Richard Whitnable, 56, a retired computer programmer who lives alone in Madison, considers his "intimate friends circle" to include 15 people. He divorced his wife in 1982 and became polyamorous shortly thereafter. He recently launched the Madison Area Polyamory Society, an organization of about 60 people who do community service work and have a regular jogging group.
=====
Which prompts me to imagine Mr. Whitnable, as he was way back in the bygone year of 1982 (when cloning was just a sci-fi gimmick in books and films and kool-aid colored hair soared high unto the heavens), sitting on the edge of a newly solo occupied bed, wondering what to do about his dating situation.
A light bulb of inspiration appears above his head. Au revoir monogamy! Bonjour poly amour! He'll be the Niels Bohr of love - suavely handling multiple dimensions of affection. At least, that's the theory I think.
I've only met one guy in a polyamorous arrangement and he was kind of creepy in a not-dangerous-but-definitely-a-bit-too-fixated-on-this-thing kind of way.
What's funny about this to me (not in a 'ha ha' sense - more like 'isn't it curiously ironic?') is that anti-Gay types are often, maybe always, going on and on about how tolerance for queerness is a sort of 'gateway drug' of social policy. 'Once we allow Gay marriage' they say, 'who knows what other perversions will become acceptable?'
And while they shout the sky is falling into the breach or through the not-quite-open gate walks this polyamorous tribe, stating, more or less explicitly as a plan of piggy-backing action, the precise thing the anti-queer cadre fears most.
A good thing I think. Want to see more.
.d.