Love in the Plural Sense

I read an interesting article the other day about polyamory, defined by the Polyamory Society (http://www.polyamorysociety.org) as “the nonpossessive, honest, responsible and ethical philosophy and practice of loving multiple people simultaneously. Polyamory emphasizes consciously choosing how many partners one wishes to be involved with rather than accepting social norms which dictate loving only one person at a time.”

Modern views of romance suggest that your partner should fulfill all of your needs and desires, but polyamorists enjoy the fact that they can spread out those needs and desires among multiple partners. So if, say, one of your boyfriends really loves outdoor activities, and the other only wants to watch movies, you see Boyfriend A when you want to water-ski, and Boyfriend B when you want to veg out.

It sounds good in theory. Don’t we all have different friends that we do different things with? And I guess you wouldn’t get bored too easily. But I can foresee a few problems. Such as:

1. It’s hard enough to find ONE guy I actually like and want to spend time with who feels the same way about me, let alone two or three! I suppose polyamorists would claim I wouldn’t be as picky if I weren’t looking for one guy to be my “everything,” as they say.

2. What if you get jealous? What if your boyfriends gets jealous? Negotiating time commitments and other issues are difficult enough when it’s you and just one other person.

3. I just really, really, really hope everyone uses condoms.

Enough said!