Polyamory has attracted a lot of attention recently: Why?
In case you haven’t noticed, polyamory is hot right now. In particular, the inner workings of polyamorous relationships have become a popular subject in the press, from the cover story in New York Magazine to an article I was featured in for MindBodyGreen. It’s not as if polyamory—or what used to be typically referred to as open relationships—is a new way of organizing relationships. So, why is polyamory such a currently popular topic, often one written about with a quiet panic?
Even subtle judgments about other people’s sex lives betray our own feelings
It would be right to always be suspicious of judgments about other people’s sex lives. Absent sex that violates consent (or where one party lacks the full capacity to consent), these judgments always betray insecurities on the part of the people making them. For instance, fear of gay sex, as Freud and the entire Internet have pointed out, is fear of homosexuality. Fear of queer(ing) gender expressions is a fear of one’s own gender ambivalence. And so what, then, is revealed by the often thinly implied judgments about polyamory in these articles? After all, one doubts (though wonders briefly) that any of the writers (notably mostly women) who write them are themselves in open relationships.
It stands to reason that the panic these articles evoke reveals both a fear of abandonment and envy. This is not to say forays into polyamory can’t lead to messes and, yes, divorce. It’s not unreasonable for someone to hesitate before introducing such a disruption into a relationship without consideration. However, our fascination with others’ sex lives says something about our own. In this case, organizing our fascination with polyamory solely around its sexual dynamics betrays an even deeper fear. Maybe we can handle the notion of sex outside of marriage. But what if, god forbid, the lovers also become friends?
From COVID lockdowns to continued working from home, we’ve lost community
This concern about closeness with other people rather than simply sex itself may have to do with the increasing limitations around socializing. While I do truly wonder if more transparently non-monogamous relationships are happening, my on-the-fly hypothesis is that we’re captivated by them on the level of fantasy as a result of COVID lockdowns, the work-from-home imperative, and the (harder to measure but clearly felt) pull back on in-person interactions.
In considering the changes since 2020, we can easily pinpoint what businesses closed—restaurants and other low-margin retail businesses that counted on people showing up in person for activities that were either replaceable through remote work or seen as inessential altogether. Harder to discern, though evident anecdotally, is the demise of semi-formal institutions like book clubs and social clubs that built communities. These, of course, were more heavily felt in the communities where reporters for the very news outlets currently in a mini-obsession with polyamory are most likely to live and work (from home).
This is to say, opportunities for community have diminished, including the community of the workplace. This loss is felt in our close relationships outside of primary partnerships. Many have pointed out that finding friends is, in the age of online dating, harder than finding a hookup. Sex has been (it seems) easier to transactionalize and, of course, is a powerful motivator. So it’s a quicker and easier cure for loneliness than the work of building community. Hence, it’s also a quicker and easier fantasy for those working at home while feeling stuck with their spouse who is also at home.
Fantasizing about polyamory seems easier than saying, “You’re not enough people”
Thinking about the role of closeness with other people outside of a primary relationship, I often am reminded of Kurt Vonnegut’s quote: “When a couple has an argument, they may think it’s about money or power or sex, or how to raise the kids, or whatever. What they’re really saying to each other, though, without realizing it, is this: ‘You are not enough people.’” Vonnegut is being tongue-in-cheek and purposefully hyperbolic, but he is a deep believer in the underlying premise (as am I): We need more people.
What our fantasy about polyamory reveals is a desire to hold onto the nuclear family with all of its ever-unmet promises of stability while also having an escape. The work-from-home version of it extends this to its fullest extreme: We are workers and caretakers and our 0-second commute leaves no margin for anything else. So what we’ve invented is a particularly complicated, Rube Goldbergian solution for having friends that aren’t your spouse. Sex isn’t the dirty secret, it’s the excuse. The real prize is, at least in fantasy, having, as Vonnegut says, “enough people.” It may seem easier to imagine telling your spouse that you don’t find them enough sexually than admit they’re not enough socially or spiritually.
