Polyamorous people, while we’re supposed to be smarter, more loving, more together and all that nonsense….
Well, we’re not.
I wanted to compile a list of Stupid Poly Tricks. You know, dumb shit I’ve seen people do in the name of polyamory. This is in no particular order and it’s only stuff that flutters into my mind.
1. Expecting Polyamory to solve all your relationship problems
If you haven’t heard the snarky comment, “Relationship Broken, Add More People”, it’s a comment on the fact that adding someone to a relationship isn’t going to help the issues in your old one. In fact, chances are good, it’ll make the relationship problems worse. Please, for the love of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, please fix your current relationship problems before you start adding people. It’ll make your karma all shiny and sweet-smelling. Promise.
2. Expecting lovers to be in love with each other because they’re in love with you.
“If someone lurves me for real and for true, they’ll be head over heels for anyone I happen to have the hots for.” I do not know for the life of me where this nonsense came from. But you see it from time to time.
People have different tastes. You know that, right? Just because you have the total hots for someone, your partner doesn’t owe you a damn sex show. Get over it. Let them develop whatever ever friendship/relationship/cordial interaction they want to and stay out of it.
3. Expecting lovers to be at each other’s throats.
The flip side of the last one is even more absurd. “I’m bringing my new love home to meet my husband. How do I make sure they don’t start beating their chests at each other?”
I’m gonna assume you only get involved with grown-ups. (If you don’t, go back to square one. You only want to be involved with grown-ups. This isn’t a joke). Grown-ups don’t start chest beating the minute they meet each other. They smile, greet and just hang out. It’s not a big deal, nor should it be.
While it’s true that your partner may or may not think your new love is the all-wonderful that you do, chances are good that you’re going to be looking at least at a cordial relationship. Hell, they may even become friends!
4. Posting a confession of infidelity to an online forum.
I actually saw this happen. I wish I could think of something gentle to say about it. I can’t. Being online is the equivalent of going into the middle of town square with a megaphone. This is a mind-boggling depth of stupidity that I cannot begin to comprehend. Polyamorous communities, by their very nature, are rather interconnected. Stuff gets back to people. Solve the problem entirely. Don’t go against agreements. See? Simple. Problem solved. You are now free to broadcast whatever you like.
5. Making agreements you don’t intend to keep.
If you’re not okay with a partner having a veto and resent it, don’t agree to it, More than one person I’ve met has used resentment or the feeling of coercion to excuse some pretty reprehensible behavior. STOPPIT! Only agree to what you intend to follow through on.
6. Allowing yourself to be financially supported by someone who disapproves of your lifestyle.
This gets the Stupid Award with the Diamond Cluster.
When I say financially support, I mean reduced rent because you live on their property, large gifts of cash, personal loans at reduced to no interest, large amounts of free child care (this last is probably the worst in stupidity, as it gives the person who is providing the child care way too much leverage in case they decide to Think of the Children and take you to court to get custody of your kids). I am not talking about property you get through a will or something like that. That’s yours.
If someone disapproves that strongly of your life, don’t give them that kind of leverage.
I welcome any other comments of Stupid Poly Tricks, but these are the ones that leapt to mind most immediately when I sat down with my nice espresso to write this.
As an addendum, what the heck do you guys really wanna see Mama Java rantin’ about this summer? Or what do you want to rant about that you think will amuse/instruct me enough to post here as a guest column? My own life is drama free enough that I don’t have much column fodder these days.
No, if you love me, don’t wish column fodder on me. Please. It doesn’t taste so nice.
Entries (RSS)
June 9th, 2008 at 11:04 am
My favorite stupid poly trick is:
You make poly look easy! In an effort to emulate you, my SO/spouse and I will now make reckless, uninformed, hurtful, and potentially dangerous changes in our relationship. We want to do in 3 weeks what took you and your husband 3 years to accomplish. Wait… what? It doesn’t work like that? Our relationship problems are now all your fault! Shame on you!
Eegads.
June 9th, 2008 at 1:04 pm
#6 made me absolutely cringe. I can’t imagine how dumb a person would have to be to say “hey, Mom and Dad, thanks for the free rent and child care, but you don’t have any say in how many people I sleep with at once because I Am Polyamorous and Evolved, and you’re not the boss of me anyhow.” But I know that it happens. *weeps*
June 9th, 2008 at 3:04 pm
> they’ll be head over heels for anyone I
> happen to have the hots for.” I do not
> know for the life of me where this
> nonsense came from.
Oh, easy. People understand this when it’s not about humans. Susie falls in love with Bob, who is in love with flyfishing. Susie may discover that she adores standing in the water tossing string and goes burbling about it around the office, and no one thinks it’s odd. Maybe it’ll wear off post-NRE… or maybe it’ll turn into a long-term interest in its own right.
Don’t laugh. That is how I because a downhill skier, office burbling included, after 45 years of less than zero interest in it. Today I still love skiing even by myself.
The stupid part would be for Bob to expect Susie to love flyfishing….
June 9th, 2008 at 11:08 pm
I can add a few. Grants, I’m Christian and only follow polygyny issues…
1. Forcing polygyny down your wife’s throat until she gets so tired of hearing you that she caves in.
2. Taking a disorganized unstructured fisaco and adding an unsuspecting victim to it.
3. Being so paranoid that you hide your family and constantly harp on how the government is hiding behind every rock - then using the paranoia to abuse the family and keep them silent about it.
4. Saying that it is easy or giving someone that is unsure advice to “just do it.” Most of the time it is a disaster.
5. Going on a talk show.
6. Introducing your second wife as “my wife’s sister” (even though she is black and your other wife is white).
7. Starting a cult. Then calling hte police nad telling them that they are not welcome.
And the last one and it is a HUGE one for me…
Lying to everyone, refusing to stand up for your rights, and going underground at every little noise. All that does is tell the world that you know you are wrong, and that what you do is illegal, and it guarantees that the rest of the wold thinks that way as well. It places every legitimate family in same boat as the crazies and brands you and your family as a cult. It does no good whatsoever and even your children will be marked with “Coward” becuase it is all they see their entire lives. It guarantees that the only examples of polygyny are the rotten examples and hides the good examples. I have very little respect for those that do this.
June 11th, 2008 at 1:36 am
I’m not sure this is a Stupid Poly Trick so much as a personal hot button, but straight guys getting involved with bi women and saying, “Hey, you can have all the chicks you want and so can I!!!” is something I used to see way too much of, and I’m sure it still goes on.
There’s also the ever-popular “trashing the rest of one’s life for the sake of the next NRE fix” Stupid Poly Trick. You know, ignoring not just the current partner but the kids, the job, the bills, and any other inconvenient bits of reality that interrupt the NRE flow…
June 13th, 2008 at 6:54 pm
I stumbled upon your site from the poly LJ community. I just wanted to say thank you so much. As someone new to the poly world I just want to say I really appreciate your blog. A lot of it is common sense but it is super helpful to read it all organized and logical.
June 18th, 2008 at 2:50 pm
On the straight-guys-getting-involved with bi women thing, unless you’re just arguing against it being open…
Dunno. I mean, I been there and done it, and the thing is, there isn’t really any fair solution. Well, actually there is, and that’s monogamy–but most bi poly chicks balk at that, holding their relationships with girls somehow apart from their relationships with boys. Which may very well be an accurate representation of reality–as the self-confessed straight guy I have no idea–but is not necessarily the fairest theory on which to found any agreement.
I mean, I’ve dated girls. All of them–even the crazy ones–have given me something unique, something the others didn’t or couldn’t. I don’t know that categorizing one’s interests into male and female realistically represents the various psychosocial needs that your relationship with them fulfills. I seem to mirror lesbians in a lot of my relationship behaviors, for instance.
Also, if you’re interested in hoo-hoos AND ha-has (hehe), then one who is straight must assume it’s no different from his various preferences as well. Perhaps he is turned on by fertility goddesses and also by waifs. Well, YOU can’t be both, just like he is unlikely to be both male and female. Why should he limit himself when you are unwilling to do the same? If your answer is that he is asking of you a partial limit, well, that may be true, but
But even if you do accept the premise that a girl’s relationships with girls consistently give her something she never gets from boys, if the straight guy can’t date but the bi girl can, you still have a big ugly glaring inequity. The kind that often will build up venom behind it. And I don’t think that’s necessarily smart either.
To put it another way, if you’re a bi poly girl and we’re in a relationship where I ask you to forego other penis in your life because I deal poorly with it, yes, I place a restriction on you, but you’re still poly. Place a similar restriction on me and suddenly we’re in a monogamous/poly relationship, and honestly, not everyone can deal with that kinda inequity. Seems almost like it’d be more fair to ask me to arbitrarily forego dating some specific subset of females.
Kind of a hotbutton topic for me, too, I guess, judging by volume. Feedback is welcome; I’m trying to come to terms with my feelings on that kind of relationship. Send spam c/o jackdabastard at gmail.com.
November 10th, 2008 at 12:45 am
Well, my bf is poly with two other women who don’t know about me, and I live with him. Nor do they know about each other. They each live in different states. I am the only one who knows about each of them, and I am not allowed to talk to them or in any way let them know about me and the fact that I live with him. I don’t think this is right.
November 10th, 2008 at 5:50 am
Well, consenting to stuff you don’t feel right about probably isn’t a great way to live.
The “allowed” part makes me wonder if this individual is really a good choice for you.