Polyamory (ish): A framework of organized vulnerabilities

[kawatan]

This is something I've been contemplating for a while, and talk a lot about when people ask me in person about polyamory. It applies to more than that, though.

What does it really mean to be in a relationship with someone?

The trite answer is "it means something different for every person". But what does that mean?

I think choosing to be in a relationship - romantic, sexual, business, familial, otherwise - with someone means there's activities that you want with that person but not necessarily others. The activities are generally things that are kind of risky: they take trust and energy to do ethically. I'll call these activities "vulnerabilities" - they make you vulnerable by doing.

Many things can be vulnerabilities - sexual activity is an obvious one, but so is emotional closeness, sharing secrets, partaking in family-driven activity (like visiting for holidays), using affectionate nicknames or declaring role ("are you my girlfriend or just my girl friend?") giving and receiving extravagant gifts, traveling together, giving and receiving money/financial assistance, eating together, working on large creative projects together... Basically, if you need to be careful about who you do that with for some reason, it's probably a "vulnerability."

Any of the activities of the five love languages is a vulnerability. The relationship escalator is really a list of vulnerabilities society expects couples to do exclusively, and a sanctioned order to do them in. But there's others, too, and others that people don't necessarily examine because they don't "feel like relationships".

For any given vulnerability, the question then becomes: who are you okay with doing that with?

No one? One person? A handful of people? Or is it the kind of thing that's vulnerable for others but not necessarily for you, so it's a lot of people?

Let's call this your number for the vulnerability.

If your answer is at least one, what kinds of people would you do that with?

Only men? Only women? Only nonbinary people?
For kink, only tops? Only bottoms?
For partnered dance, only leads and you want to always follow? Or vice versa?
For performing music, what kinds of instrumentalists or vocalists are you searching to collaborate with? (Someone looking to start a rock band wants very different things from someone looking to join a barbershop quartet!)
I'm sure you can think of other dichotomies that matter here.

For any of those, "a mix of these" is also an possibility. (A pet theory about this with regards to gender/sexuality will follow.) For some activities and gender, this might be considered "your sexuality". To generalize it, let's call it your typing.

Defining your limits

So an exercise this leads to is:

1. Name a vulnerability. Get as specific as you can - "calling them sweetie", "touch in these areas", "making sure I don't watch The Good Place without them", "bring them to my parents' Thanksgiving dinner", "share a house/apartment with them".
   
2. For each of the possible number categories, think of an example person/lifestyle that would look like. So what would doing that with no one look like? With one person? With a few people? With a lot of people?
   
3. Compare these theoretical lifestyles with the one you would feel most comfortable with. So based on these possibilities, what do you think your number is?
   
4. If relevant to you, define a typing, and determine yours.

I think doing this activity for lots of vulnerabilities, your own and those of people you care about, can reveal a lot about your personal limits and spur lots of useful discussion.

Worked examples

1. Vulnerability: Sexual activity
   
2. • No one: Asexuality.
   • One person: Classical monogamy.
   • A few people: Polyfidelity, "I'm seeing a few people".
   • A lot of people: Big swinging/kink parties, deep participation in hookup culture.
   
   
3. My personal number: Somewhere between "a few" and "a lot". I like having the option for expansive, casual sexual fun, but generally stick to a few known and trusted people, and I like it that way.
   
4. Type: gender. I like the idea of sexual activity with lots of possible genders, though I know others are more selective about it.
   
5. Type: age. I generally hold to the xkcd theory of not-being-a-creep in terms of age range.

1. Vulnerability: Living with others
   
2. • No one: Living alone.
   • One person: Classical monogamy, or just having one roommate.
   • A few people: Polyfidelity, a handful of roomates, or a small nuclear family.
   • A lot of people:Big shared households, living with extended family, dorm living.
   
   
3. My personal number: None! I love living alone and getting to make decisions about where and how I live without compromise!

The pet theory of the semi-straight dude

There's a stereotype out there that exists, of men who self-label as straight but search for casual, often anonymous or semi-anonymous homoerotic experiences. Of course, some of this is fueled by internal or external homophobia, but also: I think for some of these men, they would define their number/type for "romantic vulnerability" as "one or a few, only women" and their number/type for "sexual activity" as "a few or a lot, both men and women".

Since one version of the relationship escalator model assumes romantic vulnerability is higher on the escalator, and thus "more important", than sexual activity - and assumes that it's a prerequisite for legal vulnerability (cohabitation and legal marriage) - these particular dudes view that as more important than their sexual openness when defining sexuality.

Is that activity still homophobic in some way? Maybe. (Probably?) But is that a reasonable set of limits to have? ...Quite possibly!