San Diego Poly Pod folks appear on ABC's Nightline

When Showtime's Polyamory: Married & Dating ended its season last month, Michael and Kamala Devi seemed to be in an uncertain place with respect to Michael's new lover Rachel. (The filming was done months earlier.)

Things apparently turned out well, because she has moved in with them. And last night the three of them appeared on ABC's Nightline, which can't hurt the show's chances for a third season.

Kamala Devi, Michael, and Rachel on camera with Nick Watt.

Tahl and Jennifer, in the interim, have moved out and gotten a place of their own. The whole bunch hope to move into roomier quarters when they can afford a big enough home.

Michael, Rachel, and Kamala Devi presented well on Nightline, but unfortunately the segment was marred by the loud, smarmy narrator Nick Watt, who I thought hogged the audio track. He sounded like a British tabloid. To future people researching Watt and considering whether to be on a show that he does: Avoid him.

Watch the segment here (6:15). A transcript is also at that link. Note the segment's dumb title: "Polyamory: The End of Marriage?"

A nice, separate article is posted various places on the ABC-TV site. It presents most of the segment's content minus most of Watt's interjections, and has a not-dumb title:

Open Marriages: When Husband and Wife Have Lovers and Date Other People

Rachael, Michael, and Kamala Devi

...They call what they have a "pod," like what you would call a group of dolphins. They practice safe sex and total honesty.

"The first rule is really about making sure that we have created the space to have that conversation," Kamala Devi said.

Kamala Devi and Michael have a 6-year-old son together named Devin, and Rachel provides a helping hand.

"We share life together," Kamala Devi said. "It takes a village to raise a child and it feels really good to have that kind of support."

This kind of "polyamorous" relationship is becoming increasingly common, experts say.

"The divorce rate in the United States is over 50 percent. ... People are not staying nearly as faithful they used to," said Dr. Karen Stewart, a sex therapist in Los Angeles. "The world has become a much smaller place. We can seek out connections, there's dating sites on every street corner. You can go anywhere to meet someone now."

But could there ever be societal acceptance of something more than monogamy? Despite having multiple partners, Stewart said polyamorous relationships are about love and commitment....

..."I really think that in 10 years society is going to be like this a new paradigm," Kamala Devi said. "The culture is changing."

"It is quite normal already. It's just not out of the closet," Michael added.

Read the whole article (Nov. 25, 2013).

This article and the video transcript version are being reprinted by various other big outlets, such Yahoo News, the U.K's Daily Mail, The New York Post, the Huffington Post, and probably many others. Update: Kamala Devi notes, "This positive portrayal of polyamory was translated into 4 languages and was one of the top trending stories on Yahoo."

Here's an example of the grim reactions going around Christian right sites: The End of Marriage? 'Spreading the Gospel of Polyamory'.

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