strong upvote: this seems like a great post on a difficult topic that a lot of people are going to feel a little bit touchy about and therefore downvote unnecessarily, I am personally enthusiastic about the idea of poly being a thing near my social circles, but I also agree that there are a lot of men and women who are not great at boundaries and who push on boundaries too much, [edit: convinced by replies that this clause is wrong: and who assume that dating is ok in professional contexts]. I suspect that a fair portion of them are intentionally agentic about pushing on boundaries and another larger portion of them are unaware of how boundaries normally work; there have been previous reports of people having agentically bad behavior sexually.
however, I would contest the claim that police are the best solution to this; they have a bad track record of being helpful to communities. while I would not completely write them off as useless, I would say that they have a track record of simply not doing much and taking a lot of effort to get them to not do much. in this respect I would not say the police are that different from any other form of community safety group, other than the fact that they also carry weapons and so invoking them means inviting people who are used to being on the wrong end of weapons to try to deal with a sensitive situation.
I want to push back on the implication that dating is not okay in a professional context. I agree that when there’s a significant power differential (e.g. between a person and their boss), this is a serious opening for abuse and must be avoided. And ofc if someone says “no” then don’t try again. However, professional context doesn’t automatically imply power differential. Moreover, professional context is the most convenient way to run into like-minded people, and just meet people in general. IME when you have few professional interactions with people in your geographic area, it’s very easy to become isolated and have few opportunities for romantic relationships or even just platonic friendships. So, a blanket ban on dating in professional contexts[1] really seems like throwing the baby with the bathwater.
(As an aside, the OP sounds to me like pure propaganda: “EA is an optimization of altruism with “suboptimal” human tendencies like morality and empathy stripped from it” really?!)
I agree that the article is exaggerated. It makes FTX and EA sound like synonyms. I think the common-sense response to “socializing with presence of psychedelics” with strangers is to say no. Etc.
That said, it seems to me that you trivialize the issue of power differentials. Mere “do not date your boss” is not sufficient, because:
1) Sometimes people get promoted, and what started as dating or flirting with your equal may suddenly become a relationship with your boss.
2) In situations with complex networks of relationships (people dating each other, polycules, group houses), the only person in a formal position of power may be your boss, but there are people with various kinds of informal power, such as “a lover of your boss”, “a roommate of your boss”, etc.
Also, the dynamics of dating at the workplace is different if you have e.g. 7 people, where A and B are a couple, C and D are a couple, and E, F, G are dating outside of workplace (or not at all), compared to a situation where A, B, C, D, E and F are a polycule, and G is not interested in dating any of them but keeps getting all kinds of hints.
It seems to me that many people like the idea of having a great relation at a workplace, but hate getting unwanted attention or getting involved in other people’s drama. Also, sex may become a factor in office politics, which some people enjoy, but others hate it with a burning passion.
(That said, I believe you can be an EA without living in a group house and having group sex with other EAs.)
If Alice is dating Bob and Alice is promoted to become Bob’s boss, then Alice should refuse the promotion, or everyone involved agree that Bob moves to a different department, or some other solution along these lines. And, yes, informal positions of power is a thing that should be watched out for. I don’t think I’m trivializing, I just feel there’s a reasonable trade-off point and the norms associated with the American left (which is obviously very influential in this community) went too far to one end of spectrum.
Now, when most people in a workplace are dating each other… I don’t know, this is too far outside my experience for me to have an informed opinion. I can believe this is a terrible idea, or that it’s somehow manageable if done right. I think that usually this organically doesn’t happen, but I have no experience with working in heavily-poly / heavily-EA orgs, maybe that’s different.
Notice that “the gears to ascenscion” wrote “in professional contexts”, not just “while working at the same place”. That might be interpreted to mean things like “don’t date people who you sometimes see in professional conferences”, and AFAICT some people actually endorse norms along those lines. And, I think that’s going way too far.
I agree. If it’s not the same workplace, it seems generally okay to me.
There might be some special case where I would say otherwise. But I believe most people would not object against two plumbers dating, or two software developers, or two teachers...
strong upvote: this seems like a great post on a difficult topic that a lot of people are going to feel a little bit touchy about and therefore downvote unnecessarily, I am personally enthusiastic about the idea of poly being a thing near my social circles, but I also agree that there are a lot of men and women who are not great at boundaries and who push on boundaries too much, [edit: convinced by replies that this clause is wrong:
and who assume that dating is ok in professional contexts]. I suspect that a fair portion of them are intentionally agentic about pushing on boundaries and another larger portion of them are unaware of how boundaries normally work; there have been previous reports of people having agentically bad behavior sexually.however, I would contest the claim that police are the best solution to this; they have a bad track record of being helpful to communities. while I would not completely write them off as useless, I would say that they have a track record of simply not doing much and taking a lot of effort to get them to not do much. in this respect I would not say the police are that different from any other form of community safety group, other than the fact that they also carry weapons and so invoking them means inviting people who are used to being on the wrong end of weapons to try to deal with a sensitive situation.
I want to push back on the implication that dating is not okay in a professional context. I agree that when there’s a significant power differential (e.g. between a person and their boss), this is a serious opening for abuse and must be avoided. And ofc if someone says “no” then don’t try again. However, professional context doesn’t automatically imply power differential. Moreover, professional context is the most convenient way to run into like-minded people, and just meet people in general. IME when you have few professional interactions with people in your geographic area, it’s very easy to become isolated and have few opportunities for romantic relationships or even just platonic friendships. So, a blanket ban on dating in professional contexts[1] really seems like throwing the baby with the bathwater.
(As an aside, the OP sounds to me like pure propaganda: “EA is an optimization of altruism with “suboptimal” human tendencies like morality and empathy stripped from it” really?!)
Btw, AFAICT it’s an American invention, and not some kind of global universal. Which ofc doesn’t mean it’s wrong, just, be aware of possible bias.
I agree that the article is exaggerated. It makes FTX and EA sound like synonyms. I think the common-sense response to “socializing with presence of psychedelics” with strangers is to say no. Etc.
That said, it seems to me that you trivialize the issue of power differentials. Mere “do not date your boss” is not sufficient, because:
1) Sometimes people get promoted, and what started as dating or flirting with your equal may suddenly become a relationship with your boss.
2) In situations with complex networks of relationships (people dating each other, polycules, group houses), the only person in a formal position of power may be your boss, but there are people with various kinds of informal power, such as “a lover of your boss”, “a roommate of your boss”, etc.
Also, the dynamics of dating at the workplace is different if you have e.g. 7 people, where A and B are a couple, C and D are a couple, and E, F, G are dating outside of workplace (or not at all), compared to a situation where A, B, C, D, E and F are a polycule, and G is not interested in dating any of them but keeps getting all kinds of hints.
It seems to me that many people like the idea of having a great relation at a workplace, but hate getting unwanted attention or getting involved in other people’s drama. Also, sex may become a factor in office politics, which some people enjoy, but others hate it with a burning passion.
(That said, I believe you can be an EA without living in a group house and having group sex with other EAs.)
If Alice is dating Bob and Alice is promoted to become Bob’s boss, then Alice should refuse the promotion, or everyone involved agree that Bob moves to a different department, or some other solution along these lines. And, yes, informal positions of power is a thing that should be watched out for. I don’t think I’m trivializing, I just feel there’s a reasonable trade-off point and the norms associated with the American left (which is obviously very influential in this community) went too far to one end of spectrum.
Now, when most people in a workplace are dating each other… I don’t know, this is too far outside my experience for me to have an informed opinion. I can believe this is a terrible idea, or that it’s somehow manageable if done right. I think that usually this organically doesn’t happen, but I have no experience with working in heavily-poly / heavily-EA orgs, maybe that’s different.
Notice that “the gears to ascenscion” wrote “in professional contexts”, not just “while working at the same place”. That might be interpreted to mean things like “don’t date people who you sometimes see in professional conferences”, and AFAICT some people actually endorse norms along those lines. And, I think that’s going way too far.
I agree. If it’s not the same workplace, it seems generally okay to me.
There might be some special case where I would say otherwise. But I believe most people would not object against two plumbers dating, or two software developers, or two teachers...