I’m all for people having as much and as varied sex as they like; but I want to dissent from the normalization of polyamory. Most people struggle to find ONE person who’ll stick with them through the slings and arrows of fate. Meanwhile these people are trying to sponge up as many people as possible. Not just for one night stands, but emotionally too. It strikes me as a greedy self indulgence of the fairly healthy and attractive. Sleep with whoever you like while you can, but spare me talk of your pseudo-utopian “philosophy” or that you’re a “community.” As an aside I would also add “ethical non monogamy” = boring non monogamy. Where’s the naughty thrill? I’m only half joking. My real point is this is another vain attempt to tame the untamable: the human libido. Doomed to fail and, I predict, be a passing fad.
I agree and add young (especially for women) self indulgence of the fairly healthy and attractive.
PS Polyamory may be a huge fad right now, but it's always gone on and always will, but it was mostly done in secret in the past. Decades ago there was a thing called key clubs where singles, couples and groups would exchange house keys, etc...
Seems pretty clear that monogamy was a passing fad which was only ever really workable in extreme patriarchy... I tend to think things like honesty and radical consent are more than just a passing fad...
Btw, Ms. Khazan, I love your writing. And re: previous stuff of yours I've read, I can't imagine why on earth you would want to change your personality. Other than the offing oneself thing, that can be heavy. But somewhat less than happy and chipper all the time seems like a pretty rational response to life.
What happened to that age-old, infamous emotion called jealousy? Are we so enlightened now that we don't feel it for a lover, or have we just gotten so inundated by literally everything that we've stopped feeling period?
I don't think people feel less jealousy, they just have different ways of talking about it and dealing with it. Polyamory allows for different kinds of honesty to emerge.
I think an additional reason it has become more popular is through the book 'Sex at Dawn'. Although widely criticized in the academic literature for its methodology, it nevertheless made it on to the NYTimes bestseller list. It probably garnered popularity from some circles precisely because, regardless of its methodology, it shared stories of alternative societies living accepted, nonmonogamous practices as part of a culture, raising the question of how things may possibly work in other arrangements as well.
I’m all for people having as much and as varied sex as they like; but I want to dissent from the normalization of polyamory. Most people struggle to find ONE person who’ll stick with them through the slings and arrows of fate. Meanwhile these people are trying to sponge up as many people as possible. Not just for one night stands, but emotionally too. It strikes me as a greedy self indulgence of the fairly healthy and attractive. Sleep with whoever you like while you can, but spare me talk of your pseudo-utopian “philosophy” or that you’re a “community.” As an aside I would also add “ethical non monogamy” = boring non monogamy. Where’s the naughty thrill? I’m only half joking. My real point is this is another vain attempt to tame the untamable: the human libido. Doomed to fail and, I predict, be a passing fad.
I agree and add young (especially for women) self indulgence of the fairly healthy and attractive.
PS Polyamory may be a huge fad right now, but it's always gone on and always will, but it was mostly done in secret in the past. Decades ago there was a thing called key clubs where singles, couples and groups would exchange house keys, etc...
Seems pretty clear that monogamy was a passing fad which was only ever really workable in extreme patriarchy... I tend to think things like honesty and radical consent are more than just a passing fad...
Btw, Ms. Khazan, I love your writing. And re: previous stuff of yours I've read, I can't imagine why on earth you would want to change your personality. Other than the offing oneself thing, that can be heavy. But somewhat less than happy and chipper all the time seems like a pretty rational response to life.
What happened to that age-old, infamous emotion called jealousy? Are we so enlightened now that we don't feel it for a lover, or have we just gotten so inundated by literally everything that we've stopped feeling period?
I don't think people feel less jealousy, they just have different ways of talking about it and dealing with it. Polyamory allows for different kinds of honesty to emerge.
That's interesting. I need to think about this more.
I think an additional reason it has become more popular is through the book 'Sex at Dawn'. Although widely criticized in the academic literature for its methodology, it nevertheless made it on to the NYTimes bestseller list. It probably garnered popularity from some circles precisely because, regardless of its methodology, it shared stories of alternative societies living accepted, nonmonogamous practices as part of a culture, raising the question of how things may possibly work in other arrangements as well.
Sociopolitical commentary doesn’t get much stupider than this.
Polyamory sounds good when you're young but may well lead to loneliness in old age. I'm happy to have lived 50 years with the love of my life.