#0A Orientations and Choices Primer: Gender, Sexuality, Romantic, and Relationship Structures

http://polyinthemedia.blogspot.com/2016/08/why-people-are-fighting-to-get.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=facebook

While it could have legal implications, there are two glaring problems with identifying polyamory as a sexual orientation.

First, polyamory deals with relationships, which DO NOT HAVE TO INVOLVE SEX. Defining relationships as sexual orientations actually excludes asexuals and anyone with a low libido, and trivializes everything non-sexual that goes into forming deeply intimate relationships.

Second, not everyone who practices polyamory or other forms of nonmonogamy does so because they’re wired to love more than one person. Open monogamous relationships (and swinging) look, feel, and involve very different people than open or closed polyamorous relationships, which look, feel, and involve very different people than relationship anarchy. The division within poly communities comes from the many ways to practice nonmonogamy, and the many different people who construct modes of being that fit them.

I worry that identifying polyamory as an orientation will exclude people who practice ethical nonmonogamy while only being capable of forming an intimate, loving relationship with one person. I don’t want to see them excluded from our community when the monogamous community already frowns on them. The trans* community deals with “twue-ism” or “truescum” when they judge people who don’t pass or whose transition didn’t start with their earliest memory. The sexual orientation community deals with discrimination against bisexuals by both homo and heterosexuals. I don’t want to see nonmonogamous people told they aren’t doing it well enough, or are “just having some fun before settling down.” I want to see us continue to validate all flavors of ethical nonmonogamy and come together to reduce society’s mononormativity.

TL;DR:Thinking about it more, I worry that it would exclude asexuals and nonmonogamous people who aren't polyamorous. I know there's already a divide between swingers and the rest of the nonmono community, and I'd hate to see that divide deepened by legality and "twueism" ("You can't really be poly if..." - it's like what the trans community deals with when people don't pass or didn't feel it from their earliest memory. It's also like how bisexuals get discriminated against by homo and heterosexuals.)