Re: [UUPoly-L] Identity Polytics.

If there are people who are Poly with a capital P, I am not one of
them.  While most of my immediate friends are poly, we are not any
sort of poly community.  This is the only online poly community I am a
member of.  I don't tend to associate with people because of similar
relationship or sexual preferences.  In my oh-so-personal experience,
poly communities and fetish communities and queer communities creep me
out; I have never had what I considered to be a good social experience
with any group that was meeting up specifically because of similarity
in religious or sexual philosophy or interest.  I am on this list
because I do consider UUs to be my community, and am interested in
discussing poly issue with people in my religious community.  (No
offense meant to people who are in such social communities based on
these things; it's just something that doesn't work for me.)

Someone can form a social group based on being poly; they still have
no more claim over the associated words than anyone else.  I'd have to
still go with if you don't like the associations that other people
call up from the word, then feel free to not use it.  I would use it
if describing you in the third person.  In conjunction with Michael's
statements, I don't have to call myself white or female (though it
should be noted that I never call myself "woman" because that is a
gender term which I do not identify with and not a sex term) or
American or polyamorous or bisexual or pansexual or tall or
English-speaking or anything else if I don't like those terms or don't
like the ideas other associate with those terms.  The fact remains
that those terms accurately describe me.

(Unlick Michael, I have heard the word "polyamorist" used on a
semi-regular basis both by poly people and non-poly people.  YMMV.)

-Laura

On 6/2/07, Kelly Cookson <kc62301@hotmail.com> wrote: 
>I consider them, and I'm sure you, to be polyamorous.  It is a descriptive
>term.  I will apply it descriptively to anyone who is
>open to more than one "romantic" relationship at a time.

>From a purely descriptive use of the term polyamory, I would have to concede
my open marriage is polyamorous.

I vote in elections and tell people I believe in democracy. Does that mean
I'm a Democrat? I like living in a republic that governs by representation
and rule of law. Does that mean I'm a Republican? The words democrat and
republican are ambiguous. They can be used descriptively. But they also
refer to political organizations with their own philosophies and agendas. We
generally distinguish the use of the words by capitalization: lower case for
the descriptive meaning and upper case for the political organizations. I
can say I'm a democrat and a republican, but I'm not associated with the
Democrats or the Republicans.

Polyamory certainly isn't an organization like a political party. But it is
a social movement, with loosely connected groups of people who call
themselves polyamorous, with Web sites and magazines and a literature base,
and with activists trying to gain greater social acceptance of
non-monogamous lifestyles.

So I ask my original question with a twist in capitalization: When is a
polyamorist not a Polyamorist? Can a person be in a relationship that fits
the descriptive meaning of the term polyamory and be univolved and distanced
from the Polyamory social movement? (The irony of my asking this in a Poly
group does not escape me, but I'm really curious to hear what intelligent
Polyamorists think, and this is the most intelligent group of Polyamorists I
know.)

>However, it seems to me a waste of time to
>circuitously describe a concept which is described concisely by a
>now-largely-accepted single word because other people have decided
>that they get to say "polyamory is exactly X, Y, and Z."

The term "open marriage" is four syllables. The terms "polyamory",
"polyamorous", and "polyamorist" are all five syllables. I actually save
time by saying I'm into open marriage. ;-)

>People can go around all day
>saying that "Marriage is only a lifetime commitment between one man
>and one woman" or "Polyamory is only complete openness to all sexual
>and romantic relationships where the concept of jealousy is rejected"
>or anything else.  The word is in common useage among non-poly people
>without all those caveats.

I agree. The common useage among non-poly people does not make caveats.
Which is why, when I am labelled a polyamorist, non-poly people associate me
with everyone else and everything else labelled polyamorist.

But again, can a person be a polyamorist (lower case P) and not be a
Polyamorist (upper case P)? And if so, since non-poly people don't make
caveats, is it fair to label people on a descriptive basis?

Just some thoughts... :-)
Kelly

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