this post was submitted on 16 Apr 2024
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A power outage killed my response as I was writing, so I'm going to try to remember the salient points. There's a lot to unpack here.
All about sex? No. BUT sex--and specifically the lack of sex with other people--is the single defining characteristic of a monogamous relationship. If there is neither sex, nor is there a limitation on having sex with other people, then it's not a monogamous relationship. Love is hopefully a component of a monogamous relationship, but it's not necessary to love your partner to be in a monogamous relationship.
I love my parents. I'm not in a polysexual relationship with them. (...Thank fuck, ew.)
I love my friend Jeff like the brother I wish I had. I'm not in a multiamorous relationship with him.
I love my spouse. I am in a monogamous relationship with them.
Being in a monogamous relationship with my spouse does not mean that I can not love other people. Being monogamous with my spouse doesn't mean that I can't still love my parents, or Jeff. It doesn't even mean that I can't be physically or sexually attracted to other people. It does mean that I can't have sex with any other people, and it means that engaging in activities with other people that are sexual or are otherwise linked to erotic--romantic--love would put me on very, very thin ice. A private dance that I paid for at a club? Probably okay, but very questionable. Getting (consensually) fingered by a dancer? Definitely not okay. Getting a private dance from someone that I also have a deep personal friendship with? That's several flyover states away from okay.
So, then, if sex is not a defining characteristic, a necessary prerequisite, of a multiamorous relationship, then how does it differ from the love that I feel for my parents, or for my closest friends? I said, "[...] sex is the entire point of being in any kind of non-monogamous relationship." I stand by this, because once you remove all of the sexual elements, it is no longer any different from a platonic love. It is the sexual element that makes it a different kind of relationship entirely. The only things that you cannot do with a platonic friend, and have the relationship remain platonic, is anything erotic.
Deeply intimate relationships can be entirely platonic; my friendship with Jeff is frequently very intimate, because we can both discuss deeply person, painful things with the other without fear of judgement or loss of that intimacy. My spouse has been developing very intimate relationships with some of the people that they work with; that does not affect our monogamy. Citing intimacy as a primary driver for polysexual relationships simply isn't plausible. If intimacy is what they want, then, again, why does the relationship need to be non-monogamous, since monogamy goes not exclude other emotionally intimate relationships? If you can have non-sexual cuddling--which I'm told is a thing, and--as an autistic person--sounds like absolute hell--then what, exactly, do you gain from being multiamorous other than the ability to choose to have sex with more than one person?
Exactly what do you suppose is the difference between multiple deeply intimate platonic friendships and a multiamorous relationship?
Revisiting
and connecting that to the original point of the meme, I do think that if your partner makes a unilateral choice to discontinue all sexual activity, that no person should be expected to be bound to their original agreement to be monogamous. If your spouse is no longer willing to have sex with you (and I don't mean at any particular time, I mean in general), then they also lose any right to have any say in who you do have sex with.
So yeah it's pretty clear your polyphobic and do conflate romantic relationships with being sexual.
Ask other people about their views on monogamy and I think you can find some that would call your emotional dependence on friends cheating. Clearly a red flag for most and abusive, but your post is a big red flag for me as well.
I have some questions for you,
Is going on a date with a friend ok? Is kissing someone romantically ok? Is cuddling and holding hands ok? Is emotional dependence ok? Is flirting ok? Is going on a vacation with them ok?
Romance and sex
I won't deny that for me personally as a sexual person there is also a sexual element, but one of my partners is ace so for her it's all romantic.
...Wut? How am I emotionally dependent on them? It's an intimate relationship, not a co-dependent one. Taking the view that a close and deep friendship is emotional dependence is a rather grim view, don't you think?
I'm going to briefly interject: romance is sex without the denoument. Romance is sexual. A person that says they're asexual can give and receive a lap dance, and yet a lap dance is still fundamentally sexual.
If you call it a date, and label it as a romantic activity? No. If you're going out with a friend to do something you are both interested in doing? Yes. Dates are about intent.
Is kissing someone romantically okay? No, because romance is fundamentally about sexuality.
Is cuddling and holding hands okay? It depends on intent. Is it intended romantically by either person? Then no. Otherwise? Yes.
Is emotional dependence okay? No. But that's not okay in a relationship either. No person should ever have their emotional well-being dependent on another.
Is flirting okay? No, again, that's fundamentally about sex and sexuality. (Which should be obvious, since people of all genders mistake simply being friendly for flirting, and vice versa, all the time.)
Is going on a vacation with them ok? Of course it is, when it's something that my partner has zero interest in.
...How so, exactly? You're more than welcome to do as you choose, and I have zero interest in stopping you. Assuming that everyone is enthusiastically consenting, it is neither my circus, nor my monkeys. Edit: My spouse is free to do as they please as well; should they choose to have multiple partners, that is there choice. I will immediately leave, but I won't stop them.
On the other hand, I think that it's absolutely delusional to claim that sex is not the defining factor in multiamorous relationships, and to insist that all other people accept that delusion as gospel truth. I was, for a number of years, in multiamorous relationships. I noted that, in all of my partners, and in all of the other multiamorous people I knew, people were always open--at least some degree--to the next new-shiny. Time is zero-sum; you can't put in time with your new-shiny without also taking time away from somewhere else. That didn't bother me for a long time, because I was the same. Then it did bother me, because I realized that what I could never find stability in that.;I could never count on being anyone's first priority all of the time, nor could I ever reasonably promise that to anyone. (Of course, you can't truly find that in monogamy either. But monogamy as least has that veneer, even if people don't always live up to the ideal they claim.)
That wasn't meant as an accusation or anything, nor was I claiming you had or have an unhealthy emotional dependence. There are certainly stages to intimacy, emotionally, romantic, and sexually.
And that really helps tie together what I am trying to explain here. No partnership is inherently anything, people have different needs, desires, and experience the world in vastly different ways. People have varying degrees of emotions, romanticism, and sexuality. Your responses and how you said them did appear phobic or angry/dismissive at the least so that's why I decided I should just dismiss you as a person disrespecting of my lifestyle.
I think it is clear to me now you either had a bad experience and were traumatized by a poor partner, or simply realized you were monogamous. That is totally ok, I'm glad you realize who you are and are happy with it. Though it is certainly easier desiring a societal norm, see our discussion on what I am, where I am defending and trying to explain the vastness of experiences I and others have. You don't ever have to defend monogamy in our society. As for your views on relationships and sexuality, I still will deny that partnerships are always ever sexual. It's definitely possible, reading what you've said, you are some measure of aromantic to tie everything to being sexual in origin and meaning within a romantic gesture or close non-platonic intimacy. That's ok too, that is how you experience the world, but that's not how everyone is or feels about things. If that view is a response to your experiences, I'm sorry that you've only ever experienced things as a pretense to sex, but there is a lot more out there.