Polyamory and communism

[Questionable]

I don't know if this is the right place to post this, but if it's not a mod can always move it.

Lately I've been reading articles and hearing on TV about how family models such as the polyamorous relationship being on the rise. For those who have never heard of it, polyamory is a relationship between more than two people. So there could be two women and one man, two men and one woman, three men, three women, what have you. This is not merely a fetish lifestyle. Many of these people take their relationships very seriously, considering them just as serious as monogamy. Some of them even go onto to get married to each other.

I'm curious about the material conditions that are causing this. It was unheard of until recently. I'm also curious about what kind of implications this could have in a future communist society.

The bourgeois mode of marriage arose from private property. Women were expected to remain loyal to their men for reasons of inheritance. In a communist society where private property has been abolished, wouldn't all forms of subservience in relationships be useless? It seems natural that all relationships would become open relationships. The cultural urge to hate "sluts" and "cheaters" would vanish because the property relations that stigma stems from would be gone. There would be no harm in having romantic and/or sexual encounters with people at your own discretion. Plus, it goes with the collectivist concept of raising children.

In general, I'm really interested in the materialist explanation behind this whole sex-positive movement. I also recently read a book called "The Ethical Slut" that advocated polyamory, open relationships, and tried to abolish the stigma of women who enjoy sex as being whores, and it really got me thinking about the issue from a Marxist perspective. What is changing about our society that this form of life, which was socially taboo years ago, is now trying to come into the norm?

[Ostrinski]

Of course, it's why I'm a communist.

[Os Cangaceiros]

It was unheard of until recently.

Not to nitpick, but I'm pretty sure that's not true.

I mean, the obvious example that everyone knows is polygamy. I'm sure there are other anthropological examples as well...

[Questionable]

Not to nitpick, but I'm pretty sure that's not true.

I mean, the obvious example that everyone knows is polygamy. I'm sure there are other anthropological examples as well...

I suppose you're right. I was more referring to the phenomenon appearing within the context of first-world capitalist families, raising children and whatnot in a culture that hates non-monogamous relationships. Although maybe that's not so unusual either.

[cantwealljustgetalong]

I would say that this is the relatively positive side of capitalism destroying the feudal social order, where "all that is sacred is profaned." while undermining the family unit in nasty and horrifying ways, capitalism has also opened the door for de-pathologization of sexual 'deviants' as the Christian conception of morality crumbles. this relation takes on a fundamentally individualistic and selfish character under capitalism; under socialism, it should evolve into something more inclusive and communal.

say what you want about liberal nihilism, but it has great sex.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

I personally don't like the idea of polyamory.

I think sometimes humans (and clearly i'm no philosopher) can get too big for their boots. Our main point in life is to live long enough to re-produce. Generally we re-produce with people who we are attracted to; we're genetically attracted to them if they have certain features which make us think they will produce 'healthy' offspring.

I personally think that the love aspect comes hand in hand with an agreement of exclusivity; I am not convinced by the possiblity of polyamorous love. Sorry.

[Thirsty Crow]

I personally think that the love aspect comes hand in hand with an agreement of exclusivity; I am not convinced by the possiblity of polyamorous love. Sorry.
Why do you think that everyone must share your perspective?
You didn't say so, but your claim clearly implies it. You're not convinced that there is even a possibility of polyamorous love, meaning that you are significantly more convinced that there is a possibility that monogamous love is the norm, normal, natural, or what have you.

@Questionable: these are all very complex issues. But for one, I think you're mistaken in claiming that there has been a kind of a resurgence only recently of such ideas and movements (as you state - sex-positive movements). I think that at least from the sixties the conservative sexual morality has been in marked decline.

[Philosophos]

Well there many parametrs for this subject. First of all you can be whatever you want polygamous or monogamous. It all depends on the way you were raised. For example I can't go and cheat on my girlfriend because there something inside of me telling me it's wrong (and I wouldn't like if she was cheating on me).

At the same time there is also the danger of getting a divorce/break up ,call it however you want, because another person in your relationship can really ruin it. It's like you are taking all the energy you should put in the relationship (sex, fights, daily routine etc) and you put it on having sex with other people (and I'm not counting the possibility of being jealous which will really dry you out of energy).

Also there are different parametrs for the sexes. A woman will consider you an ass because you fell in love with another woman. She doesn't really care if you slept with her . What bothers most women is if you had feelings for the other woman. If you slept with one and then you never met her again is just fine, but if you had a secret affair with her then boy you are screwed. Men believe the worst thing that a woman can do in a relationship is having sex with another guy. They don't care if their girlfriend had some feelings for another guy if they thought of having sex with him but the actual sexual intercourse.

To conclude I don't really believe that communism can change the way people think about sex or relationships. Obviously there are going to be some people getting affected, but at the same time there going to be some people that will not. It's all about the way you were raised. I can think this thing happening after some years that communism has been achieved but while we have capitalism or adaptive socialism I think it's not really to happen.

[Hermes]

I personally don't like the idea of polyamory.

I think sometimes humans (and clearly i'm no philosopher) can get too big for their boots. Our main point in life is to live long enough to re-produce. Generally we re-produce with people who we are attracted to; we're genetically attracted to them if they have certain features which make us think they will produce 'healthy' offspring.

I personally think that the love aspect comes hand in hand with an agreement of exclusivity; I am not convinced by the possiblity of polyamorous love. Sorry.

Wouldn't the fact that there are oftentimes two people together, one of whom is either infertile or unable to reproduce, and yet they still stay together? Obviously there will be no child, which would seem to discount your theory, unless you're claiming that the subconscious would be unable to accept the fact that there was no chance of fertility.


Well there many parametrs for this subject. First of all you can be whatever you want polygamous or monogamous. It all depends on the way you were raised. For example I can't go and cheat on my girlfriend because there something inside of me telling me it's wrong (and I wouldn't like if she was cheating on me).

At the same time there is also the danger of getting a divorce/break up ,call it however you want, because another person in your relationship can really ruin it. It's like you are taking all the energy you should put in the relationship (sex, fights, daily routine etc) and you put it on having sex with other people (and I'm not counting the possibility of being jealous which will really dry you out of energy).

Also there are different parametrs for the sexes. A woman will consider you an ass because you fell in love with another woman. She doesn't really care if you slept with her . What bothers most women is if you had feelings for the other woman. If you slept with one and then you never met her again is just fine, but if you had a secret affair with her then boy you are screwed. Men believe the worst thing that a woman can do in a relationship is having sex with another guy. They don't care if their girlfriend had some feelings for another guy if they thought of having sex with him but the actual sexual intercourse.

To conclude I don't really believe that communism can change the way people think about sex or relationships. Obviously there are going to be some people getting affected, but at the same time there going to be some people that will not. It's all about the way you were raised. I can think this thing happening after some years that communism has been achieved but while we have capitalism or adaptive socialism I think it's not really to happen.

I'm not entirely sure I agree with that. I was raised in a monogamous, (fairly) normal family, but I don't believe that I have any 'claim' to someone that I love. I also don't see where the mentality of a limited amount of love comes from. Why do people assume that, simply because you love one person, you cannot love another? We accept this day to day in the separation between, say, familial love and romantic love, but we seem unable to accept it across those categories.

I dunno. Probably being stupid, again.

[Rugged Collectivist]

I personally don't like the idea of polyamory.

I think sometimes humans (and clearly i'm no philosopher) can get too big for their boots. Our main point in life is to live long enough to re-produce.

This just isn't true. There are tons of people who willingly choose to never reproduce. Surely if reproduction was such a biological imperative, we would be compelled to do it?


Generally we re-produce with people who we are attracted to; we're genetically attracted to them if they have certain features which make us think they will produce 'healthy' offspring.

Again, not true. There are tons of people who willingly choose "unhealthy" mates.


I personally think that the love aspect comes hand in hand with an agreement of exclusivity; I am not convinced by the possiblity of polyamorous love. Sorry.

Why is exclusivity a prerequisite for love? You made this claim but you never explained why so I'm having a hard time responding to it.

Sorry comrade, A lot of evolutionary psychology is a crock of shit.

[Os Cangaceiros]

If you're going for a purely biological view of sexuality, then a look at the animal kingdom doesn't really do many favors to the idea of monogamy being "natural", as another poster on this board once said, even animals that have traditionally been thought to only have one mate for life (like swans) go on "romps".

[Positivist]

Also there are different parametrs for the sexes. A woman will consider you an ass because you fell in love with another woman. She doesn't really care if you slept with her . What bothers most women is if you had feelings for the other woman. If you slept with one and then you never met her again is just fine, but if you had a secret affair with her then boy you are screwed. Men believe the worst thing that a woman can do in a relationship is having sex with another guy. They don't care if their girlfriend had some feelings for another guy if they thought of having sex with him but the actual sexual intercourse.

Those are pretty big generalizations about men and women. I've forgiven my partner when she cheated on me one time, while I broke up with a partner for giving other guys too much attention in my opinion. I'm not saying that this is, or should be the typical response but a lot of posters (not just you) are making some pretty sweepy generalizations based on nothing other than their own experiences.

[Questionable]

Why do you think that everyone must share your perspective?
You didn't say so, but your claim clearly implies it. You're not convinced that there is even a possibility of polyamorous love, meaning that you are significantly more convinced that there is a possibility that monogamous love is the norm, normal, natural, or what have you.

@Questionable: these are all very complex issues. But for one, I think you're mistaken in claiming that there has been a kind of a resurgence only recently of such ideas and movements (as you state - sex-positive movements). I think that at least from the sixties the conservative sexual morality has been in marked decline.

You're right that it's not BRAND new, but I think the cultural norm is still man-woman monogamous relationship. Polyamory and other forms of marriages/relationships are still treated as taboo.

But whether it began appearing in the 60s or the 2000s, I'm still interested in a materialist hypothesis for that kind of behavior.

[Thirsty Crow]

You're right that it's not BRAND new, but I think the cultural norm is still man-woman monogamous relationship. Polyamory and other forms of marriages/relationships are still treated as taboo.

But whether it began appearing in the 60s or the 2000s, I'm still interested in a materialist hypothesis for that kind of behavior.
Yes yes, it is still the norm. Though, you confused me with this "sex-positive movements" - as they do not necessarily include advocacy (or "defense") of polyamory.

It's hard to speculate upon such complex issues without any knowledge from fields which would be at least auxiliary to historical materialist analysis (psychology definitely).

As I said, I would start with the 60s, the hippies, and sexual emancipation. But the problem is that it is not really an established social practice so it might be hard to connect it to other such practices. For instance, I can easily imagine such an arrangement due to more "personal" causes than an obvious social cause.

[bcbm]

polyamory is the natural condition of the human species. deviations from it are a result of change in means of production and have almost universally had to be upheld with social restrictions and violence, which didn't do much because people still managed to sleep around. marriage in order to bond families or property is becoming basically non existent in much of the first world so people are opting for what their bodies are made for- sleeping around

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Why do you think that everyone must share your perspective?
You didn't say so, but your claim clearly implies it. You're not convinced that there is even a possibility of polyamorous love, meaning that you are significantly more convinced that there is a possibility that monogamous love is the norm, normal, natural, or what have you.


You're right and wrong.

I don't think anybody should have to share my perspective at all, but yeah I do think monogamous love is a societal norm, and that there are good reasons for it to be so, just as I don't deny that polyamorous love has its own logic.

I was expressing a personal view, not a political view.

[Thirsty Crow]

You're right and wrong.

I don't think anybody should have to share my perspective at all, but yeah I do think monogamous love is a societal norm, and that there are good reasons for it to be so, just as I don't deny that polyamorous love has its own logic.

I was expressing a personal view, not a political view.
Well, OK, your wording was a bit confusing to me since it seemed to be implying that you're unconvinced of the possibility of polyamorous love. Which would not actually be a personal opinion (personal as in expressing your own attitude, implying preference, towards the phenomenon in question).

And it is obvious that monogamous relationship is the social norm, but that's besides the point.

As for these "good reasons", I'd like to hear more :) What are these good reasons for starters?

[Камо́ Зэд]

Perhaps the ever broadening availability and improving efficacy of anti-disease and contraceptive measures represent material conditions influencing notions of sexual liberation. Consider that, in the past, childbirth alone represented a serious risk for the mother, and even after surviving childbirth, there was no guarantee that the child would survive into adolescence, despite the material efforts of the parents and community at large. Engels postulated that the advent of class antagonisms coincided with the oppression of woman by man. Perhaps this sexual antagonism resulted when it became more difficult for men of oppressed classes to care for children resultant of sexual relations, and so sexual relations became taboo to some extent. Further, women became the object of scorn if they were to birth a child and could not demonstrate legal bondage to men, meaning that the woman in question had obviously broken the taboo and was not able to demonstrate that any specific man had fathered her child. (What I mean is, it is much easier to identify a mother than it is a father, for reasons that ought to be obvious.) So, women were encumbered by motherhood at this point, whereas men were relatively free, and since the oppressed classes could no longer enjoy the resources necessary for communal childcare, mothers were forced to spend every waking moment attending to their children. This may have also been true to some extent for higher classes, but we see that sexual freedom (sometimes called "decadence" or "perversion") was fairly common among those classes who had the resources to have their children (and even their women) cared for. We see, even now, that organizations emphasizing the taboo of sex outside of marriage tend to have trouble following their own commandment among their members.

This raises a troubling question, though: is sexual liberation the mark of progress for the proletariat, or is this a bourgeois notion stemming from a class that has historically been able to afford it? The answer is that any notion that can be considered "bourgeois" is characterized by its effect of limiting the freedom of working people, whether through ethereal ideological constraints or concrete material inhibitions. While oppression of the proletariat will not end but with their seizure of political power and the establishment of a socialist mode of production, the working people gain freedom with every victory over material obstacles. In this way, the availability and efficacy of contraception and childcare is creating a new proletarian morality: that of sexual freedom, tempered, of course, with responsibility to oneself, one's partner, and one's class, including children potentially resultant of a completed cycle of pregnancy.

[Blake's Baby]

I suppose you're right. I was more referring to the phenomenon appearing within the context of first-world capitalist families, raising children and whatnot in a culture that hates non-monogamous relationships. Although maybe that's not so unusual either.

I think it's probably more open now. I think there was an awful of stuff in earlier decades and even centuries that just wasn't talked about. Except maybe in France. Mistresses and whatnot. But then there were 1/4 million prostitutes in London in the 1880s (IIRC), and you come across some right strange stories about artists and writers (especially) in earlier centuries with their complex love lives; and from a social history point of view, things like census records and early registers (parish records in the UK, I'm sure there are similar things in other countries) reveal some very odd relationships. Men living with a wife and having children with a 'housekeeper', women living for 20 years with a husband a 'lodger' that she marries five years later after her husbad's death, women having six illegitimate children by different fathers before marrying a widower late in life... the 'nuclear family'/monogamy I think in most times has been rather an ideal that we're expected to conform to, than a model that has been rigourously observed.

After all, what's the point of establishing social norms, if not to castigate those that fall outside them? No point having laws that everyone obeys. The point of rules is to create insiders and outsiders.

[Rusty Shackleford]

If consenting adults want to engage in polyamory(homo/heter/bi), polygamy(hhb), monogamy(hhb), then so be it. people arent robots and as has been pointed out before, whatever the prevailing from of sex-relationship is, there are still different trends.


when bourgeois ideology reigns in bourgeois society, it doesnt mean everyone has bourgeois goals or aspirations. if this were the case, then how did bourgeois society come about? and how did marx ever come to critique it?

[ComingUpForAir]

It has to do with young people moving into Urban areas in increasing numbers, along with cultural and social viewpoints that have become more progressive.. traditional church morality is losing it's grip, and people are accepting science and humanism more and more as a better guide to living life and enjoying it.. more college students with more progressive views at least among a sizeable subset of the population is part of it too.. the cultural revolution will hopefully make the material revolution that much easier. Once you become a marxist, a feminist, an anti-marriage, anti-racist type of person, there's no going back!

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Well, OK, your wording was a bit confusing to me since it seemed to be implying that you're unconvinced of the possibility of polyamorous love. Which would not actually be a personal opinion (personal as in expressing your own attitude, implying preference, towards the phenomenon in question).

Well, personally I am unconvinced by the possibility of polyamorous love, but I recognise that other people can happily be in a relationship with more than two people, but you know, it's one of those things where if you don't experience it yourself you're always going to be unconvinced. My girlfriend is a spiritualist, and was telling me about physical meditation the other day, and obviously it was the same: I didn't think she was lying per se, but I was extremely sceptical merely because i've never seen stuff like that with my own eyes.

As for these "good reasons", I'd like to hear more :) What are these good reasons for starters?

Well again, it comes down to the animal instinct and the development in humans. In a lot of wild animals, the male and female will copulate together for a season or a year or whatever, and they'll stay together during that period as a sign of love/loyalty/protection or whatever (like ducks), and then they'll re-mate. Up to the middle ages or so (I think i'm right here), there were still examples of human males effectively 'discarding' females who couldn't bare children (Henry VIII is probably the best example, but the idea of the accepted 'mistress' was in fact a common idea up until quite recently was it not?). But now we've reached a stage where we still have the genetic instinct that tells us effectively that our sole underlying purpose in life is to produce babies, but also we have the tools to know that we can do so in a more controlled way, because we have great information about population dynamics.

There is then also the issue that, as intelligent beings, we have such a wide range of emotions that, personally, I believe they are best harnessed in a loving, monogamous relationship.

Again, these are just personal reasons. I don't deny that people can be happy in a polyamorous relationship, it's just not for me. I don't 'get' it.

[Philo]

Again, these are just personal reasons. I don't deny that people can be happy in a polyamorous relationship, it's just not for me. I don't 'get' it.

Then maybe you should stop posting this nonsense about "natural purposes" and genetic instincts.

Anyway, I'm not sure there's a single "material cause," that seems like cack-handed reductionist determinism to me. However, what I can say is that the bourgeois family and the associated "cult of procreation," to use Daniel Guerin's phrase, with its associated ideologies (e.g. sexually conservative morality, etc.) were crucial to capitalism as the means of producing and reproducing the most essential commodity of all - laborers - and shifting the massive cost of such an operation onto the workers themselves. Sexual liberation is resistance to this tendency. I would also add that sexual repression is probably the most powerful way to create authoritarian social-psychological structures and submissive/hierarchical individual psychologies.

If hard pressed to pinpoint a single most influential material cause, active resistance aside, it would probably be the increased socialization of labor and development of productive capacities. The latter has given us contraception, treatments for STDs, etc. while the former has forced more people to live in far closer contact with many more people, greatly increasing opportunities for sexual experimentation/contact. Furthermore, this increased socialization has relaxed the hold of the cult of procreation, as it has made it easier (though by no means easy or normative) to reproduce outside of the traditional family model (for example, increasing amounts of effort needed to maintain and reproduce laborers --> welfare state). Of course, it does so in a way that is partly exploitative and not liberating, such as the fact that due to the trends of increased socialization, opportunities for sexual contact etc. it is much easier to get someone pregnant, especially as there will be a way to maintain the labor power of these births even without a bourgeois family (schools, welfare, etc.) while at the same time keeping the woman in servitude by making it difficult for her to use her sexuality for her own purposes (denying easy availability of contraception, abortion, etc.).

[Art Vandelay]

Call me a prude, but I'll stick with a monogamous relationship in communism thank ya very much. I've had random hook ups; its not as good as with someone you love.

[Камо́ Зэд]

Call me a prude, but I'll stick with a monogamous relationship in communism thank ya very much. I've had random hook ups; its not as good as with someone you love.
I really don't know that poly-amorous relationships are quite the same as random hook-ups, comrade. The root words suggest that the people involved in such relationships do indeed love one another. It's merely that their love extends to more than one individual at a time. This isn't to disparage one's choice of pursuing a monogamous relationship, of course, but consider that others may find fulfillment in alternative relationships.

[Marxaveli]

I'm indifferent. I think everyone should be able to choose the way they have a relationship with their partners be it monogamous or polyamorous. I personally prefer the former, and I would hold this belief in a Communist society just as do now. That being said, I have no problem with someone wanting a polyamorous relationship as long as they are up front about it with their partner(s), and as long as its not with me :cool:

I do have to wonder though, what the repercussions would be for children who have one or both parents that conduct polyamorous relationships.

[Art Vandelay]

I really don't know that poly-amorous relationships are quite the same as random hook-ups, comrade. The root words suggest that the people involved in such relationships do indeed love one another. It's merely that their love extends to more than one individual at a time. This isn't to disparage one's choice of pursuing a monogamous relationship, of course, but consider that others may find fulfillment in alternative relationships.

That's true, I more meant the kind of "free love" thing that alot of commies propose in communism.

[bcbm]

Well again, it comes down to the animal instinct and the development in humans. In a lot of wild animals, the male and female will copulate together for a season or a year or whatever, and they'll stay together during that period as a sign of love/loyalty/protection or whatever (like ducks), and then they'll re-mate.

humans evolved in cooperative band societies where child rearing was a communal activity and sexuality was as well, as sexual contact strengthened group bonds and having a number of partners led to at least all men in the band viewing all of the children as their own. in many societies having more partners during pregnancy was viewing positively as it was believed to strengthen the growing child. monogamy is the result of men needing to control womens bodies in order to ensure patrimony and make sure they are passing on their possessions to their biological children.


But now we've reached a stage where we still have the genetic instinct that tells us effectively that our sole underlying purpose in life is to produce babies, but also we have the tools to know that we can do so in a more controlled way, because we have great information about population dynamics.

gatherer-hunter band societies practiced controlled child rearing.

[Questionable]

I'm indifferent. I think everyone should be able to choose the way they have a relationship with their partners be it monogamous or polyamorous. I personally prefer the former, and I would hold this belief in a Communist society just as do now. That being said, I have no problem with someone wanting a polyamorous relationship as long as they are up front about it with their partner(s), and as long as its not with me :cool:

I do have to wonder though, what the repercussions would be for children who have one or both parents that conduct polyamorous relationships.

But you have been raised in a society based on private property, thus the cultural urge for a monogamous relationship exists. Perhaps if you lived long enough to see a communist society, you would still feel as though monogamy is the best, but that doesn't say anything about people who are raised in a society without private property having these inclinations.

[black magick hustla]

I think polyamory in the abstract is probably the ideal condition of humanity, but we live in class society, and people have their psyches and wills warped in such a way that it is hard to be "completely" polyamorous for most people without being actively ideological invested in that project (i.e. hippies and wingnuts). Even in those projects there is all sort of weird gender imbalance going on. A lot of people try to look for some stability in a life they have no control over, and marriage/monogamy offers some sort of stability/emotional/financial security. That's why even people who cheat and sleep around have primary partners etc. and hide their affairs, because your primary partner gives you a sense of stability etc. People also have nasty, visceral reactions like jealousy. I don't really know any "poly" person (and I know a lot of them) that is "healthier" than its monogamous counterparts.

[Blackburn]

How the word was coined.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RqO1beLcFYE

[Comrade #138672]

Shouldn't we expect that people become polyamorous in capitalist society, because the relationship provides more co-operation to acquire and manage material resources, and because of the power of hedonism in capitalist society as consumerism requires a mindless hedonist attitude? Polyamory could be more or less a material necessity.

So perhaps we should expect a decrease in polyamorous relationships in communist society.

[Workers-Control-Over-Prod]

Well, as a Marxist i have my "economistic" opinion of course.
Men [blue], total [black], and Women [white] in the Labor Force:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/a2/US_Labor_Participation_Rate_1948-2011_by_gender.svg/720px-US_Labor_Participation_Rate_1948-2011_by_gender.svg.png

To me, the material basis for the reoccurrence of polyamory is quite simply increased equality of the sexes. If you look at the graph, you see that in 1948 only 31% of women were working while 88% of men were working. The bourgeois family. Woman stays in the kitchen, makes herself pretty, takes care of the kids, and prepares herself to make more kids for her husband. The material basis for this patriarchal relationship has though constantly been diminished by the material conditions. In 2009 however 60% of women were working while 72% of men were working. 1/3 of american women are single, over 60% of the world's psychopharmica are consumed in the US and women consume the majority of this.

I have pondered on increasing statistics of depression, augmented with western women, increasing single-ness, increasing divorce rates etc. and the obvious answer is that the bourgeois family is outliving itself. As to the reason for this increasing equality among the sexes, the first thing that comes to mind is of course the increasing amount of labor for capital to exploit, but when one looks you see that the labor force really has not increased so much because as women entered, men have been leaving the labor force. This is unexplainable by simple workplace relations, other forces such as increased social life during the 20th century, new innovations of humanity and women wanting to take part in these new things and not be suppressed banished from these social gains, play a part.

So when it comes down to it, the advance of the productive forces are the cause for more group sex.

[Jimmie Higgins]

You're right that it's not BRAND new, but I think the cultural norm is still man-woman monogamous relationship. Polyamory and other forms of marriages/relationships are still treated as taboo.

But whether it began appearing in the 60s or the 2000s, I'm still interested in a materialist hypothesis for that kind of behavior.

I can try and give a sort of sketchy swing at this question, I'm not an expert on this but I think there are some general things which could apply to this particular issue. In general, as was said, capitalist relations break up the old family arrangement where the family was a productive unit directly connected to production of feudal lands... people got married and had lots of kids no matter what their personal preference was because they needed kids to be extra labor for the plot of land and they needed wives to do non-field production at home (home-crafts for use and trade). By letting people loose from the land, this sort of social relationship looses its real material roots. Now some farmers sent their daughters to work or their sons became migrants and sent money back to help with debts as farming itself became more incorporated into the capitalist system and lower-end yeomen farmers became (indebted) tenant farmers. In industrial cities, large groups of people with little need for family attachments (since their self-support cam not from family production, but from selling their individual labor) were grouped together and often moved around to find work and so there were a lot of crowded same-sex situations as well as men and women who had some level of individual autonomy through wage-work and so all kinds of sexual relations were now possible based not out of a real practical need like having kids, but just for the sake a pleasure. So this is actually some progress in a way despite being part of a process that's upending people's lives.

But this was also a problem for the ruling class and these worries are reflected in a lot of literature from the 1800s - think of the social ills described by Dickens or the melodramas about urban life in this period: pickpockets and roving gangs, prostitutes and rapists, etc. Since these things are the result of industrial city life and inequities caused by capitalism, obviously the bourgeois ruling class wasn't going to say: "well this thing that we base our power on is actually kinda fucking things up". So their alternative was "bourgeois morality" of the family. If women didn't work but were domestic caretakers in working class family, then there would be a cheap way to deal with gangs of working class kids on the streets all day; if men went home to their wives after work rather than go out to the halls to get drunk and fuck every night, then maybe they'd be more reliable workers with something to loose by rebelling.

So I think that's why there's this tension in society over everything from homosexuality to people who don't fit gender roles or norms to non-monogamous relationships. On the one hand there is no material reason to be in capitalist nuclear families, on the other the ruling class needs nuclear families as a way to both organize the labor-force in ways that are helpful to our leaders and as a way to scapegoat workers for social ills: like Obama blaming black poverty on black dads watching too much TV and not helping their kids.

As to why there seems to be more awareness of poly- now: actually I think it's a side-dividend of gains by LGBT folks. In some ways the homophobes are right in worrying that gay rights erode "traditional marriage" but it's not a bad thing at all in my view because the institution and expectations work a fucking number on working class people of any sexual preferences. Personally, I'm married and in a monogamous relationship - I am very happy with this, but I also don't fetishize it and we both work, have our own bank accounts etc. and would only be sad from divorce for the fact of breaking up, not because we "failed" in our one true chance for happiness:rolleyes:.

But despite being happily monogamous, in the abstract, in my opinion, monogamy is a construction. I think it's quite natural to be attracted to more than just one person and I think this has always been true. There would be less of a base for prostitution, less affairs, less frustrated people if this wasn't the case. Biologically it's true too: we were made for pleasurable sex and masturbation. We don't go into "heat" and our sexual organs make it easy to have sex pretty much any time. If sex was just reproduction, then women wouldn't have clitorises and men would die after orgasm.

So with revolution, with worker's power, and the end of the need for a family in order to basically survive in society, and an end to alienation which I think also causes us to crave a solid long-term (and sometimes possessive) relationship for fear of getting sick alone or growing old and being neglected I think we will see a huge variety of arrangements and preferences flourish and "variety" become the norm. I think most people will have relationships involving people of both sexes and probably many will have multiple partners just as they do today either on the sly or, less common, in open arrangements.

My evidence for this is that in history and in cultures with little agriculture, there are a variety of kinds of relationships - some monogamous, some male-choice, some female-choice, some non-monogamous as the norm. Second, anecdotally I think in LGBT relationships you also see more variety in kinds of relationship arrangements - I think this is due to being marginalized from the "traditional family" structure in society and so due to that exclusion there are different expectations.

[Paul Cockshott]

think you can overstate the sex was invented in the sixties line, the advocacy of 'freelove' went back at leat to the start of the 20thc.

[Questionable]

think you can overstate the sex was invented in the sixties line, the advocacy of 'freelove' went back at leat to the start of the 20thc.

Again, I didn't state that sex was invented in the 60s. Where did I say that? And whether I was right or wrong, that still doesn't provide a materialistic answer for the situation.

[Thirsty Crow]

And whether I was right or wrong, that still doesn't provide a materialistic answer for the situation.
I got the impression that by "materialist" you actually mean an account of a more narrowly economic causality (correct me if I'm wrong).
But that doesn't amount to materialism in the sense we use it to refer to Marxist class analysis since not all social practice is immediately bound to capital production.

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

What is people's obsession with finding that one reductionistic program which explains all of human nature!?!? What an utterly arrogant statement to say that mankind is either naturally oriented towards monogamy and polyamory.

There are "monogamous" species out there (for instance, many kinds of birds), "polygamous" species (many mammals with alpha males) and "polyamorous" species, so they are all possible. However we also have much more complex psychologies. Humans tend to be determined by a complex mixture of emotions, social constructs, individual experiences, desires, etc. Context matters too, as there are advantages to monogamy in some situations and polyamory in others. A rock star on the road is going to find polyamory much easier, while a couple who work together on a farm will find monogamy easier. They also work better and worse with various types of people, respectively, and that goes to components of character which are not in essence defined by the class character of our society. Science and biology shouldn't be used in such a manner.

[bcbm]

What is people's obsession with finding that one reductionistic program which explains all of human nature!?!? What an utterly arrogant statement to say that mankind is either naturally oriented towards monogamy and polyamory.

not any more arrogant than saying that humans are naturally oriented towards an omnivorous diet. being naturally oriented towards something is not the same as saying it is correct or the only way it can happen.


Science and biology shouldn't be used in such a manner.

for a greater understanding of our species?

[Jimmie Higgins]

What is people's obsession with finding that one reductionistic program which explains all of human nature!?!? What an utterly arrogant statement to say that mankind is either naturally oriented towards monogamy and polyamory.

There are "monogamous" species out there (for instance, many kinds of birds), "polygamous" species (many mammals with alpha males) and "polyamorous" species, so they are all possible. However we also have much more complex psychologies. Humans tend to be determined by a complex mixture of emotions, social constructs, individual experiences, desires, etc. Context matters too, as there are advantages to monogamy in some situations and polyamory in others. A rock star on the road is going to find polyamory much easier, while a couple who work together on a farm will find monogamy easier. They also work better and worse with various types of people, respectively, and that goes to components of character which are not in essence defined by the class character of our society. Science and biology shouldn't be used in such a manner.

I understand the frustration in general. I oppose arguing that homosexuality is OK because it is "natural" and that some people are born that way for example, because it implies that it would be wrong if someone proved that it wasn't biologically determined - and it denies all the countless numbers of people whose sexual attractions have changed at different times.

At any rate, I think that it is appropriate in this case though. I think it would be like saying that humans are bi-sexual: it doesn't mean everyone is attracted to both sexes, it doesn't mean that bi-sexuality has been accepted by individuals or cultures, it only means that humans have the capacity to have romantic and sexual relationships with people of either sex.

Just the fact of how common cheating is shows that in the abstract humans are not strictly or biologically monogamous. That's not a judgement or a requirement (like anyone who is in a monogamous relationship is repressed and fooling themselves and that everyone SHOULD be polyamerous) it's just a statement of fact.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Then maybe you should stop posting this nonsense about "natural purposes" and genetic instincts.

Anyway, I'm not sure there's a single "material cause," that seems like cack-handed reductionist determinism to me. However, what I can say is that the bourgeois family and the associated "cult of procreation," to use Daniel Guerin's phrase, with its associated ideologies (e.g. sexually conservative morality, etc.) were crucial to capitalism as the means of producing and reproducing the most essential commodity of all - laborers - and shifting the massive cost of such an operation onto the workers themselves. Sexual liberation is resistance to this tendency. I would also add that sexual repression is probably the most powerful way to create authoritarian social-psychological structures and submissive/hierarchical individual psychologies.

If hard pressed to pinpoint a single most influential material cause, active resistance aside, it would probably be the increased socialization of labor and development of productive capacities. The latter has given us contraception, treatments for STDs, etc. while the former has forced more people to live in far closer contact with many more people, greatly increasing opportunities for sexual experimentation/contact. Furthermore, this increased socialization has relaxed the hold of the cult of procreation, as it has made it easier (though by no means easy or normative) to reproduce outside of the traditional family model (for example, increasing amounts of effort needed to maintain and reproduce laborers --> welfare state). Of course, it does so in a way that is partly exploitative and not liberating, such as the fact that due to the trends of increased socialization, opportunities for sexual contact etc. it is much easier to get someone pregnant, especially as there will be a way to maintain the labor power of these births even without a bourgeois family (schools, welfare, etc.) while at the same time keeping the woman in servitude by making it difficult for her to use her sexuality for her own purposes (denying easy availability of contraception, abortion, etc.).

On a philosophical level I don't disagree with any of what you say, but I don't get why i'm some 'cack-handed reductionist' for personally (And I stated explicitly that I was talking on a personal, not an exclusively political, level) finding no appeal in polyamory. Yeah, I understand about sexual resistance against bourgeois social conservatism, but that shouldn't lead to some sort of pressure to embrace something that one isn't comfortable with. Otherwise you're just turning active resistance into impending orthodoxy (i.e. if 'we' win, then the orthodoxy in 'your' society becomes what you will it to be, and the new conservatism becomes that which is currently the resistance).

I respect what you're saying and agree with it, on a philosophical level. That doesn't mean I should be pressured to subscribe to it on a personal level. And I don't. I'm personally not inclined to polyamory and I don't make any apologies for that.

[Capitalist Octopus]

A manifesto a friend of mine wrote for a class dealing with this very topic titled "End Monogamy; Begin Communism".

http://www.scribd.com/doc/92625536/End-Monogamy-Begin-Communism

[Scarlet Fever]

Engels certainly talks of the material role of the monogamous family structure in The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State, and some of his ideas are elaborated by Shulamith Firestone in The Dialectic of Sex (though I don't agree with everything in the second, I recommend both). I'm convinced on an intellectual level that the 'traditional' family is a manifestation of individualism (stay behind the white picket fence and all that) and I have several friends who are poly whose relationships seem deep and authentic to me--deeper than many monogamous relationships, surely, because there is less jealousy and possessiveness. That said, on a personal level I would still like a monogamous partner and family, but I can accept that that's what I want even if it is largely a product of social conditioning under patriarchal capitalism.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Engels certainly talks of the material role of the monogamous family structure in The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State, and some of his ideas are elaborated by Shulamith Firestone in The Dialectic of Sex (though I don't agree with everything in the second, I recommend both). I'm convinced on an intellectual level that the 'traditional' family is a manifestation of individualism (stay behind the white picket fence and all that) and I have several friends who are poly whose relationships seem deep and authentic to me--deeper than many monogamous relationships, surely, because there is less jealousy and possessiveness. That said, on a personal level I would still like a monogamous partner and family, but I can accept that that's what I want even if it is largely a product of social conditioning under patriarchal capitalism.

Why is polyamory not a product of social conditioning under patriarchal capitalism? Indeed, it can be seen as a reaction to patriarchal capitalism, as 'active resistance' in some form.

Why is there this exceptionalism for polyamory, as if just because monogamy in one form (the nuclear family) is a certain product of bourgeois social relations, then polygamy - the anti-monogamy - must therefore be anti-bourgeois.

[Questionable]

Why is polyamory not a product of social conditioning under patriarchal capitalism? Indeed, it can be seen as a reaction to patriarchal capitalism, as 'active resistance' in some form.

Why is there this exceptionalism for polyamory, as if just because monogamy in one form (the nuclear family) is a certain product of bourgeois social relations, then polygamy - the anti-monogamy - must therefore be anti-bourgeois.

Marriages were conducted in early capitalism as a way of families gaining properties. I think that social custom is mostly irrelevant when the majority of families don't own nearly as much property as they used to, and daughters aren't viewed as bargaining chips. Could it be argued that this lack of the property-incentive is what is causing polyamory? Without that incentive in marriage, more and more people are simply doing what pleases them.

Not entirely sure if that's correct, I'm just trying to go deeper than the "It's not bourgeois, so it must be good" argument you're unsatisfied with.

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

I understand the frustration in general. I oppose arguing that homosexuality is OK because it is "natural" and that some people are born that way for example, because it implies that it would be wrong if someone proved that it wasn't biologically determined - and it denies all the countless numbers of people whose sexual attractions have changed at different times.

At any rate, I think that it is appropriate in this case though. I think it would be like saying that humans are bi-sexual: it doesn't mean everyone is attracted to both sexes, it doesn't mean that bi-sexuality has been accepted by individuals or cultures, it only means that humans have the capacity to have romantic and sexual relationships with people of either sex.

Just the fact of how common cheating is shows that in the abstract humans are not strictly or biologically monogamous. That's not a judgement or a requirement (like anyone who is in a monogamous relationship is repressed and fooling themselves and that everyone SHOULD be polyamerous) it's just a statement of fact.


not any more arrogant than saying that humans are naturally oriented towards an omnivorous diet. being naturally oriented towards something is not the same as saying it is correct or the only way it can happen.


I appreciate what you are both saying. I agree that people have the natural emotions which drive them towards having more than one lover. However they also have emotions which drive them towards having one. We're a species which is unlucky enough to be left choosing between often contradictory desires. In other words, polygamy, polyamory and monogamy are all natural, just as much as hetero, homo and bisexuality.

IMO there are particular material conditions in the Marxist sense which make one more likely to appear than in another.


for a greater understanding of our species?

If you could call it that. Using a tiny bit of evidence to make normative statements which we can empirically see to be false (by the number of happy and unhappy couples of both types) is not what I would call greater understanding.

[Keath]

Lately I've been reading articles and hearing on TV about how family models such as the polyamorous relationship being on the rise. For those who have never heard of it, polyamory is a relationship between more than two people. So there could be two women and one man, two men and one woman, three men, three women, what have you.

I'm curious about the material conditions that are causing this.

The bourgeois mode of marriage arose from private property. Women were expected to remain loyal to their men for reasons of inheritance.



It was a combination of private property and lack of female involvement in the workplace that led to the bourgeousie mode of marriage.

Currently both male and female reactionaries seek to perpetuate the bourgeousie mode of marriage because they both crave the particular male and female privileges that occur within the bourgeousie mode of marriage.

I was recently at a dating website and so farr every girl I have talked to has asked me what I do for work within the first three questions she asks me. This has led me to realize that not only men but women as well have a role in perpetuating bourgeousie fascism.

A man should not tell a woman what his financial status is, what he does for work, or even his level of education until he has has had a relationship with her for a certain amount of time. If a man immediately discloses his financial situation to a woman the result could be that the woman enters in a relationship with him for mainly financial reasons and this would unfortunately perpetuate the bourgeousie mode of relationships.

Women today(in USA) are more educated and have greater access to employment, women are not on the same financial level as men and that needs to change however affirmative action policies make it so that in general women can make money on their own and they don't need men for money anymore. So there is no reason for women to treat men like financial objects any more but unfortunately many of them do and it is up to men to fight against these reactionary tendencies that many women still cling to.

Men have to remember that their financial and employment and educational situation is personal information when it comes to romantic relationships due to the unfortunate gender situation that has been promoted by systems that have oppressed both men and women.

[Jimmie Higgins]

It was a combination of private property and lack of female involvement in the workplace that led to the bourgeousie mode of marriage.I think in a way yes but also in a way no. Women in some places were a big part of the early industrial workforce and some important strikes in the early labor movement were of female, and often immigrant, workers.

But I think the marginalization of women in the workforce later is inherently tied to female subjugation and the construction of an ideology around nuclear family units.


I was recently at a dating website and so farr every girl I have talked to has asked me what I do for work within the first three questions she asks me. This has led me to realize that not only men but women as well have a role in perpetuating bourgeousie fascism.Not sure what you are getting at with this anecdotal impression. Of course in order for ruling class hegemony to work, most people have to accept the state of things as somewhat inevitable or unchangeable. So many people under slavery or Jim crow actually believed themselves that there was no better alternative than to try and accommodate and make peace within those systems. Many women buy into the idea in the past (and to a lesser extent now, but it's still an observable attitude) that the best they could do was marry well or be good mothers.


A man should not tell a woman what his financial status is, what he does for work, or even his level of education until he has has had a relationship with her for a certain amount of time. If a man immediately discloses his financial situation to a woman the result could be that the woman enters in a relationship with him for mainly financial reasons and this would unfortunately perpetuate the bourgeousie mode of relationships.Frankly I think this argument is male chauvinism and has no place in this discussion. There is no real basis for this assertion to be made in a general way other than stereotypes attributed to women. Do some individuals do fucked-up things under the conditions of alienation and competition in capitalist life? Of course! Do some women try and advance personally through marriage? Sure - especially under conditions where women are paid less then men and surrounded by a culture and ruling ideology which says that fulfillment for men is professional status and fulfillment for women is good marriage and a family - and maybe professional status as a bonus. SO even if an individual woman tries to advance through marriage, is it really a case of enforcing bourgeois ideology - or, as I see it, a case of someone trying to adapt to the terrain created by the bourgeois society and reinforced through their ideology?

If a male boss tries to use his position to pressure people into having sex, there is a power dynamic involved in which his higher position allows him to take advantage. In the case of a woman who tries to marry-up, the power dynamic is not on her side, the power dynamic is that poor women with little chance for advancement are more dependent on men for financial support and so obviously one option might be to try and marry well. But really I think this is an exception to the norm and largely based on male-centric stereotypes of women. I don't have the statistics, but I'm pretty confident that people tend to marry people of a similar social status and relative income.


Women today(in USA) are more educated and have greater access to employment, women are not on the same financial level as men and that needs to change however affirmative action policies make it so that in general women can make money on their own and they don't need men for money anymore. So there is no reason for women to treat men like financial objects any more but unfortunately many of them do and it is up to men to fight against these reactionary tendencies that many women still cling to.No it is not up to men. How is this, when it does happen IRL, reinforce oppression in our society? As far as "reinforcing bourgeois ideas about marriage" well a marriage out of love by equals does this just as much as someone marrying for money.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Marriages were conducted in early capitalism as a way of families gaining properties. I think that social custom is mostly irrelevant when the majority of families don't own nearly as much property as they used to, and daughters aren't viewed as bargaining chips. Could it be argued that this lack of the property-incentive is what is causing polyamory? Without that incentive in marriage, more and more people are simply doing what pleases them.

Not entirely sure if that's correct, I'm just trying to go deeper than the "It's not bourgeois, so it must be good" argument you're unsatisfied with.

Hmm. I don't think that the socio-economic incentive reaches quite as far as polygamy, though. I think it leads to a reaction against traditional marriage, and the practice of having more partners before marriage or what have you, but i'm not sure, again, why the abandonment of 'traditional' attitudes to marriage lead to a rise in polygamy. It's just a non-sequitor for me. Monogamy is perfectly compatible with a cynical, or even oppositional, attitude towards traditional ideas of marriage, social conservatism etc.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Marriages were conducted in early capitalism as a way of families gaining properties. I think that social custom is mostly irrelevant when the majority of families don't own nearly as much property as they used to, and daughters aren't viewed as bargaining chips. Could it be argued that this lack of the property-incentive is what is causing polyamory? Without that incentive in marriage, more and more people are simply doing what pleases them.

Not entirely sure if that's correct, I'm just trying to go deeper than the "It's not bourgeois, so it must be good" argument you're unsatisfied with.

I agree. I think property comes into play with monogamy generally and the bourgeois family unit specifically and I'd add that I think labor does too. Specifically in capitalism women as caretakers are providing a social service at really no cost to the ruling class. Labor also comes into play because in feudalism, for example, more children meant more labor for a peasant on their plot of land - the same is true for yeomen and later petty-bourgeois small farmers.

I also think monogamy in general goes back further than capitalism and has been important in various class societies: once there is a social surplus held by a ruling few, they have to figure out how to maintain that system past their own lifetime: where does the surplus go when they die? In passing this surplus and status down in the family it became important that children weren't just an addition to the community as a whole (as it likely would have been in pre-class societies) but connected primarily to the specific family in many cases. This required wives to be faithful or in some cases alternative schemes for ensuring direct linage such as inheritance going to the first son of your oldest female sibling. At any rate I think this suggests that under minority-rule class societies there is always a tendency to need to control the kinds of personal relationships people have in addition to the obviously more fundamental economic relationships.

In contrast, in cultures where polyamory was the norm - always pre- or semi-agricultural band societies to my knowledge - labor and any surplus that exists is shared more equally. Generally this resulted in relationships where people went from one partner to another for various lengths of time throughout their life. I know of at least one case where any attempt at demanding an exclusive partnership would have been taboo and shocking - not that some people probably didn't pair up with one person for most of their life, it's just that it would have been illogical to mandate ahead of time that organic exclusive pairing.

I have no idea what sexuality would be like a generation or two after class liberation. I'm pretty sure it would be different today - in fact I think it would need to be. But my feeling is that relationships would only be held together by mutual care and enjoyment of each-other; they would exist in much more variety as far as types of relationships; and they would be a hell of a lot less stressful and a lot more baggage-free.

[bcbm]

If you could call it that. Using a tiny bit of evidence to make normative statements which we can empirically see to be false (by the number of happy and unhappy couples of both types) is not what I would call greater understanding.

its not a 'tiny bit' of evidence. there is a great deal suggesting our species evolved in societies where sex with multiple partners was common practice. even our biology reflects that.


IMO there are particular material conditions in the Marxist sense which make one more likely to appear than in another.

sure.

[officer nugz]

polyamory is the natural condition of the human species.it seems kinda foolish to consider there to be a natural condition of the human species in regards to family models, particularly if you then go on to say that family models are determined by economic conditions. which I would think makes there no "natural" model. what are you going by to determine what is natural and what is not?:confused:

[bcbm]

it seems kinda foolish to consider there to be a natural condition of the human species in regards to family models, particularly if you then go on to say that family models are determined by economic conditions. which I would think makes there no "natural" model. what are you going by to determine what is natural and what is not?:confused:

humans are animals. we evolved from other animals. that evolution took a certain path and certain tendencies are favored by our evolution and for much of our time on this planet we practiced them. this is what i mean by 'natural.'

[Sea]

I just can't understand how polyamory can represent real love.

Homosexuality, interracial relationships, all that I'm okay with because I'm one of those progressive pro-equality types but polyamory.. I just can't get it!



Welcome to the putrid, rotting carcass of intolerance.

[Jimmie Higgins]

I just can't understand how polyamory can represent real love.

Homosexuality, interracial relationships, all that I'm okay with because I'm one of those progressive pro-equality types but polyamory.. I just can't get it!

Welcome to the putrid, rotting carcass of intolerance.

Well you don't have to get it, but in fact some people do get it and want or like that arrangement, so I think we should support people's right to find mutual love where and how they please. There's no material reason why workers should oppose it while there are some reasons they should to support it. For example: marginalization of non nuclear family arrangements strengthens the family-unit based social organization that our rulers push; marginalization of one sexual minority makes it easier to marginalize others.

Fighting for the right of people to live as they want, in this case specifically, polyamorously, doesn't mean we want to get in the way of organic monogamous parings, we just want relationships freed from capitalist social relations so that they are based on love, not the need to have two incomes to raise a kid or fear of living alone or social pressure and expectations.

[m1omfg]

It has to do with young people moving into Urban areas in increasing numbers, along with cultural and social viewpoints that have become more progressive.. traditional church morality is losing it's grip, and people are accepting science and humanism more and more as a better guide to living life and enjoying it.. more college students with more progressive views at least among a sizeable subset of the population is part of it too.. the cultural revolution will hopefully make the material revolution that much easier. Once you become a marxist, a feminist, an anti-marriage, anti-racist type of person, there's no going back!

Fuck Western college students.

[m1omfg]

I would say that this is the relatively positive side of capitalism destroying the feudal social order, where "all that is sacred is profaned." while undermining the family unit in nasty and horrifying ways, capitalism has also opened the door for de-pathologization of sexual 'deviants' as the Christian conception of morality crumbles. this relation takes on a fundamentally individualistic and selfish character under capitalism; under socialism, it should evolve into something more inclusive and communal.

say what you want about liberal nihilism, but it has great sex.

I live in a disharmonious family and it profoundly damaged my life. A communist society should make a stronger family unit rather than indulge in perversions that liberal first world college students love. Proper communism does not include this "anti-marriage", radical feminist crap, but whatever, destroy any societal value because you feel "opressed" by actually having to abide by morality. The only thing it will result in is the fascists slaughtering you and your dreams of destroying families to achieve "great sex" will not help real communists in the slightest. This is also why you hate real past socialist states so much, because they would spit in your face and send you to prison for spreading this ultra-liberal shit. You are like every bad liberal stereotype, except multiplied by a factor of 100. "Cultural marxism" crap has nothing to do with real Marxism.

[Jimmie Higgins]

I live in a disharmonious family and it profoundly damaged my life.You live in a disharmonious family in capitalism, a system which privatizes the social maintenance of people through the family unit: working class families with two working parents have more income, or one stay-at-home parent (generally the mom) to ideally provide (unpaid) maintenance for the family unit. Children and disabled people who can't work or elderly people are the responsibility and dependent on family units. This is how the family as a capitalist economic unit works.

So have an unstable family does have an impact - but this is due to the specific conditions of families under capitalism. If you had abusive parents in a early band society what did you do? Other people in the band would probably intervene if a parent was cruel beyond the norms of that group or the child, if old enough to realize that they didn't want to be in that situation would move on. When Jesuit priests tried to "teach" native American men to "discipline" their wives, how did they wives respond? They moved into other houses or found new lovers who weren't abusing them.

This was because parents and wives and families as a whole weren't seen as private entities, but part of the community; wives and children weren't the "property" essentially of the head of the family.

So as a Marxist I want to smash the family as we know it - not smash a loving monogamous couple who love their offspring, but smash the dependance on having to live in this way to survive under the system. Smash the social situation of having to stay in a bad marriage because of no where else to go.


A communist society should make a stronger family unit rather than indulge in perversions that liberal first world college students love. Proper communism does not include this "anti-marriage", radical feminist crap, but whatever, destroy any societal value because you feel "opressed" by actually having to abide by morality.Morality? Whose morality? Perversion? Perversion from what? The family as we know it was invented by a bunch of Victorians who wanted workers not the rich to have to take care of those unable to work, raise and pay for raising new generations of workers, and take the blame for the problems of capitalism: oh well you know it's the lack of good fathers that causes crime :rolleyes:.


The only thing it will result in is the fascists slaughtering you and your dreams of destroying families to achieve "great sex" will not help real communists in the slightest. This is also why you hate real past socialist states so much, because they would spit in your face and send you to prison for spreading this ultra-liberal shit. You are like every bad liberal stereotype, except multiplied by a factor of 100. "Cultural marxism" crap has nothing to do with real Marxism.The only thing perverted here is your sense of what "real" Marxism is. Go read the Manifesto - the section about fighting for the right to divorce and against the capitalist organization of the family. Marx and Engels refute most of your arguments there.

[Sea]

Well you don't have to get it, but in fact some people do get it and want or like that arrangement, so I think we should support people's right to find mutual love where and how they please. There's no material reason why workers should oppose it while there are some reasons they should to support it. For example: marginalization of non nuclear family arrangements strengthens the family-unit based social organization that our rulers push; marginalization of one sexual minority makes it easier to marginalize others.

Fighting for the right of people to live as they want, in this case specifically, polyamorously, doesn't mean we want to get in the way of organic monogamous parings, we just want relationships freed from capitalist social relations so that they are based on love, not the need to have two incomes to raise a kid or fear of living alone or social pressure and expectations.
I was being sarcastic in that post........

I live in a disharmonious family and it profoundly damaged my life. A communist society should make a stronger family unit rather than indulge in perversions that liberal first world college students love. Proper communism does not include this "anti-marriage", radical feminist crap, but whatever, destroy any societal value because you feel "opressed" by actually having to abide by morality. The only thing it will result in is the fascists slaughtering you and your dreams of destroying families to achieve "great sex" will not help real communists in the slightest. This is also why you hate real past socialist states so much, because they would spit in your face and send you to prison for spreading this ultra-liberal shit. You are like every bad liberal stereotype, except multiplied by a factor of 100. "Cultural marxism" crap has nothing to do with real Marxism.
.....and that is what I mean by the rotting carcass of intolerance! ;)

Anyone that is against polyamory can kiss that same special spot on my ass as homophobes and the "don't mix races" crowd. I've never heard an argument against polyamory that doesn't fall back on that imposing, assuming, oppressive and ultimately meaningless moralizing. Such arguments have no place here.