Bi and Poly Nico Tortorella: "This Is What a Queer Family Looks Like"

Luke Fontana / The Advocate

The current issue of The Advocate, arguably the leading gay publication for the last 50 years, is themed "The Many Ways LGBT People are Creating Families Today." The cover story features Nico Tortorella — the bi and poly star of Younger — his partner Bethany Meyers, and their fluidity. For 3,000 words. It went online this morning. Excerpts:

This Is What a Queer Family Looks Like

Nico Tortorella and Bethany Meyers are reinventing what it means to be family.

By David Artavia

From the outside looking in, Nico Tortorella doesn’t seem all that different from the straight cisgender character he plays on the sweetly addictive hit comedy Younger, which had its fourth-season premiere in June. ... And as the show has grown, so too has Tortorella’s public openness.

...Tortorella is also the guy behind the super popular podcast The Love Bomb, now in season 2, where each week he interviews one of the many, many people he loves. He’s committed to shaking up norms around gender and sexuality. His decade-long polyamorous romantic partnership with Bethany Meyers, a fitness and lifestyle entrepreneur (who identifies as gay) is proof. It’s a different kind of queer relationship, they admit, one that is thoroughly open and modern and enduring.

...Tortorella — who has been described as queer, bisexual, demisexual, and sexually fluid — and Meyers — who usually dates women, calls herself “gay,” and admits Tortorella is the only man she’s ever had intercourse with — are open with each other and the public about their romantic relationships with other people. ...

...Tortorella and Meyers have been in love for over a decade, and their relationship seemingly has but one rule: to love each other. Boundaries are more or less nonexistent when it comes to having additional relationships outside their own. It’s an idea founded on trust, and a notion that has yet to be fully understood across the cultural mind-set. Even they don’t have a word to describe it, except for possibly being “witnesses” to each other.

...The first episode [of The Love Bomb] sparked a much-needed dialogue on what it means to be part of a polyamorous arrangement as well as the fluidity of love and sex.

...Polyamorous relationships have been around for centuries, yet it’s only now that people are becoming less afraid to speak openly about them. Tortorella and Meyers's relationship is 11 years in the making and survives on what they refer to as a “day by day” pace, knowing that no matter what happens they’re always going to be in each other’s life. As Tortorella explains, this type of trust needs to be sealed before exploring such nonconventional avenues. It doesn’t happen at the beginning: “It’s not like you can jump on Tinder and look for a Nico or Bethany,” he says.

Meyers also admits that due to a lack of examples of similar relationships, she had to teach herself how to navigate the rules....

...They told me they never get jealous when the other is dating someone of the same sex, like Tortorella’s highly public relationship with Los Angeles-based hairstylist and Instagram star Kyle Krieger. It’s only when they’re dating someone of the opposite sex that jealousy intervenes, mainly because there’s a chance of having a child, and they both desperately want to have a baby together.

Luke Fontana / The Advocate

...“We’re still figuring out the best way we can bring other people into our relationship,” [Tortorella] agrees. “I think we’re in the best place now [that] we’ve ever been, but we’re definitely still on an amateur level.” Then he urges, “If anybody is reading this and wants to give us some advice, and has been living this way for a long time, seriously, we’re sponges! [Hey folks, that's a hint! --Ed.] We’re so down to hear stories because these stories aren’t told often.” [Where have you been?]

The truth is Tortorella and Meyers know their relationship is a threat to others. “[Past partners] didn’t fully realize and understand who we are and what we mean to each other,” Tortorella admits. “Like, ‘OK, you have Bethany, [but] where do I fit into the puzzle?’ ‘Am I ever going to be as important as Bethany is?’ And what’s the answer to that? How do I best answer that question?”

“So many people have this idea that if you can love this, you cannot love this,” she adds. “And I don’t understand, because I do. I can have feelings for two people. There are different kinds of feelings, they fulfill different needs. I don’t find it very realistic to think that I’m going to get everything I need out of Nico.”

...Their sexual needs exist along the same lines. Tortorella says he’d rather wait to have sex until the love blossoms in a relationship, while Meyers has no qualms about her love of casual sex. The best part is, despite their contrasting approaches, their goals are ultimately the same: to reach empowerment, fulfillment, and satisfaction. So what if they happen to take different avenues to get there?

“For me, sex is such an explosive exchange of energy between two people that if you’re not connected, energetically, before you have sex, it can be damaging,” Tortorella says about the rising hookup culture on apps like Grindr and Tinder. “If you open yourself up to somebody on that level it can be damaging to yourself and damaging for the other person if there isn’t trust there. … That being said, I totally understand people who want to have casual sex. I think what you have to do in this scenario is stay in your lane. Find people who want similar things — physically, energetically, and emotionally. ...”

Meyers, who was raised in an ultra-conservative Christian family, has a different opinion: “I think sex can be really fun and really empowering. I think for someone who’s raised in a culture where sex is so bad and you can’t orgasm… I find a lot of empowerment. And I do think there’s a lot of responsibility to be up front and honest. I’m proud that as I’ve aged, I have been [honest]. I think women haven’t gotten to feel super empowered with sex for a very long time.”

...They’re both still learning how to navigate this brave new world, they admit. But as a Hollywood leading man, one of the most valuable lessons Tortorella has learned was about his responsibility now that he has this place in history. ...

“...There would be so much more love if we just saw each other. As much as I love getting worked up in these conversations, imagine how much energy we’d save if we weren’t having them, if it didn’t exist, if we were all just people and we could love [who] we wanted and it wasn’t an issue. Granted, is that some utopian idea? Yeah, sure, but what if? What if we allowed ourselves to just be ‘me?’”

Read the whole article (July 5, 2017).

Tortorella is indeed a star; his life and ideas have been getting lots of attention all over.

For instance, to pick one story that went around more than most, a couple weeks ago the tabloid New York Post ran this: ‘Younger’ star Nico Tortorella talks polyamory, hallucinogens and Hollywood. With video (June 22).

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"Six Things I Learned When I Catered My Partners’ Wedding"

Earlier today I mentioned that group marriages are an uncommon form of polyamory. (Technically they don't exist — polygamy is illegal — but I mean life-bonded groups that are marriages in all but law.) Then just as I was writing that, this happy triad marriage story popped up on The Good Men Project:

6 Things I Learned When I Catered My Partners’ Wedding

By JJ Vincent

When my partners got married – to each other – I learned a lot about the people around us.

...We’re a polyamorous relationship and have been for more than three years. Recently, two of the three of us decided that the time was right to get married.

I was not one of the two.

It was an easy decision, but not a light one.... Whatever reasons two people have for committing to one another, it should be done with thought, discussion, and consideration, not because of external pressures or expectations.

I brought the cupcakes.

We began to tell people; by arrangement, I did most of the telling before the ceremony, we all did afterwards. Friends, co-workers, parents, chosen family. I came away with some insights that frankly, I didn’t expect.

1. There was an automatic assumption by many that the marriage of two meant the ending of three. This wasn’t a big surprise from more casual acquaintances, although some of the people who questioned the status of our relationship know us very well.

I think this speaks to the general lack of understanding about polyamorous relationships. No big surprise. There’s not much open conversation about them... and what there is seems to focused on sex, time-sharing, and validating the feelings of the people who say, “I could never do that.” So the idea that marriage, which is still very much about “two”, could allow for a “three”, is confounding. The relationship between the three of us did not change, only the legal status of two of the people....

2. There was an unexpected amount of concern for the “third”.  And for this we were truly grateful.

On the flip side of number one, which assumed no room for a third, were the questions, “Are you okay with this?”, “Is JJ good with this?”, “How do you feel about this?” ...There was genuine concern among our friends that the “third” was okay with this decision.... We were all touched that people wanted to check-in.

3. People are still surprised when you don’t want to get married, even though they knew this, but especially when you fought for marriage equality.  One of the side effects of the right to marry is pressure on gay couples to exercise that right....

4. Parents ask the most unusual questions.  One parent doesn’t get it and wants to know what “take care of each other” means. We expected a lot of objections and questions, but not, “What do you mean, ‘they’ll take care of you’?”, and “What do you mean ‘build a future’?”, things that seem pretty self-explanatory.

One parent sent congratulations and flowers, two bouquets. He was very happy for his child, their marriage, and thank goodness he loves their spouse.

One parent, the ultra-religious one, asked if we were still all going to live in the house, if we were changing bedrooms (what parent asks about bedroom anything!), if there was a name-change or if they were hyphenating, and then got them a lovely card, handwriting a sentiment that showed she got it.

5. Congratulations (and parties) come from very unexpected places.  Like co-workers you get on with, but you aren’t sure if they get the “poly” thing.

They’ve always been nice, but we’re in the South, and for many Southern Politeness goes bone deep. So it’s all the sweeter when suddenly, unexpectedly, your partner tell you that his coworkers threw him a “Congratulations! You got married!” party…. Allies are everywhere, sometimes in unexpected forms, if you give them a chance.

6. Cupcakes make everything better.  Want to make a potentially uncomfortable situation better? Bring cupcakes.

All the better if they are in John Deere green for him, capital-P-Purple for her, and there are cookie-and-frosting sandwiches, too. We did not know how the ceremony would go. It was among a small group of friends, so that was in our favor, but you never know. Seeing it in action, with 1/3 of the relationship on the outside for the majority of the ceremony (I handed them their rings and we had a few minutes hugged together), you don’t know how people will react. When the “third” comes loaded down with frosted treats he made, it’s pretty clear he’s good with this....

JJ Vincent is a 40-something guy who lives in north Alabama with his two partners and their three dogs, five cats, and a hamster. He's a graphic designer, copyeditor, and polycrafter who is equally fond of knitting and NASCAR and gleefully surrounds himself with pink sparkly things.

Read the whole tale (October 6, 2015).

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Bisexuals are the largest group of LGBTs, but they are strikingly closeted.

Pew Research issued a report in June on opinions and attitudes within the LGBT world. Pew Reports are the gold standard for social-survey research. Among the interesting findings: bisexuals, who don't get much public attention, make up the largest group under the L, G, B and T umbrella. But they are much less out to the people around them than lesbians and gays are.

Bisexuals account for the most self-identified LGBTs...
  

...but they are much less out than gays and lesbians.

This is significant to the poly world because roughly a third to a half of all self-identified polys say they are bi, and vice versa. That compares to just 3% of people in the general population who call themselves bisexual.

Here's the full Pew report: A Survey of LGBT Americans (June 13, 2013).

Most of it is about other topics. But here is a Los Angeles Times article, which came out more than a month later, about the study's bisexual findings:

Pew study: Majority of bisexuals still in the closet

At a time when gay rights have made stunning strides, and gays and lesbians have become far more willing to come out, the vast majority of bisexuals remains closeted, according to a Pew Research Center survey last month.

By Emily Alpert

LOS ANGELES — In the middle of the rainbowy revelers at the pride parade in West Hollywood, Jeremy Stacy was questioned: Are you really bisexual?

“One guy came up to me and said, ‘You’re really gay,’ ” said Stacy, who was standing under a sign reading, “Ask a Bisexual.”

“I told him I had a long line of ex-girlfriends who would vehemently disagree. And he said, ‘That doesn’t matter, because I know you’re gay.’ ”

Stacy had gotten the question before. From a friend who said anyone who had slept with men must be gay — even if he had also slept with women. From women who assumed he would cheat on them. From a boyfriend who insisted Stacy was really “bi now, gay later” — and dumped him when he countered he was “bi now, bi always.”

Such attitudes appear to have kept many bisexuals in the closet. At a time when gay rights have made stunning strides, and gays and lesbians have become far more willing to come out, the vast majority of bisexuals remains closeted, a Pew Research Center survey revealed last month.

Only 28 percent of bisexuals said most or all of the important people in their lives knew about their sexual orientation, compared to 71 percent of lesbians and 77 percent of gay men, Pew found. The numbers were especially small among bisexual men: Only 12 percent said they were out to that degree, compared to one-third of bisexual women who said the same.

Closeted bisexuals told the Los Angeles Times that they had avoided coming out because they didn’t want to deal with misconceptions that bisexuals were indecisive or incapable of monogamy — stereotypes that exist among straights, gays and lesbians alike.

The stereotypes make some reluctant to use the word, even after they come out. Laura McGinnis, communications director for the Trevor Project, an LGBT-youth suicide-prevention group, said she was 29 or 30 before she would readily share that she was bisexual or actively correct someone who thought otherwise.

“I hated the label because the assumption is that you’re sleeping around,” said McGinnis, now raising a child with her wife....

....“Bisexuals are thought to be confused, opportunistic and unable to make commitments — and those aren’t the kinds of things you want to see in an employee,” said Denise Penn, vice president of the American Institute of Bisexuality, a nonprofit that funds research.

LGBT community reacts

Inside the gay community, bisexual people are often seen as more privileged than gays and lesbians, able to duck discrimination by entering into straight relationships.

Far more bisexuals are in relationships with people of the opposite sex than the same sex, Pew found. They are less likely than gay men and lesbians to have weathered slurs or attacks, been rejected by friends or family or treated unfairly at work, its survey showed....

...A Kent State University study of bisexual women found that they were more likely than straight or lesbian women to harm themselves or endure suicidal thoughts. Other studies have also cited higher risks for bisexual men.

“I think these problems are coming from two places,” said Northwestern University human sexuality researcher Allen Rosenthal. “The absence of a bisexual community and the psychological stress of being in the closet.”

Activists say bisexuals have two closets — a straight and a gay one....

Read on (July 21, 2013).

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Edge magazine now explores why:

"If there’s no strong bisexual community and culture to be supported by, it’s hard to come out," said Kyle Schickner, a filmmaker and outspoken bisexual activist of 20 years. "If you’re a gay teenager and you move to a metropolitan area, it becomes easier to come out because there are so many of you - you have less to lose. Some bisexuals might be in a relationship with the same gender and just find it easier to say they’re gay."...

Whole article (August 8, 2013).

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While we're on the subject: here are Autostraddle's 37 Books By, For, or About Bisexual or Otherwise Non-Monosexual People, with 202 comments from readers about these selections and others.

Update: White House to Hold Roundtable on Bisexual Issues on September 23. This is certainly a first. The invitation to LGBT people for this was dated August 16th. I wonder if someone in the White House noticed the Pew report and realized there were voters being unreached?

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LGBTQ mag profiles exemplars of "ethical sluttery"

PQ Monthly

In case LGBTQs in Oregon hadn't got scoop on poly, the free monthly queer magazine of Portland and surrounding territories presents...

Ethical sluttery: Poly relationships expand the reach of love and sex

By Erin Rook

...Folks whose romantic and sexual relationships include more than two are still widely scorned in popular culture, so much so that same-sex marriage campaigns often emphasize that the couples they represent are “committed.”

But commitment is not the sole purview of monogamy. For those who practice polyamory (and it does take practice), the challenges inherent in holding space for and communicating with more than one person are outweighed by the opportunities for personal growth — and, to be fair, getting laid.

THIS IS WHAT POLYAMORY LOOKS LIKE

...Jake (a pseudonym) is 34 and currently considers himself “single.” But he is involved in a matrix of relationships, ranging from deep friendships that occasionally get physical to “flovers” (between a friend and a lover) and lovers with whom he shares physical and emotional intimacy....

“In general most people don’t expect one person to fulfill all of their needs in a particular area. No one expects a person to have just one friend who takes care of all of their non-romantic needs,” Kyra says. “Yet our culture demands that we do that for romantic love and for sex — and that romantic love and sex must be with the same person.”

Rachel Palmer and Devon Chase

Polyamorous relationships can take many forms and may shift over time. Rachael Palmer, 32, and Devon Chase, 30, have been married/partnered for seven years and each has casual secondary partners in addition to their primary relationship. Devon’s current secondary partner also has a primary partner and family of her own.

“The nature of our polyamory has changed a lot since we first got together,” Rachael says. “We used to only date people together and that came with its own set of rules that changed with who we were dating and, again, what made us both feel safe. For example, originally we would only date/sleep with people together and we wouldn’t interact romantically with said date without the other person around, but as we got more comfortable that changed, too. Now we date people together and opposite,” Rachael says. “We fuck other people because we want to be together for a long time and indulging our fantasies and desires keeps us happy and healthy.”

Read the whole article (December 2012 issue).

The author posts on the magazine's website a longer interview with Rachel and Devon, who identify as butch and femme queers, that didn't make it into the printed edition (Dec. 28, 2012).

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Are gay media becoming less fearful? Profiles of MMM triads.

Gay Express (New Zealand)

Long-term gay partners agree on some form of non-monogamy more often than straight couples do, though gay spokespeople sometimes act embarrassed by this fact and try to sweep it under the rug.

Gay-marriage advocates in particular often mirror the straight trope that young people will sow their wild oats and then want to settle down into monogamy. But as with straights, some do, some don't. Gay media gradually seem to be getting more forthright about reporting on committed couples in open relationships — and, less often, on fully poly households of three or more.

There's even a term for a gay triad — a thruple — that I don't see used elsewhere.

Two San Francisco thruples were recently profiled in GayExpress, New Zealand's only gay magazine:

Three’s no crowd

By Leif Wauters

You can call them three-ways, but that more often refers to a purely physical encounter. Triad is the most common name used, although I lovingly conjured up the phrase “thruple” in reference to this variety of relationship that is gaining more and more acceptance. It’s not for everyone, and perhaps shouldn’t be for some, but when it works, it really works. It brings out the best in each member and can open up incredible opportunities for love and companionship.

I’ll venture thruples are more common than you’d expect as many prefer to keep their unions private....

Mike and Race had dabbled in a thruple before meeting Jim [they're all pictured above], with both of their personalities being open to this type of union. “Neither of us has a monogamous nature. In fact, we’re seriously dedicated to non-monogamy and were from the time we started dating.” It was a first for Jim, however, spawned not by any type of need but by how truly special he found Mike and Race. “At one point I said something like ‘If I could put the two of you together you’d make the perfect husband’,” says Jim, “so it seemed natural to pursue it.”

It might amaze you but they faced very few hurdles becoming a thruple, with most of those in the first few months. Truly a testament to the belief that the right relationships are meant to be – they just click – and they believe that their combined love isn’t really much different than that between two people. “It’s about communication, caring, etc. It’s the same stuff as pairs have, but there are four relationships going on, each with each other and then the three together. You have to honour each of the four dynamics to make it work.”...

While the magic of Mike, Race and Jim’s relationship continues, others’ attempts haven’t lasted as long. Not to say they still aren’t a family, but Daniel, Dave and Ken (known in global bear circles as DaDaKe) committed an inspiring level of love and energy to maintaining their thruple in the time they spent together.

In 2001, Daniel and Dave were married in San Francisco, just two magical years after they’d met. Five years down the road, Dave encounter a tall, tattooed force of love from Atlanta named Ken while at Mid-Atlantic Leather (MAL) in Washington DC. Their initial relationship leaned more towards that of long distance daddy/boy bond, but when Daniel entered the mix, the dynamic shifted dramatically. Dave recalls Daniel and Ken’s first meeting quite clearly. “Ken flew to SF for my birthday (May 2007) and I think I could actually see Daniel fall in love with him at first sight. It was that immediate.”

Ken’s shares the same view of how their relationship blossomed. “After I came out in May and met Daniel, the balance obviously shifted with an intense attraction on all sides, far beyond the physical. From May to November, Daniel and I had the chance to have our ‘courting’ phase, as Dave and I had the previous few months.”...

...“Communicate, communicate, and communicate some more; no subject is taboo,” says Daniel, a perspective shared by all six men. “Allot time for each of the four relationships: the three pairs, and the thruple. During intense discussions between a pair, the third should not take sides and help them think out of the box (“Have you considered…”). Ken also strongly adds that people should “not try to force a triad into the mould of a two-person heterosexual relationship. Triads are a break in tradition. Allow your version to find the level of relationship that it needs, and be open to it when that form changes over time.”

Read the whole article (Sept. 6, 2011). Thanks to Sarah Taub for spotting it.

Here are all my poly-gay related articles in the last two years (including this one; scroll down).

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"Monogamish"

The Advocate

The Advocate has been a leading publication in the GLBT movement since the 1960s. Its August 2011 issue offers a gay take on the "monogamish" or "New Monogamy" trend that's growing (or at least being more discussed) among straight couples.

The terms refer to allowing secondary relationships, often with the goal of keeping a marriage thriving.^[1]. These build-it-yourself arrangements are supposedly taking a cue from gay culture, Dan Savage in particular. The term "monogamish" is Savage's invention.^[2]

Monogamish

We often protest when homophobes insist that same-sex marriage will change marriage for straight people too. But in some ways, they’re right. Here’s how gay relationships will change the institution — but for the better.

By Ari Karpel

When birth control pills were making Megan’s sex drive almost nonexistent, she told her boyfriend, Colin, what many gay men in a similar position might say to theirs: “If you want to have sex, feel free to sleep with someone else; just don’t tell me about it.”

...That’s how Megan, now 25, and Colin, 26, college sweethearts who live in Minneapolis, came to fashion a committed, nonmonogamous marriage. They don’t flaunt their unconventional lifestyle (they requested that their last name not be used), but they are hardly alone. By designing a relationship that doesn’t fit a typical married couple, Megan and Colin have joined a small but growing number of straight couples who are looking to gay male relationships as the model for long-term, nonmonogamous unions.

Anti-equality right-wingers have long insisted that allowing gays to marry will destroy the sanctity of “traditional marriage,” and, of course, the logical, liberal party-line response has long been “No, it won’t.” But what if — for once — the sanctimonious crazies are right? Could the gay male tradition of open relationships actually alter marriage as we know it? And would that be such a bad thing?...

Welcome to Queer (Roving) Eye for the Monogamous Straight Couple Lie....

Monogamish relationships are not about wild promiscuity or even Swingtown-style polyamory, two things the term nonmonogamy connotes...

“If it’s open in a controlled way, then it’s less destructive to a relationship,” preaches Savage, whose podcasts, column, and blog have become a soapbox for his views on relationships.

Nevertheless, Savage’s own account of his monogamish relationship (he and his husband, Terry Miller, have been together for 16 years and have a 13-year-old son) fosters a sense of support and community for couples who find little of it elsewhere....

Even many gay male couples, who Savage describes as having “perfected nonmonogamy,” fear disclosing that their relationship is anything but one-on-one. Gary (not his real name) is out in every area of his life, and his family is completely supportive. “But I don’t tell my family, even my brother — who I’m incredibly close with — that I have sex outside of the relationship with Ben,” his partner of 14 years, he says. “I have never said that to him.”

Gary and Ben, who live in Los Angeles, won’t reveal their real names because Ben has a high-profile career in television. “We have too much to lose,” Gary says. “But we also don’t want people passing judgment on us.” Which is why they don’t even tell most of their friends.

Blake Spears and Lanz Lowen recently completed The Couples Study, an examination of nonmonogamy among 86 gay couples.... The thing they found most striking is that while nonmonogamy seems to be fairly pervasive among gay couples (though they did not hear from the many monogamous pairs), there is surprisingly little support within the gay population for such relationships.... [Many statistics follow.]

...The Couples Study suggests that consensual nonmonogamy can have a stabilizing effect on relationships.... “Having an open relationship, even when we don’t act on it frequently, has been great for us and for our sex life,” says Dave. “It makes us feel more secure with each other, and we don’t fear cheating. Also, it’s improved the sex just because it’s exciting to think about having sex with other people.”...

Read the whole article (August 2011 issue).

Update: Autostraddle now has an article on this topic: Gay Marriage Doesn’t Change Straight Marriage… Except When It Does (Aug. 9, 2011).

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Announcements: Upcoming Poly Gatherings!

Several poly-community events are happening soon! In date order:

● Polycamp Northwest, Millersylvania State Park south of Seattle, August 26–29. A big, kid- and family-friendly campout with workshops, hikes, canoeing, singing, dance, games from Calvinball to frisbee golf. Some adults-only workshops/discussions. Polycamp NW had well over 100 people last year. Deadline for meal-plan signup is August 7. See newspaper article about Polycamp last year (by Dan Savage!).

● Polyday at Dragon Hall, London, U.K., August 27. "At Polyday you'll meet a wide variety of people who all know that happy and honest relationships don't have to be monogamous. Talks and discussion groups throughout the day, followed by an evening of music and socialising. Workshops begin at noon, entertainment and social in the evening until 11pm."

● At Burning Man, Nevada desert, Aug. 29 – Sept. 5. (Note, Burning Man is already full. If you didn't get a ticket yet you can't get in.):

Poly Asylum theme camp, all week; azimuth 7:30, sector Graduation. Pepper Mint and friends are running this. He writes, "We will be holding workshops, putting on parties, and doling out nonmonogamy advice to anyone who wanders in. Feel free to stop by and chat with us! Also, be sure to check out our Friday mid-evening party — this is the first ever public polyamory party on playa that I've heard of." Afternoon offerings include The Poly Doctors Are In, Happy Insanity Hour, Dealing With Jealousy, Nurturing Secondary and Play-Buddy Relationships, Poly Perspectives Beyond Sex, and Nonmonogamy and Parenting.

Poly Paradise theme camp, all week; azimuth 4:15, sector Engagement. Poly Paradise is now in its 13th year. In past years it has been, to my knowledge, one of the largest poly assemblages anywhere. Scheduled workshops and events include Heart of Now, Poly High Tea, the desert Hiney Hygiene Station and the famous Human Carcass Wash, Radical Honesty workshops, Revolutionary Honesty, Mind Melt, and Herpes/STIs Out of the Closet.

● Loving More's annual Conference Retreat, north of Albany, New York, at the Easton Mountain Retreat Center; September 9–11. Relationship and deep-communication workshops, navigating poly both for beginners and the advanced, tantra and energy sessions; warm fellowship, beautiful rural setting, hot tubbing, sauna, pool, stars. Clothing optional (though not many go bare except around the hot tub, sauna, and pool). I've been coming to this since 2005 and will be back again. Highly recommended. See you there.

● Poly Pride Weekend, New York City, October 7–9. Sponsored by Polyamorous NYC. Now in its 11th year, the Poly Pride Picnic & Rally takes place Saturday noon to 6 on Great Hill in Central Park. Music, speakers, performers; past programs have been excellent. Not huge; attendance the last two years has only been in the 100 range. GLBT oriented. The weekend also features a dance party at Infinity and a massive Cuddle Party. I attended in 2008, 2009, and 2010 and spoke at the first two. See my last writeup.

● OpenCon, in Gillingham, Dorset, U.K.; October 14–16. "A 3-day event in the English countryside for everyone who knows that happy and honest relationships don't have to be monogamous. OpenCon combines discussions, workshops and socialising to give you a chance to meet like-minded people, to build our community and to celebrate its diversity.... OpenCon 2010 was hugely successful, and we anticipate that OpenCon 2011 will be even more fun. OpenCon has grown out of Polyday, which has been run in various cities in the UK over the last several years. We hope you'll join us!"

● Southern Polyamory Gathering at All World Acres, Tampa Bay area, Florida; October 20–23. "Workshops, activities, and entertainment presented by members of the polyamorous community. The community at AWA has had plenty of experience presenting festivals that are always educational and fun. Planned activities include meet-and-greet party the first evening, entertainment, nightly bonfire with drumming and dancing, workshops by various presenters to help one understand and appreciate polyamory; camping, vendors, more." Camping facilities are said be to very primitive, but there are showers, flush toilets, and a cafe on site. No kids allowed (except for little bitties).


Farther out, mark your calendar for 2012:

● Poly Living Conference, Philadelphia, February 10–12, 2012. This is also put on by Loving More each year. The format and people are similar to the September Retreat, but Poly Living is held in a very nice large hotel with full amenities, convenient to the Philadelphia airport. Not clothing optional. Here's last year's workshop list to give you an idea. Here's my writeup of the first Poly Living I attended (2006).

● Atlanta Poly Weekend, northern Atlanta, March 9–11, 2012. This new hotel conference, which began in 2011, is put on by energetic people of the Atlanta Poly meetup group. Participant-generated workshops, panels, discussion sessions; fun events in the evening. Kid-friendly. I came to the first APW last March, which drew well over 100 people; see my writeup.

● Polyamory House Party Weekend, June 8-10, 2012. The dates are already set for this second annual network of “barbecues, keggers, potlucks, raves, picnics, blues dances, play parties, tantric retreats, game nights, field days, movement fundraisers, cuddle parties, and fancy dinners.” Mark your calendar, and start planning your event!

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[1] My posts on recent articles about the "monogamish" trend:

The New York Times Sunday Magazine is the biggest outlet so far to jump on it, citing Dan Savage as the model; much reaction resulted. Elsewhere, Savage is called America’s most important sex ethicist. A New York weekly considers what straight couples can learn from same-sex couples about negotiating unconventional arrangements. Two new books on the topic are getting mainstream press: Marriage Confidential and Unhitched. Another is in the works: The New Monogamy. And check out Polyamory for Monogamists.

So why do I have a queasy feeling? There’s a big unspoken assumption going on here: that radical, paradigm-breaking relationship forms will naturally work out just fine for normals — people who don't think to examine their other old-culture habits about human relations, or the assumptions in which the rest of their lives are embedded. There is a reason why the 1970s open-marriage movement among mainstream, middle-class couples is widely remembered for its failure rate. I say this while still full of fizz from being at Network for New Culture Summer Camp East last month.

[2] Savage has quite the knack for inventing words that stick: santorum, saddlebacking, pegging, campsite rule, GGG, DTMFA, lifting luggage.... See list with definitions and origins (scroll down).

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Happy Pride Month! Poly in the GLBT world

President Obama has declared June as LGBT Pride Month. At Pride parades and festivals around North America, poly groups are joining in. If you're in Boston this Saturday June 11th, come by the Boston Pride Festival at City Hall Plaza (where the parade ends) and visit our "Polyamory!" booth. I'll be there. We've always had a hugely positive reception.

Meanwhile....

The Bilerico Project claims to be the web's largest LGBTQ group blog. It features a cream-of-the-crop roster of invited contributors in GLBT leadership roles, "offering analysis and opinion on almost every aspect of LGBTQ politics and culture." The Washington Post called it a "must read" that is "rebooting the gay rights movement in a decentralized, spontaneous, bottom-up way."

A guest commentator (not one of the regulars) speaks up there for polyamory, still a contentious topic in parts of the gay community:

A Straightforward (But Complex) Loving Life

By Wintersong Tashlin

I have been sitting in front of my blank computer screen for a solid ten minutes now trying to figure out exactly how to begin this post. No matter how hard I reach for greater eloquence or depth, I keep coming back to a single sentence....

Being polyamorous is pretty damn awesome.

Now for the requisite disclaimers:

I am of course, only speaking for myself, from my own experience. I am not going to say that being poly is always awesome.... Nor am I going to say that polyamory is inherently better than monogamy...

I have a husband. I actually used to have two of them, and hopefully will someday again. What "husband" in this case means is that we live together and share just about every aspect of our lives. My husband Fire and I have been together for about twelve years now and intended to be in a multi-partner marriage from the very start. About two and half years after we got together we entered into a relationship with Evan, which lasted for just over eight years before he chose to divorce us. As the three of us before did, Fire and I share a house, bills, the care and feeding of an adorable dog, and other joys and duties found in traditionally "married" relationships. Even when there were three of us, it was remarkably "normal" by many of the yardsticks by which marriages are measured.

However, outside of our marriage, Fire and I have other intimate relationships that can take many forms. I have a boyfriend I am crazy about, although he lives far away. There are a number of people I care about and in some cases love deeply who I sometimes I play/have sex with. Right now there's also a relationship with another guy in my life that I'm letting evolve where it will....

If that sounds complicated, it is because it is. Whenever people tell me that I'm poly because it is "easier" than monogamy I have to laugh. Friends of mine who are in a four-person polyamorous marriage, and have a new baby, have to balance their schedules as carefully as generals plan amphibious invasions involving multiple chains of command. Ensuring that people don't end up feeling neglected or on the reverse, like they never have time to themselves, is a perpetual challenge in polyamory. Keeping lines of communication flowing between two people can be a task; doing it with a husband, a boyfriend or two, and several lovers can feel downright Sisyphean at times.

But then, at the same time it's damn awesome when things click together right.

A few weeks ago I attended my boyfriend's wedding. If this were a Hollywood film, that sentence would likely be filled with depressive angst about watching the man I love marry someone else.... What probably wouldn't leap to mind is me walking him proudly down the aisle and handing him off to his radiant bride while her father stood teary eyed beside her.

...My heart is directed outwards, not locked in a box that only one other person has the key to....

Polyamorous people, especially queer ones, are boogymen at the moment. Every time the anti-gay right brings us out as part of the "slippery slope" argument against same-sex-marriage, the representatives from Gay Inc are quick to take offense and clarify that we LGBTs are just as against that sort of thing as they are.... I have to say that I am growing tired of my family being demonized from both sides.... I think it is important for us to make our voices heard once in a while. Not to demand legal recognition or a place at the table, but simply to say "This is how we love, and you know what, it's pretty damn awesome. So maybe lay off a little."

Read the whole article (May 16, 2011).

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Elsewhere in the gay world, Kiki Christie, a mover and shaker in the Canadian Polyamory Advocacy Association, got a good say at the podium of a GLBT event in Vancouver. From Xtra/ Vancouver:

Over 400 attend anti-homophobia breakfast

A 400-plus crowd at an annual anti-homophobia breakfast gave a rousing ovation to a delegation of Burnaby students who are fighting to introduce a gay-friendly policy in their district's schools....

The day was also honoured at city hall with Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson declaring May 17, 2011, "International Day Against Homophobia" in Vancouver.

While the original theme of the breakfast was same-sex marriage, the event's organizers decided in the end to embrace a broader concept of queer relationships.

...Kiki Christie, founder of Victoria Poly 101, challenged the audience to reconsider the heteronormative ideas that dominate society's view of partnerships. She highlighted social networking site Facebook and its limited relationship option tags as a prime example of how "couple normative" ideas permeate society and limit the choices of those who might identify differently.

"As open relationships become increasingly public and politicized, we are in need of a new cultural relationship model that is distinct from monogamy [and] that still demonstrates the values of love, commitment, and security that are important to all of us," she added....

Read the whole article (May 17, 2011).

Update: Some more poly LGBT items:

Poly as a hip queer-female thing: "All the Cute Girls Have (Multiple) Girlfriends: Polyamory And Queer Women.

The recent book Finally Out: Letting Go of Living Straight, by gay psychatrist Loren A. Olson, treats poly in a chapter on sex outside of a committed relationship.

At The New Gay: "I, Non-Monogamist".

A while back in Metro Weekly of Washington, DC: "Two For One: A magic number for some, "3" brings a world of challenges in a triad relationship".

Here are many of my past LGBT posts (including this one; scroll down).

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"There’s More Than One Way to Have a Lesbian Relationship"

Autostraddle

If you haven't studied Franklin Veaux's Venn diagram of nonmonogamy even now that it's gone viral, you just have no geek cred at all. It may have inspired the flowchart of lesbian relationships that's gone up on Autostraddle ("news, entertainment and girl-on-girl culture"). Autostraddle is an online lesbian magazine that specializes in the brash, radical and sexy. A quality flowchart is brash, radical and sexy, and if you don't understand this you probably don't get xkcd either¹, so there.

Start at the "YOU" box at center and see if you end up at "polyamorous." That's where the happiest choices seem to get you.

Here's the article accompanying it:

There’s More Than One Way to Have a Lesbian Relationship

By Andrea

...Perhaps you have, in the recent past, had an intense, intimate, friendly, semi-cordial relationship with another cute/hot/pretty/(insert aesthetic adjective here) person and are now wondering what it could possibly mean.

Hopefully it means that your life is about to get a lot more exciting, filled with lots of adorable chemical reactions that hopefully don’t leave you with any complicated byproducts. There’s no need to worry; hang out with this new girl, go to a concert, make breakfast, cuddle. You don’t have to give in to external pressures of labeling yourselves. You can enjoy yourselves without being monogamous.

...I mean, if the only ‘real’ interactions we had with people were serious relationships and we were otherwise alone, we would probably all be friendless, emotionally distraught hermits.

...Thus I have compiled some possible relationship (or friendship) types for all of you autostraddling lovers and friendlers.

Friendship: Filled with platonic cuddling, honesty, and wonderful adventures....

Ambiguous friendship with a straight girl....

Friends with benefits.... Who doesn’t love hooking up without consequences?

Open relationship: Through my own experience and friends’ experiences here’s what I have learned: open relationships are much like monogamous relationships in that both people deeply care for each other, maybe even love (scary, right?). However, this does not imply the demise of sexual attraction to other people. Thus, both interested parties are granted the freedom to pursue alternative, noncommittal, non-significant intimate relationships with other people....

--Type I open relationship:... If/when one member gets down and dirty with someone else, they come clean about it....

--Type II open relationship: Both people agree that they are allowed to hook up with other people; however, neither wants to hear about it.

Polyamory: Having both intimate, emotional, open, and consensual interactions with multiple people. Polyamory includes the idea that jealousy does not have to exist (for a more in-depth discussion, check out Autostraddle dot com’s ‘Polyamory 101’). Jealousy is hard to deal with. As much as I would like to pretend that I’ve never experienced it or never will it can be a pernicious destroyer of both relationships and friendships. But that is only if you let it.

Monogamous relationships: I don’t think I can go here until I’m older/mature/experienced/mentally stable.

Long distance: It better be fucking worth it.

Read the whole article (April 21, 2011).

The article references this earlier one:

What Do You Mean You’re Not Monogamous?

by Akwaeke Z Emezi

....Eventually I reached a point where I had to put my foot down, throw my hands up and say it: I don’t want to be monogamous. Never have. Ever. Ever. Just admitting that was step one, and step two meant that I had to get vocal about it from the jump, so that I wouldn’t end up dating monogamous people and mislead us both about what was possible.

Whoo, that led to some interesting conversations that raised my hackles. I’ve heard some blanket statements and generalizations about nonmonogamy that simply did my head in, so I think it’s about time we educate ourselves, open discussions, and learn from each other. Let’s tackle a few issues in bullet point, shall we?...

● Poly people just want to sleep with a lot of people. You can switch this up with ‘poly people are greedy,’ et cetera – any format where it just gets reduced to sex....

● Poly people just can’t commit. Oh, this one gets under my skin to no end.... This one usually gets linked to the first one: operating under the premise that it is impossible to commit to a person if you’re busy smanging other people, i.e. commitment always = monogamy. False.

● Isn’t this the same thing as being a cheater? No....

● What’s the point of being with someone if you’re going to continue smanging/dating other people? If you don’t want to be with a poly person, it’s simple. Don’t.... I’ve had a close friend get furious that I had the nerve to get married while nonmonogamous....

● What if you change your mind and turn out to want a monogamous relationship? #blinks. Then I’ll date monogamously.

● Did... did you just say relationship orientation?? I believe that for some people, being poly is innate and not a choice....

● Polyamory/nonmonogamy is just the newest trend. People started saying this about natural hair, did you know?

Feel free to add your own bullet points.

There are also a lot of myths that run in the opposite directions, such as claiming that poly relationships are ‘more evolved’ than monogamous ones, or that involve people treating monogamous people with disdain. Prejudice can run both ways in this case....

So now, I turn it over to you. What are some preconceptions you’ve had about monogamy or nonmonogamy? Have you ever encountered someone who is extremely anti- one or the other?

About the author: Born and bred in the south of Nigeria, Akwaeke Z Emezi is an Igbo and Tamil free love advocate, genderqueer Nutri-C addict, and natural hair aficionado... A current Brooklynite.

Read the whole article (March 24, 2011).

More lesbian poly on Autostraddle.

P.S., later: How could I have forgotten to include Franklin's flowchart snarking stereotypical couples looking for hot bi babes?

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¹ Okay okay, here's the joke. The scientists study 20 jelly bean colors. For 19 colors they find no acne causation at the 2-sigma level, meaning only a 5% chance that the result is a statistical fluke (p = 0.05), the usual standard for scientific publication. But look carefully at panel number 14: the statistically expected fluke happens. Scientifically illiterate media then go nuts.

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Mono, poly, and the anthropology of jealousy

Psychology Today online

If we've been shaped by the fact that our ancestors evolved in polyamorous mate-sharing tribes for hundreds of thousands of years — as argued in the hot new book Sex at Dawn: The Prehistoric Origins of Modern Sexuality — then why do humans the world over seem to have come out of those hundreds of thousands of years hardwired for jealousy?

The conventional answers are simple. Men who carry the trait of driving other men away from their women are more likely to spread their own genes — including that trait. And, women and infants were more likely to survive and reproduce if a woman stopped her man from giving scarce resources to someone else; this selected for the jealousy trait in females.

But those two answers are built on an unspoken assumption that the Sex at Dawn authors call Flintstonization: the assumption that our stone-age ancestors lived in compartmentalized monogamous families like the Flintstones, "the modern stone-age fam-il-eee." In reality (anthropological findings indicate), people in isolated, stone-age hunter-gatherer tribes interbreed so thoroughly that they perpetuate very similar genes no matter who they mate with inside the tribe. And secondly, child-rearing is such a communal activity that the identity of the birth father hardly matters and is often not even known.

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NEWS! Christopher Ryan, Sex at Dawn co-author, will appear at Loving More's Poly Living West conference near Seattle on October 23, for an evening speech and book-signing! Day passes available. See the end of this post.

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Dropping the Flintstones assumption explains another age-old question: why wasn't homosexuality quickly bred out of humans ages ago, since gays tend to not pass on their genes at all? Yet homosexuality continues to exist all around the world, and as far back as is known.

A poly-tribe explanation for this is clear. Females in the tribe had abundant mates; semen-scarcity was not the limiting factor for successful reproduction. The limiting scarcities were things like food, resources, defense against predators, and other things that depend on cooperation and loyalty within the tribe — for which gay bonding works as well as the straight kind. Darwinian selection happens at all levels — groups as well as individuals.

But what about jealousy? In particular, what about jealousy among gays and lesbians? Why does gay jealousy persist when it has nothing to do with breeding?

Jesse Bering, a blogger for Scientific American, challenged Sex at Dawn co-author Christopher Ryan about this last month in a much-quoted essay on why jealousy and heartbreak exist. He challenged the "polyamory chic" that Sex at Dawn and its like are creating, and argued that the powerful human traits of jealousy and heartbreak torpedo Ryan's thesis.

Last week he and Ryan met in person (and shared a dinner of octopus). Following their no-doubt animated (and tentacular?) discussion, Ryan posted his rebuttal on his Psychology Today blogsite. In short: jealousy as we know it is not really about sex. Symptoms of mate-jealousy in modern society, where available mates tend to be scarce, are remarkably like childrens' fear of abandonment where there is a scarcity of invested parents. Writes Ryan:

On Gay Jealousy:
How to explain jealousy in same-sex couples?

Jesse Bering recently wrote a typically insightful and entertaining blog piece in which he explores the possible evolutionary origins of sexual jealousy. He begins by asserting that, "Heartbreak is every bit as much a psychological adaptation as is the compulsion to have sex with those other than our partners, and it throws a monster of a monkey wrench into the evolutionists' otherwise practical polyamory."

He goes on to dramatically buttress his case that our evolved capacity for empathy, a signature feature of our species, makes us very sensitive to the suffering our sexual indiscretions may cause our primary partner:

"We may not be a sexually exclusive species, but we do form deep romantic attachments, and the emotional scaffolding on which these attachments are built is extraordinarily sensitive to our partners' sexual indiscretions. I also say this as a gay man who, according to mainstream evolutionary thinking, shouldn't be terribly concerned about his partner having sex with strangers. After all, it isn't as though he's going to get pregnant and cuckold me into raising another man's offspring. But if you'd explained that to me as I was screaming invectives at one of my partners following my discovery that he was cheating on me, curled up in the fetal position in the corner of my kitchen and rocking myself into self-pitying oblivion, or as I was vomiting my guts out over the toilet for much of the next two weeks, I would have nodded in rational Darwinian assention while still trembling like a wounded animal.

...Bering argues that while this emotional/psychological response may have originally been related to biological concerns (paternity assurance for men, resource flow for women), its ubiquity among homosexuals shows that the response is now deeply embedded in the human psyche, concluding that, "sexual jealousy in gay men can only be explained by some sort of pseudo-heterosexuality mindset simulating straight men's hypervigilance to being cuckolded by their female partners."

I'm not buying that.

Where's the proof that sexual jealousy (experienced as heartbreak) is an unavoidable response to a partner's extra-pair sexual activity? If it were a genetically encoded behavioral response, there would be very few, if any exceptions to this pattern. Yet every major city (and plenty of small towns) have sex clubs where couples have sex with extra-pair partners with no discernible emotional consequences at all — at least not negative ones.... Most surveys of these so-called "swingers" indicate that they are more satisfied with their marriages than couples in more conventional arrangements. Add to this the large number of men who actually find the notion of being cuckholded very appealing (described by fellow PT blogger, David Ley in his fascinating book, Insatiable Wives). Then add the societies we describe in Sex at Dawn in which a party without extra-pair sex is like breakfast without coffee, and the genetic argument starts looking very wobbly indeed.

Let's consider the possibility that much, if not all, of this heartbreak is a learned response.

The separation anxiety Bering describes bears striking similarities to that experienced by a baby who feels abandoned by its mother. We live in a society that greatly amplifies that innate fear of abandonment by ignoring the baby's need for 24/7 maternal contact in the first few years of life.... The association between mother-love and lover-love is enhanced through a constant media onslaught ("Oooh baby, baby") and a freakishly childish understanding of mature sexual love.

...Loss is loss, regardless of sexual orientation. We all fear rejection and abandonment. It's a harsh and lonely world out there, and we're a tender, vulnerable species. So it's not surprising that gay men cherish their deepest connections and fear losing them just as much as anyone else does. It's not really about sex at all, at the deepest levels. It's about intimacy and love [when these are scarce –ed.]. We just find this fear often expressed in the sexual arena because that's where we've relegated so much of our intimacy in our fractured, conflicted world.

Read the whole article.

The anthropological studies behind this stuff, by the way, aren't just about mating and relationships. Just out from the University of Notre Dame: Research Shows Child-Rearing Practices of Distant Ancestors Foster Morality, Compassion in Kids.

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Breaking News: Loving More has just snagged Christopher Ryan for its Poly Living West conference on the outskirts of Seattle October 22-24. Ryan will speak on Saturday evening, October 23, from 7 to 8. This will be followed by an author's reception from perhaps 8:30 to 11:30 along with three other poly-book authors, as a fundraiser for Loving More (which desperately needs funds). Ryan is witty, fast and funny and should be quite an attraction.

He has not had much to do with the poly community up to now, but he has become very interested in learning more about us. This means you. C'mon, show up! I'll be there too.

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"Queer Polyamory for Lesbians"

Autostraddle

There's the idea that lesbians are way less interested in multi-relating than gay guys. Maybe so, but not always. The online magazine Autostraddle — "an intelligent, hilarious & provocative voice and a progressive online community for a new generation of kickass lesbian, bisexual & otherwise inclined ladies" — presents an interview with a couple of poly girl girls.

Do you have a girlfriend? That’s fine. I also have a girlfriend. But I think you’re cute, and you think I’m cute, and let’s not waste all this cuteness and attraction just because we both have girlfriends. I’m sorry, did that come off a little harsh? It wasn’t supposed to. It’s just what a conversation might sound like in a world where monogamy wasn’t the norm. Contrary to popular belief, monogamy and fidelity are not one in the same....

LAUREN: You guys, I’m a real lesbian! I think U-Haul jokes are trite but true, I can’t help but make cooing sounds at babies and small animals, I love Tegan and Sara like whoa, and oh, right, I like girls. I’m just like any other lesbian — but I don’t believe in monogamy.

KATRINA: A lot of people right now are beginning to see a shift in the definition of what it means to be in a relationship, and that definition is no longer contingent upon monogamy. The concept of polyamory is nothing new, of course, but the concept of serious, loving, and functioning relationships that are also sexually open sometimes seems to be.

LAUREN: Because let’s face it, most of us can’t really seem to get down with the idea of a true, real, loving, and open relationship. I’ve been there! I used to be one of those preachers too: monogamy and self-control and don’t you ever think about cheating....

KATRINA: I get it, the idea of straying from monogamy is scary. I know that when Sara Quin first sang “I’m not unfaithful, but I’ll stray,” all of our lesbian hearts stopped as we resigned ourselves to believing that if Sara Quin didn’t believe in monogamy or happily ever after, then none of us ever had a chance at falling in love again. Ever!

It’s no surprise that we feel this way. “Monogamy” is most relationship’s #1 Rule. Straying from that is like falling down a slippery societal slope which eventually leads to women getting the right to vote and gays wanting to get married....

We are inclined to cling to monogamy as the defining factor of ‘serious relationships’ because society values it above all else. It’s more important than trust, honesty, stability, reliability, or emotional availability....

LAUREN: My new outlook on relationships has been vague and life-changing, kinda like when I came out to myself as a non-hetero. ‘Monogamous’ is yet another mold I don’t fit into, and its one that I’ve been trained to see as wrong, immoral and just plain “unnatural.” And if you do do it, you’ve gotta be a gay man, because they’re the only ones who can get away with it.

KATRINA: ...Much like coming out to yourself as queer (I hear a lot of us around here have done that), coming out as non-monogamous isn’t just about sexual freedom, it’s about sexual honesty.

It’s important to us not just as queer women, but as WOMEN. Men have monopolized the idea of multiple sexual partnership for all of time: from the pre-feminist acceptance of men having mistresses to how lesbians have been repeatedly left out of same-sex couples’ polyamorous movement. We’re mired in ideas like “men want to fuck, women don’t.” “Boys will be boys.” But it’s not fair to ignore this desire in women.

Sex does matter to us. It’s not an obligation and it’s not for procreation, and we do it for love, yeah, but we do it for fun too. ‘Cause it feels good, ’cause we wanna, and ’cause we can....

LAUREN: If you don’t fit into the box, it’s okay to let yourself out of it. And it’s okay to stay in the ‘box’ if that’s what makes you happy. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with monogamy; just that we’ve observed that the pressure put upon it makes room for some nasty things, like being overly possessive and jealousy.

...LAUREN: I actually ended up in an open relationship on accident. Me and my partner let an elephant out of the room when we finally had a conversation about how we both found the same girl attractive, and admitting this out loud to each other brought us closer, actually, rather than jealousy pulling us apart.

Things opened up. We saw each other as people with independent sexualities instead of just each other’s girlfriends. Of course it was more comfortable to tell myself that she only wanted me, forever & ever, and that we’d live happily ever after, but that would be lying to myself about what I really wanted and about who she really is.

KATRINA: ...Exploring polyamory for me is almost like exploring a new kind of queerness....

We shouldn’t expect to get non-monogamy right the first time we try to understand or execute it. We still might not get it the second time, or even the third. But maybe it’s not because monogamy is the only way that works, but because there are an infinite amount of ways for relationships to succeed or fail or rework themselves before it’s right.

...This is the generation in which it’s becoming possible to grow up gay. To be able to come out and live without alias or excuse. Maybe our sexual revolution is a revolution of exposure and presence. And although the ultimate goal that some chase is normalcy, we are in a period now where being out means that sex and sexuality are intrinsically tied to your identity, whether that’s the way you perceive it or the way others perceive you. Being gay forced us to honestly consider the possibilities of our sexualities; being non-monogamous forces us to honestly consider the possibilities of our sexualities as they relate to others and re-evaluate the forces that make our partnerships special and honest above all else....

Read the whole article (Aug. 24, 2010).

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"Gay after marriage: A bisexual woman figures out how to make it work"

The Daily Loaf

The website of Creative Loafing for Tampa Bay (one of a chain of alternative newspapers in the South) offers a first-person story tracing a path by which many people explore their way into polyamory.

Gay after marriage: A bisexual woman figures out how to make it work

What do you do when you discover you’re gay after you’re already married?

By Alexandra and her husband, Nick

I suppose a lot of spouses trip over themselves as they run to find a lawyer. I suppose others cry or yell or throw things. I suppose still more sprout feathers and thrust their heads into the sand. But not my husband. Actually, he was the one who told me that I’m bi.

No, it was I who sobbed into our bedspread until my eyes could hardly open. It was I who said “No, no, no” as my husband rubbed my back and told me everything was okay and that he still loves me. It was I who woke up the next morning and denied that night had any real meaning. And it was I for whom it took eight more months until I could finally learn to realize, then accept, then love the fact that I also love women.

But what then? I am married. I am loyal. I am … so gay.

Once again, Nick surprised me. First in the utter joy and relief he emanated when I finally realized that I like women, and then when he said, “This is an important part of who you are. You need to explore this and date women.” When I replied, “But I’m married,” he said, so what? He didn’t want me to deny a fundamental part of who I am or hold me back. And that’s when I learned the word, polyamory....

...Nick paved the way eight months prior, and then Kim helped get me to the tipping point of acceptance in October 2009. Out of the blue, she casually mentioned that she had once dated a couple. My head snapped to attention at that moment. Wait, you can DO that?...

...For days I couldn’t stop thinking about that. I began to unlock dusty doors hiding in the shadows of my mind, allowing myself to sneak inside and, for the first time, explore the mental images and concepts that hid behind them. I remembered a dream that I’d had more than a year before that left a smile on my lips for days without knowing why....

...My two champions and best friends threw me a coming out party. Nick even baked me a pussy cake. Yes. That’s right. A French vanilla cake with vanilla fudge frosting, pink sugar sprinkles and topped with fruit in the unmistakable arrangement of a vagina. A half a mango, raspberries, grape jelly and cocoa powder came together to create a beautiful, delicious … um, yeah. I don’t even need the photos Nick snapped to remember the look of delighted disbelief on Kim’s face when she realized what the cake depicted.

Then came the more challenging part. How in the world does one dive into the poly world? Nick and I found an amazing support network on FetLife.com, both for my bisexuality and for polyamory.... The biggest gift it gave me was realizing that Nick and I aren’t alone....

Read the whole article (June 26, 2010).

Update July 6: The author posts another article on The Daily Loaf telling more about her evolving story: My poly adventure: Polyamory, bisexuality and me.

Update July 29: She's doing more in this continuing series. Here's the list.

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The Non-Monogamous Male Couples study

San Francisco Bay Times

Open committed relationships are much more common and understood in the gay world than in straight society, though same-sex marriage campaigners are sometimes embarrassed to say so. Such arrangements can often work very well, according to a recently completed study of non-monogamous gay couples.

What factors make for success? Members of long-term open gay couples in the study often cited communication, honesty, transparency, respectful negotiation about needs and boundaries, and various forms of conscious relationship work. Sounds familiar.

The study included 86 couples who had been together for at least 8 years (the average time together was 16.2 years) and who were currently non-monogamous. The two authors themselves fit this category. They have posted a comprehensive summary, "Beyond Monogamy: Lessons from Long-Term Male Couples in Non-Monogamous Relationships" (78-page .pdf document), and have set up a website with overviews.

The San Francisco Bay Times reported on the study Thursday:

Long-Term Non-Monogamous Male Couples

By Tom Moon, MFT | March 4, 2010

Blake Spears and Lanz Lowen have been together for over 34 years. They told me that they still have great sex, contradicting the common belief that sexual interest inevitably wanes in a long-term relationship. How do they do it? “One reason,” Lanz said, “is that we’ve been in an open relationship from the very beginning. If we hadn’t been open, we wouldn’t have been able to grow individually or as a couple.” But, they write, this was a journey they took “without a roadmap… Information about how couples navigate this terrain is surprisingly lacking. We were curious about the experience of others and assumed many long-term couples might offer valuable perspectives and hard-earned lessons.”

So, a few years back, they decided to use their combined training and experience in research and psychology to do an independent, in-depth study of other long-term open gay male relationships.

They hoped to provide the community with an accurate picture of what non-monogamy actually looks like in the lives of gay men....

This study is a fascinating read because the authors largely avoid speculation and let the participants speak for themselves. One finding that fascinated me was the many varieties of “openness” that the couples practiced. Some only played together, some only separately, and some did both. Some only allowed anonymous outside encounters, while others allowed “friends with benefits” and still others built polyamorous families with multiple partners. Some (about ten percent) had no rules at all governing outside sex, while at the other end of the spectrum others created detailed ground rules and contracts. Every imaginable kind of “openness” seemed to work for someone.

The study includes a summary of previous research on non-monogamy, in which the authors report that “Most research shows that approximately two-thirds of long-term male couples who have been together for five years or more are honestly non-monogamous,” and that “Multiple studies have found no differences in relationship quality or satisfaction between samples of sexually exclusive and non-exclusive male couples.”

Despite those findings, they had a hard time recruiting participants. They had no trouble finding non-monogamous couples, but relatively few who wanted to talk about it. One man who chose to participate said “Having an open relationship feels like a funny way of being in the closet again. Family and friends expect that we’re monogamous, and we don’t tell them we’re not. It’s like a secret….In our community and society, it feels like something huge isn’t being talked about or studied or understood.”

It’s no wonder. Non-monogamous relationships may be common in our community, but I still frequently hear gay men criticize them as pathological, immature, and destructive. I’m sometimes confidently assured, as if it’s self-evident, that open relationships are less healthy, loving, responsible, or honest than monogamous relationships; that if you’re having outside sex, something must be wrong with the love or the communication in your partnership; that outside sex causes you to lose your focus on one another other; and that once you “start straying” it’s “the beginning of the end.”

Blake and Lanz came to different conclusions. While they concede that “…we had a study population skewed towards the positive,” they believe their work shows that “...it is reasonable to conclude that non-monogamy for gay male couples is a viable option. When partners find enough common ground in their inclinations and perspectives toward non-monogamy, sanctioned outside sex is a sustainable and satisfying possibility. If a couple is willing to be forthright and to problem-solve as needed, non-monogamy isn’t by nature de-stabilizing. In fact, the results of this study would suggest the opposite – many study couples said non-monogamy enabled them to stay together. The average length of relationship for interviewed couples was 16 years – double our minimum requirement. Given the difficulties we had in recruiting participants, this figure suggests a positive correlation between longevity and non-monogamy. At a minimum, it destroys the myth that opening the relationship is the ‘beginning of the end’.”

On the other hand “…for most couples, there was a price of admission. Non-monogamy came with risks and required maintenance.” Most participants found that making it work required “clarifying values and making certain they are mutual; appreciating and accommodating differences; holding steadfast to agreements and a commitment to honesty; growing greater capacity to process and manage their own emotional reactions; learning to voice their desires, concerns, and uncomfortable feelings; becoming increasingly vulnerable, trusting, forgiving, generous; partnering to constructively problem-solve and find resolution for unforeseen and possibly highly charged issues.”

Wow! That’s a tall order. As I read this, it occurred to me that this may help explain why non-monogamy gets a bad rap from some gay men. Too many men go into open relationships expecting that it will be a lot easier than monogamy, providing them, more or less effortlessly, with “the best of both worlds.” That may be one of the most important myths this study destroys. It provides a much-needed dose of realism: successful open relationships require commitment, patience, and hard work.

(Tom Moon is a psychotherapist in San Francisco. His website is www.tommoon.net.)

Here's the original article (March 4, 2010).

Lowen and Spears point out that the study participants are a skewed sample because they were willing to talk about their open relationships; most non-monogamous gay couples that the researchers approached declined. But with that in mind, here are some interesting statistics:

Beneficial Impacts — Key Themes
(percent of all study participants naming this as a significant impact)
78% - A sanctioned sexual outlet
48% - Stimulates our sex life, e.g. titillating, energizing
40% - Different needs met
34% - Brought friends, new experiences into relationship
33% - Encourages & reinforces honesty
27% - Provides variety, sense of freedom
26% - Brought perspective & greater appreciation
24% - Encouraged sexual growth (expertise, repetoire, awareness)
23% - Increased intimacy & commitment
20% - Encouraged personal growth
15% - Wouldn’t be together without it

...

Most Commonly Mentioned Difficulties
21% - Jealousy (markedly less than what is often assumed in the research)
20% - Getting too emotionally involved
12% - Becoming comfortable with non-monogamy
9% - Dishonesty
8% - Issues related to drug/alcohol use
7% - Lack of sensitivity
20% - “Nothing has been difficult.”

Update, July 2010 Here's a conservative response.

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"Many Successful Gay Marriages Share an Open Secret "

New York Times

Do open marriages fare better or worse, on average, than closed marriages?

Anecdotes abound on both sides. Scientific data that would answer the question are scarce.

Now, reports the New York Times, a three-year research project is about to announce that among gay couples — where open relationships are more common than in the straight world — open couples do at least as well as closed ones, if not better.

Many Successful Gay Marriages Share an Open Secret

By SCOTT JAMES | January 28-29, 2010

When Rio and Ray married in 2008, the Bay Area women omitted two words from their wedding vows: fidelity and monogamy.

“I take it as a gift that someone will be that open and honest and sharing with me,” said Rio, using the word “open” to describe their marriage.

Love brought the middle-age couple together — they wed during California’s brief legal window for same-sex marriage. But they knew from the beginning that their bond would be forged on their own terms, including what they call “play” with other women.

As the trial phase of the constitutional battle to overturn the Proposition 8 ban on same-sex marriage concludes in federal court, gay nuptials are portrayed by opponents as an effort to rewrite the traditional rules of matrimony. Quietly, outside of the news media and courtroom spotlight, many gay couples are doing just that, according to groundbreaking new research.

A study to be released next month is offering a rare glimpse inside gay relationships and reveals that monogamy is not a central feature for many. Some gay men and lesbians argue that, as a result, they have stronger, longer-lasting and more honest relationships. And while that may sound counterintuitive, some experts say boundary-challenging gay relationships represent an evolution in marriage — one that might point the way for the survival of the institution.

...The Gay Couples Study has followed 556 male couples for three years — about 50 percent of those surveyed have sex outside their relationships, with the knowledge and approval of their partners.

That consent is key. “With straight people, it’s called affairs or cheating,” said Colleen Hoff, the study’s principal investigator, “but with gay people it does not have such negative connotations.”

The study also found open gay couples just as happy in their relationships as pairs in sexually exclusive unions, Dr. Hoff said. A different study, published in 1985, concluded that open gay relationships actually lasted longer.

None of this is news in the gay community, but few will speak publicly about it....

...A couple since 2002, they opened their relationship a year ago after concluding that they were not fully meeting each other’s needs. But they have rules: complete disclosure, honesty about all encounters, advance approval of partners, and no sex with strangers — they must both know the other men first. “We check in with each other on this an awful lot,”...

That transparency can make relationships stronger, said Joe Quirk, author of the best-selling relationship book It’s Not You, It’s Biology. “The combination of freedom and mutual understanding can foster a unique level of trust,”...

Read the whole article. Thanks to Sarah Taub for the tip.

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