"Polyamory: The New Monogamy?"

Huffington Post

Dr. Belisa Vranich is a psychologist much in the public eye. In her Huffington Post column, she waves the flag for poly and swinging:

...Before you start your nasty email to me, calling me a home-wrecking "whore with a pen" who wants your husband, let's make it clear that I am writing this in response to hundreds of my clinical patients over the years who have been in my office asking if it's normal to be monogamous. "Why is it so hard?" they ask.... My personal opinion is irrelevant, really. We discuss boundaries, truth, guilt, safety, respect....

I talked about this with Neil Cavuto on Fox TV, who sneered at my answer that "it's better to have a truthful relationship, where both people are happy, and that is not monogamous, than one that is supposedly monogamous but is full of lies and guilt."

...Sites like Adultfriendfinder.com and Passion.com actually have their fair percentage of singles looking for another single who doesn't mind cutting out the anticipation of not knowing genital anatomy size... In the name of science and being up on my pop culture, I logged on. If only our voting system could have a small percentage of the organization, rules, and clarity of these relationships! "Have some manners and call or write my wife the next day" lists one man in a couple who swing together.... "If you don't have basic hygiene down, don't bother emailing me." ...Plenty of married men and women state staunchly, "I'm married and happy, not planning to leave my significant other."... In most, I'm glad to see, condoms and safe sex aren't a question, they often a non-negotiable.

Is there a darker flip side to this, one where sexual addiction takes over or significant others find those cams and want a divorce? I'm sure. But many many other scenarios exist. "A guy I met last night has been happily married for 14 years," my patient quipped. "That is more than anyone I know!"... She ends the session asking rhetorically, "Once you go polyamorous, can you ever go back? Do you want to?"

Don't shoot the messenger. Again, I don't want to sleep with your husband, or wife, or both.

Read the whole article (May 4, 2008). She doesn't make much distinction between poly and semi-random hookups, to my eye.