by Tammy Ng
Polyamorous relationships have always been a hot topic of discussion of whether it is right or wrong. I was able to interview two students at UCSC that have a pro stance on this subject. They will be referred to as A and B per request.
I asked a two simple questions of “How would you define a polyamorous relationship?” and “Are you pro-poly or not?”. The second question was asked in general, whether it be about poly relationships for themselves or not, I wanted to receive information on why they have this opinion rather than the opinion itself. Both A and B answered the first question very simple and almost similarly, which was that being in a poly relationship meant being with more than one person, but all parties involved consenting. It is within their answers to the second question that differed slightly.
A had answered saying “I don’t think I am necessarily pro or anti poly; I think that it is just another way of life and if everyone in that relationship has consented and like, is happy, I don’t see anything wrong with that.” Consent was something that everyone I had interviewed had voiced was very important. Without consent of all parties involved, that would be considered cheating. Polyamory and non-monogamy relationships are not something for everyone. Everyone’s relationships are different, and while some people are straight or gay, there are others that are in poly relationships and others that aren’t. Poly is not about trying to find a way to keep a relationship from falling apart or a way to cheat without really cheating, but poly relationships are much deeper and is another aspect of a certain kind of relationship (Safronova 2016).
B had answered the question saying “I think poly relationships are great. I could never see myself with just one person. That’s not to say like, I want to fool around or anything like that, but I just love people and I would want to share that with more than one individual, you know.” There are many people out there that have similar thoughts as B has. They either could never see themselves be fully involved and only sharing their love with one person, but also, they have noticed their struggle with being attracted to or in love with more than one person. One recurring theme as I did my research was that, they never want to force their own ideals on other people, they just want recognition on why this type of relationship works for them.
At the end of the interview, I followed up with a question asking, “In the contemporary world, we have become more accepting of things that aren’t the norm, but why do you think that polyamorous relationships are still viewed as wrong?”. A had answered saying “People don’t like anything that goes against the norms” and B saying, “Media paints poly relationships as this crazy thing and not really like educating anyone on what it means to be in a poly relationship and the different kinds also”. One of the problems many have with representation of poly relationships is that what we see mostly is through crazy TV shows or horrid stories of people trying to escape these relationships (Goldfeder 2013). There is no realistic representation of these relationships, so many continue seeing these as a way for people to just have multiple partners as a way of infidelity. There also being an issue of what is ‘traditional’ or not. It goes against what popular culture dictates and thus is not okay (DeBoer 2015).
Breaking Relationship Norms 