Why is polyamory trending?

[KiwiMum2023]

What’s going on with polyamory? Seems like a very blatant push to make it acceptable with all these throuple stories in the news. AIBU to think it’s all a bit grim?

I don’t think things are as well thought out as that tbh. I think it’s a mix of those naive enough to think that that human emotions don’t come in to play in these kind of relationships and cause havoc and those so selfish that where there are children involved they don’t put them first. Also there are edgelords who just have to further out there than everyone else, also known as terminal bores.

Oh no, we've been rumbled!

How about this, I'll try my best not to destroy civilisation, and you can try to sound a tiiiiny bit less like dodgy political pamphlets from the 1930s.

Also there are edgelords who just have to further out there than everyone else

I know I'll probably regret asking, but who or what are edgelords?

It's a mildly derogatory term for people (usually online but not always) who intentionally do things that they hope others will see as edgy, presumably for the thrill of being shocking. Like when teenage boys make a huge deal about being into gory horror movies or making jokes about dead nuns. That kind of thing.

It's what a lot of poly people like me get accused of. Not sure what I'm supposed to do about that. Change my entire lifestyle and dump one of my partners? Because, clearly, if I'm doing something they find icky, it MUST be a performance I put on for their benefit.

The fact you immediately applied this meaning to yourself does somewhat underline the point. I don’t find polyamory ‘icky’ and I don’t think it’s a performance for anyones benefit. What I do think from my own observations is that there appear to be very vocal polyamorous people who seem to be determined everyone should know and respect their relationship status. Most people know it’s utter nonsense. The only people concerned on here are only interested where the welfare of children is involved. Attention seekers gonna attention seek 🤷‍♀️

You were calling poly people edgelords very explicitly in the first instance. It's not like I pulled that association out of thin air.

You're absolutely right! I would like people to "know" my relationship status (what's the alternative? Lie about it to people who know us?), and I would like people to "respect" it too (what's the alternative? Take insults, generalisations and insinuations of child abuse with silence and a merry smile?). I guess that makes me "vocal". Can't argue with that.

I don't agree that poly is "utter nonsense", because I'm not sure what that means in this context. That it's not real, and I'm just pretending it is? That it's always bad and I'm pretending it might sometimes be ok?

Look, if I wanted to, I could pluck a ton of peer-reviewed data, case studies, sociological texts and my own anecdotal experiences to convince you that monogamy was "nonsense" as well as being frequently harmful to women and children. I could show you video after video of gender-reveal parties, shit weddings and engagement announcements to make the point that heterosexual, monogamous people are "attention seekers". I'm not going to, because it would be misleading, needlessly sensationalist, insulting and unhelpful.

When "attention" looks like this thread most of the time, why on earth do you think I go around seeking it?

Cause hetero marriages and their kids made is all so happy and healthy! 😇🤣😂

Probably because you are so devoted to posting long and laboured posts about it.
I haven’t insulted any polyamorous people. You’re conflating several different things there.
You couldn’t convince me monogamy was nonsense though could you? It’s the most successful relationship model across all countries, societies and religions. Individuals may fail at being monogamous but that doesn’t negate the model. People marking milestones in their lives can be attention seeking but the milestones themselves aren’t contrived for the sole purpose of seeking attention.

Ok.

Short posts now.

You win!

I suck.

I go seek attention, destroy society now.

You come across as very immature. Are you a young? I haven’t said you suck and I’ve been q clear that I don’t think polyamory can ruin society because very few people take it seriously. The hyperbole and storming off are straight from the attention seekers handbook lol!

They may think there would be no arguments about inheritance, but the UK tax authorities would not agree. The non married ‘spouse’ inheritance would be subject to tax.

It's none of your business whether another adult freely chooses to sleep with one or fifty people at a time.

no, but you’ve got to wonder…..that’s quite some stamina

Maybe I was being immature, and I'm sorry if it derailed the conversation. I guess that when I feel like my entire, very quiet, very dull poly life is constantly under attack (not just from posters here, but the world), I get very defensive, and sometimes the only way left to respond is through absurdity.

I'm not "young", actually, just tired.

Maybe the lifestyle isn’t as life enhancing as you’d hoped. I don’t see people constantly attacking polyamory, most people are disinterested and roll their eyes. As long as people don’t embroil their children in poly situations I couldn’t gaf. However I’m not able to pretend I think it’s an amazing choice.

I'm going to ignore that horrible little dig in the first sentence and agree that we just see things differently.

As a woman who dabbled in a poly relationship (two boyfriends) when I was younger and is now happily monogamously married I feel called out by this comment!

In retrospect I do think there was an aspect of neither of my partners being quite right for me - one was very dependable (and a tiny bit dull?) and the other was charismatic and exciting and useless at anything practical, and I of course, was very young and didn't have a clue what I wanted or needed in a relationship. The real thing that killed my interest in polyamory though was the time it took up though. You spend a lot of time bonding with someone in a long term relationship and having to do it all twice eats up a lot of time that could be spent on other things. It's like a very full on hobby.

I still have a few poly friends. They are married seem happy enough. If everyone is happy with the arrangement then why would anyone else be bothered by it?

No. You don’t have to wonder. Find something better to do with your time.

I have friends who are a polycule. They have a beautiful family they raised together and everyone seems very happy. Certainly much happier than many other marriages I’ve known.

so @TheOriginalEmu they seem happy, but you don’t really know. How old are the children?

Rolling your eyes is a passive aggressive form of attack, it’s being dismissive and invalidating to a person. Imagine if every time you mentioned your marriage everyone ‘just’ rolled their eyes at you? After a while it gets tedious. It’s disingenuous to say you can’t understand that is attacking in another form. You don’t have to agree, but you also don’t have to be a judgy prick. It’s not hard.

Rolling your eyes is a well known sign of bemusement or lack of interest, a physical manifestation of ‘oh here we go again’... Most people don’t care enough about polyamory to give it much thought or think it’s a fairly ridiculous concept. That you would classify someone rolling their eyes as an attack is laughable and again seems a bit of a childish thing to say. I wouldn’t gaf if someone rolled their eyes at my marriage.

Ofgs. And the sky is falling. Exactly what they used to say (and the extreme right still say)about gay civil rights. Oh, and women's rights too. And minorities.
They will make x compulsory! We will be forced to abandon our way of life! It will be the end of civilization!!!!
The intense narrow mindedness of some of these comments is bloody depressing, and the deep bigotry is rather frightening.

Well that’s why I said ‘seem’. You never know what anyone life is like behind closed doors and that has nothing to do with polyamory.

the kids are late teens. between 15 and 18. I know them through my kids being friends with theirs. My kids stay there a lot, theirs stay here. I’m as sure as anyone can be that everyone is happy. They’re shit hot on the communication thing and everyone gets a say in their household.

If it was every day and most people I think you might. You’re not saying you’re disinterested if you are talking about the down sides. Disinterested people don’t care one way or the other.

Let’s hope the kids stay as happy as they get older and in to the world. I’m sure you’ve read the sad posts from the person who grew up in a polyamorous household. As with any set up, I’m not saying all have the same outcome but you don’t really know at all and you certainly don’t know about the relationships between the adults.