Polyamory

To quote Austin Powers... "Oh, ''be-haaave!"

Anyhow, I liked Blue Ninja's article. Very informative.

I've seen some polyamorous people confused as to why some monogamous people would only date other monogamous people. I've also seen some of those people say things like "You wouldn't want someone to stop making friends because they're friends with you, would you?"

Well, here's the thing: You can never really know how much you will grow to like someone when you're just starting to make friends with them/date them. I can't speak for anyone else, but for me in particular, if one of my friends ends up liking someone new more than me, that's not a problem, whereas if someone I'm dating started dating someone else and they liked that person more than me, I wouldn't be okay with that. So, that's why: I don't want my partner to romantically love someone more than me (or even equally to me).

As for why I wouldn't want my hypothetical partner to love someone more than/equally to me? I don't know why that is, but it's my business.

They don't understand why monogamous people want to date other monogamous people? And they're serious? Do they not understand that serious consideration of a romantic partner includes vetting them for shared values? Opposites attract is great and all, but if you don't have something that important in common the relationship is going to crash and burn. It's right up there with asking for someone of a certain physical type (because you're attracted to what you're attracted to, and you want them to be attracted to you in return) and asking what their religion is if it's important to you. (And judging by the number of Christian dating sites I see commercials for, it's very important to quite a few people.)

I don't know how common it is, but yeah, I've met some who don't understand why some people want their partners to be exclusive.

[testing]

Edit: Well that's weird... I can post here but can't post in the North Korea thread...

edited 28th Apr '13 6:04:17 PM by Silasw

It's like that in Oz too. hopefully it will be fixed soon

I'm not sure I understand the difference between romance and friendship. :S They seem almost identical to me. Granted, the former usually has sexual implications and implies a higher level of attachment, but that's not universal and friends can also have sex and be close companions that without it being counted as romance, while romance can be non-sexual and not have too much attachment.

The implications/values of different kinds of interpersonal relationships (platonic, romantic, etc.) are highly subjective. It all depends on the person.

Yup. Subjective. For me . . .

Friends: Someone who has your back who you kill time with. You have to trust them, but if they drift off and find others to hang out with, you just move on.

Romance: Someone to grow together with. You spend lots of time together doing things you both cherish, and you want them around often enough that you don't grow apart.

I've never managed to keep a friend close for more than 7 or 8 years, and those were school friends. Now that I'm out of school, I don't expect to have more than casual friends I know from work.

I find that there's a lot of devaluing of friendship in favor of romance. Which is.... kind of dumb. Then again, maybe that's just because of media having to shoehorn a romance plot into nearly everything.

Personally, to me it's friendship that means "someone I want to grow with", while romance is "someone I happen to be infatuated with". And yes, devaluing of friendship in favour of romance is one of my biggest pet peeves.

Friendship without romance is still something that can enrich your life. Romance without friendship, in as far as I understand, is likely to be disastrous.

That being said, I think that one of the explanations about why lots of people are comfortable with their friends having other friends but not romantic partners having other romantic partners is the "all-encompassing" nature a romance is supposed to have. As a friend, one is not expected to satisfy everything - there need to be only so many areas of compatibility. With romance, the expectation is higher, so if one's romantic partner is looking for others, it is easy to be alarmed - "What am I doing wrong?"

I'd really like to live in a commune...

And, I think that's weird. Why should "romance" get the extra shine?

My thoughts on poly-, or any relationship set-up, really can be boiled down to one thing: we don't really ever learn the clever ways of doing it, do we? Be it the friendship or the romantic kind. <_< We... supposed to pick stuff up as we go along. And, for something as complex and as important as relationships and the emotions surrounding them... most societies suck at providing rounded templates of what to do. <_<

You'd think we humans would have got to grips with training ourselves intelligently in interpersonal relationships over our 1.5 million years. But... um... nope. Generally... not the case.

Screw learning how to be Mum, Dad and Kid: we need to concentrate on teaching kids how to go about all relationships in an emotionally mature way, not just the sexual or familial ones and their varied flavours. -_-

edited 28th Apr '13 8:25:56 PM by Euodiachloris

The term "Limerence" might help illuminate things a bit.

Limerence is a romantic affection similar to, but distinct from, love. It's a feeling of longing and desire which drowns out all other considerations. For example, day-dreaming about the limerent object, thinking about your future together, fantasizing about them, that sort of thing. But the most dangerous thing about Limerence is that it needs reciprocation. Limerence demands that the limerent object feel just as strongly about you as you do about them. Without that reciprocation, more negative emotions (sorrow, depression, jealousy, anger) all start to emerge.

People who can't handle a romantic object as a friend (also known as the Friend Zone) are subject to this. For example, if you have a friend you sexually desire, and feel anger or frustration whenever you know they're dating or having sex with someone else, that's limerence.

You too, huh?

edited 29th Apr '13 6:00:13 AM by KingZeal

Isn't that just jealousy?

edited 30th Apr '13 2:02:33 PM by joeyjojo

Nope. Jealousy might be a component, but... there are other components involved. <_<

Nope. Jealousy is hostility toward someone else based on something they have, or the converse, hostile possessiveness of something that you have that you believe others are trying to take from you.

Limerence may have a component of Jealousy toward the limerence target's significant other, if they have one. But it doesn't necessarily, and the target of limerence doesn't have to be involved with anyone else.

I don't know about "as strongly", but personally I do prefer my friends to like me. It seems normal to want the people you like in a friendly way to like you too. That doesn't seem particularly unique to romance.

I think when you get to words like "limerence" you mean something rather more... unusual, strongly felt, and probably selfish than simply wanting people you like to like you back. It's... an excess of feeling, I think. Like how "hubris" is used to mean specifically an excess of pride.

This all seems rather off the topic, though.

Indeed.

Well, first I have to get a girl. Then I can figure out how I'm going to start into polyamory. Using Fetlife to actually get the girl seems like the best way to find one who'd actually be poly herself.

After that I think the best course would be finding her a second boyfriend. I have to be able to handle that if this is going to work, and I'd rather start off getting my side ironed out and my jealousy issues tamed. Otherwise shit just gets complicated. Once I know I'll be fine sharing, then I can find a second woman. Then comes the balancing act. Mastering making both women feel loved and special to me, and making the man feel like my best friend.

It's best if you don't start planning that stuff out until you actually start up a relationship with someone.

Some men/women, for example, like to belong to one person and don't mind that person being allowed to have other lovers. It's considered unusual, due to the human propensity for jealousy, but people are people. I was in a stable for a woman who had multiple male and female lovers, but her lovers were not each-others' lovers. For example, I couldn't go and screw one of her women (or other men) without her permission. But I was fine with that, because it let me focus all my attention on pleasing her.

The best thing to do is to find out what you want, and then either keep or bend those standards as befitting your lover(s)' happiness and your own.

edited 1st May '13 8:23:57 AM by KingZeal

Yes. Find out what I want. A couple of brothers in the household, and as many women as there are us. We share them, they share us, and we work out any problems we have in a civilized manner. Once you know what you want (Which I do, at least in theory) you find others who want the same.

Dude, that sounds kinda creepy. 'Find her a second boyfriend'? What if she'd rather find herself a boyfriend?

You guys may find this interesting, the UK has sentenced a man to 20 weeks in jail for bigamy. It wasn't even deliberate, he thought he was divorced from his wife so he went ahead and married his new partner, but as he wasn't divorced at the time of the second marriage, so he committed a crime by having a second marriage.[1]

edited 1st May '13 8:03:04 PM by Silasw

It only sounds creepy. It doesn't mean me finding her one, it means me saying, "You have my blessing, I want to see how this makes me feel, and work through any problems I have with it."