Pardon the jargon: the intersection of kink and poly
June 16th, 2007This post is inspired by Sex Geek’s 10 realistic rules for good non-monogamous relationships. It makes me tingly all over.
(And I wonder why I’m blogging instead of having sex right now.)
I went to TES on Wednesday night, for an otherwise unexciting Novice Group about communication. In the post-class discussion a girl asked about emotions when playing with multiple people. I brought up polyamory, where people often talk about managing love, lust, and loyalty between multiple partners.
A woman came up later to thank me for my comment, saying she’d never connected her serial (or perhaps parallel) play to polyamory. Gah. How?!
One of the staples of the kink community, such as it is, is non-monogamy. We have parties all the time at which otherwise staid and respectable people go from partner to partner, sampling tasties like rope bondage and spanking and knives and electricity. It is, dare I say, normal.
When I first discovered the kink community I had some embarrassing notion of meeting a “master” and riding off into the sunset with him into a life of sexual delights. It was the only way I could fit kink (which I wanted desperately, painfully, violently) into the structure I knew. Thankfully, as I am a very bad submissive, this failed to happen. But you can understand how horrified I was by all this promiscuity.
Promiscuity — that’s how it seemed to me. Not education, not “play”, not abstracted “power exchange” or “service”, but sexually driven activities.
Hello, it is sex! And that’s great. Acknowledge it.
“Relationship” is not just boyfriend-girlfriend, boyfriend-boyfriend, or girlfriend-girlfriend. It’s also dom-sub, master-slave, owner-pet, daddy-girl and daddy-boy, fuckbuddy, playpartner, and whatever-else-have-you. Yes, those count.
Call it what you like, but if you have more than one of these, you know. Welcome! You’re in the wonderful world of polyamory.
There’s a horrid misconception that monogamy is easy and standard, and that everyone knows how to do it. And there’s the corresponding misconception that poly is difficult and bizarre. I suspect it’s for this reason that people are reluctant to admit they’re not monogamous, that their extramarital encounters are more than dispassionate meetings of hand and asscheek. (See also: swingers.)
If you think about polyamory, nothing bad will happen. You will not grow long unkempt hair, put on fifty pounds, develop an abiding passion for Heinlein, become addicted to RenFaires, or quit your consulting job to become a coder. I promise. You might just learn how your relationship works. So it might help to pick up a couple of books — even if they have the dreaded P-word on the cover.
The reason I want people to read about polyamory is not because I’m proselytizing. It’s because polyamorous people have done some great work on how relationships operate, removed from traditional structures sometimes synonymous with monogamy (marriage and kids as an assumed goal, say) that obscure our own needs and wants. Poly is a little like relationship theory in a vaccuum. Even if you plan to sleep with the same person for the rest of your life, it might help to look into it.
You never know, you might be doing it already.
June 16th, 2007 at 3:21 pm
I loved reading this. It so evenly and eloquently voices an opinion on the matter that I have agreed with for a long time but never tried to articulate beyond conversations with like-minded people. Your post does a lot more than preach to the choir and I hope a lot of people read it, regardless of how they play or relate.
I also enjoyed very much the saltwater enema survival tip I found further down the page. You learn something new every day, and now I needn’t fear dehydration if floating out at sea or exiled on a remote island (it is only a matter of time before society casts me out).
For those, and other reasons, you have my many humble respects.
June 17th, 2007 at 5:01 am
Call it what you like, but if you have more than one of these, you know. Welcome! You’re in the wonderful world of polyamory
Um, *raises hand*
Damn you caught me. You are so right and I really do skirt around calling myself poly so much it’s nuts.
I think i might need to have a conversation with someone…
June 17th, 2007 at 1:56 pm
While I’m in a happy monogamous relationship right now I do wish I’d encountered poly as it is presented now when I was younger. Back then all I heard of was “wife swapping” which sounded like smarmy suburban infidelity as open mindedness.
I can’t help but feel I might’ve made few really bad mistakes in affairs of the heart. Though it might have simple been different mistakes.
June 17th, 2007 at 6:01 pm
Gentleman Whore: I’m still trying to verify the saltwater theory. Wikipedia says that an enema may be used for hydration purposes, but it doesn’t elaborate.
Everything I’m finding now seems to suggest that saltwater enemas prevent hydration. Ms. Porn Girl may’ve gotten it confused.
You’re welcome to experiment if you really feel that the need is imminent!
June 18th, 2007 at 1:40 pm
Sure. I’ll pick up a kit the next time I’m at a CVS. I’ll also get some Gatorade just in case…
June 18th, 2007 at 3:44 pm
Hmmmm… food for thought.
I guess polyamory always indicated to me a level of emotional involvement (love of many being a pretty literal translation)… Since most of my play relationships don’t expend beyond “play” I guess I never really felt any need to identify as poly. Which is not to say I have any problem with the concept. LOL. Except I’m a scorpio and we all know how jealous scorpios are. LOL.
Seriously though, you raise some interesting points.
June 19th, 2007 at 10:25 am
R - I don’t identify as poly (or anything really), unless pressed. But all my relationships do have a level of emotional involvement — even if that involvement is “nominal”.
June 19th, 2007 at 11:04 am
Interesting point.
BTW, it’s Rebecca… Didn’t realize it was posting as “R”. Sorry. See you tonight?
June 19th, 2007 at 12:03 pm
I think a lot of people tend to enjoy the comfort zones they define for themselves and are often unwilling to explore beyond that. Once someone who’s already afraid of coming out is out, they have so much more to lose, or so they thing. I’ve been thinking about the differences between fetish, kink, sex, and what not for a while too, and while there are subtleties, I think there are more similarities than people are currently willing to admit to themselves.
June 23rd, 2007 at 8:55 pm
While many of the people in the BDSM scene are poly, I also know many who are monogamous, including me. And while there is certainly a great deal of overlap between poly and kinky people, I wouldn’t say that they absolutely go hand in hand for everyone.
June 26th, 2007 at 11:31 am
Romantic Rope - You’re absolutely right.
July 9th, 2007 at 10:54 am
If you think about polyamory, nothing bad will happen. You will not grow long unkempt hair, put on fifty pounds, develop an abiding passion for Heinlein, become addicted to RenFaires, or quit your consulting job to become a coder. I promise
Oh my god, I love you. *grin*
May 4th, at 4:48 pm
It’s amazing. I like it. Sounds good to me, even though I can’t agree with everything that is written here