By this time my misgivings about the idea of owning another’s sexuality had grown into a full-blown endorsement of polyamory. I needed to deprogram my sexual jealousy, which sounded daunting. Sexual jealousy was hard-wired into me by evolution, right?
How did you determine that monogamy and jealousy are not terminal values of yours? How is this not a simplification of value, or at least an exchange of terminal value? What safety measures did you use?
If you would choose to self modify to get rid of your jealousy or monogamy, I think that in itself is strong evidence that jealousy or monogamy are not terminal values for you. That doesn’t mean they won’t be terminal values for anyone else though.
I think I now understand why Luke was comfortable changing himself in such a way that he expressed as modifying himself into polyamory. I’ve willingly self modified to reduce my own jealousy before, but it wasn’t jealousy related to my romantic partners having other romantic partners. I suppose if I differed from myself only in such a way that I had that jealousy, I might want it removed. But I think many people would not, because it supports something they actually want out of relationships, and I’m confused as to what Luke means by his “support of polyamory” if not that other people should also not have that jealousy.
Personally, I am not comfortable with being in a relationship with multiple people who are not also in a relationship with each other. I would not want to self modify to change this, even though it’s more difficult to find relationships that meet this additional specification, because that would mean changing what I actually want about relationships (it helps that I’m not dissatisfied with being in a two person relationship.) I suspect that for many, perhaps most people, modifying to become polyamorous is of this unwanted kind, rather than the former kind.
Personally, I’ve known enough people who are monogamous in one context and polyamorous in another context (some but not all of whom describe themselves as “becoming polyamorous” and “no longer being polyamorous”, as though the context were irrelevant) that I’ve become somewhat skeptical of the “modifying to become” formulation in this context.
E.g., I’ve been in a monogamous romantic relationship for ~20 years, and have no particular desire to become romantically involved with anyone else, so I generally describe myself as monogamous. But I can imagine situations in which I would become romantically involved with a second partner. I would change my self-description in that case, but I wouldn’t consider it a particularly significant self-modification.
The map is not the territory, etc.
Regardless, yes, many people can be happy in certain kinds of polyamorous relationships (for example, closed polyads as you describe), and not others. This should not be surprising.
How did you determine that monogamy and jealousy are not terminal values of yours? How is this not a simplification of value, or at least an exchange of terminal value? What safety measures did you use?
If you would choose to self modify to get rid of your jealousy or monogamy, I think that in itself is strong evidence that jealousy or monogamy are not terminal values for you. That doesn’t mean they won’t be terminal values for anyone else though.
I think I now understand why Luke was comfortable changing himself in such a way that he expressed as modifying himself into polyamory. I’ve willingly self modified to reduce my own jealousy before, but it wasn’t jealousy related to my romantic partners having other romantic partners. I suppose if I differed from myself only in such a way that I had that jealousy, I might want it removed. But I think many people would not, because it supports something they actually want out of relationships, and I’m confused as to what Luke means by his “support of polyamory” if not that other people should also not have that jealousy.
Personally, I am not comfortable with being in a relationship with multiple people who are not also in a relationship with each other. I would not want to self modify to change this, even though it’s more difficult to find relationships that meet this additional specification, because that would mean changing what I actually want about relationships (it helps that I’m not dissatisfied with being in a two person relationship.) I suspect that for many, perhaps most people, modifying to become polyamorous is of this unwanted kind, rather than the former kind.
Personally, I’ve known enough people who are monogamous in one context and polyamorous in another context (some but not all of whom describe themselves as “becoming polyamorous” and “no longer being polyamorous”, as though the context were irrelevant) that I’ve become somewhat skeptical of the “modifying to become” formulation in this context.
E.g., I’ve been in a monogamous romantic relationship for ~20 years, and have no particular desire to become romantically involved with anyone else, so I generally describe myself as monogamous. But I can imagine situations in which I would become romantically involved with a second partner. I would change my self-description in that case, but I wouldn’t consider it a particularly significant self-modification.
The map is not the territory, etc.
Regardless, yes, many people can be happy in certain kinds of polyamorous relationships (for example, closed polyads as you describe), and not others. This should not be surprising.