Re: [UUPoly-L] UUCA: welcoming congregation

["Laura Stewart" <lonelocust@gmail.com>]

On 12/1/06, JasmineGld@aol.com <JasmineGld@aol.com> wrote:
> Jasmine writes:
> > We have no expertise in  swinging, and we
> > should keep that limitation in  mind.
>
> lonelocust@gmail.com writes:
> > That's not necessarily true of  everyone.
>
> When I said "We", I meant, We-this-list, this community of poly  UUs.
>
> We-this-list have a widely divergent representation in this  community of
> various types of poly families and individuals, and this pooling of  our
> experiences and insights brings a little bit of expertise and a lot of  opportunities
> to seek more information.
>
> We-this-list have a few swingers  or swinger-friendly folks, but it is a very
> biased group by the simple fact that  these folk are swingers who have enough
> interest in poly to sign up for a poly  list. Swingers who have zero interest
> in poly or swingers who would be offended  to be linked with poly are
> unlikely to be represented on this list. Since  we-this-list are lacking input from
> that segment of the swinging community,  we-this-list cannot begin to develop
> any expertise about swinging.
>
> Therefore, as we individuals go out from this list to talk to anxious  folks
> in our congregations and districts, we need to recognize that we bring  from
> our poly UU community no expertise in swinging, and it is extremely  important
> that we keep that limitation in mind.

And I'm saying I think it's not a great idea to think that you have a
grasp on what anyone else's relationship preference status is like
unless you know the specifics of those individuals.  We-as-individuals
don't necessarily know more about what relationship A is like in order
to represent it to the UU community than what relationship B is like
in order to represent it to the UU community just because relationship
A calls itself polyamorous and relationship B calls itself something
else.

> Some individuals may have  a great deal of personal experience with swinging,
> and may indeed speak to these  questions differently. But as we-this-list
> talk about general "how to respond"  preparedness, we need to talk to everyone on
> the list, including those who know  very little about swinging.

The point of my initial contribution was to suggest avoid making a
pigeonhole about poly being exactly what we-as-individuals or
we-as-a-list (or you-as-a-list if you prefer, as I'm quite new and
perhaps thus not qualified to include myself in a "we") have expertise
about.  And in particular, I think that focusing on specific types of
polyamory can implicitly villainize other relationship types if one
doesn't keep in mind that the goal is to accept and promote people to
be able to live their lives as they need to and as they see fit.

For example, say Joe is sort of uncomfortable with the idea of poly.
His friend Mary is in a poly relationship.  Joe says to Mary "Well
isn't that just an excuse to have sex with more than one person?"
Let's say Mary is in a closed poly relationship.  I think it would not
be the best thing for her to say "Oh, it's not about that at all!  I
only have sex with my partners whom I'm very in love with!  So your
fear of casual sex is nothing to worry about!"  I believe this
implicitly agrees with some of the negative impressions that Joe has.
I think it would be better for Mary to say "Well, what about having
sex with multiple people do you think is a problem and why?  I can
talk about my experiences, needs, and choices, and those of others
twith whom I have discussed this topic at length."  I don't think Mary
should say "Well personally I only have sex with my partners whom I'm
very in love with, but other people have casual sex and that's OK too,
but I don't know much about them."

-Laura