Polyamory: A Brilliant Idea? Until It’s Not.

I personally don’t believe in sex before love. And what is love? To me it comes from sacrifice, from caring enough about someone to invest time and effort into them. Without that, sex can easily become just using another person’s body for self-gratification. I see sex as something that comes after the foundation is built. Liberal/progressive leftists today seem to see sex as part of building that foundation. There’s a reason we call it love making. That’s why casual sex feels a bit like wasting good wine to me. It gains meaning when it isn’t cheap or effortless to obtain. Restraint and effort give it depth, kinda like the appeal of forbidden fruit. At the same time, I personally don’t expect my partner to follow my exact philosophy about sex. If she wants casual or even extra-marital experiences, I’m not automatically against it. What matters to me is whether it affects the time, emotional energy, and attention she gives to our relationship. Time and emotional energy are limited. If I start feeling those things shifting away from us, that’s when it becomes a problem. At that point it’s on her to reflect on whether what she’s doing is affecting the relationship. If she could somehow have those experiences while making it feel like nothing between us has changed, then I wouldn’t necessarily object. But realistically, because time and emotional energy are finite, arrangements like these will sooner or later struggle to last. 

That’s why social norms should continue exist to restrain us. Humans want to transgress those norms in secrecy. When that happens, I think the other partner should try to forgive rather than treat the act as the entire definition of the relationship. It should be seen as a transgression against one of many pillars, not the whole foundation. In recognizing that impulse to transgress, we also recognize our shared humanity. That’s where forgiveness comes from. Still, I do think it is important that these norms remain social taboos.