A rant against polyamory

[IAmReallyImportant]

4 minutes ago, ThermalTide said:

which golden rule? I genuinely can't see an issue with how people conduct their relationship dynamics privately.

I meant, asking yourself what would happen, if everybody would do that. And there is certainly the possibility that it would become a norm. Moreover, as mentioned the role model part. It is not healthy for anybody to live this kind of live and even if they would feel good, they would lead other people to suffer and have other risks in place as well. So you would live it in front of others and - as you want to convince yourself of your views - you would want to make it look like it is good and healthy.

[IAmReallyImportant]

There are certainly new perspectives that arises in this world, which are good and progressive. But not every change in society is that.

Edited January 5, 2023 by IAmReallyImportant

[ivankiss]

11 minutes ago, LastThursday said:

I wouldn't be polyamorous (despite the allure), I don't need the drama. I feel that to give polyamory justice requires a level of maturity that most people don't have. Mostly, because you're having to co-ordinate the emotions, needs and desires of several relationships, all at different stages, and to do potential conflict resolution (jealousy etc.). All of that stuff can be hard enough with one person let alone many. There's reasons people keep affairs secret.

But every relationship does give you something different. Maybe Mary gives you the philosophical discussions you crave, and Jane is the adventurous type. Sometimes you just slip into something more than just platonic friendship, and what to do then with Mary and Jane? Date Jane and have an affair with Mary?

 

What you are describing here is purely egoic and transactional. It's about meeting your selfish needs by any means necessary. Has nothing to do with love. 

In the scenario you presented, the right thing to do would be to take a step back and look deeper into yourself. Not date either Jane nor Mary, rather stay single and figure out who you really are and what it is that you're actually looking for. Instead of taking bits and pieces of multiple partners.

[thepixelmonk]

7 minutes ago, ivankiss said:

What you are describing here is purely egoic and transactional. It's about meeting your selfish needs by any means necessary. Has nothing to do with love. 

In the scenario you presented, the right thing to do would be to take a step back and look deeper into yourself. Not date either Jane nor Mary, rather stay single and figure out who you really are and what it is that you're actually looking for. Instead of taking bits and pieces of multiple partners.

You cannot say it is purely egoic and transactional and you are in no position whatsoever to tell other people how to love and to stay single if everyone is mature enough to handle their relationships. If polyamory is not for you that's perfectly fine. It's not for me either or most people. That doesn't mean it's inherently wrong and cannot work.

[LastThursday]

4 minutes ago, ivankiss said:

Instead of taking bits and pieces of multiple partners.

But we do this anyway, we just call them friends normally. In that sense we are polyamorous anyway, we can love more than one person at a time, albeit not sexual love.

I'm obviously playing devil's advocate here for the sake of discussion.

I'm unsure whether you're talking relationships or pure love. There's always a transactional element to relationships even sexual ones, so sure, you can call that ego if you want.  Personally I wouldn't call it "taking bits and pieces", I would just call it "enjoying a person's uniqueness". In other words you love each person you encounter in a different way, because of the different things they express or you find attractive in them. That would be the allure of polyamory.

[ivankiss]

TLDR

6 minutes ago, thepixelmonk said:

You cannot say it is purely egoic and transactional and you are in no position whatsoever to tell other people how to love and to stay single if everyone is mature enough to handle their relationships. If polyamory is not for you that's perfectly fine. It's not for me either or most people. That doesn't mean it's inherently wrong and cannot work.

 

[ThermalTide]

20 minutes ago, IAmReallyImportant said:

I meant, asking yourself what would happen, if everybody would do that. And there is certainly the possibility that it would become a norm. Moreover, as mentioned the role model part. It is not healthy for anybody to live this kind of live and even if they would feel good, they would lead other people to suffer and have other risks in place as well. So you would live it in front of others and - as you want to convince yourself of your views - you would want to make it look like it is good and healthy.

I understand what you're saying but I have to disagree, this post is an example of how we're all able to think for ourselves and deduce our own conclusions about these sorts of things. I don't want to have a polyamorous relationship, but the fact that they exist doesn't change my mind at all. Nor does it bother me that people are engaging in these kinds of relationships. It's simply not my business. With your logic, straight people viewing homosexual PDA would threaten their straightness lol

[ivankiss]

@LastThursday Can agree with some of what you're saying, sort of. But yes, mostly clever devilry 

[IAmReallyImportant]

4 hours ago, LastThursday said:

But we do this anyway, we just call them friends normally. In that sense we are polyamorous anyway, we can love more than one person at a time, albeit not sexual love.

I'm obviously playing devil's advocate here for the sake of discussion.

I'm unsure whether you're talking relationships or pure love. There's always a transactional element to relationships even sexual ones, so sure, you can call that ego if you want.  Personally I wouldn't call it "taking bits and pieces", I would just call it "enjoying a person's uniqueness". In other words you love each person you encounter in a different way, because of the different things they express or you find attractive in them. That would be the allure of polyamory.

It is not just about love and relationships. It is also about responsibility and long-term thinking, emotional maturity etc.  It is just so unhealthy and untrue, what most people say about polyamorous relationships, that I feel the urge to say something.

Just fucking around means increased risk of STDs, hurting someone etc. And in a broader sense destroying society if it scales.

Edited January 5, 2023 by IAmReallyImportant

[IAmReallyImportant]

Of course, you can fall in love with other people, but then you have to let go of the feeling or try to leave it as it is and not enter into a sexual relationship or jeopardize the current one.

Life is not a fluffy cloud on which you can glide, or not always. It is not only about you or your needs, but also about society and other people. And not only whether you fall in love with someone and then want to live it out.

[IAmReallyImportant]

Moreover, it is not a good strategie because of the mangement emotional, financial and temporal resources over a longer timespan as mentioned.

So even if a few people are the only one doing it and nobody sees it, they would have less life quality by definition, even if they would feel relatively good doing it. It doesn't pay out or leads to a less fulfilled life one can have. It is counter-intuitive..

Edited January 5, 2023 by IAmReallyImportant

[zurew]

1 hour ago, IAmReallyImportant said:

Alone because of the mangement emotional, financial and temporal resources over a longer timespan

You can have distributed wealth if you want to and you can build more and bigger things if all of you are working together because you can accumulate more resources.

1 hour ago, IAmReallyImportant said:

Should I list you different papers that suggests that? You wouldn't read them anyways and I don't want to take the effort to pick all this out again for you now, just because you then try to pick out one particular thing, which you then take out of context to further confirm your entrenched worldview.

Don't have to source things, but it would be good if you could list thing at least on an abstract level, I don't think it too much to ask for, when you claimed that you have things. I saw you mentioned STD-s but if a person is okay with catching certain std-s and if that person has safe sex whats your argument against that? Most std-s can be cured anyway.

Also to be clear, I wouldn't be in a poly relationship, or wouldn't suggest it to most people, but that doesn't mean that its impossible to make it work  or that everyone should follow one rule and one type of relationship, when it might not fit to every person

1 hour ago, IAmReallyImportant said:

And it is kind of obvious that if you dig into different holes, you wont get deep.
- obviously this only applies for polyamorous relationships

What do you mean by you won't get deep, do you mean that you can't have multiple meaningful realtionships, because of the lack of time? If thats your point I don't think thats true.Iif that would be true,then you wouldn't have time to create meaningful relationship with other parts of your family because of the lack of time, and you basically would make an argument with that point against creating a big family.

1 hour ago, IAmReallyImportant said:

These people ran into the illusion of the perfect partner, who doesn't exist and end up dying alone this way.
- If you have a monogamous relationship, it doesn't matter if you think that or not as long as you figure the relationship out and stay there or brake up if it doesn't work at all. Of course, before choosing a partner one must know oneself well enough.

Your point applies exactly the same to polyamorous relationships as well. "it doesn't matter if you think that or not as long as you figure the relationship out and stay there or brake up if it doesn't work at all."

1 hour ago, IAmReallyImportant said:

It can scale, if people get educated and socialized this way.

So whats is your argument when it comes to individuals? What If there is a person who is okay with an increased chance of catching std-s and this person doesn't want a family?

Also your reasoning about poly relationship couldn't raise kids is not necessarily true. You mentioned lack of time, but time can be managed in different ways and to suggest that its impossible to manage time to focus on kids is not true. In a monogamous relationship parents can work all day without focusing on their kids or without paying much attention to their kids. Its a question of how much attention you pay to the kids regardless of polyamory or monogamous relationship. So that point is not exclusive to polyamory either.

1 hour ago, IAmReallyImportant said:

The issue is, that you participate on something which can scale and then it becomes a problem. Violating the golden rule.

Moreover, you live something for other people and signal that it would be good, even though it is harmful. This is similar to taking drugs or smoking at school. Not everyone can get rid of it.

The golden rule sometimes counterproductive to people and can make them miserable. There is no one fits for all system all of that is naive and eventually fails and can create more problems than solutions.

If you want to go with the logic of "you might signal something that is harmful and people would try it regardless of how harmful it is" you would have to apply that to everything and that is not stable, I don't think you believe in that logic. Also harmful can be defined is multiple ways, and when people and society make choices we don't only look at the negatives (and that alone can change depending on from what pov you make you analysis), but we look at the benefits as well.

[IAmReallyImportant]

53 minutes ago, ThermalTide said:

I understand what you're saying but I have to disagree, this post is an example of how we're all able to think for ourselves and deduce our own conclusions about these sorts of things. I don't want to have a polyamorous relationship, but the fact that they exist doesn't change my mind at all. Nor does it bother me that people are engaging in these kinds of relationships. It's simply not my business. With your logic, straight people viewing homosexual PDA would threaten their straightness lol

I believe that there is a difference between someone who is heterosexual looking at homosexual pdas and someone who is heterosexual being persuaded by polyamorous relationships. Since man is polygamous, there is a difference.

I am not interested in opinions but facts. You can have your opinion. You can't stop anyone from misguiding other people or condoning unhealthy behavior. That would also be too exhausting.

[IAmReallyImportant]

5 minutes ago, zurew said:

You can have distributed wealth if you want to and you can build more and bigger things if all of you are working together because you can accumulate more resources.

You can not distribute your time, unless you clone yourself and then you would be multiple persons anyways. And you forgot the emotional part. Most people aren't rich in addition.

See, you only want to seek evidence for you being right. So what is the point?

Edited January 5, 2023 by IAmReallyImportant

[zurew]

 

2 minutes ago, IAmReallyImportant said:

You can not distribute your time, unless you clone yourself and then you would be multiple persons anyways. And you forgot the emotional part. Most people aren't rich in addition.

I already addressed this point if you read further. If you have a problem with time , wealth and emotional distribution and cost, then you essentially making an argument against having a big family and having friends, because you spend your time, money, and emotional faculties in those cases as well.

[IAmReallyImportant]

5 minutes ago, zurew said:

 

I already addressed this point if you read further. If you have a problem with time , wealth and emotional distribution and cost, then you essentially making an argument against having a big family and having friends, because you spend your time, money, and emotional faculties in those cases as well.

Multiple partners would cost much more of that than just family and friends.

And I also mean like the outcome of your resources. If you allocate these resources for one partner, the outcome would be better obviously. Because, it develops better if you do it right, it gets deeper etc.

Edited January 5, 2023 by IAmReallyImportant

[zurew]

Just now, IAmReallyImportant said:

Multiple partners would cost much more of that than just family and friends.

Thats totally depends on how it is set up, and on the dynamics that are in that relationship. Again depending on the situation it could be argued that people in a poly relatonship can distribute more than in a monogamous relationship in other cases they can't, but again it totally depends and not a question of polyamory or monogamous relationship.

[IAmReallyImportant]

And also it doesn't make much sense, if you have 1k friends. You cannot possibly create a real friendship out of that. And if you concentrate on some more and on some less, are the other people real friends then? And also, der would be a moral issue as well.

So in general, less friendships are usually better. Of course it is fun to be around with many people, but the quality is less.

Edited January 5, 2023 by IAmReallyImportant

[IAmReallyImportant]

2 minutes ago, zurew said:

Thats totally depends on how it is set up, and on the dynamics that are in that relationship. Again depending on the situation it could be argued that people in a poly relatonship can distribute more than in a monogamous relationship in other cases they can't, but again it totally depends and not a question of polyamory or monogamous relationship.

How could they distribute more, in which situations? : D

[IAmReallyImportant]

But if so, this would be edge cases, but if you look at it gloablly it is obvious that more resources are taken for a distributed set of entities and the outcome would be less.

Synergetic effects would lead to chaos and regulation-problems, as there is resistance in the system because of egos. So it is an unstable system, which can rarely work and if so, the quality would not be better than on a single-resource distributed one.

Morever, regardless - it wouldn't be good for society and the broader collective anyways..

Edited January 5, 2023 by IAmReallyImportant