Unicorn Hunting 101

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Asexuals can and do form romantic relationships, though those relationships may include little or no sex. They have been together for over a year and are open-minded, tolerant, ethical, progressive people. The Oxford English Dictionary attributes the word to Jennifer Wesp, who founded the newsgroup alt.

It will make things much easier to simply assume that these are their names. Commentary: A tertiary relationship may be very limited in scope or priority for many reasons, one of the most common of which is often distance.

So, somebody called you a Unicorn Hunter?

Polyamory and couple privilege Approaching privilege is daunting. One could easily write a book on the subject of couple privilege and how it plays out in relationships. But privilege, especially couple privilege, is a real and tangible thing that plays out in polyamorous relationships in some pretty messed-up ways. Part 0: Privilege: What is it? Because privilege is invisible, it can be really, really hard to admit we have it. This essay was certainly an eye-opener for me. Whenever people try to talk about privilege, certain criticisms always seem to come up. There are environments that privilege different groups in different ways. All other things being equal, women are awarded custody of children in a divorce more often than men are. In US society, white people have a lot of advantages over black people, yet a black man will probably get better treatment at an auto mechanic than a white woman will. The extent to which women are treated as total ignoramuses by auto mechanics never ceases to amaze me no matter how many times I see it. John Scalzi wrote , and people still, predictably, reacted quite poorly to it. The fact is, we are not all born equal. Some of us are born into situations—wealth, power, race, whatever—that give us advantages over other people. That does not mean that we are bound to succeed. And I want to talk about the role it plays in polyamorous relationships. Part 1: Couple privilege in society We live in a society that expects certain things of us. One of the things that our society expects is that we will find someone else, fall in love, get married, and start a family. The default social expectation is heterosexual monogamy. People who are born clearly male or clearly female and generally like getting it on with other people who are clearly of the opposite sex are granted certain privileges by our society. What kinds of advantages? Other people will, by default, tend to react better to straight or bisexual but straight-partnered cisgendered folks better than they do to gay, trans, or intersexed folks, all other things being equal. Religious institutions overwhelmingly favor monogamous straight folks—not always and everywhere, but by and large. You get certain tax benefits. So polyamorous folks already have a disadvantage. I think this is most often true of people who come to poly after having been in a monogamous relationship for a while—the couple looking to expand on their relationship with polyamory. Thinking about privilege is a bit like listening to music. If you have an untrained ear, it can be really difficult to, say, pull out the bass line from the music. Part 2: The unicorn When an existing couple first starts exploring the notion of polyamory, it can be very tempting to try to keep hold of as many elements of monogamy as possible. After all, we live in a world that tells us that commitment means the same thing as exclusivity. We live in a world that says sex and relationship go hand in hand. So to step outside that world can get pretty intimidating. What happens if our lover wants sex with someone else—does it mean that he or she will just start running around willy-nilly, having sex with everyone? And what about jealousy? How can we keep from feeling jealous if our lover has sex with someone else? The solution to all these problems that seems obvious and occurs to a lot of folks right out of the gate is to find a bisexual woman to have sex with both members of the couple in a fidelitous triad. Yet they often end up doing a lot of harm to anyone who crosses their paths. For starters, you probably sat down and talked very carefully with your partner about it, and both of you probably agreed that it would meet your needs, right? When you decide in advance what the rules of a relationship are, without even being in that relationship yet, well…people tend to feel a bit disenfranchised by that. And most folks in the poly community are poly because they reject the idea of restrictive relationships; they reject the notion that being in one relationship means giving up on being in any others. So let me talk for a bit about what some of those advantages are. You might live together. You might be married. Maybe you have a dog named Spot or a kid named Freddie or a goldfish named Wanda or something. So you decide you might want to give polyamory a try. I know we both wanted to try this, but it still makes me feel awkward when I see you have sex with our third. Can you do me a favor and stop having sex with her for a while until I feel better? It makes me feel kind of awkward to see you have sex with your wife. Can you do me a favor and stop having sex with her until I feel better? A disturbance in the Force. You can bring a partner with you. What do you do? Do you bring your husband, or your third? There it is again, that disturbance in the Force. What do you say to your family? Do you bring your third to Thanksgiving dinner? What do you say? Do you stay closeted? Do you tell any of your monogamous friends? The person at the sandwich shop across the road? What will your mom think? But if you do that, what are you telling your third? There are a lot of privileges that go along with being monogamous. Many hotels have policies forbidding them from renting a room with one bed to three or more adults. Marriage brings a whole slew of privileges of its own: tax advantages, legal protections for joint property, survivorship benefits, Social Security benefits, insurance benefits, and on, and on. Of course, not every relationship benefits from every one of these privileges, and not every couple privileges their relationship in these exact ways. These are examples of ways in which privilege can favor established couples. Part 4: But what about protecting the couple? Some of the things on your list, like having a shared history, are inevitable. And if I already have kids, or a mortgage, or other obligations, of course those obligations come first! You have pre-existing commitments and relationships and you want to take care of them. This is a sticky wicket. I trust that you will find a way to honor your commitment to me. Since I was here first, that means me. What matters is that my needs are being met, not that I am getting more than anyone else. I may not always get what I want. What matters is that my partner listens to me and hears my concerns, not that I am always right or I always win. A lot of these come down to the sorts of things you might expect if you had two kids. We all can instinctively recognize that if we have a second child, we still want to protect and invest in the first child, and we can do that without privileging the first child over the second. So why is it so hard to recognize this when it comes to relationships? It talks about the backlash we often see when we try to discuss privilege. When we feel a fear of loss—which, it must be said, is quite normal for someone coming into polyamory for the first time—it is almost impossible for us to be compassionate toward others. Especially toward the people we see as being responsible for that fear. So the privilege goes from being unconscious to being something we feel entitled to. True story: I know a guy, who will remain nameless, who is quite hostile to the idea of feminism. He especially resents what he sees as the feminist idea that men are dangerous—that women should take care around strange men because strange men represent a threat of rape. He also feels very uncomfortable walking through black neighborhoods. He sees no parallel there, and no irony. They also help to keep the original couple in control. Any time a couple starts to negotiate the process of opening a relationship, there are some tools which I think are quite valuable in preventing the unconscious assertion of privilege. But often, especially for newcomers to polyamory, there can be a fear that unpleasant feelings whether they be jealousy or feelings of threat or whatever mean implosion of the existing relationship; in that way, use of privilege to defend against jealousy or other unpleasant feelings becomes a way to avoid personal responsibility for growth. We need not fear unpleasant feelings; they are a part of life. The exercise of privilege may also become a way to avoid facing that members of a couple might have different goals or needs in the relationship. It is my experience and observation that the more a couple clings to couple privilege, the more disempowered and unhealthy new relationships are…and the more easy it is for the couple to blame their dysfunction on the third person. And, unfortunately, relationships that start out from a position of rules, restrictions, and couple privilege can easily become relationships where the greatest dysfunction wins. The invisibility of privilege, coupled with the fact that a fearful person often finds it difficult to act with compassion and empathy, can combine to make even well-meaning people act in ways that are harmful. I need to find a primary of my own if I want to be happy. Privilege even seeps into our language. Many, many of the conscious and unconscious projections of privilege are prevented simply by trusting your partner. Looking from the outside, it often seems to me that many people in polyamorous and monogamous! When you trust your partners, things change. Having tried both approaches, I can say from experience that letting go of privileges and entitlement and instead building relationships with people who I trust and believe will, if given free rein to make any choice whatsoever, will still choose to nurture me is the most wonderful, secure feeling in the world.

What matters is that my needs are being met, not that I am getting more than anyone else. Usually carries an implicit understanding that when the couple is physically together again, the for will become. The fact is, we are not all born equal. Yep, nothing can go wrong with that. He was pretty controlling and there were a host of other problems which explains why he is now my ex. It means two people in the relationship get the zip of both worlds, threesomes as well as twosomes, while the third person is restricted to only having threesomes. Some of the things on your list, like having a shared history, are inevitable. Relationships need to be fair, but much of the time people use that word meaning con. I was beginning to think about dating again, but for companionship only. A social organization for swingers. What to watch out for: Any indication that affection must be displayed or felt equally is a warning sign. PRIMARY: In a relationship, the person or persons in the del with the highest degree of involvement or entanglement, or sometimes the person accorded the most polyamory terms unicorn.