communication vs bullying

[kareina]

The author tammypierce has been posting recently on the topic of bullying, prompted by a now-famous incident of bullying which ended in the suicide of the victim. Today's post on the subject discussed the fact that many women are inclined to blame other women when their men "cheat" on them, and when this happens words like "slut" tend to be used. This is a topic which is important to me, and I wound up leaving a rather long comment in reply. Since it was a long comment, I decided that it was worth sharing here, as well, since not everyone I care about will see it there.

I, for one, am grateful that there is a good alternative to the whole "cheating" culture. Polyamory, with its emphasis on honesty and communication between all parties involved, as well as communication with anyone with whom one of the people in the relationship would like to be involved, avoids many of the problems such as you describe here.

There are some people out there who claim to be genuinely monogamist--they say that they literally never find anyone else even a little bit attractive once they've found their "one true love". This is very, very rare. Most people are human, and will find more than one person attractive in their life.

In the latter case they have a variety of choices 1) they can choose the polyamory approach and form stable, honest, communication-filled relationships with more than one person. 2) they can deny that aspect of themselves and choose only one person with whom to be involved, "forsaking all others" with whom they would otherwise be compatible 3) they can claim to follow the party line and do monogamy whilst lying about who they are with and "cheating" on their "partner".

To my eye it is an easy decision. I will always choose truthfulness, honor, communication, and love over self-denial or dishonesty.

I, too, have been a victim of the "blame the girl" mentality, where people who should know better chose to bandy around the word "slut".

When I in high school I fell head over heels in love with an intellegent young man, who had the best library. We were together for a while and then he felt the need to end the relationship for reasons I never did understand. I was heartbroken, and still totally smitten with him. A couple of years later my best friend, who had always been a self-described "flirt", who often stated that she wanted to have lots of fun before "settling down", started dating my first love. Meanwhile, I started dating someone else, and the relationship had its ups and downs, as they do, and we eventually decided to go our separate ways.

Sometime later, when my best friend was in the hospital with mono, my first love was visiting my house, and we discovered that the attraction we had felt for one another was still there. We did the right thing and called my best friend to ask her if she was ok with our spending time cuddling and kissing. She told him to do whatever he wanted, and we enjoyed some very sweet affection (not sex; I was still too young to be willing to go that far).

Much to my surprise, when my "best friend" got out of the hospital she wrote me a note expressing her unhappiness with my betrayal and stated that she never wanted to speak with me again. She then spread rumors about me claiming that I was a "slut" (never mind that I'd kissed only three people in my life at that point), and my final year at high school was very difficult and painful as a result.

Even though that incident took place many years before the term "polyamory" had been coined, my instinct was to approach everyone involved with honest communication. Her choice to close off communication and spread hurtful rumors broke my heart just as much as the ending of any other relationship can do. This incident underscored for me the paramount importance of communication in all relationship, romantic or not. People who choose to eschew communication are the ones who also choose paths of bullying, hate, and violence. That is not a path that I find acceptable.

Comments

[hunrvogt.livejournal.com]

I will never, ever understand the women that blame the "other" women rather than blaming the one who broke the promise. It boggles my mind. It really does. Especially when they verbally condone it.

Option 2 should be about honesty and communication too. In fact, strong monogamous realationships require honesty and communication every bit as much as I suspect strong polyamorous ones do.

I do think it's fair to identify an element of self denial in option 2. Option 3 is about pleasure regardless of pain. While option 1 meets the classical definition of Hedonism in terms of optimizing pleasure (major pleasure, little to no pain).

For me the self-denial is almost un-noticeable. The best comparison I could think to give you probably relates to materialism. I tend not to find myself voraciously materialistic, but I suspect with my life in private industry and your life in academia, that I am more materialistic than you. From where I sit, acquiring material goods takes a certain commitment to a specific professional career choices. Your career focus seems to be more on knowledge and variety than on amassing material wealth. From where I sit you deny yourself goods and services because you have chosen a different path. Both Dr's different paths and focuses.

Not exactly your original point on bullying, but perhaps that makes sense on the monogamy front?

[kareina.livejournal.com]

Yes, I agree, all forms of relationships require honesty and communication, be they romantic or platonic, monogamist or polyamorous.

From what you say here, and in your journal, you do sound like one of those true monogamists; so happy in your own relationship that you don't really notice the other options out there, and so it is easy not to pursue them. I admire and respect that when it happens, but am all to aware how very rare that is, both in the real world, and in "literature" (both in the sense of books and plays as written throughout the ages, and modern TV and movies).

It is difficult that literature on the one hand holds up monogamy as an "ideal" for which we "should" strive, and on the other holds up countless examples of how impossible that goal can be, for so very many people. Rather than living in a world which vilifies people for having the audacity to care for more than one person at a time, I prefer to live in a world where it is ok to love all whom thou wilt, an no one need ever lie about adhering to a rule which doesn't fit.

[hunrvogt.livejournal.com]

"It is difficult that literature on the one hand holds up monogamy as an "ideal" for which we "should" strive, and on the other holds up countless examples of how impossible that goal can be, for so very many people."

Ain't that the truth!