More Than Two: A Practical Guide to Ethical Polyamory (29 page)

• The primary couple always comes first with regard to time or other resources.
  
• Each member of the primary couple can veto any secondary partner of the other. (We discuss vetoes in detail in the next chapter.)
  
• Members of the primary couple are not permitted to spend the night with a secondary partner.
  
• Members of the primary couple pledge to love each other most.
  
• If the members of the primary relationship run into trouble or feel threatened, they can put secondary relationships "on hold" while they work things out between them.
  

People often assume these prescriptions are okay because secondary relationships are "casual"—but often they are not. Some secondary relationships are emotionally serious, long-lasting and deeply committed. (Franklin's hierarchical secondary relationship with Bella, described
here
, lasted a decade.) Nevertheless, secondary relationships are defined as relationships subordinate to a primary relationship—by rules, structures or agreements determined by the primary partners.

FRANKLIN'S STORY
When Celeste and I first started practicing polyamory in 1988, before we had the word
polyamory
, neither of us had any idea there were other people trying to do the same thing we were. Without the support of other polyamorous people, we had to make things up as we went along. We talked a great deal, trying to decide how we could do this non-monogamy thing. We tried to create rules for our relationship that we could both live with and that we thought would help us each feel secure and happy.

We were so busy thinking about protecting ourselves that we didn't think about the happiness of anyone else who might become involved with us. As a result, our rules focused on our own relationship. We thought that if we preserved the relationship between the two of us, the "core relationship," we were doing the right thing. We never considered that rules that worked for us might not work for the other people we would come to love, and we certainly never looked at our relationship from their perspective.

Prioritization
of relationships does not necessarily imply hierarchy by our definition. For example, the two of us each have a partner (not each other) with whom we live and own property. Sharing a home means we have financial commitments that lead us to prioritize whom we spend money on. The mortgage must be paid before we spend a lot on dates! And if we start dating a new partner, that new person doesn't immediately get a vote on whether we sell the house.

Other examples: You probably don't give the keys to your car to someone on the first date. And most parents, mono or poly, are rightly cautious about whom they introduce their young children to, and when. Exercising your personal judgment in these kinds of decisions, and expecting your partners to make good judgments, is not displaying a hierarchy toward the person affected. Nor is requiring a partner to get your consent for things that concern both of you (such as property or children).

But if you control when and how your partner can make relationship decisions with
others
, and this prescription is intended to overrule the choices of your partner and his other partner, that is hierarchy.

Children are often used to justify hierarchy. If you are co-parenting, hopefully you are co-parenting with someone whose judgment you trust, and whom you trust to protect your children's interests. Deciding what parenting values you both share and will honor, and setting mutually agreed expectations for shared responsibilities and the structure you will provide for the children, is not imposing hierarchy per se, if the parents trust each other to make decisions within their other relationships that honor their commitments to one another and the kids.

The relationship structure becomes a hierarchy, though, when one partner expects to make decisions about how the other partner will conduct their other relationships, or what level those other relationships will be permitted to reach, to ensure that the commitments to the children are—in their opinion—met.

COUPLE FOCUS

Hierarchy almost always focuses on a couple. The couple may explicitly choose a hierarchical model as a way to add other relationships "on the side," or they may not realize how hierarchical they will become in a pinch, but to these people, the couple is always the relationship that matters. The emphasis on a "core couple" can permeate a relationship in ways that are both obvious and subtle. When it is taken to its extreme, a couple may see others as simply expendable, to be ditched without warning or explanation at any sign of trouble. A lot of single poly people who became involved with a couple who they thought loved and respected them have tales to tell about abrupt loss of all contact: phone calls and emails unanswered and no further communication.

FRANKLIN'S STORY
Celeste's family had a Christmas tradition: every year her entire family, no matter how far-flung, would get together at her parents' house for the holiday celebration. Because she and I were married we both attended, and because she was closeted about polyamory to her family, we never considered inviting any of my other partners—or even asking them what they might like to do for the holiday. I was simply unavailable to them, regardless of what they wanted. Far from being something that was negotiated, this situation was a given. Celeste and I didn't think to ask whether my other partners might want to spend time with me over the holidays, so I was blind to the idea that this might matter to them at all.

We had other, more far-reaching rules. At the beginning of our relationship, Celeste and I decided that no other partners would be allowed to live with us, that I would not love anyone else as much as I loved Celeste, that I would never say "I love you" to any other partner, and that I would never share finances with anyone else. We didn't consciously decide to ignore the needs or happiness of any secondary partners—we didn't think about them at all! We never considered, "What if someone wants to live with us?" or "What if being forbidden to tell someone I love her hurts her?"

People in hierarchical primary relationships may view a secondary partner's needs or expectations as a problem, or even imagine that future secondary partners should not have needs or expectations at all. If they even think that far: as with Franklin and Celeste, the happiness of the secondary partner may not even have occurred to them.

The members of a primary couple may have a belief—even a tacit, almost unconscious belief—that having more than one primary partner is not possible. Many new polyamorous people believe you can have only one primary partner, as in the monogamy ideal: they believe when push comes to shove, you can
really
only love one person. This model might be called "polyamory as modified monogamy," including the idea that you can only have one "soulmate" while still having multiple lovers.

REASONS FOR HIERARCHY

In many ways polyamory can be disruptive, and hierarchy can seem like a way to keep that disruption at bay. In our overwhelmingly monogamous culture, hierarchy can seem like a way to protect ourselves from risk by creating an agreement that our partner will always consider us more important than anyone else. For many people, hierarchy creates a powerful feeling of safety and control.

Hierarchy also seems to promise stability and continuity. It can seem like a way to explore a radical new relationship style without giving up the comfort and certainty promised by monogamy. It also seems to promise that we can have multiple relationships while still ensuring all our needs are met. If we need something, we'll get it; only after our needs are satisfied may secondary partners have our partner's time and attention.

Hierarchy may also feel like a way of buffering ourselves from our partner's other relationships. By packaging these up and keeping them at arm's length from the core couple, we may try to prevent them from affecting the life we have.

Outside of polyamory, the hierarchical model can sometimes work fine. The world of swinging is much larger than the poly world, and emotionally monogamous, hierarchical couples tend to dominate there. The focus is on sex for fun and adventure, with no emotional spillover allowed into the rest of life. If you have a partner and the two of you as a couple are strongly drawn to a hierarchical style, swinging may be an alternative to polyamory you might choose to investigate.

But the waters of poly are deeper, and for loving relationships, depth needs to be allowed—threatening as it may sometimes seem.

When we have been in an existing relationship for a long time, we might feel like some of the early intensity has faded. Watching a partner enter a wildly passionate, starry-eyed, intensely sexual new relationship can be quite uncomfortable. New relationship energy has quite a reputation in this regard. The existing partner may feel insecure enough to impose hierarchy to try to limit the intensity for his own comfort. You can see the smoldering fuses that this move sets.

The assumption lurking beneath a desire for hierarchy is that we can't really trust our partners to act well without a set of rules. That without a formal ranking to remind our partners that we come first, we will lose our status, lose the things we most value about our relationship, lose our sense of security, or even lose the relationship entirely. But as we've said before, if your partner can't be trusted to work with you on your needs when asked, she probably can't be trusted to follow rules.

THE POWER DYNAMICS OF HIERARCHY

In a hierarchical relationship by our definition, power is diverted from within one relationship to restrict another relationship, forming a sort of "gate" to limit commitment or connection. When the natural flow of connection or commitment is smaller than the width of that gate, everything is fine. This is usually what's going on where people point to hierarchical poly groups in which prescribed roles are working well for everyone involved. Of course, if the natural connection and commitment are small enough to fit within the "gate," hierarchy probably isn't necessary: that relationship would remain where it is on its own.