I don’t know much about what’s going on in the Bay Area etc. communities, as I don’t live there. But I know plenty of non-rationalist poly people. AFAICT, their numbers seem to have been gradually increasing as some people try it out, find that it works for them, which encourages a few more people to try, etc. (Of course, for some people it isn’t appealing, and they don’t try.) Overall my impression is that the thing described by Scott in Polyamory is Boring keeps gradually happening to various people:
It just started seeming normal. [...] It just seemed like once the entire culture was no longer uniting to tell me polyamory was something bizarre and different and special, it wasn’t. And then it started to look like a slightly better idea to take part in it than to not take part in it. So I did.
Assuming that both of our experiences are correct, maybe there’s something about rationalists in particular that makes poly work worse for them than for non-rationalists? That would seem strange, though. Or maybe you’re just seeing a community that has been particularly unlucky, or vice versa.
But in particular, this bit seems like the opposite to what I’ve been observing:
However, most people are not actually looking back at the evidence IMO—it’s just become an installed and unexamined norm.
The story that I’ve often heard is more along the lines of “I was in monogamous relationships because that was the prevailing norm, had bad experiences with them, did some soul-searching, decided to try poly instead, and have now been happier as a result”.
After reading that article and the comments I still don’t buy monogamous relationships expecting their partner to fulfill all their needs. I have two besties, one male and one female, who both provide me things that I often lack in relationships. It still feels like the only difference between poly with a primary partner and monogamy is the sex/kink/cuddling* stuff. It feels like a strawman argument; but if I’m wrong this wouldn’t be the first time I misinterpreted someone in a situation like this.
*I considered excluding cuddling from this list, but it seemed disingenuous to count that one monogamous couple that cuddles everyone as representative of all monogamous people
I think the “getting your needs met by one person” thing is more of a failure mode of bad monogamous relationships. As you mentioned, it’s especially a problem if a person has varied sexual needs, as those are things you’re only allowed to get from one partner in a monogamous context, however a common failure mode of monogamy is to also expect your partner to provide for all social needs.
I think for different types of monogamous relationships this also varies. For instance there’s a thing called “emotional cheating” in which partners don’t have physical relationships with the opposite sex, but have a particular type of a emotional closeness that people are only expected to get from their partner. This can be an example of the failure mode.
I don’t know much about what’s going on in the Bay Area etc. communities, as I don’t live there. But I know plenty of non-rationalist poly people. AFAICT, their numbers seem to have been gradually increasing as some people try it out, find that it works for them, which encourages a few more people to try, etc. (Of course, for some people it isn’t appealing, and they don’t try.) Overall my impression is that the thing described by Scott in Polyamory is Boring keeps gradually happening to various people:
Assuming that both of our experiences are correct, maybe there’s something about rationalists in particular that makes poly work worse for them than for non-rationalists? That would seem strange, though. Or maybe you’re just seeing a community that has been particularly unlucky, or vice versa.
But in particular, this bit seems like the opposite to what I’ve been observing:
The story that I’ve often heard is more along the lines of “I was in monogamous relationships because that was the prevailing norm, had bad experiences with them, did some soul-searching, decided to try poly instead, and have now been happier as a result”.
Somewhat unrelated to that comment but:
After reading that article and the comments I still don’t buy monogamous relationships expecting their partner to fulfill all their needs. I have two besties, one male and one female, who both provide me things that I often lack in relationships. It still feels like the only difference between poly with a primary partner and monogamy is the sex/kink/cuddling* stuff. It feels like a strawman argument; but if I’m wrong this wouldn’t be the first time I misinterpreted someone in a situation like this.
*I considered excluding cuddling from this list, but it seemed disingenuous to count that one monogamous couple that cuddles everyone as representative of all monogamous people
I think the “getting your needs met by one person” thing is more of a failure mode of bad monogamous relationships. As you mentioned, it’s especially a problem if a person has varied sexual needs, as those are things you’re only allowed to get from one partner in a monogamous context, however a common failure mode of monogamy is to also expect your partner to provide for all social needs.
I think for different types of monogamous relationships this also varies. For instance there’s a thing called “emotional cheating” in which partners don’t have physical relationships with the opposite sex, but have a particular type of a emotional closeness that people are only expected to get from their partner. This can be an example of the failure mode.