Coming out as poly-friendly

[ailbhe]

Believe it or not.

My sister - one of the two I speak to, who I love very much, wanted to know where I'd been at the weekend. I tried to hedge, which was silly, because she could tell I was hedging and kept asking.

So I said "polyamory" and "even though I'm monogamous they were cool with me" and stuff, and she thought "swingers" which translates in her dialiect to "sluts". So I said, "well, no, some of the people there had been married for 10 or twenty years or so. Just to more than one person."

She still suspects that a lot of people use it as an excuse to get laid a lot, and frankly, they do, I've met them, but she also thinks it's absolutely valid. And it got her thinking about how polygamous religions such as, er *thinks hard* Islam? deal with legally monogamous societies (they're married according to their religion, but there's no protection under the law for any except the legally married couple, so mostly they default to monogamous, at least in Ireland and the UK). In the context of a recognised religion, that struck her as totally unfair.

However, she also mentioned that polygamy was one of the first things that women voted to outlaw in somewhere - South Africa? Zimbabwe? - when they got a new government. That and being forced to marry your dead husband's brother.

I think that going from "polygamy is bad because everyone knows it's bad and I've never thought about it" to "I suppose it's not bigamy if they're honest about it" to "it's unfair that even people whose established and legally recognised religion allows it aren't legally allowed it" in one three-minute conversation bodes pretty well.

I won't say she really understands - hell, I don't think I do, and I doubt many actively poly people do either - but I think she's on her way to understanding enough.

On a slight tangent...

And I'm kind of proud of how she didn't eep at it at all once I explained that it wasn't only one man, many women, much nookie. And I'm kind of pleased that she thinks it was very nice of Rob to "let" me go, though she thinks it's strange that it was he who introduced me to the group in the first place!

Perhaps I should write her an email explaining a bit more.