Polyamory and Me: A Belated Part II
So it’s been over a year since I wrote that entry about my polyamory and almost a year since I started identifying as queer. I’ve moved on a little from the polyamory entry (see a much better and revised version in the Hermes!). So yeah, something I’ve been pondering a bit is the relation of polyamory to queerness, plus the radical critique implicit in asexuality. I’ve begun to realize how incredibly complementary (and dare I say essential?) polyamory, queerness, and asexuality are to each other. Polyamory explicitly endorses multiple intimate relationships with people, and implicitly problematizes the dichotomy of “in a relationship”/”out of a relationship” by conceptualizing all individuals (of preferred gender(s)) as potential partners (sexual or otherwise). Asexuality explicitly blurs the line between friends and lovers by rejecting the need for sex to create intimacy, and thus (possibly) implicitly endorses multiple loves by recognizing friends as lovers (someone please kick/educate me if I’m misunderstanding asexuality.) Of course, queerness provides the lovely umbrella under which these two practices/preferences/… can meet and dialogue.
Note: The next paragraph is going to come off as sounding really harsh towards monogamists. Sorry. I should point out that at one time the idea of loving, egalitarian, and monogamous conjugality was truly radical and consistently associated with revolutionary political movements throughout the world in the 19th and 20th century (as opposed to plain old patriarchy/paternalism/chauvinism). My point is not to label monogamy as an ideology of political reactionaries but to demonstrate that the social conditions which made it once radical/useful/viable have disappeared or transformed. What you all (monogamists) need to understand is that a polyamorous society doesn’t threaten you. In fact, it only solidifies your relationships. If your love is true, why be afraid that your lover will be with someone else. Obviously, if you’re both truly, committed to each other in a monogamous fashion, you have nothing to worry about. Wouldn’t you rather have your monogamy be a mutually-agreed upon and consistent choice rather than a default? Basically, I don’t see a strong (but perhaps a weak) dichotomy between monogamous and polyamorous people; however, I do see a strong dichotomy between monogamous and polyamorous social relations.
Sometimes I wonder if polyamory is a superfluous label and I can just identify as a het queer (have het queers been written about/discussed?). Then I consider how labeling myself exclusively as a het queer and not polyamorous would imply that queerness is implicitly polyamorous, and how this is more than a bit presumptuous. On the other hand, perhaps polyamory should be a very specific term that refers only to people with multiple “serious” relationships. This situation is something I’ve never experienced (although I’m not adverse to the arrangement). While, I’ve been involved with multiple girls during the same lapse of time, I wouldn’t really call any of these relationships all that emotionally significant (with the exception of my connection to Darby and my current relationship), or they were more like friendships than romances (not that that’s a bad thing). The point is, I’ve never literally been involved with “multiple loves”. On the other hand, perhaps this is a problem with the definition of love and not the definition of polyamory. Perhaps it’s misguided to conceptualize love based on a model that has more to do with monogamy and Modernity. Why can love only be conceived of using the standard paradigms of the 19th and 20th century? There was a time when Max Weber’s (and a lot (perhaps most) of Marx’s) writing was radically new and insightful concerning a specific historical situation. But now this time is passed. The same is true of monogamy-bound conceptions of love. One day our prevailing idea of love will seem as antiquated and undeveloped as bureaucratic/industrial economies. While that may smack of an almost Marxian sense of historical inevitably (of which I’m no fan, Marxian, Hegelian, or otherwise) I feel that a serious politicization of love could potentially liberate us all from fossilized and harshly constraining perspectives on social relations. Of course, some may shudder at the thought of politicizing love; unfortunately, for those of us who don’t fit into straight paradigms (most of our species, according to my conception of Queer Theory), it’s too late (note: this doesn’t mean I’m thinking about politics while I make out, or even in hindsight).
I know I haven’t actually defined love in this entry, but I think it might have something to do with my asexual musings (my next entry will probably be about the definition of love (an in depth discussion of how previous social conditions were conducive to monogamy and current ones are to polyamory is beyond the scope of any livejournal entry (but I’ll probably write one in the distant future, anyway))). If you plan on commenting, I suggest trying to come up with a definition of love independent of monogamist baggage and conventional conceptions of sex.