Intimacy, Relationships, and The Problems of Monogamy

What is intimacy?

Intimacy is the creation of genuine connections with people. Some people see that sexual intercourse is the only "real" form of intimacy. However, I think that this is a narrow-sighted view of what intimacy is.

There is a wide array of things that can create intimate connections with people. Simple gestures that convey a loving attitude are intimate. Sharing similar views on certain topics can be intimate. Being excited about an idea can be intimate. And sex for sure can be intimate.

And therefore, when monogamous people insist on the exclusivity of sex I see it as an indirect declaration that sex is the only thing that matters in a relationship. I think sex is important, but by far not the only thing that is important.

So, when we see that restricting sexual intercourse is an indirect attempt to restrict intimacy a large array of problems come into light.

If someone takes seriously the idea of restricting the intimate connections that their partner has with other people, there is far a lot more than just sex that needs to be restricted. A simple conversation can be intimate, and how are you going to control that? Are you going to prohibit your partner from having meaningful conversations with other people?

Let's say a couple had a rule that they are not allowed to have deep meaningful conversations with other people in order to restrict intimate connections. What is the definition of a "deep meaningful conversation"?

For example, you can sit with someone and talk about something mundane... Like say, the weather. Let's imagine the following conversation:

- "Hey, the weather is nice today."
- "Yes, it is a lovely day today."
- "Did you watch the news? Do you have any idea how the weather is going to be tomorrow?"
- "Yeah, it is going to have some light rain tomorrow!"
- "Yay, I love rainy weather!"
- "Me too. Why is it that you love rainy weather?"
- "I just love going out in the rain. The feel of rain drops splashing my face is fantastic!"
- "Oh wow... I have the same feeling too... It's just so liberating!!"
- "Liberating... That's exactly the word I would describe that feeling!"

Looking at the conversation above, it might seem to some people to be about two people just conversing about the weather - nothing intimate about it. However, this conversation can be seen by some as an intimate conversation where people are sharing how they feel. A simple conversation like that can be the start of a great relationship, if the two people felt connected at a deep level, and sharing that attitude towards the rain had deep significance to them.

So, if you were in a monogamous relationship, how would you feel about your partner having that conversation with someone else?!

What if the conversation took a deeper turn? Let's say the two people started talking about the weather, and ended up talking about their dreams and aspirations. Maybe they both were for example atheists, and created a connection when they both became honest about their views of something that goes deep into the human psyche like religion. Maybe even they shared stories of having to fight social pressure to conform to mainstream religion, and so they felt a deep intimate connection?!

What would you think of the following conversation:

- "Hey, the weather is nice today."
- "Yes, it is a lovely day today."
- "Did you watch the news? Do you have any idea how the weather is going to be tomorrow?"
- "Yeah, it is going to have some light rain tomorrow!"
- "Yay, I love rainy weather!"
- "Me too. Why is it that you love rainy weather?"
- "I just love going out in the rain. The feel of rain drops splashing my face is fantastic!"
- "Oh wow... I have the same feeling too... It's just so liberating!!"
- "Liberating... That's exactly the word I would describe that feeling!"
- "Do you know what else I find liberating?"
- "What?"
- "Being honest with other people."
- "I agree. And in that spirit, I want to share something with you about myself."
- "What is that?"
- "I am an atheist, and it plays a huge role in my views about life!"
- "I am not atheist, however I am an agnostic! But wow, that was a really brave thing to say, seeing how much atheists are frowned upon in our society. I face a lot of negative reactions about my agnosticism, to the point of being afraid to tell others that aspect of myself!"
- "I do too, however I felt a good connection with you, and so I felt at ease sharing that with you!"
- "Yes, me too. The feeling is mutual, I also feel ecstatic that we could share that about ourselves."

What do you think of THAT? Now imagine that instead of the conversation above, the following conversation happened:

- "Hey, the weather is nice today."
- "Yes, it is a lovely day today."
- "Did you watch the news? Do you have any idea how the weather is going to be tomorrow?"
- "Yeah, it is going to have some light rain tomorrow!"
- "Yay, I love rainy weather!"
- "Me too. Why is it that you love rainy weather?"
- "I just love going out in the rain. The feel of rain drops splashing my face is fantastic!"
- "Oh wow... I have the same feeling too... It's just so liberating!!"
- "Ouch, I am sorry. I have a girlfriend. I sense this conversation is becoming meaningful. I am not interested in any conversation that goes beyond 'That's a nice weather!'... I prefer to only have meaningful conversations with my girlfriend."

What do you think?

I personally would feel abhorred by such over-protective fear of human connections and intimacy, that people feel they have to sabotage any meaningful intimate connections with others.

In my view, sex is an advanced stage of such intimate connections. It's not much different than simply cutting of a conversation that have just become interesting and meaningful. Relationships by their nature advance as people become more accepting and in tune with the other person. So, whether you cut off the conversation just when it has become interesting, or cutting off a relationship just when you feel that sexual intimacy is just few inches away, it all about sabotaging and being afraid of intimate connections happening between people!!

It's just an arbitrary line drawn in the sand!!

Also, if you were a person in the business of disallowing their partner from intimate connections with other people. What is sufficient protection? Even a seemingly innocent conversation about the weather can turn out to have an intimate aspect to it. So, what are you going to do? Ban conversing altogether?!

So, it really does not make sense to think you can simply make a bunch of rules to restrict intimacy.

The Human Core: Pansexuality, Polyamory, and Relationship Anarchy

There are three aspects of the human experience that exemplify it's core values: Love, sexuality, and relationships. In this post, I will address those most essential elements of the human experience.

Let's start with a few quick definitions before we delve into the subject.

Pansexuality is a term used to describe undiscriminating choice for sexual and\or romantic partners. Most people are familiar with the term "bisexuality", which includes both "homo" and "hetero" partners for sexual and\or romantic affairs. Pansexuality extends beyond bisexuality, to include the sexes that are usually referred to as "others", including -but not limited to- transsexuals (people who undergone a sex-change operation) and intersexes (people who don't fall in either male or female profiles). I have expressed my admiration for pansexuality in previous posts, like this one.

It is worth noting that pansexuals don't have to actually be attracted to that full spectrum. A pansexual might be someone who is in fact heterosexual, but refuses to identify with that label because they would not repress any attractions towards someone from the same sex (if it happened), although they realistically know that they may never feel such an attraction. The same logic also applies to homosexuals who may or may not experience heterosexual urges.

Relationship anarchy is the practice of forming relationships that are not bound by set rules. Relationship anarchy has strong connections with open relationships, although being distinct from open relationships. It differs from other relationship models by postulating that there need not be a formal distinction between different types of relationships. Relationship anarchists look at each relationship (romantic or otherwise) individually, as opposed to categorizing them according to societal norms such as 'just friends', 'in a relationship', 'in an open relationship', etc.

Polyamory is the belief that it is possible to love more than one person at the same time. I have addressed this topic on multiple occasions in this blog. What follows are three posts that discuss the concept of polyamory:
- Can You Love More Than One Person At The Same Time?
- Polyamory: The Ethical Problems of Monogamy
- Dissecting The Concept of Monogamy


The questions that are at the core of this post are: In what ways are those three concepts connected? What are the common values that those perspectives share? And why I believe that those three concepts work beautifully well together that there is a good chance that someone who subscribes to one is likely to subscribe to the others as well?


Fluidity:
The first word that comes to mind to describe those three positions is fluidity! I believe that the common values go much deeper than that, but this is a good place to start. Pansexuality is about being fluid about your sexual preferences. A pansexual person is one who is not willing to limit his or her sexual preferences in a normative manner. This can to be contrasted with self-identified heterosexuals, who may have some homosexual urges, but choose to repress those urges in order to avoid a situation where they might have to question their sexual orientation. A pansexual would give themselves permission to act on their desire without feeling the need to question their attraction.

In a similar fashion, a relationship anarchist would not 'define' and consequently constrain their relationships with other people. They prefer to keep their relationships fluid, and hence lack the need to constrain themselves or others through rules, but even more importantly, roles!

And finally, let's address polyamory. Monogamy in this context can be seen as a limiting belief, that may cause a person to repress an emotional connection that is developing with another person, due to the fact that they believe that loving more than one person at the same time is somehow not 'real love'!! In the same way that a heterosexual might ignore feeling of attraction to someone of the same gender based on normative considerations, a monogamist might ignore an evolving emotional bond based on normative considerations of a similar nature.


Genuine Connectedness and Freedom of Expression:
In a very similar manner of understanding, those three concepts allow a person have have the freedom to express themselves, and allow others to express themselves openly and honestly. The outcome of an atmosphere of freedom is genuineness.

Since love, sexuality, and relationships are the most profound aspects of the human experience, the expression of those elements expresses the fundamental values of the personal identity. Our inner most values as humans are expressed through love, sex, and relationships. Any act that aims to censor or inhibit the free expression of those values hides away an aspect of our personal identify. The people we enter relationships with are a mirror to our inner most needs, desires, and values.

In order to maximize the genuineness of the interpersonal bonds with our fellow human beings, we need to maximize their ability to express their inner most selves genuinely without manipulation or censorship.

Pansexuality, polyamory, and relationship anarchy are effective tools to guarantee that yourself and others are free to express themselves in the most genuine manner...


Avoiding Self-Limiting Beliefs:
As has been explained in the previous section, adopting the social norms that create normative barriers to self-expression are self-limiting beliefs, that encourage the person holding those beliefs to not fully explore their inner-selves. It shuts down routes that may lead to experiencing life without any barriers.

However, it is my personal belief that the most gratifying relationships are with those who both are willing to be open and honest, and also have done the necessary self-reflection to actually know themselves deeply enough. After all, you cannot share your values if you have not done what is necessary to discover those values.


Acceptance and Celebrating Our Humanity:
Love, sex, and relationships are momentous experiences. Without them life would be dull, and frankly meaningless. When we experience love we feel joy. When we experience sex we feel joy. And when we have genuine relationships we feel joy. Any of those experiences calls for a celebration. It is a celebration that expresses our humanity. Humans are social creatures, and all those experiences exemplify the best aspects of our social selves.

Pansexuality, polyamory, and relationship anarchy demonstrates an acceptance and receptiveness to all those joys of life. It allows us to experience life to its fullest potential without having to feel guilt, shame, or internal conflict while expressing our values.

I shall quote from an article that expresses such concerns quite eloquently:

"[Monogamy] makes a person feel guilty about having a feeling that I consider to be one of the most important feelings of all. Our ability to connect with other people, to admire other people for their greatness, to be attracted to what we value (spiritually and physically), the ability to love – is probably our most vital characteristic in this life. Monogamy takes a somewhat controversial stance towards it – this property is considered wonderful in a person if he is single, but once he already has one romantic relationship, this very same property is labeled as extremely immoral and wrong. [...] So, basically, if you're in a monogamous relationship, and there's this other person that you realize is absolutely awesome, then you should feel somewhat guilty. You should reject this realization." (source)

And within this understanding, the goal is to celebrate our core human values without guilt or repression. To give ourselves and those we are in a relationship with the means to experience the joys of life.

The Feminist Movement Revised

Check out this video about the flaws of the current feminist ideology, and how it is counter productive to the stated goals of feminism, namely gender equality.

The Morality of Seduction: Is Redistribution of Wealth Moral?

Libertarians generally believe that the actions of government should follow the same ethical principles that private individuals follow. It is generally believed that theft is unethical. Assuming that theft is immoral, should redistribution of wealth through government be considered moral?!

The morality of seduction is the principle that moral human relationships are voluntary interactions (some libertarians do call themselves voluntaryists). The morality of rape is the idea that moral human relationships can be coercive by the use of force. Is redistribution of wealth consistent with the morality of seduction or the morality of rape?!

See this video of Economist Walter Williams making the moral case against the redistribution of wealth.

To Think or Not To Think

"I exist, therefore I'll think."

"Devotion to the truth is the hallmark of morality; there is no greater, nobler, more heroic form of devotion than the act of a man who assumes the responsibility of thinking."

"Man’s mind is his basic tool of survival. Life is given to him, survival is not. His body is given to him, its sustenance is not. His mind is given to him, its content is not. To remain alive, he must act, and before he can act he must know the nature and purpose of his action. He cannot obtain his food without a knowledge of food and of the way to obtain it. He cannot dig a ditch – or build a cyclotron – without a knowledge of his aim and of the means to achieve it. To remain alive, he must think.
But to think is an act of choice. [...] In any hour and issue of your life, you are free to think or to evade that effort. But you are not free to escape from your nature, from the fact that reason is your means of survival – so that for you, who are a human being, the question ‘to be or not to be’ is the question ‘to think or not to think’."

"Man must obtain his knowledge and choose his actions by a process of thinking, which nature will not force him to perform."

Ayn Rand

Re-Evaluating Discrimination

Economist Walter Williams gives great lecture about the common myths and misunderstandings about discrimination.

Watch the full lecture, titled "How Much Can Discrimination Explain?".

How Good Is Greed?!

Is greed a virtue or a vice?! Economist Walter Williams believes that greed is the noblest of human motivations... I happen to agree, do you?!

See this video of Walter Williams explaining the virtues of greed.

Socialism: Behind The Curtains

This post is a prelude to posts that critique socialism/communism.

The question is: If it was proven beyond reasonable doubt that socialism would lead to massive poverty, would you still support socialism?! If making everyone equal in terms of financial wealth meant that the average wealth of people in a socialist society is below the average of wealth in a capitalist society, would that change your mind?! What if the average wealth in a socialist society will be below the poverty level by today's standards, would that concern you?!

Would you rather live in a society where everyone is equally "poor"?! Or a society where wealth is disproportionate, but where even the poorest individuals are relatively well-off?!

I would love to hear from anyone who supports socialism/communism their perspective on the subject. Is financial equality the be-all-end-all value?!

The Psychology and Politics of Self-Responsibility

Dr. Nathaniel Brandon is a well-known psychologist and gives a talk about self-esteem and self-responsibility, and how it affects the political arena of the current world.

Click here to see the video.

Do The Minimum Wage Laws Cause Poverty?

Government intervention in a free market causes lots of problems. Minimum wage laws are just one example of how the government limiting the freedom of individuals to create contracts hurts individuals.

To better understand how minimum wage laws hurts individuals and causes poverty, check the videos below:
Does the Minimum Wage Hurt Workers?
John Stossel - The State Against Blacks
How the Minimum Wage Creates Unemployment
The Job-Killing Impact of Minimum Wage Laws

Do We Need Government?!

While I don't have strong beliefs whether a government is absolutely necessary, or can be completely discarded, there are good reasons to believe that it might be possible that we don't need government in any form. The functions of the government might be subject to privatization, and this may lead to more efficient and flexible security implementations.

See those four videos that explain the possible mechanisms that government can be discarded. The first two videos are short straight to the point explanation. The third and fourth videos are complete lectures that provides additional insights how such a system can happen, and how this is already widely used in our current times.

1- Social Cooperation: Why Thieves Hate Free Markets
2- Law without Government: Conflict Resolution in a Free Society
3- Do We Need Government?
4- Anarchy and Efficient Law

The Disposable Male

Check out this video about the social double standards in regards to the treatment of men and women in society, and how men are also oppressed under "patriarchal" systems.



PS: If you find this video interesting, check out it's continuation here

Types of Rights: Positive and Negative Rights

In political philosophy, rights are broadly categorized as positive rights and negative rights. LGBT rights, women rights, and freedom of speech are examples of negative rights. Right to healthcare, right to welfare, right to education are examples of positive rights. If you are puzzled by the notion that LGBT rights, for example, are negative rights, then just bear in mind that positive and negative in this context are not judgements on whether those rights are good or not.

Positive rights are those rights that create duties on others. Negative rights are those rights that are satisfied by simply not taking action by others. For example, when we say that homosexuals have the right to engage in homosexual acts, this right does not create a duty on anyone to act; They are maintained by simply not taking action. In other words, by refraining from taking action to try and stop their sexual acts. On the other hand, a right to education does create duties on others. By claiming education rights, you claim that someone has to build a school, and teachers have to attend the school to provide education.

For this reason, positive rights are usually called entitlements. Saying that a person has a positive right to education, means that the person is entitled to education. On the other hand, negative rights are usually called rights of non-interference. Saying that a homosexual has the negative right to practice homosexual acts, means that the homosexual has a right that others don't interfere and prevent him or her from practicing their preferred sexual acts.

But let's do a thought experiment and assert that LGBT rights are positive rights. In other words, that homosexuals are entitled to engage in homosexual acts. So, let's say that a gay person is walking down the street picks a random stranger and says: "Let's go and have sex." The stranger replies: "But I don't want to." Then the gay person says: "But I have a positive right to homosexual sex." and forces that stranger to engage in homosexuality. Any reasonable person would object and say: "That's a misinterpretation of the concept of a right! Saying that homosexuals have positive rights is a right to rape people! That's nonsense...". This scenario raises a reasonable question: Are positive rights misinterpretations of the concept of a right?! Or are there positive rights that are legitimate?! It is obvious that claiming that homosexuals have positive rights to homosexual acts is illegitimate, but is it the case that all positive rights are really illegitimate?!

Some people claim that a right to education is a legitimate positive right. Or that right to healthcare is a legitimate positive right. But are they really?!

Consider the right to healthcare. If someone goes into a clinic and demands that they get treated for some illness without paying anything to the doctors or nurses who are taking care of him; Is that patient's actions legitimate?! To understand the problem with the proposition that this is a legitimate action, let's see how such a scenario would play out. Suppose the doctor refuses to give treatment for the patient, the patient might use force to get treatment. This would be a form of theft in practice. What about the case that the patient makes the case that the doctor has the duty of providing healthcare. Such duty can only be interpreted as slavery. Claiming that the doctor has an obligation to provide medical care to patients without being compensated, is to say that the doctor is a slave to his or her patients. Moreover, if we establish that patients have the right to medical care without providing compensation to doctors, what would happen to the medical profession?! Would any person desire to become a doctor and go through the process of medical education just so that in the end he would be regarded as a slave?! Under such conditions, no person in his right mind would decide to become a doctor!

In practice, this is not how the right to healthcare is implemented. So, let's try to propose a second scenario that comes closer to practice. Say, a group of people decided that a right to healthcare is desirable. And as such, they created an institution where people pay 10$ each month to this institution, and the people who participate in this institution would receive free medical care from doctors. But doctors don't do it as slaves, they do it with the understanding that they are going to be compensated by the institution that those people participated in. That is all good. Such an institution would be analogous to health insurance companies that we are all familiar with. The problem arises if and when such an institution claims that people should have "free" healthcare, and hence being a member of the institution is not optional, it is mandatory. What if a person decides that they do not want to pay 10$ monthly?! If they are forced to pay the 10$, then this is no longer voluntary participation in an institution, but rather outright theft. Taking 10$ from a person against his will is theft in the most common sense of the word.

Imagine that you go into a shop, and the shopkeeper decided that all customers must buy a bar of chocolate. And you enter that shop, and the shopkeeper puts a gun in your head and demands that you pay for a chocolate bar, and then gives you the chocolate bar. While this is not theft as we are used to it, but the fact that the purchase was forced and not voluntary implies a form of theft, even if you were getting what you paid for.

And this brings us to what actually happens in practice when claiming that people have a right to healthcare. Such a system is implemented through one or both of the following methods: 1- Making health insurance mandatory to all citizens by law. Or 2- Raising taxes to create public sector clinics and paying those doctors. It does not take a genius to figure out that both solutions are forms of theft. Simply claiming that it is required by law to have health insurance, does not negate the fact that forcing someone to pay for health insurance is a form of theft, be it forced by the insurance company itself or by the government. And raising taxes to achieve the same result is also forcing people to pay for healthcare, but with simply creating the trick of changing labels from mandatory health insurance to tax money. It's the same process but under different pretenses.

So just as claiming that homosexuals have a positive right to homosexual acts is in practice (and also in principle) a right to rape others, saying that people with a medical condition have a right to healthcare is in practice (and in principle) a right to steal from others or enslave them.

The same logic applies to the right to welfare, education, and almost every other set of positive rights that are proposed. If someone is entitled to a positive right, then someone else has to provide that entitlement either voluntarily or by force. Therefore, we can see the obvious problem of positive rights; That they cannot be implemented without infringing on somebody else's rights!

PS: Check this video for more explanation about positive and negative rights

The Problem of Welfare State

It is well-understood that the welfare state and socialism are incompatible with Libertarian politics. While the philosophical reasons for this position need to be addressed, however, without such philosophical analysis it can still be easily seen why welfare and socialism are incompatible with liberty and the principles of a liberal society. To illustrate this in the most simple terms, check this YouTube video titled: Self-ownership or Socialism?

Share your thoughts.

Enemies of Freedom

"The greatest enemy of freedom is a happy slave."

Amen!

Thoughts on Speciesism

I have been lately reading a little bit about the animal rights concept, especially as it applies to justify veganism as an ethical choice, and one concept is introduced titled "speciesism", which is roughly defined as discriminating life forms according to their species. The purpose of this term is to draw parallels between sexism and racism which are generally considered as questionable practices, and raising the question of why speciesism is considered acceptable.

It should be noted that for me personally, my general attitude against racism and sexism is not axiomatic (axiomatic roughly means being regarded as an assumption). It is a derivative position. In other words, it is a consequence of other principles that I consider axiomatic, rather than a position that I hold for it's own sake. Additionally, I believe that people have a right to practice private sexism and private racism, my objection lies in institutionalized sexism and racism. In other words, sexism and racism should not exist in the legal system, however private citizens are still allowed to practice sexism and racism.

If this idea is not clear, let's see what criminalization of private sexism and racism would entail. If private racism was not allowed, there would be laws against having an unequal number of while-skinned and black-skinned friends. Would you think that a law should exist that prevents individuals from having all their friends white-skinned and none black-skinned?! I don't think that such law is desirable in any way. Same applies to opposing private sexism. Opposing private sexism would come into direct contradiction with LGBT rights for example. Should there be laws banning individuals from having sexual orientations like homosexuality or heterosexuality, and requiring all individuals to become bisexuals because this is the direct consequence of abandoning gender discrimination?! Obviously, such law is abusive and undesirable. This does not mean that racism and sexism are desirable in private interactions, however it does mean that there should not exist laws that ban the practice for private citizens.

These examples show why sexism and racism should not be considered axiomatic. This at least opens up speciesism to the view that abandoning this practice should not be considered axiomatic.

Let's explore the reason that animal rights advocates claim that killing animals constitutes speciesism. The argument goes that if we as humans consider it illegal to kill other human beings, why is it that animals are not held in the same regard. Such argument might seem reasonable at first, but I can identify few problems.

The first problem I see is that what animal rights advocates claim to be abandoning speciesism is itself an act of speciesism. It is natural that animals prey on other animals. Animal rights advocates (I assume) would not object if a lion killed a deer for food. But they would object if a human did that same action. Isn't that a form of discrimination?! I find it hard to argue that this would not entail some forms of discrimination. The only solution to this problem is to ban carnivores from preying on other animals, which would bring a whole new set of problems.

Another problem I see is the discrimination of the plant kingdom and animal kingdom, which is being systematically advocated by veganism. This of course is also a form of speciesism^(*). Animal rights advocates ask the question of why we are willing to give humans rights, without providing the same rights to animals. But then again, why not give plants the same rights as those animals?! If discrimination is the principle involved that is deemed objectionable, then discriminating animals and plants raises serious questions in regards to that principle.

It should be noted that those problems are not sufficient arguments to discredit animal rights, but they do challenge speciesism as an argument for that position.

^(*)PS: Technically, this should be called "kingdomism" not "speciesism". However, the underlying principle is the same. Why is it okay to practice kingdomism but not speciesism?!

Revolutionazing Education

I have stumbled upon two really interesting YouTube videos that I think are truly eye-openers. They address the limitations of the current education systems, and propose ways things might be improved.

Sir Ken Robinson: Do schools kill creativity?
Sir Ken Robinson: Bring on the learning revolution!
Sir Ken Robinson - Changing Paradigms

The last video is the longest, and it does repeat some of the things that are mentioned in the previous videos. However, it does add some value and show additional insights. So, it is worth watching.

Dissecting The Concept of Monogamy

Monogamy can be interpreted in two contexts. The common context relates monogamy to romantic love, and the other relates monogamy to marriage. In this post, I am addressing monogamy in the context of romantic love. The concept of monogamy has two common views. The first one is usually called "strict monogamy", the other is usually called "serial monogamy".

Strict monogamy states that a person has one "true love" in his lifetime. This belief is commonly held but rarely practiced. This belief is a direct derivative of the common imagery of the "one true love", and the fairy tales of the prince and the princess meeting and falling in love and living happily ever after. In this belief, there are two scenarios that can happen. The idealistic vision is that a person will experience attraction and love only once in their life, and this would be their one true love. In more pragmatic visions, a person is perceived to experience love several times in their life, but only one of their experiences in love is "true" love.

The pragmatic vision of strict monogamy is usually characterized by the concept of a "soul mate". So basically, the vision is that people live their lives, fall in and out of loves multiple of times, but those relationships that failed, failed because they were not with their soul mate, their one true love. So the people would be entering relationships in the hope of stumbling upon their soul mate, and having an everlasting relationship! In this vision, previous lovers are pictured as being somewhat inferior to the person that one ended up having an everlasting relationship with. That's to say, they were not instances of "true love", your true love is that love you finally got to after successive failures.

Serial monogamy states that a person can have only one "true love" at any point of time. There is strong similarity between the pragmatic vision of strict monogamy and serial monogamy. So, just like in strict monogamy, a person falls in and out of love several times in their life. Serial monogamy is also a commonly held belief, and is much more practiced in real life. The idea here is that a person gets a lover (usually with the title boyfriend or girlfriend), their relationship is maintained for some time, then they break up, and then enter into a new relationship. The difference from the pragmatic vision of strict monogamy that there is no belief that the love of a given person should be superior to all previous lovers. So in this belief system, you can claim that you had more than one experience of "true love". One does not have to denounce previous relationships as inferior to their current relationship in order to claim that their current relationship is sincere.

After this brief introduction to the various beliefs held for monogamous love, let's look at the implications of those beliefs.

Most people (I guess) would identify with serial monogamy. It is after all how most people conduct their relationships, although for some people their inner thoughts and feelings resonate more with the vision of the pragmatic strict monogamy. Pragmatic strict monogamy in my opinion is very insulting to the concept of love.

When I was first introduced to the concept of strict monogamy I was completely abhorred!! And yes, like most people I was introduced to this concept at a very young age. To see why strict monogamy is abhorrent, let's look at a very simple scenario:

Say that you met someone who you find to be absolutely charming, and that you find yourself in love with that person. You would characterize your love for that person as honest and sincere. In other words, it's love in it's most noble form. But then, you foresee that this person may not be in your life forever. That you may have to part with this person at some future point of time. And then you find yourself in a pickle. If you ever met someone else and felt those same noble feelings of honest and sincere love, then you have to denounce your love for the person you are currently with as "not true love"! This is because in that belief system you can only have one true love, so you either have to admit that your current lover is not the real deal, or that it is impossible that any future love that you experience is also sincere because you already consumed your one shot at true love!!

Such scenario is truly disturbing in my opinion. That if you sincerely love a person now, all your future relationships are a "fraud". Or that if you were going to have a future sincere relationship, then your current relationship is a "fraud"!! It is a very disturbing and counter-intuitive idea, and I find it truly immature to hold such belief!

Needless to say, labeling your relationships as insincere or frauds is insulting to the people that you love. So in this setup, you are being forced to insult either your current partner, or all of your future and past partners. You are being forced to value your relationships in a post-facto (after the fact) manner. Such setup obviously does not make the concept of love noble in any way, but rather one has to hold a belief of inferiority of all your relationships that did not turn out exactly the way a person envisions them.

The obvious solution to this dangerous belief is that a person can indeed have sincere feelings of love towards more than one person in his or her lifetime. To me, this instantly made me believe in polyamory. However, the concept of serial monogamy solves the same problem but with an additional condition. So, in serial monogamy it is believed that a person can have sincere feelings of love towards more than one person in his or her lifetime, BUT you can only sincerely love one person at any given point of time!

That's a really big BUT there in serial monogamy. And I believe this additional condition is misinformed. Once we understand why strict monogamy is problematic, we can easily see why serial monogamy is also problematic. I have already addressed this in a previous post, but let's get over it once more. As we have seen with the problem of strict monogamy, we are being forced to denounce certain love experiences as insincere because we perceive it as impossible to experience true love more than once in a lifetime. However, in serial monogamy we are being forced to make that same denouncement of the sincerity of love if our experiences of love happened to overlap in time.

So, for a serial monogamist, if they find that they are developing feelings and emotional connections with someone, they are instantly being forced to decide that one of their love experiences as being insincere. So, you either love this new person in your life sincerely which means that you should terminate your relationship with the person you are currently involved with, or you see the new person as a threat to your current relationship, and must destroy any emotional connection that is developing between you and that new person.

However, this notion is ludicrous in my opinion. The notion that the sincerity of one's love has to be questioned if they find themselves being emotionally connected to more than one person. In my mind, this problem at it's core is not in any way different from the problem that is raised in the context of strict monogamy. And for this reason, I think that anyone who has a problem with the implications of strict monogamy should be equally disturbed by the implications of serial monogamy!!

Again, the limitation of loving one person at a time is nothing more than a misinformed, not properly thought out, externally imposed limitation. There is nothing in our nature (at least for most people) that prevents us from wholeheartedly loving more than one person at any given point of time. And the introduction of this limitation does not make the concept of love more noble. Quite the contrary, it is debasing and insulting to the concept of love, and to the people we love!!

Polyamory, which is the belief that we can love more than one person (even at the same time), is the obvious and natural response to the problems that are being introduced by the concept of monogamy...

There are some challenges to practicing polyamory in system that idolizes serial monogamy. The problem is highlighted with the concept of cheating. In most relationship paradigms that are practiced today, having more than one relationship is indeed insulting to your lover. This is because for a person to love someone other than the one they are currently in a relationship with would involve cheating. And cheating in my opinion does challenge the sincerity of love one has for another. However, this is a problem of design and construction. In other words, when people design their relationships with the principles of serial monogamy embedded in their construction, they create a system where loving more than one person comes at direct contradiction with sincerity.

So our initial problem is persistent in such a design. If, by design, the only way a person can practice polyamory they need to cheat, then it is an obvious flaw in the design. The very purpose of polyamory (in my personal view) is that we do not undermine the integrity and sincerity of our relationships either past, current, or future. For this reason, the open-relationships design is crucial to practicing polyamory while adhering to the principles that compelled a person to hold a belief in polyamory. For a person to be able to truly love a person without compromising their integrity and sincerity with respect to their already established relationships there needs to be an understanding between partners and lovers about the principles of polyamory. So open-relationships is a paradigm design of relationships such that practicing polyamory does not undermine the concept of love, and maintains its integrity...

The False Dichotomy of Friendship and Romantic Companionship

In a previous post I hinted at the problematic distinction between friendship and romantic companionship. I have stumbled upon a very interesting post that expresses my concern in a quite eloquent manner.

The following are excerpts from that post:

I recently witnessed many discussions on how acceptable it is to pursue a friendship with someone you're interested in romantically, and I keep hearing opinions that are absolutely baffling to me. I hear things like: it's wrong, it's dishonest, it's not a "real" friendship, the other person will be rightfully furious at you when they find out, etc. etc.

It seems that, for all these people, friendship and romance are required to develop on absolutely distinct paths, right off the bat; otherwise, they see it as wrong somehow.

I suspect that the difference between us is this: they see friendship as opposed to a romantic relationship, like the two are mutually exclusive, whereas I see friendship as being a part of romantic relationship. Moreover, it is an absolutely vital part – I can’t have romantic relationships without it. All of my romantic relationships began with friendship!

Another point: friendship is not only a vital part of a relationship – it is also the most important one, by far! The most rewarding, the most fun, the most worthy to pursue. Whenever I really like someone, I’ll always be willing to give up the sex in order to be able to be their friend.

When I am trying to become friends with someone, it is because I find them interesting and fun and I want to be their friend. Now, I may also want to sleep with them; but I can’t emphasize the “also” enough. The romance is not mandatory – the friendship is. First, foremost and most importantly – I want to be their friend.

For me, spending time and energy on a friend is its own reward... Otherwise, what kind of friendship is that?! And regarding the emotional turmoil – yes, I agree, it can be not easy sometimes. But it’s totally worth it. (At least for me.)

source: Dishonest Friendship?

Although the concluding remarks in that post are a little bit off-topic, I am going to include them because I find them enlightening and address some issues commonly encountered in practice:

This post has a dual goal:

If you’re my friend, and you realize that I’m in love with you – don’t conclude that my friendship is not genuine. It is.

If you are interested in me romantically, ask yourself: if a fairy told you that she looked into the future and I definitely won't sleep with you, ever – would that knowledge make you not want to be my friend anymore?

If the answer is yes – that you’re interested in my friendship only on condition for the prospect of sex – please, fuck off! I mean it – we’re not right for each other, I don’t need you in my life.
But it is completely okay if you are interested in sex – as long as you are interested in me regardless of ever having it.

Compersion: Polyamory Realized

Compersion is defined as taking joy in the joy of others. It is the opposite of envy, which is characterized by feelings of spite towards the joy of others. In the context of relationships it is the healthy alternative to jealousy.

Love is a joyous emotion. If a friend or somebody we care about falls in love, we'd be happy for them. We would share with them their joy, and wish them the best of luck, and sincerely hope it will work out for the best for them. We would take inspiration from their smiles and enthusiasm...

Isn't it odd that when people claim to be in love they would express intention of compersion, and tell their partners that their own happiness is elevated when their partner is happy, yet if their partner fell in love they would deny those feelings of compersion and indulge jealousy instead?!

Isn't it odd that some people can share the joy of love with friends and acquaintances, but not their significant others?!