Devon I got only like 1/3 of the way thru before I was sobbing. I can't thank you enough for this. I have been in a very weird loop lately realizing just how much I don't even know what I want or need across the board (this tracks given an upbringing rife with abuse and neglect, but still is deeply sucky and disabling even though I know I came by it honestly ) and I certainly am not giving myself permission to have or feel into them. I feel so seen and armed with actually useful and actionable information and I needed all of this affirmation essentially saying 'be selfish' so so much.
It also strikes me that OF FUCKING COURSE white poly people who are largely WEIRD (as in the white educated etc acronym) bring a weird hyper individualistic streak to this due to the influence of whiteness and other facets of dominant culture. I yap about this all the time and feel genuinely like I am losing my sanity or grip on reality when people who claim to be or are otherwise aligned with me and hip to white supremacy culture fail to see they're perpetuating it by insisting, for example, they can't hear or understand me unless I used the right specific sanctioned prescribed sterile therapy language to describe my experience. I feel so validated to have a more "serious" public academic and author affirm all this. I've screenshotted like all of this and will be coming back to it a lot.
therapy-speak/the norms of mainstream psychology and psychiatry are one of those last bastions of subtly authoritarian, colonialist thinking that even a majority of left-leaning people do nothing to question! I don't get it, because I think the ways in which that stuff is used to manipulate and silence people seem so obvious, and feel so intuitively BAD to interact with, but i'll use my ill-gotten elitist respectability for taking pot-shots at this stuff while I can.
Nonmonogamous is a far preferential term, in my opinion. The kink stuff ain't my thing (I honestly find it hard to even read about your submissive desires but I am impressed by your ability to claim them), I just love fucking rando hot grrls, and well...that's it. And, basically, I am sick of the oppressive nature of the "ethical slut" era whereby we all pretend that we some great new goal of a loving and better society. I don't want to discuss feelings, or be intimate in other aspects of life, I want my friends and who I fuck to not even really know each other and I am profoundly insulted by the pressure for "standardization", the almost continuous arguments that I am "doing it wrong", or as has been implied, I am abusing other people's polyamorous intentions by not being willing to talk about feelings for hours and hours of my own and only life. I am down to share pleasure, if people want circular and endless self-exploration, they should go to therapy, not tell me to go to therapy so I will accept their "normative" view of sexual liberation.
WOW yes you get it. "I don't want to discuss feelings, or be intimate in other aspects of life, I want my friends and who I fuck to not even really know each other and I am profoundly insulted by the pressure for "standardization"..."
Thanks for stickin around through all the kink talk.
As long as you're 100% transparent about what you want, it's all good... the issue nonmonogamous or polyamorous people have -myself included- is that many people who ONLY want sex lie about it... Yes, wanting sex with no emotional strings attached is 100% valid. What isn't acceptable -in monogamy and nonmonogamy- is lying to people just to get laid. Now, if you've been 100% transparent and literal about your intentions BEFORE fucking someone, and they start judging you for having said intentions, then you can disregard their judgment and move on to the next one. Feeling judged is valid, too. Just keep doing you, you're not responsible for other people's limerence hehehe
Also a big problem in the kink world! Lots of people talk a big game about all the kinks they are into and the skills they have but all they really want is to fuck without any commitment or investment in the partner's wellbeing.
Also gonna name that it can be an issue when people don't *know* what they want - when this is the case, we also need to be honest with ourselves and those we're relating to in an intimate, sexual, or romantic (etc.) way! I think this factor/aspect also needs to be discussed more as I'm sure I'm not the only one, but I see a lot of "what you want" language in these kinds of discussions that feels to me like it assumes that everyone actually knows what they want.
great point. I think that's part of why it is so important to be able to be jealous and insecure -- a lot of times we get the alarm bells long before we could ever know a possible solution.
I deeply appreciate this fresh perspective on nonmonogamy. You articulated something that annoys me about online polyamory culture, which is that some influencers almost make it seem like there's a syllabus you have to complete before you can practice polyamory responsibly. I appreciate the utility of reading other people's perspectives on nonmonogamy, but the sort of excessive theorizing and infographic-ication of polyamory just makes it seem so UNCOOL!
"I want to be wanted unfairly. And I certainly have my unfair, un-ascended, greedy little wants, and I think I’d like to be with someone who wants me clawing for them, too."
I love this line, and feel it encapsulates most of this post. When I think of it this way, I rather enjoyed you sharing your feelings about ENM and labels and expectations common in our community.
The parts where you rant about some of the worst stereotypes in our community -- the terminally online, must give advice all the time, "enlightened" ones -- is fine. I think those types infiltrate every subculture. It seems like you argue for a more expansive view of what non-monogamy can mean, but I think it already does mean that. I think it's just another case of the loudest voices on social media being tedious and annoying.
In IRL spaces, these problems don't loom quite as large, but I certainly do still come up against them enough to see them as a legitimate problem. It is true that it's easier for someone with limited actual experience navigating conflict in poly to rise to the point of social influence online rather than in person, but those worlds are connected and do affect one another -- and some people have a vested interest in leaning on bad advice and bad norms to validate their actions. I'm glad to hear you haven't had partners push that kind of thinking on you, but I certainly have, and am still building enough experience myself in nonmonogamy to begin to push back against it.
Yea, I think it's much harder to ever feel like we've "arrived" at some complete understanding of our desires the older we get. We always had this conditioning that we settle into who we are in our late teens and then there's just a happily ever after for the 60-ish years (if we're lucky) after. The reality for me has been that the moment I have an epiphany is a momentary peace before realizing how many other ideas in my life got toppled over in its wake. Nothing feels permanent, but some of it is. It's just not always visible to us.
So that's why I like the boundary-setting and communication skills I've learned by making those mistakes along the way in ENM world. I'm slowly getting better at where I can bend and where I can't and I re-evaluate those ideas with each new connection. Often unsuccessfully. But that's okay too. I'm learning to just take pleasure in making an effort.
Today is my birthday, and I woke up to this post with liberating and expansive takes on not one but two topics that have been weighing on me. Thank you for this gift!
I know it's not the main point of the post, but thank you for sharing that thing about how trauma can change our sexual needs/expresson, and the boom/bust cycles thing. So many of us have had it shamed in a relationship, and that's the worst thing because then not only are you dealing with the original thing that traumatised you, but with shaming from the person you're meant to be safe with.
I love the post but you gotta find different poly influencers to follow 😄 Admittedly I'm very picky with who I follow but I feel like what you talk about in this post fits perfectly with what the poly influencers I follow talk about. Anyways, great post!
Unfortunately news from Palestine and Sudan have entirely taken over my insta feed where I used to follow poly content. I can still give one wholehearted recommendation and that's Leanne Yao, their channel is Polyphiliablog at least on youtube and instagram, probably also tiktok but can't say as I'm not on there. Unsurprisingly they're also not white and based on personal experience I'm with you on the white people problem.
This was such an interesting read! I identify as a polyamorous person, and have had my fair share of both monogamous and non-monogamous relationships. All of them took work, communication, and negotiation to ensure the needs of both/all parties were being met, or to help determine if the relationship had run its course. Jealousy ≠ passion in my opinion. While I agree that jealousy can help up identify feelings of need or opportunities for growth, it has never felt good to revel in. That said, we all have our own set of experiences, desires, and aspirations to inform our choices.
Should you (or any others reading this) be interested in more exposure to ENM/polyamory folx/creators, I highly recommend the work and stories of @polyfamily on TikTok, author Jessica Fern, or any of the work produced by the team behind the Multiamory podcast. Although there is no one “right way” to be ENM/polyamorous, I can attest to the fact that things I’ve learned from the parties mentioned above have informed and improved multiple relationships in my life (romantic partners, friend, co-workers, family members, etc.). Even those who prefer to avoid talking about emotions may benefit from updates to their communication toolset, regardless of their relational make-up. ♥️
I'm happy for you that you've found the specifics of what work for you in non monogamy, but this whole post is tainted with you shitting on perfectly fine polyamorous people. Just because they don't practice relationships the way you want, doesn't mean they are doing anything wrong. It feels like maybe you were wronged by some individuals through lack of communication and failing to realize the incompatibilities of what you wanted before you got hurt, but that doesn't make the entirety of polyam people who practice a more relationship anarchy style of poly bad. And never in all the books and influencers around poly that ive consumed have I ever seen advocating for eliminating jealousy. That's as stupid as asking people to eliminate sadness or anger. It's an emotion, its communicating something to you. And this post could have been a really wonderful read about how to navigate and advocate for what your jealousy is pointing to, but instead you used it to shit on a group of people who are part of your community. Creating a straw man out of a certain type of poly person for you to sacrifice to what end? To assuage your own cringe? This post has good advice in it. It's a shame you used it to vent your hatred towards your own community.
I agree. I was going to come out to a broader groups of friends and family, but after reading this I felt so bad about myself that I’m just going right back in the closet. If someone like Devon who is part of the community and often so thoughtful finds polyamory so off-putting and bad, why would I risk that cruel treatment in my own life? People can be so disappointing.
I think the fact that I harbor my own deep, troubling biases is a reason to be disillusioned with *me*, and with caring about the attitudes of complete strangers in general, not a reason to stifle yourself. The discrimination that polyamorous people face is rampant, and structural, and so underserved. I live a nonmonogamous life and always have, and those biases still really warp my thinking all the same. Some of the norms that the community develops in response to all that stigma are, I think, misguided by respectability politics, and that's largely what this piece is about. But the piece is also shaped by my own limitations, and I'm very transparent about what those are because I think they do color everything, and so people should be skeptical of my take. I'm sorry to hear that what I have written has hurt you, and I hope it will give you all the more reason to live your life on your terms rather than on anybody else's.
I'm sorry his post hurt. It hurt me too. I tried to keep my response calm, but I'm still mad and upset. It keeps coming up as rants to my partner about how wrong he is. This kind of cruelty hurts so much worse when its from people in our own community with a platform. I hope you are able to find safe people who will understand you and celebrate your identity and journey and listen to your experience. I'm trying to find comfort in the fact that my community doesn't share his view of polyamory, including the monogamous people I know (my friend is mono and read this and immediately shared it with me because she also found it distasteful and wanted to pick it apart with me lol)
Just something that came up for me, especially after reading this comment thread (not necessarily directly responding to something you said): It seems so hard for non-monogamous people online to just be accepting of other people doing non-monogamy differently from them. I do love having long in depth emotional convos with my partners and I want to meet their other partners and I've read a lot of the poly literature and use the jargon etc. etc. On the other hand I'm in a triad (two women and a man) and a lot of the same people who have strong options about things like hierarchy and processing emotions and such are extremely judgemental about relationships like mine. My relationship style is the way that it is because it's working for me, not because I think it's inherently better than any other relationship style. It's not better to be polyamorous any more than it is better to be monogamous. We're all just trying to find love and pleasure in whatever way feels best for us. It sucks that there is so much judgement even within the community!
Devon I got only like 1/3 of the way thru before I was sobbing. I can't thank you enough for this. I have been in a very weird loop lately realizing just how much I don't even know what I want or need across the board (this tracks given an upbringing rife with abuse and neglect, but still is deeply sucky and disabling even though I know I came by it honestly ) and I certainly am not giving myself permission to have or feel into them. I feel so seen and armed with actually useful and actionable information and I needed all of this affirmation essentially saying 'be selfish' so so much.
It also strikes me that OF FUCKING COURSE white poly people who are largely WEIRD (as in the white educated etc acronym) bring a weird hyper individualistic streak to this due to the influence of whiteness and other facets of dominant culture. I yap about this all the time and feel genuinely like I am losing my sanity or grip on reality when people who claim to be or are otherwise aligned with me and hip to white supremacy culture fail to see they're perpetuating it by insisting, for example, they can't hear or understand me unless I used the right specific sanctioned prescribed sterile therapy language to describe my experience. I feel so validated to have a more "serious" public academic and author affirm all this. I've screenshotted like all of this and will be coming back to it a lot.
therapy-speak/the norms of mainstream psychology and psychiatry are one of those last bastions of subtly authoritarian, colonialist thinking that even a majority of left-leaning people do nothing to question! I don't get it, because I think the ways in which that stuff is used to manipulate and silence people seem so obvious, and feel so intuitively BAD to interact with, but i'll use my ill-gotten elitist respectability for taking pot-shots at this stuff while I can.
10,000% agree, and would include the vast majority of psychiatry/psychology as well, from which therapy norms are derived. Appreciate you!
Nonmonogamous is a far preferential term, in my opinion. The kink stuff ain't my thing (I honestly find it hard to even read about your submissive desires but I am impressed by your ability to claim them), I just love fucking rando hot grrls, and well...that's it. And, basically, I am sick of the oppressive nature of the "ethical slut" era whereby we all pretend that we some great new goal of a loving and better society. I don't want to discuss feelings, or be intimate in other aspects of life, I want my friends and who I fuck to not even really know each other and I am profoundly insulted by the pressure for "standardization", the almost continuous arguments that I am "doing it wrong", or as has been implied, I am abusing other people's polyamorous intentions by not being willing to talk about feelings for hours and hours of my own and only life. I am down to share pleasure, if people want circular and endless self-exploration, they should go to therapy, not tell me to go to therapy so I will accept their "normative" view of sexual liberation.
WOW yes you get it. "I don't want to discuss feelings, or be intimate in other aspects of life, I want my friends and who I fuck to not even really know each other and I am profoundly insulted by the pressure for "standardization"..."
Thanks for stickin around through all the kink talk.
As long as you're 100% transparent about what you want, it's all good... the issue nonmonogamous or polyamorous people have -myself included- is that many people who ONLY want sex lie about it... Yes, wanting sex with no emotional strings attached is 100% valid. What isn't acceptable -in monogamy and nonmonogamy- is lying to people just to get laid. Now, if you've been 100% transparent and literal about your intentions BEFORE fucking someone, and they start judging you for having said intentions, then you can disregard their judgment and move on to the next one. Feeling judged is valid, too. Just keep doing you, you're not responsible for other people's limerence hehehe
Also a big problem in the kink world! Lots of people talk a big game about all the kinks they are into and the skills they have but all they really want is to fuck without any commitment or investment in the partner's wellbeing.
Also gonna name that it can be an issue when people don't *know* what they want - when this is the case, we also need to be honest with ourselves and those we're relating to in an intimate, sexual, or romantic (etc.) way! I think this factor/aspect also needs to be discussed more as I'm sure I'm not the only one, but I see a lot of "what you want" language in these kinds of discussions that feels to me like it assumes that everyone actually knows what they want.
great point. I think that's part of why it is so important to be able to be jealous and insecure -- a lot of times we get the alarm bells long before we could ever know a possible solution.
Yes!!! This is such an important point. Most of us are truly just making things up as we go along, and that applies to sex and relationships too <3
Hmm - yes, exactly!
I deeply appreciate this fresh perspective on nonmonogamy. You articulated something that annoys me about online polyamory culture, which is that some influencers almost make it seem like there's a syllabus you have to complete before you can practice polyamory responsibly. I appreciate the utility of reading other people's perspectives on nonmonogamy, but the sort of excessive theorizing and infographic-ication of polyamory just makes it seem so UNCOOL!
seriously!
"I want to be wanted unfairly. And I certainly have my unfair, un-ascended, greedy little wants, and I think I’d like to be with someone who wants me clawing for them, too."
I love this line, and feel it encapsulates most of this post. When I think of it this way, I rather enjoyed you sharing your feelings about ENM and labels and expectations common in our community.
The parts where you rant about some of the worst stereotypes in our community -- the terminally online, must give advice all the time, "enlightened" ones -- is fine. I think those types infiltrate every subculture. It seems like you argue for a more expansive view of what non-monogamy can mean, but I think it already does mean that. I think it's just another case of the loudest voices on social media being tedious and annoying.
In IRL spaces, these problems don't loom quite as large, but I certainly do still come up against them enough to see them as a legitimate problem. It is true that it's easier for someone with limited actual experience navigating conflict in poly to rise to the point of social influence online rather than in person, but those worlds are connected and do affect one another -- and some people have a vested interest in leaning on bad advice and bad norms to validate their actions. I'm glad to hear you haven't had partners push that kind of thinking on you, but I certainly have, and am still building enough experience myself in nonmonogamy to begin to push back against it.
Yea, I think it's much harder to ever feel like we've "arrived" at some complete understanding of our desires the older we get. We always had this conditioning that we settle into who we are in our late teens and then there's just a happily ever after for the 60-ish years (if we're lucky) after. The reality for me has been that the moment I have an epiphany is a momentary peace before realizing how many other ideas in my life got toppled over in its wake. Nothing feels permanent, but some of it is. It's just not always visible to us.
So that's why I like the boundary-setting and communication skills I've learned by making those mistakes along the way in ENM world. I'm slowly getting better at where I can bend and where I can't and I re-evaluate those ideas with each new connection. Often unsuccessfully. But that's okay too. I'm learning to just take pleasure in making an effort.
I saw a beggar leaning on his wooden crutch
He said to me, "You must not ask for so much"
And a pretty woman leaning in her darkened door
She cried to me, "Hey, why not ask for more?"
Oh like a bird on the wire
Like a drunk in a midnight choir
I have tried in my way to be free - Leonard Cohen
Dude thank you for the reminder to listen to this album
Today is my birthday, and I woke up to this post with liberating and expansive takes on not one but two topics that have been weighing on me. Thank you for this gift!
I know it's not the main point of the post, but thank you for sharing that thing about how trauma can change our sexual needs/expresson, and the boom/bust cycles thing. So many of us have had it shamed in a relationship, and that's the worst thing because then not only are you dealing with the original thing that traumatised you, but with shaming from the person you're meant to be safe with.
I love the post but you gotta find different poly influencers to follow 😄 Admittedly I'm very picky with who I follow but I feel like what you talk about in this post fits perfectly with what the poly influencers I follow talk about. Anyways, great post!
Please, drop some recs for us if you can!
Unfortunately news from Palestine and Sudan have entirely taken over my insta feed where I used to follow poly content. I can still give one wholehearted recommendation and that's Leanne Yao, their channel is Polyphiliablog at least on youtube and instagram, probably also tiktok but can't say as I'm not on there. Unsurprisingly they're also not white and based on personal experience I'm with you on the white people problem.
I really resonated with this post! Thank you for your beautiful articulations and freedom to be
This was such an interesting read! I identify as a polyamorous person, and have had my fair share of both monogamous and non-monogamous relationships. All of them took work, communication, and negotiation to ensure the needs of both/all parties were being met, or to help determine if the relationship had run its course. Jealousy ≠ passion in my opinion. While I agree that jealousy can help up identify feelings of need or opportunities for growth, it has never felt good to revel in. That said, we all have our own set of experiences, desires, and aspirations to inform our choices.
Should you (or any others reading this) be interested in more exposure to ENM/polyamory folx/creators, I highly recommend the work and stories of @polyfamily on TikTok, author Jessica Fern, or any of the work produced by the team behind the Multiamory podcast. Although there is no one “right way” to be ENM/polyamorous, I can attest to the fact that things I’ve learned from the parties mentioned above have informed and improved multiple relationships in my life (romantic partners, friend, co-workers, family members, etc.). Even those who prefer to avoid talking about emotions may benefit from updates to their communication toolset, regardless of their relational make-up. ♥️
I'm happy for you that you've found the specifics of what work for you in non monogamy, but this whole post is tainted with you shitting on perfectly fine polyamorous people. Just because they don't practice relationships the way you want, doesn't mean they are doing anything wrong. It feels like maybe you were wronged by some individuals through lack of communication and failing to realize the incompatibilities of what you wanted before you got hurt, but that doesn't make the entirety of polyam people who practice a more relationship anarchy style of poly bad. And never in all the books and influencers around poly that ive consumed have I ever seen advocating for eliminating jealousy. That's as stupid as asking people to eliminate sadness or anger. It's an emotion, its communicating something to you. And this post could have been a really wonderful read about how to navigate and advocate for what your jealousy is pointing to, but instead you used it to shit on a group of people who are part of your community. Creating a straw man out of a certain type of poly person for you to sacrifice to what end? To assuage your own cringe? This post has good advice in it. It's a shame you used it to vent your hatred towards your own community.
I agree. I was going to come out to a broader groups of friends and family, but after reading this I felt so bad about myself that I’m just going right back in the closet. If someone like Devon who is part of the community and often so thoughtful finds polyamory so off-putting and bad, why would I risk that cruel treatment in my own life? People can be so disappointing.
I think the fact that I harbor my own deep, troubling biases is a reason to be disillusioned with *me*, and with caring about the attitudes of complete strangers in general, not a reason to stifle yourself. The discrimination that polyamorous people face is rampant, and structural, and so underserved. I live a nonmonogamous life and always have, and those biases still really warp my thinking all the same. Some of the norms that the community develops in response to all that stigma are, I think, misguided by respectability politics, and that's largely what this piece is about. But the piece is also shaped by my own limitations, and I'm very transparent about what those are because I think they do color everything, and so people should be skeptical of my take. I'm sorry to hear that what I have written has hurt you, and I hope it will give you all the more reason to live your life on your terms rather than on anybody else's.
I'm sorry his post hurt. It hurt me too. I tried to keep my response calm, but I'm still mad and upset. It keeps coming up as rants to my partner about how wrong he is. This kind of cruelty hurts so much worse when its from people in our own community with a platform. I hope you are able to find safe people who will understand you and celebrate your identity and journey and listen to your experience. I'm trying to find comfort in the fact that my community doesn't share his view of polyamory, including the monogamous people I know (my friend is mono and read this and immediately shared it with me because she also found it distasteful and wanted to pick it apart with me lol)
Just something that came up for me, especially after reading this comment thread (not necessarily directly responding to something you said): It seems so hard for non-monogamous people online to just be accepting of other people doing non-monogamy differently from them. I do love having long in depth emotional convos with my partners and I want to meet their other partners and I've read a lot of the poly literature and use the jargon etc. etc. On the other hand I'm in a triad (two women and a man) and a lot of the same people who have strong options about things like hierarchy and processing emotions and such are extremely judgemental about relationships like mine. My relationship style is the way that it is because it's working for me, not because I think it's inherently better than any other relationship style. It's not better to be polyamorous any more than it is better to be monogamous. We're all just trying to find love and pleasure in whatever way feels best for us. It sucks that there is so much judgement even within the community!