotional and financial hell involved with that, so, we have each other, we each have a side piece, and occasionally we even double-date too.
Idk, it's fun. I have two women in my life that bring me joy and my wife has another man that does the same. I'm sure it's not for everyone but I will admit that I find myself wondering how many marriages that end in infidelity could've been saved if the people in them just accepted that it was pretty understandable to not remain completely 100% committed to one person for the rest of your natural life.
I totally get your perspective but what I don’t understand is these two other individuals. Are they actually happy being second best? Do they know/think they’re second best? Possibly you’re going to tell me they’re not second best and the love is equal? I think all of you have a preference and equality is impossible, but I’m willing to hear that position out.
I’m sure it’s fun, my feeling is that these situations are often fun for some of the participants but aren’t fun or become quite hellish for others. Obviously I’ve no statistics but it seems to end badly more often than not. As do most relationships, admittedly.
> Are they actually happy being second best? Do they know/think they’re second best? Possibly you’re going to tell me they’re not second best and the love is equal? I think all of you have a preference and equality is impossible, but I’m willing to hear that position out.
I mean they're "second best" with regard to the law, which is unfortunate but there really isn't any legal mechanisms where we live for multi-partnering, so it's just kind of the reality we've had to accept. But outside of that, we do our best to keep ourselves equal to our extraneous partners. It may seem strange but this is really the best. Sometimes that means plans with my wife can't happen because she already has some, and sometimes it means stuff my wife can't go to, my girlfriend does instead. It usually breaks down to whoever is available first, and we keep the lines of communication open and do our level best to head off any sense of resentment that crops up.
As with most things, communication resolves a lot. It also doesn't hurt that my wife's second man really doesn't have much romantic interest at all outside of her, so he doesn't have someone else to juggle, and mine happens to be married to my best friend, which certainly complicated that relationship for awhile there but we've had it more or less down to a routine for a good while now.
> I’m sure it’s fun, my feeling is that these situations are often fun for some of the participants but aren’t fun or become quite hellish for others. Obviously I’ve no statistics but it seems to end badly more often than not. As do most relationships, admittedly.
There are unique challenges. Since one party is always a limitation on the other, there is sort of a baseline sense of rejection and de-prioritization one has to contend with. It just is what it is, so much of our culture and conditioning is built around this idea of you find ONE person and that one person is just, your entire world, forever and now you're sharing them. However, again the flip side to that is, you have another person too. So it sort of replaces the monogamous sole-relationship with... almost a sense of community belonging that is profound. It's not without it's costs to get it sorted, but IMO it's the best thing I've ever done in my life for my mental health. Not putting all your eggs in one basket has advantages, you know?
Just curious, what if the novelty wears out even with two partners? I'd imagine it'd wear out twice as slow, but eventually familiarity will take over, right?
I mean, it hasn't yet? We don't all live together so the extra partners do retain a sense of novelty I feel, what with us being perpetually held back from the true "spousal" feel? But even so, with the two of them, I feel no need to like... add another. That's just too much, haha.
My wife and I are still very attracted to each other after fifteen years of marriage and a kid.
There isn’t the same initial “rush” or “excitement” of getting to know a new partner, but she jokes how I still make (impressed/obama meme) faces when she’s scantily clad, and she still seems to appreciate when I’m working out etc.
We prioritize dating and physicality, just like we prioritize other parts of our life we find important.
I've always found this really sad to think about. I'm attracted to my partner and I'd like to stay this way indefinitely, but I'm also aware my own biology isn't on my side. I really hope we figure out ways (medicine? mind tricks? fork in the brain?) to keep the candle burning in the long term.
What I heard is that medicine can keep one up but does not really replace the sudden release of hormone, which gives one this voracious desire and burning sensation
I’m convinced this is the next big legal/political marriage change after gay marriage. Though, this one might be a bit harder for developers. I imagine most government databases are setup to assume a 1-to-1 marriage relationship rather than a many-to-many relationship.
There will be plenty of time to fix the code. Like most social change, it will be politicized, fought against bitterly by the usual suspects, and the battle will drag on until enough of the detractors die of old age so that finally another piece of society can move on. We'll have entirely different databases by the time the 1:1 mappings have to be fixed.
> We'll have entirely different databases by the time the 1:1 mappings have to be fixed.
Don’t underestimate how long government databases can linger. Not so long ago I worked with data from a school system than was running on RDB - an old VAX based database from the 80’s. They kept it going on a virtualised OpenVMS system rather than rewrite it. This system was so old that they were using it when I was in school myself.
I’m reminded of Steve Yegge in 2009 saying, “Everyone these days, when debating the merits and demerits of marijuana legalization, seems to have completely overlooked the fact that it's HARD. It's a project of vast, nearly unimaginable complexity.”
It's harder legally: marriages at the moment end when one partner leaves or dies.
A polyamorous marriage on the other hand would be more similar to the board of a corporation since it theoretically could be immortal through consistently replacing partners.
> A polyamorous marriage on the other hand would be more similar to the board of a corporation since it theoretically could be immortal through consistently replacing partners.
I remember reading a SF story that had that sort of arrangement, but I can’t remember the name.
The Moon is a Harsh Mistress? The Cat Who Walks Through Walls?
A lot of Heinlein's stuff had polyamory at least in the background, it not front and center.
More recently, The Expanse dealt with it.
Though, honestly, the other spouses all just felt like 2D cutouts of characters, existing solely to show the "open mindedness" of the main character.
I don't think I've ever seen a story that really dealt with polyamory with all the characters having agency. Though, granted, haven't gone out of my way to look for it.
Does a government really need a database of marriages? IRS is the only agency I can think of, but they probably don’t need to put it in a database. I’m probably missing something though.
Sure. They need the info for handling inheritance, to handle disputes around divorces and also for rights around medical information and decision making when one is incapacitated.
I’ve been through all of those except the divorce, and I don’t think any of them involved a government database. It was all done with documents I provided.
If your marriage license is lost or destroyed you request a copy of the original from the county where you were married. A clerk finds the license and makes copies to send you. Some counties make have digitized this.
It’s hilarious (in a good way) in threads like these that someone always bring up a pretty trivial aspect that, though relevant to the forum, is tiny compared to the other effects
$dayJob is a records management system for LEA, we definitely support many-to-many subject relationships. You have to account for past and present as well, so from/to comes into play as well.
Now I start to think about inheritance and who would be considered a parent of a child from such marriage... All members, some paternity test? If paternity test is not allowed, all males?
Nah, we'll just use the existing spouse_id field in the records to set up a circular linked list through the polycule. A conventional two-person marriage is just a special case of that anyway.
Linked lists can only have two neighbours, a polycule can be arbitrarily complex.
(Depending on the purpose for which the data is being used, it may even be directional — e.g. for STD tracking, it does actually matter if someone has a cuckoldry kink).
I'm not sure which will come first: mainstream polyamory; or brain uploading.
If the latter, every personal ID has to switch from a single database entry to a git (or other vcs) repo, where relationships may or may not survive the branch.
The data suggests it truly is more popular. The Gallup poll below shows that the percent of people who find it "acceptable" has tripled since 2000. The generational data, which admittedly would be more useful if it was over time, still shows younger generations are more into it.
What data or info do you have to believe things haven't changed? Other than your own anecdotal interpretation of vibes?
I realize that some of this could be changing labels for the same behavior, but nonetheless I don't think the author is incorrect at all for observing it is more popular.
Note that Gallup changed the question in 2011: before the question defined polygamy as "when one husband has more than one wife at the same time", after 2011 it was defined as "when a married person has more than one spouse at the same time".
That may not account for the slope post-2011, but it's a significant enough difference that it's important to call it out. A lot of people who were opposed to polygamy when it was framed as patriarchal switched their opinion when it was made gender-neutral.
From 2012 to the most recent poll it went from 11% to 20%. I realize "moral acceptance" is not the same as "widely popular" but still think it directionally shows a meaningful change, even if its a change from "very rare" to "uncommon".
Yeah, I'd be more interested to see the numbers of people who are actually interested in polyamory rather than those who think it's okay for someone else to do it. 38% of the population believe that gender can be different than biological sex [0], but only ~1% of the population identifies as transgender.
All the data from Gallup shows is that people are increasingly open to alternative marriage arrangements, but it doesn't indicate anything about how many people are interested in those arrangements.
I'm aware that that's a distinction people make, but I was just responding to what OP was citing.
I would expect that the numbers wouldn't move much if you could do a poll on polyamory as distinct from polygamy. The distinction is so far removed from most people's experience that it's not likely to change their sentiment.
Maybe so. There is definitely a lot of confusion and misunderstanding for those that have only ever been taught and only ever experienced monogamy. I'm polyamorous but I find polygamy to be pretty vile. I've never seen polygamy mentioned or practiced outside the context of religion, cults, or seeing people as property. Polygamy almost never benefits all the people involved and when I've heard of it practiced in the U.S. it's often commingled with the absolutely vile practice of child marriage.
edit: I'm surprised this is an unpopular opinion, curious what I said that people don't like.
The link you sent is polygyny, in which one man has many wives who are all his. The woman is not allowed to have more than one partner.
It's perfectly acceptable for someone to write an article on trends in America or New York (it is still called The New Yorker after all) even if something similar existed once and waned in popularity before modern times.
Imagine if someone saw that homeschooling rates were up in the US over ten years. Would you not want people to write on that - because 5,000 years ago technically everyone was taught by family members?
If I felt secure in a relationship, having a partner that wants to experiment with others/date others wouldn’t really bother me. Everyone likes a little novelty from time to time.
If you felt secure in the relationship you probably wouldn't feel the need.
The desire for novelty comes from bored or unfulfilled from your current relationship, which would contest the "security" of the relationship if it is impossible to live without it.
I have access to far more food than I can physically (let alone healthily) eat.
That I am clearly fulfilled with my existing diet doesn't stop me from trying new things on the menu, nor new restaurants with entirely new menus.
And the desire to try new things doesn't imply that the absence of them is "impossible to live without" — even back out of metaphor land and back to human sexuality, lot of gay people used to live straight lives.
A person isn't a food item, and "formally straight" relationships (including marriages) fall apart, obviously because that person isn't straight anymore..
Which is my point: the relationship isn't "secure" if you're to find out that you're actually gay.
You appear to be shifting the goalposts, and not just because this comment of yours right here looks like it's mixing up formerly and formally.
Are you unfamiliar with the concept of a metaphor? I did explicitly note that food was a metaphor. After all, your original comment said:
> if it is impossible to live without it.
Which is a much higher standard than you're now using, one where food is a useful metaphor as one does actually need it to live, albeit as a category and not any specific food — I like capsaicin, alliums, and fresh coriander, and yet I can live without them (e.g. if I had a partner who was allergic).
And are you unaware of the history (and indeed current diversity) of rules about sexuality, including the cases where couples aren't/weren't allowed to separate and gay relationships are/were forbidden? You can know full well what you like, and still be bound unfulfilled but alive. Thus, that question of fulfilment is still present when your relationship is not merely "secure", but the security is enforced by law.
Prisoners are secure. They are also, to use the word you used earlier, bored.
Don't mistake "secure" for "fun". It is an independent axis of consideration.
Lots of people value security over fun, including when it comes to sexuality.
Not everyone, but lots of people.
And going further up this thread back to what Quinzel wrote:
> If I felt secure in a relationship, having a partner that wants to experiment with others/date others wouldn’t really bother me.
Alice can feel secure about Bob always being there for Alice when Alice needs it, while also being comfortable with the idea that Bob sometimes boinks Chris, and this can be either true or false, this is independent of if Alice wants to boink Dee.
Well-reasoned points. Nice job avoiding the extremely online argument where "relationship security" and "food security" apparently mean the same thing.
Being broadly critical of something outside of heteronormative behavior is ok.
Telling somebody you don't know in a situation that you aren't familiar with that they aren't secure in their relationship comes off as ignorant at best.
Especially since OP describes something on the more casual side of the ENM spectrum as opposed to full fledged polyamory.
You might find it difficult to stay secure when your partner says you’re no longer good enough.
Of course, some people don’t seem to mind this much. Or maybe this fancy new Bay Area “polyamory” memeplex works really well. I find it hard to imagine any amount of coping strategies could dull the pain for me.
Thinking that your partner is suddenly going to think you’re not good enough because they see other people is an insecure kind of line of thought and the sort of thought processes that breed jealousy IMO.
Being sexually exclusive doesn’t prevent people from falling out of love and moving on. People in monogamous relationships still sometimes decide their partners are not good enough, or they get bored, or whatever…
You can't just choose not to feel a certain way. It's quite difficult, and often a bad idea besides. Feelings aren't meaningless noise.
We might have different ideas of security. If you don't value monogamy anyway, maybe your security isn't threatened much by your partner deciding you aren't good enough for it.
> If you don't value monogamy anyway, maybe your security isn't threatened much by your partner deciding you aren't good enough for it.
I wrote a comment 3 times trying to steel man this but it still reads like horribly bitter snark rather than an earnest pov.
People who enter poly relationships are not doing so because they value their partners less.
In a relationship between more than two people their communication skills must be on point and they have to sincerely take one another's needs into account or the whole thing crumbles, it's all the effort of monogamy and then some. If your partner isn't "good enough" for monogamy then they definitely won't manage polyamory.
You claim in your other comments to not experience jealousy. This is the same as not valuing monogamy. That’s completely fine, but it means my comments aren’t for you. They’re for people like me, who don’t have your gift, but are perhaps vulnerable to being convinced by others that they do. There’s no reason to feel insulted or to insult me in turn; my honest feelings as a human being are not bitter snark, thanks.
Talking about people who mutually decide to engage in polyamory is off-topic for this particular thread. Quinzel’s scenario is someone in a monogamous relationship deciding to seek out new partners.
> There’s no reason to feel insulted or to insult me in turn; my honest feelings as a human being are not bitter snark, thanks.
These may be your sincere feelings, I've also absolutely got the right to feel insulted by the way you've chosen to express them. It's mean spirited to vent in such a way that you catch other people in the crossfire when you're airing your personal dislikes.
Saying that people with polyamoristic proclivities seek out other people because their partner "isn't good enough for monogamy" is an offensive mischaracterizastion of the kind of relationship I've been in for half a decade.
It isn't. I don't know of a single couple in my personal life or extended group of friends that went poly and remained a couple past 5 years. They all eventually split up. Why get married if you're going to be polyamorous. Seems like a bit of a hassle to tie yourself up legally and financially when you've otherwise thrown all other parts of the relationship to the wind.
Your anecdote is in the basis correct. Very few relationships which start closed and go to open/poly survive as you do not have the required communication skills or emotional intelligence to make it work. This is usually developed over several failed relationships, similar to monogamy. I suspect relationships that start out polyamarous have a similar failure rate to nonmonogamy. Also, it is advisable to find local poly meetups to get social support and hear about what works.
I've been polyamorous for around a decade and I don't date anyone that is just learning the ropes. It is too much of a risk to my existing relationships. Some of the skill sets required are covered in the book Polysecure. Trying to become poly to save your relationship is almost certainly going to fail. Do some marriage counseling first and then consider it if you have an emotionally secure base, but be aware it still likely will blow up.
The question is a lie at face value. Polyamory isn't popular at all. It's just not as much of a taboo as it used to be. There's a giant difference between "what would your opinion of someone be if they were in an open relationship" and "would YOU want an open relationship?"
The first has nothing to do with you personally past your opinion of how you would relate to someone else.
> Not sure what you're even trying to get at here.
Evidently.
“how did X become so popular” does not mean that X is popular. “X is popular” is a statement about the absolute popularity of X. “How did X become so popular” is a question about the change of popularity of X. It might or might not imply that X is popular in absolute terms.
Let’s take the relatively niche sport of running-facefirst-into-a-rock. Last year there was only one athlete practicing it, this year there are 200. It is still a rounding error in popularity, yet you can ask “how did it become so popular?” When you ask that you don’t make a statement about the absolute popularity, but the change of it.
Pardon me, but what isn’t? Are you saying it is not popular?
> I don't know of a single couple in my personal life or extended group of friends that went poly and remained a couple past 5 years.
This sentence makes it sound like you know multiple people who went poly. Which is exactly what “become so popular” mean. Then it sounds like you argue that it doesn’t make sense and the affected mariages didn’t last. Which is fine I guess, but that is a different question from if it is popular or not.
> Why get married if you're going to be polyamorous.
I don’t understand this question either. Many people are polyamorous without getting married. Perfectly valid choice.
Then some people are first married, they live in a monogamous marriage and then they realise that the lifestyle is not working out for them. The choice for these people is not between monogamous marriage and polyamory but between divorce and polyamory.
The question you are asking presuposes that people are aware that they want a polyamorous relationship at the time when they get married.
Then of course there can be people who want a marriage for some legal or social protection. Let those things be preceived or real. If we believe that two adults can promise each other to stick together and help each other in good and bad, sickness and health, why couldn’t the same thing work just because they also have other people in their lives?
I also know three people in prison for murder, two for rape, and two more who died by cop while unarmed in their cars. It doesn't mean any of those things are popular or even approaching popularity. That you've heard of something doesn't imply popularity.
And at least in the case of the poly couples I mentioned, there are no poly couples anymore. Not only did all of them break up, but they all decided that it was incongruent to maintaining a lasting and trusting relationship for the long term.
I know one person who tried this and in their experience it's something that's gender-unbalanced. That is, as an average male, you need to invest much more work to enjoy the same level of connectivity when compared to an average female. This might be related to the fact that still after so many decades of sexual freedom males are still expected to be the initiating side, by and large.
Another difficult aspect is that apart of your "main" partner, your "secondary" ones either need to accept that you already have a partner, hence also be open to polyamory, or you have to lie to them, which is definitely not a game for everybody. Overall, seeing all this, I wouldn't recommend it unless you have your emotions like jealousy well under control.
Regardless of being in a poly relationship or single or not - men do have to invest much more time into dating and dating-related activities (such as exercising and diet to achieve a great physique, grooming, and dress) to get anywhere near the results that women will. Even then, 90%+ of men with great effort will never achieve the results that 50%+ of women will get with little to no effort.
There’s a vast chasm between male and female experience that will never be bridged. If you’re with an even remotely attractive woman and you’re not top 1% yourself, you will feel like a cuckold in comparison when opening up a relationship to polyamory. (Assuming she has significant interest in exploring)
Most men are quite clueless - especially if they’ve been off the dating market since their early 20’s and haven’t been observing closely how dating has changed in the last couple decades.
The article hints throughout that polyamory is just for the rich. I don't have the data but it's not clear to me that the rich are having more non-monogamous sex than the poor.
As far as the concept itself goes, I don't think it's possible to divorce possessiveness from sex. I'm suspicious of people who claim to have conquered jealously.
And then there's children. It's hard for me to see how polyamory won't be a disaster for children. I hope polyarmory is a fad and I suspect it is, just like "free love" in the 60s.
> As far as the concept itself goes, I don't think it's possible to divorce possessiveness from sex. I'm suspicious of people who claim to have conquered jealously.
It depends on what you mean by "jealousy", because that term wraps a bunch of disparate ideas, especially given the modern use encompasses envy too. Possessiveness and jealousy are not the same, and jealousy and envy are not the same either.
Here's a few different scenarios:
1. My partner sleeps with someone else and this upsets me because I want to sleep with my partner
2. My partner sleeps with someone else and this upsets me because I'm afraid this other person will take my partner
3. My partner sleeps with someone else and this upsets me because I want to sleep with other people
4. My partner sleeps with someone else and this upsets me because I wish I was like the other person
All of these scenarios are labelled jealousy, but they're for the most part built from feelings with different motivations.
I've been in a long-ish poly relationship since 2015 and since then I've discovered I don't experience jealousy or possessiveness in the classical expression, I'm actually pretty excited when my partners sleep together. Scenario 1 and 2 haven't ever happened for me, I'm either very secure in my feelings around my relationship or that emotional response isn't in my nature.
I do experience 3 and 4 but I'd definitely call that a split on envy/FOMO rather than jealousy.
> I don't think it's possible to divorce possessiveness from sex.
I don't get jealous: and I've definitely been in situations which I would judge that many men would get jealous. Maybe I'm on the spectrum or something.
As a second example, I presume the majority of Johns that pay for sex don't get jealous about the sex worker having multiple partners.
> It's hard for me to see how polyamory won't be a disaster for children
I reckon the western nuclear family (mum, dad and kids) is unhealthy. I believe kids do better if they have more than two adults in their lives. Certainly added difficulties: but extended families have been managing similar issues for centuries.
A lot of disbelieve in the comments if polyamory even exists for real. However, I know a long time married (+/- 30y) couple where the wife has a second partner. Her husband knows and approves. They are very good friends of us.
At the beginning (+/- 15y ago) it was hard on the husband, the alternative basically was to divorce. But he loves her and stayed. She also loves him very much, but she missed something more spiritual in their relation. She now is mainly with her husband, only not on Fridays (although all very flexible). The couple has no children themselves but the other partner has three. The husband and the other partner know each other and occasionally meet on Birthdays and such. We also meet up with her and the other partner.
As a side note, the wife is writing a book on her own life. My own wife did some proof reading and she says it is beautifully written (my wife reads many, many books). Hopefully she can get it published.
The main barrier to normative polyamory, it turns out, was the sheer logistical challenge of maintaining elaborate, reliable structures of commitments.
Google Calendar, and tech in general, have made it easier for people to scale in precisely the same way databases and ERP allowed corporations to achieve Amazon-scale.
This tech-dependence is also the reason that poly is de-rigeur in tech culture, where in some circles (esp. queer-flavoured varietals) it can be surprising to meet someone who is mono.
A good app to build would be a SaaS platform like Tailscale for maintaining polycule/solo-poly relationships and resources; incidentally, Tailscale is already used for this in nerd 'cules. But I'm thinking some sort of Bring Your Own Storage
By this I think they mean “ethical non monogamy” in the US?
People have been screwing around on their partners throughout history. Some cultures turn a blind eye so long as proper discretion is exercised. In others, polygamous marriages are explicitly sanctioned - usually to the detriment of women. The US tends to be a bit puritanical when it comes to sex.
I'm not that surprised alternative relationship structures like this are becoming more attractive in our commitment phobic "I want it now" culture.
Basically it allows you to believe you can have your cake and eat it too. The mindset of "I deserve intimacy/sexual fulfillment whenever I want it, and if you love me you'll accommodate that." That's not love, that's selfishness.
I can speak from personal experience that most that try it fail, largely because they have other relationship problems, the kind that keep them from doing the work to actually grow and nurture a deep relationship with another human being. It's a lot easier to f*ck the pain away.
Sure there are exceptions to the rule. You will always be able to find people that make it work for them. But it will never work for the masses.
Myself, I eventually realized the root cause of my dissatisfaction was inside me. As I worked on myself, I found my desire for poly/open relationships went away. It's way too much work to truly "love" that many people. Commitment is hard work. It takes, well, commitment.
Trends like this are just a sign of the times. People are becoming more disposable to each other, and we want to normalize social structures that embrace this idea. We'll pat ourselves on the back as we do this, telling ourselves it's so cosmopolitan.
Ultimately most of these people aren't capable of maintaining a real long term relationship, just a relationship of convenience. When things get hard, the relationship is jettisoned.
This HN thread is such a mess of logical fallacies
Things can increase in popularity without your bubble noticing
Things can also exist in your bubble without you noticing
But to contribute my own (equally meaningless) support to the validity of the question: I definitively know a lot of people who are poly now who were not 20 years ago, and excluding them - I also know a lot more poly people than I did 20 years ago (no idea if they were poly back then). And for bonus points, I also know a lot of people who have experimented with poly life in the last 10-15 years who hadn't previously.
Clearly some kind of shift or at least blip in culture
When two incomes are not sufficient to live somewhere. When it takes a town to raise a child and the local town is ... cruel ... When people get less attached to mythical ideas like "nuclear family" (which is a pretty modern myth), or like the myth of "man and woman" as only model to a family.
That some of the really old male-centric cultures are coming out more visible with polygamy, along with some of the "free love" movement and their crossover with the libertarians with (eg) Heinlein's "Stranger in a Strange Land" ideas, well that's likely happening too.
I think a lot of reasons people explore this. Likely multiple often. All of the sustained groups I've encountered though have been mixed, distributed and really supportive of both each other, and others. A joy to be around.
I'm not spiritual, I'm entirely materialistic and hold no stock in notions of the metaphysical, but I'm neither of the right nor left.
To me your comment is the outcome of smug, baseless superiority. Before you disagree with me on this think about it.
Assuming you're speaking only of those people, then whatever. Fair dues, I suppose you know them better than I do.
If your comment is meant to be generalized then lol. lmao, even. Why do you believe polyamory is necessarily a consequence of boredom, greed, and selfishness? Why is your preferred relationship dynamic the one borne out of the correct social dynamics? (Hint: I highly doubt this as a premise.)
I’m going to say too. It’s exactly like people not being satisfied with one house they need two. That’s why I bought up the neoliberalism. Peoples lives are empty and doll and so they’re looking for more ways to excite themselves. In their lives are empty and because of neoliberalism.
None of them were happy, none of them had less problems only more. It’s a stupid idea that’s been trying to pass and never works. The reason I bought they were spiritual is because we talked a lot about selflessness. I am not spiritual I was just hanging out with these people. I’m assuming they were seeking spirituality to massage their guilt and hide their greed.
I’m saying this new popularity of polyamory is based on the liberalism because it’s the belief that you can have whatever you want and there’s no consequences for it.
You end up, externalizing the pollution like all the corporations do.
Even calling it polyamory is idiotic because these people were just in mutual, romantic and sexual relationships, many of them had kids. There been any studies on what polyamory does to children.? One woman in the group even admitted she wasn’t telling her children. Is that healthy? A healthy thing is something you could tell your children.
To think that people can be in relationships and there be no jealousy and no problems or they can manage it somehow, and have everything they want is Ludacris and it’s never worked in the history of humanity.
I don’t care have sex with all the people you want, but just don’t try to rationalize it as some healthy lifestyle if one of the people in the relationship is in a long-term commitment with you.
