Stop Judging My Polyamory Lifestyle!

Love Hater Fun Breaker

What did you do when you met your very first one?

You know who I’m referring to. The person who took the maiden voyage of shit all over your wet dreams. The person who pissed on your pleasure parade before anyone else. The people who curb-stomped your hopes so low into the sewers you thought they would never see daylight again. Everyone has some. And if you don’t, you live a delicate and sanctified existence that you must write a book about, informing everyone else how to walk such a criticism-free path of inner peace and love. Because most other people spend an incalculable amount of time trying to heal themselves from the psychic, soul-scarring slanderings and disrespectful reputation attacks that are all-too-frequent in today’s perpetually-high-school-like, spy-happy, name-calling, binary reactionary love/hate Facebook/Twitter/YouTube world, where anonymous comments and trolling cyberbullies have cruelly shamed the open sexuality of some innocent women even to the point of committing suicide. Horrific.

For the vast majority of us, this new type of love will never be that dangerous. But most polyamorous people have heard some permutation of the age-old ignorant epithets of time: “You just wanna be slutty/perverted.” “So, you’re cheating?” “Oh, that stuff is not natural.” “You’re a player/ho, that’s all that is.” “Women all want to settle down and get married, you will have to as well, one day.” “Open relationships never work…” or whatever other slight twist you can put on the typical misunderstanding of polyamory’s possibilities and emotional/physical potential.

What did you do when someone returned your good news with their bad judgement? Can you remember the moment right now; the words they said, the look on their face, the sound of their voice? I don’t mean to torture you or trigger trauma in your mind, I just want  to practice the therapeutic healing necessary to arm myself against one of the most insidious and damaging by-products of open communication in polyamory. Public perception can be poison to a poly couple or triad or quad, much less a whole poly community. And what methods and memories do you use to make sure you don’t hold on to any of the negative words or attacks aimed at you and your lovers? It’s good to reflect upon those things once in a while, take stock of your psychological inventory. Sometimes, a tenet that poly people must live by is:

“I’m a lover, not a fighter… but I’ll fight for the things I love.”

• Do you outright ignore pessimistic and negative people’s preconceived notions about being poly?
• Do you reply kindly to a few points you want to inform people about, and leave it be?
• Do you engage in a full conversation about the practices and policies you preach as poly?
• Do you use comedy to diffuse the differences? Anger? Silence? Violence? (Violence is never recommended to communicate a philosophy based on love, FYI.)
• Do you have a poly ally and engage in debate and/or education?
• Do you choose to remain silent about your polyamorous lifestyle as securely as a gay/lesbian might remain “in the closet” about their sexuality?
• Do you embrace the poly lifestyle so passionately that it has cost you friends and family members who may not understand/embrace/accept the open love lifestyle you live?
• Do you choose your battles selectively, and alternate between sharing your poly truth and staying silent about your poly views, depending on the time and place?
• Do you deal with it in some other way that is uncommon to other polyamorists?

There is no right or wrong response for your own reaction to judgement of your way of loving. As stated before, anything but physical violence is endorsed here. As long as it’s the authentic response you feel is appropriate for the situation, trust your instincts to deal with the differences of opinion. Because that’s all it is: an opinion. And those things NEVER agree with every body (literally), in the world of sex.

It’s a whole new era we are living in, even though the Hippie Era of the 60’s had its psychedelic free love DNA intertwined in the essence of polyamorous sexuality for the new millenium. It’s a new form of religion, ostensibly. And just like religion, there truly is no one right way to paradise and salvation. There are multiple religions, systems of government, political parties, ethnicities, businesses, subcultures and obviously multiple sexual orientations all operating simultaneously in this world, so there must be multiple sexual social structures for us to enjoy. Monogamy has had its unnatural monopoly (read Sex at Dawn: The Prehistoric Origins of Modern Sexuality for more insight) over humanity for far too long, and an introduction of a few new ways of wandering through the wonders of life and love are just as long overdue. And as we wander, let nobody’s negative words and critical judgements stop us for even a moment, as we joyfully journey towards our dream destinations.

One love to the lovers practising pure compersion, where when you told them about your first multiple-partner polyamorous experience: they didn’t say “Ewwww!”, instead they said “Yaaaay!”

Always in Love,
Addi Stewart