So a post on twitter happened where a pansexual person was saying Polyamory was queer and that he wanted people to include Polyamory in their pride merch was getting massively dunked on on twitter. nearly 1000 people at the time of me starting to write this had decided they should tell this person to die, to say he was a fed, that polyamarous people weren't oppressed in any way, that the oppression they have is deserved, etc. That alone to me would speak to the queerness here of polyamory, getting mass harassment for dating to suggest that even against our own, a pansexual guy.
Like the post is cringe in that asking for merch is cringe, like who cares, it's capitalism, I don't care about polyam flag merch, in fact, I probably wouldn't buy it if it existed in general. I would rather get merch of three girls holding hands being polyamarous and really that mostly doesn't exist and, a little sad sure, but it doesn't matter. It's not really an access of oppression.
However, I want to talk about why polyamory is queer and to knock down all the common talking points that are levied against queer people. I am not using any strawmen here I promise you I only need to look at these quote retweets to see SOOO MANY people saying the same shit I see right here.
Polyamarous People Are Not Oppressed
Polyamorous people face many different forms of oppression. There is the obviously and previously stated mass dunking on a person for daring to say they want more polyam merch and that polyam people are part of the wider queer community. This isn't a lone incident but instead I see all the time monogamous people feeling it is totally fine to dunk on polyamarous people because they met one that annoyed them or because it makes them uncomfortable or we are sluts or something. The mass harassment and open hatred are in fact a form of oppression.
However, it doesn't just result in the public opinion but the legal reality. You can be legally fired for being polyamarous basically everywhere. If you have a divorce and you are polyamarous your child will be taken away, it doesn't matter if you have proof if it being consensual it is a mark against you. If someone is sick in the polycule only one person can claim themselves as a partner to go to a hospital and see them. Polyamarous people do not have a right to be married. Polyamarous people are subjected to increased criticism about their relationships. Polyamarous people face a hyper comparison when one person lies about being polyam to abuse their girlfriend or a polyam person ends up being a bad partner it is cast on all polyamarous people.
Cis/Het Men Can't Be Queer
When people make this argument their projecting the bad boyfriend of a friend of theirs onto all polyamorous people, it's a straw man. We've decided some time ago that cis/het men can in fact be queer, I don't even like that. If I was big goddess of queerness I would vanish cis/het men from being queer but we already decided that they were. I frankly just do not care for cis/het dudes generally, some of my favorite siblings are cis/het dudes.
The A in LGBTQIA includes Asexuals and Aromantics both of whom can be Cis/Het men. The I can in fact also include cis/het men people who are intersex and assigned male at birth and id as men do exist and those people can in fact be cis/het.
Polyamarous People Aren't Historically Oppressed
The reality is if you look at the history of the world, you'll find that most cultures were not monogamous. A lot practiced Social Monogamy aka a woman was owned by a man but the man fucked around and that was normal. However, many cultures simply had no concept of monogamy, in fact there are some cultures to this day that are non monogamous without men having ownership of women.
The reality is much how history is much gayer then we know and a lot more trans then we know history is also a lot more non-monogamous. Many indigenous cultures and pre Christian cultures practiced various forms of non-monogamy. These cultures were wiped out slowly with the Christian take over of the majority of the world. Ethical or not we know many powerful people took multiple wives in countries like China where the empires had ranks for their consorts as a standard practice. These are not vastly different then the kind of monogamous marriages that were common place by kings only they didn't need to kill their wives to be with other women.
The reality is that something that came natural to many be it bad or good instincts was suppressed and removed. Polyamory was wiped out from most the world because it deviated the mind set of the colonizers. Of course any place queerness has been suppressed queer non-monogamy was suppressed as well. We know that polyamarous people have had to hide their relationships especially if they deviated from the heteronormative model like like in the case of William Moulton Marston, Elizabeth Holloway Marston, and Olive Byrne whom had to cloak their relationship be that sexual or not.
Polyamarous Are Just Sleeping Around
I don't have to go in depth here, asexual polyamarous people like me exist. I am dating many a hot lady and person and I haven't had sex in years. I don't have sex. You don't need to have sex to be polyamarous.
However, what's wrong with wanting to have sex? Why is that a grounds for oppression? Having lots of sex or no sex, it doesn't make you more or less valid. I saw someone say that polyamarous people deserve to have their kids taken away because their sleeping around.
Does a single monogamous mom deserve to have her kids taken away if she sleeps around when her kids are with their dad? What about a dad? Like sleeping around is something most monogamous allosexuals do. Be that cheating or being chronically single and going on hook up apps for sex. The second you start dating your supposed to swear away your libido towards others forever until you break up.
If that's your form of chastity play with your partner, I am not here to stop you. However, consenting partners deciding they are good with each other fucking other people isn't wrong.
Polyamory is Oppressing Women
Where in the terfy world have I heard people claiming someone else's private lives are actually just oppressing cis women. Can cis/het dudes say "Hey girl, I'm polyamarous so it wasn't cheating when I fucked your best friend" sure they can but that was still cheating. People don't even time to understand Non-monogamy to know that the vast majority of polyam people would say that it is cheating to have sex with another person without informing your partner or agreeing in advance you both can sleep with anyone you want.
Again, I don't give a shit about cis/het dudes, send them to the sun, I don't care but here they are used as a hypnotical device to attack other queer people. The OP who was getting harassed on mass was Pansexual and most everyone I have seen say Polyamory is queer has been some form of queer person. I don't know if you know this but cis/het dudes do not want to be queer, they don't want to be counted among the homosexuals on account that many of them are homophobic and transphobic.
This simply willingly ignores that many women are polyamarous. If you look at many poly groups you'll see lots of women there looking to date men and women. If you go on dating apps like her you'll see lots of polyamarous women. If you go to one trans women's discord server you'll see lots of polyamarous women there. You can see polyamarous lesbians
Polyamory Is Oppressive
Typically they form at some form of Polygamy and go like, see, polyamory is oppressive and you all act like your better then us! This utterly ignores that to this day monogamy has not unpacked it's roots as a system of ownership. The history of dating for love is actually ridiculously small in the white world. Monogamy was just one of several systems of women being sold to men by the men in their lives. One that took root and was forced on many many many people's who did not practice this form of oppression or oppressing women at all until Christians came to their land.
Polyamory can be unethical as can many other forms of non-monogamy and some are rooted in systems of ownership just like monogamy is rooted in that. The reality is our hearts are not ethical anyway, we can't expect love to be perfect and utterly unproblematic but also there are forms of polyamory that are ethical.
Polyamory Is Just A Choice
I saved this one for last because this one is feelings based where the others have provable facts this one people can simply chose to believe me or not. However, I want to talk about wider queer theory for a second to really practically engage this idea. While the popular narrative is that being queer is not a choice some queer theorists have pushed back on this idea. The main queer counter arguments are We Chose Our Own Actions and If It Was A Choice I'd Chose It.
We Chose Own Actions poses us with the idea that while our internal feelings might not be a choice we chose how we act on our choices and queerness is choosing to express and live outside of what we are told. That queerness itself is the choice of acting against the cishetero systems of control. So it doesn't matter if a Republican law maker is secretly gay, he wouldn't be queer because queerness in this model is a choice, it's an identity we chose.
Then the If It Was A Choice It Chose It model says, so what if it was a choice. It choses to simply ignore internal feelings and say it doesn't matter why I want to kiss other women, the fact I chose to do it is consensually with other women who chose to kiss women in itself is valid and worthy of respect. That there is nothing shameful about being queer and therefore if they could chose to be queer that is enough to be respected. This simply says being gay is great, I like being gay, I'd pick it every time and you can't stop me and I will be respected.
We went over these models to say that even if you end up disagreeing with me, that being non-mongamous is in fact not a choice to you that that doesn't necessarily excluded it from being queer and that doesn't mean that Polyamarous people don't deserve respect or rights.
However, to me being polyamarous is core to who I am. It is not a choice for me but I would chose it every time. I would never want to get rid of my 15 year relationship with my Fiancé or my 8 year relationship with my girlfriends in Scotland or any other relationship I'm a part of. To me it's natural to want to be with other people, to feel romantic feelings and it feels gross to me to suggest that I should suppress those feelings or if I did that it would be morally better.
I was in high school when I started dating my Fiancé, even then Freshmen year of high school I told them, "Hey if you wanna date other people, that's okay". At the time, It was mostly because we lived an "unbareable" thirty minutes away from one another, sometimes an hour in traffic. "Worlds away" and unable to drive I really wanted them to be able to be loved and have everything they wanted in a relationship. They did not act on that for years and years. Many years later we talk about polyamory more seriously, I had feelings for my now 8 year long distance relationship GFs. We had all been friends, they helped me come out as trans, we got on so perfectly, and there was a guy friend of ours that they had been kinda attracted to and wanted to try to feel things out with. We agreed that we would explore our feelings and stuff.
From there we've been actively identifying as polyamorous, there was bumps in the road, I was not a perfect girlfriend and I misunderstood how Polyamory worked like thinking we all had to want to date each other and realizing that was not the case. It felt right to be polyam and it kept feeling right as we met people, had feelings and let our relationships evolve to wherever they went naturally, disclosing with each other obviously but we love talking about crushes and dates and stuff together. We've never dated the same person and we probably never will but we love each other and love seeing each other be loved. This is core to who I am, my Fiancé is my soul mate, but my soul isn't small, it's big and it has other soul mates and sweet loves.
It what comes natural to me and it would feel as bad to me to stop being polyamorous as to go back into the closet about being asexual, trans or being a lesbian. To me it's the part of my identity that is probably most in practice in that I talk to my GFs every single day, I live with my Fiancé, their actively part of my life every single day and I am open to new feelings every single day. Even with a recent break up with one of my Girlfriend's of nearly two years I not once wished I was monogamous, my heart was in pain but I still loved being polyam.
I don't have anything else to say on this topic really, I don't care if I get dunked on, to me, this is who I am. I don't particularly love "the polyam community" as a wider hole, I am in my own lesbian niche. Still, I think even the unfortunately straight among us deserve to have the right to love who they love. Nothing anyone stays is gonna get me to suddenly see my love as selfish or something.
[If you want more polyamorous sapphic art to exist in the world maybe consider throwing me a few bucks on Patreon or Ko-fi so I can afford to make more.]
Relationship escalator: The default set of societal expectations for the proper conduct of intimate relationships. Progressive steps with clearly visible markers and a presumed structural goal of permanently monogamous (sexually and romantically exclusive), cohabitating marriage — legally sanctioned if possible. The social standard by which most people gauge whether a developing intimate relationship is significant, “serious,” good, healthy, committed or worth pursuing or continuing.
