From: keithd@stallion.oz.au (Keith Duddy)
Subject: Re: rethinking polyamory
Organization: Stallion Technologies
Date: Wed, 9 Sep 1992 01:21:20 GMT

Margie Levine writes: [about my badly expressed thoughts]

>[Keith Duddy  writes:]
>|> 
>|> I think that if the 'additional' people in the arragment are told from
>|> the very beginning that the 'original' couple was not up for negotiation
>|> and that the new realtionship would always be shared then the 2 people
>|> in the new relationship would rarely get close enough that the new
>|> person would be able to demand severing the orginal relationship.

>I think that it is difficult to keep from getting *too close* to someone
>when you really like them.  If I am in a true poly relationship, than I 
>don't feel that there should be limits on how close I can get to another 
>person.  I feel stifled and frustrated when that becomes the case and 
>for me, it sort of defeats the purpose of trying to be poly.

Sorry, I expressed myself badly there. I agree that there should be no
limitations on how close you can get to someone outside the orginal
couple. What I was trying to say is that when you have just met a new
person, before you have had the opportunity to get close to them, if you
express the requirement that your original relationship is non-negtiable
then the new person would probably not get as close to you if they were
the type who would require monogamy. Of course that's no guarantee, and
personal attractions often override 'requirements' and 'conditions' - I
guess what I was really trying to say was that things like being asked
to leave your original partner are less likely if all the information is
on the table when you begin a new relationship.

>I really like the idea that the new relationship would always be shared 
>the two people in the original relationship, but for me at least, that
>doesn't seem to be the way my poly relationship works.  I mean, every so
>often I meet someone that I think is really great, and everything in me
>says "get to know this person!".  But that doesn't mean my SO feels the
>same way.  The resulting new relationship then seems to become more "my"
>relationship that "our" relationship.  My SO may feel like the person is
>a nice person and may spend time with us in groups, but he doesn't go
>out of his way to develop any sort of emotional relationship with the
>person.   

Once again I have allowed myself to be misconstrued; I should have said
that I would make it clear that I would be shared between 2
realtionships, not neccesarily that my orginal partner would share in
my new relationship with the other person. However I have talked to my
SO about this and he finds that it is much easier to remain secure and
happy if he knows and likes the new person... the only time that he had
problems with me being interested in someone else was when he only had a
vague idea of what the new person was like, and felt excluded from that
area of my life - whereas previously there was no activity or friend
that I excluded him from. Nothing ever came of that as I soon found that
the person I was interested in was way too unstable for my liking, but
when the situation was reversed, I was most happy that Tim could get
sexual/emotional supoport from someone while I was away, but I did find
myself wanting to find out more about the new bonk (Mark) - I think
mainly because I wanted to share in every aspect of Tim's experience.

To address your first points second:

>|> >Scott Hanson writes:
>|> 
>|> >>The only person I "converted" became involved with someone who demanded
>|> >>to be her only lover or no relations (even friendship) at all.  She was 
>|> >>interested in him enough to agree to this arrangement.  I suppose this
>|> >>would be more appropriate in alt.angst.
>|> >>

>I think that, for those of us who are still trying to attain "true" poly
>status, the most difficult time is when a new relationship feels so intense
>that you want to spend all you're time with the new person. To get past this 
>and stick with you're original partner, one thing that really helps is to
>have the conviction that your original relationship is a *really great*
>relationship, and that that's really the best there is.  Other 
>relationships could be *really great* too, but there's no comparing 
>*really great* to *really great*.  Once you have this conviction, it 
>makes jumping ship seem sort of pointless.  I think that if one member of 
>a poly relationship doesn't think this way, it's probably a good bet that 
>that person might induced to leave by a monogomous person that wants all 
>of their time. A new relationsip can feel so intense compared to a long 
>term one - if you can't step back and realize that your orignal relationship 
>is equally good or better, but just at a different stage, then it's very 
>tempting to let the intensity of a new relationship make you start thinking 
>about leaving.

This reminds me of something I was listening to on the religion report
on Radio National (Australia) the other day about the Hindu reluctance
to accept religious conversion (either to or from Hinduism). It is based
on the idea of horizontal vs vertical religious change. Horizontal
change is the changing of a set of dogmas (conversion - or taking on a
different monogamous partner) whereas vertical change is increasing
moral development with a religious tradition (taking all of your 
relationships to a higher level of development rather than
merely switching one for another.) This analogy may seem like an
argument for remaining in only 1 relationship - but only to those who
would like see valuable ideas in only 1 religion. [Oh dear I sound like
I'm preaching universality of religion, when I don't even belong to one.]
I suppose I'm saying that in general vertical growth and horizontal
growth are both valuable.

> - Margie

Keith
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Newsgroups: alt.polyamory