18/12/2020 Relationship Anarchy and The Spectrum of Relationship Control – Skepticism, Properly Applied

Skepticism, Properly Applied

Criticism is not uncivil

Relationship Anarchy and The Spectrum of

Relationship Control

Within Reason  Skepticism and atheism October 12, 2013October 22, 2015 5 Minutes
Editorial Note: This post was wri en by Wes Fenza, long before the falling out of our previous quint
household and the subsequent illumination of his abusive behavior, sexual assault of several women,
and removal from the Polyamory Leadership Network and banning from at least one conference
(h ps://polyskeptic.com/2015/02/20/wes_fenza_pln/). I have left Wes’ posts here because I don’t believe
it’s meaningful to simply remove them. You cannot remove the truth by hiding it; Wes and I used to
collaborate, and his thoughts will remain here, with this notice a ached.

—–

For most people, having a sexual/romantic relationship with a person means exercising some kind of
control over that person. Traditional couples vary in the amount and types of control they exercise over
one another, but part of traditional monogamy is a substantial amount of control over a partner’s
sexuality and “outside” relationships.

Part of polyamory’s primary appeal to me was the breaking down of this power structure. For me, the
biggest appeal of opening my relationship was that my partner was allowed to do what she wanted
(h ps://polyskeptic.com/2012/03/13/polyamory-isnt-all-about-you/), without worrying that she was
infringing on my rights as her partner. Several forms of the types of monogamy that I endorse
(h ps://polyskeptic.com/2013/04/25/toward-a-more-skeptical-monogamy/)involve partners exercising
less power over one another (or explicitly recognizing and formalizing their power structure).

RELATIONSHIP ANARCHY

(h ps://shaunphilly.files.wordpress.com/2013/10/radicalrelationsheart.png)R
ecently, I’ve been reading about a relationship style that radically breaks
down the relationship power structure: relationship anarchy. As the name
suggests, it involves the rejection of the traditional power structure that is
the norm in our society. Like polyamory, RA doesn’t have one clear
definition or philosophy, but I’ve found several sources which give
consistent descriptions.

As will all research projects, we start with Wikipedia

(h p://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relationship_anarchy):

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Relationship anarchy (abbreviated RA) is the practice of forming relationships that are not bound by set rules.
It goes beyond polyamory by postulating that there need not be a formal distinction between different types of
relationships. Relationship anarchists look at each relationship (romantic or otherwise) individually, as opposed
to categorizing them according to societal norms such as ‘just friends’, ‘in a relationship’, ‘in an open
relationship’, etc.

The Thinking Asexual has a primer on RA basics

(h p://thethinkingasexual.wordpress.com/2013/05/07/relationship-anarchy-basics/). A short excerpt:

A relationship anarchist does not assign special value to a relationship because it includes sex. A relationship
anarchist does not assign special value to a relationship because it includes romance, if they even acknowledge
romance as a distinct emotion or set of behaviors in the first place. A relationship anarchist begins from a place
of assuming total freedom and flexibility as the one in charge of their personal relationships and decides on a
case by case basis what they want each relationship to look like. They may have sex with more than one person,
they may be celibate their whole lives, they may live with someone they aren’t having sex with, they may live
alone no ma er what, they may raise a child with one sexual partner or multiple sexual partners, they may
raise a child with a nonsexual partner, they may have highly physical/sensual relationships with multiple
people simultaneously (some or all of whom are not sexually and/or romantically involved with them), etc.

I encourage you to read the whole thing, and specifically about how RA applies to asexuality and other
nontraditional orientations. There is also a good introduction tot the concept at The Anarchist Library
(h p://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/andie-nordgren-the-short-instructional-manifesto-for-relationship-
anarchy). My favorite part:

Life would not have much structure or meaning without joining together with other people to achieve things —
constructing a life together, raising children, owning a house or growing together through thick and thin. Such
endeavors usually need lots of trust and commitment between people to work. Relationship anarchy is not about
never commi ing to anything — it’s about designing your own commitments with the people around you, and
freeing them from norms dictating that certain types of commitments are a requirement for love to be real, or
that some commitments like raising children or moving in together have to be driven by certain kinds of
feelings. Start from scratch and be explicit about what kind of commitments you want to make with other
people!

As you can probably tell, I find RA very appealing, not as something i want to do, but more as a name
for something I am already doing. These concepts echo concepts that I have been advocating since I
began practicing nonmonogamy, and they resonate with a lot of other ideas that I’ve encountered in the
poly community.

THE SPECTRUM OF RELATIONSHIP CONTROL

The term “polyamory” is broad. It covers a lot of different relationship styles, some more controlling
than others. If you’re a member of any polyamory groups on Facebook
(h ps://www.facebook.com/groups/polygroup/), Reddit (h p://www.reddit.com/r/polyamory), or other
online communities, you’ll often see disagreements regarding the amount of control that’s ideal to
exercise in a relationship. Some community leaders such as Franklin Veaux explicitly argue
(h p://www.morethantwo.com/polyamorywithoutrules.html)in favor of a less controlling dynamic
(h p://tacit.livejournal.com/576246.html). Often, this idea offends people (particularly unicorn hunters
(h p://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=unicorn%20hunter)) who feel that they need to

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maintain a substantial degree of control in their relationships. Media coverage of polyamory tends to
exacerbate this issue (h p://www.policymic.com/articles/66595/have-multiple-lovers-but-don-t-follow-
the-new-poly-rules).

These disagreements arise often, and my theory is these disagreement are inevitable until we come up
with a more robust vocabulary. The problem is that people hear different things when you use a term
like “polyamory,” specifically in regards to how much control partners exercise over one another.
Relationships exist on a spectrum of control, ranging from total master/slave relationships on one end
(where one partner makes all major decisions for the other) to completely independent relationship
anarchy on the other. In the middle are all other relationships. The archetypical spectrum looks
something like this:

(h ps://shaunphilly.files.wordpress.com/2013/10/relationship-control-continuum.jpg)
^Click to embiggen. There are many other archetypes that carry assumptions about the level of control in
the relationship. The problem is that many relationships don’t fit into the archetypes on the spectrum.
Some polyamorous relationships can be just as controlling, if not moreso
(h p://www.theinnbetween.net/agreement.pdf), than traditionally monogamous relationships. Some
polyamorous relationships have all of the same rules as traditional monogamy, just with additional
people (h p://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polyfidelity). Some skeptically monogamous
(h ps://polyskeptic.com/2013/04/25/toward-a-more-skeptical-monogamy/)relationships can be just as
free and egalitarian as relationship anarchists.

I think that, when most of us get involved in the poly community, we’re looking for like-minded people
who share our philosophy on relationships. The problem is that those of us on the right of the spectrum
have very li le in common with polyamorous people on the left of the spectrum (and actually much
more in common with skeptically monogamous people on the right of the spectrum). So long as we have
no way of communicating our level of control in our relationships, these disagreements are going to
continue.

This is not necessarily a bad thing. It’s important for people to be exposed to other perspectives.
Particularly, I think newer poly people (who tend to be further on the left of the spectrum) benefit
enormously from the perspectives of more experienced poly people (who tend to be further to the right
on the spectrum). It’s important for people to see examples of sustainable relationships and how they
operate. I’m also not a fan of exclusion, so I’m not advocating forming communities that keep anyone
out.

I do think, however, that as polyamory grows in popularity, it will be necessary to come up with a more
robust vocabulary to describe our relationships. Any ideas?

Published by Within Reason

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