I don't think there is a single person here who disagrees with the bolded. Not even Monte. Which is why this "argument" is so weird.

It is possible to think that the inclusion of a third person is not likely to help and at the same time believe that it is not "inherently destabilizing".

I'll agree with the bolded, but

I think the dissent is more because RJ/fakeb seem to be discussing this more from a dispassionate, academic side of things, which necessarily ends up coming across as mental masturbatory whether the intent is there or not (and, fwiw, I don't think that was their intent here). Plus this seems like the kind of thing would be pretty hard to study and rife with selection bias, so outside of taking RJ and fakeb at their word when they say "there are a ton of people that do this is a safe, healthy, and happy way and you just aren't aware of them because it's never an issue", my response would be well, maybe, except I'm interested in the long term effect of that sort of thing on marital happiness and overall divorce rate compared to the norm, and I don't think we're ever truly going to approach knowing that.

I wouldn't be shocked if there are some studies that come out on that sort of thing in the next 10-20 years, since being open about something like being a swinger or having some sort of "monogamish" relationship becomes more acceptable.

Assuming all things being equal, I wouldn't think the divorce or break-up rate is any higher, but it may be difficult to tease out the different sort of categories or reasons people experiment with non-monogamy.

In any event, I think now that Monte has explained more completely what he meant by his original comment, I don't think there's really even that much disagreement.

Agree.

Plus I think when we're talking about present day or the near past, a lot of the married couples that experiment/ed with monogamy were probably getting divorced regardless. My argument is that, in these situations, it doesn't fix things and is almost guaranteed to accelerate the divorce timetable.

As RJ alludes, I'm pretty interested to see what things look like in 20ish years when we have a generation of people that have been able to find and voluntarily enter into all sorts of non-traditional relationships with all sorts of like-minded non-traditional people. To the extent that I have experience talking to a shrink friend or two about this, the explanation that I find a bit hard to completely swallow -- that all this non-traditional sexual stuff is due to "trauma", which seems to be the buzzword of buzzwords in the field right now -- is something I'm interested in seeing teased out a bit more.

Anyone here seen Masters of Sex? Recommended?

I don't think desire for sexual variety is in any way related to trauma, although specific manifestations of sexual desire may be.

I am definitely NOT pro-polyamory! Like I said, the assumptions needed to make it work seem way too unrealistic.

What I meant in saying that male libido is much higher than female was not to justify polyamory, but rather to illustrate that women having extramarital relationships will almost always mean less sex available for the main partner. Which is one reason it's immediately going to bring conflict. Maybe it would work for 2 male partners where that's probably not the case.

Seems like a way to dodge real intimacy and vulnerability so the almost inevitable breakup that would have happened anyway is going to suck less. So I can see the appeal even if it's not for me. . It's almost like you're having your partner pre-reject you in a way so you don't have it happen out of the blue AFTER you've already been super emotionally invested.

There's always that possibility, but it seems remote at this point, mostly because I think the other shoe would have dropped by now. She's pretty sharp about most things, but has a few blind spots (which I think is kind of sweet/cute).

Words and actions are much different! I am pretty vanilla IRL, as is the wifeacore. Seems like we are perfect for each other. Except for the part where I made anal jokes for the first 4 or so years of our relationship; pretty sure she's glad that's over.

I don't know if it's all that sage and am kind of surprised it's not intuitively obvious to most people other than my wife, but ok.

I am far from an expert, but those two categories seem like they may have a fair bit of overlap. For example, isn't sexual addiction thought to be a result of trauma/abuse?

I was just teasing you anyway, Monte, besides which I don't really consider anal all that perverse. Joke away.

Desire for sexual variety is inherent in the species - broader dissemination of DNA helps species survival. There are plenty of studies showing that novel sexual stimulus results in a stronger sexual response.

I'm not sure there's even a consensus that sexual addiction is a thing in the same way as substance addiction. Addictions in general tend to be correlated with trauma, so it wouldn't be suprising to see a correlation with any type of maladaptive sexual behavior. The problem for researchers it that the same behavior can be either adaptive or not, depending on the person. Whereas smoking crack is pretty much never adaptive, someone getting into BDSM could be acting out some past trauma or it could be completely healthy. Makes it harder to study from a purely research perspective.

desire is multi-faceted emotion. It spans biological drive, cognitive beliefs, need for intimacy, time & place etc. I guess 'trauma' fueling some kind of desire for variety could be part of the cognitive beliefs aspect of it.

Still, saying novelty or trauma correlates to sexual deviances and promotes dalliances is same as saying some beliefs can lead to some actions. That is just the virtue of having beliefs.

I guess the one thing you could argue is that comparitively rare stimulus does have a more lasting effect on the brain's memory, information updating, schemas, beliefs & concepts. Those things are part of the cognitive system and thus can alter biological drive for instance a rare action has a higher potential for inducing dopamine spikes in the mid-brain and that is a neurotransmitter partly responsible for sexual desire among many other things.

I watched most of the first 2 seasons and enjoyed it. Still need to finish up the last few eps of Se2 some day but I didn't download all of Se3 before I cancelled my VPN subscription and stopped torrenting so I may not end up going back to it since I can't watch Se3 unless I get Showtime.

Agreed, masters of sex was pretty good. Not awesome, but definitely watchable. Unlike the last 100 posts or so.

u actually read all those words? I just skimmed all the missed posts and read the short 1/2 sentence posts and assumed all the lengthy posts didn't need to be read.

Hell no, read the first 10 or so then did what you did. Ain't nobody etc.

I just look at the last post of a long discussion and reply to that out of context.

tv talk:

I am watching Fargo S2 and Knick S2.

Also trying to pick a new game for PS4. Can't decide between - Uncharted 1,2,3 combo disc, Fallout 4 or the latest Metal Gear Solid. Haven't played any of these series before.

I'm actually gonna go ahead here and (at least partially) disagree with the bolded. Adding a 3rd person into a relationship seems to me 100% adding a more complex and stressful factor. As someone said, of course there's 50% more problems, more unique desires to cater to, etc. This is huge imo. There's also another 100% (maybe 200%) more logistical issues to deal with. Then, there's all the interpersonal issues that are bound to crop up. Jealousy-related issues, equality, etc. I don't envision a situation where one of the 3 is, at the very least subconsciously, valued a little bit less, which doesn't seem like it would usually last.

Not saying it can never work, you just have to be a certain type of person. I imagine there are for sure people out there that for some reason or other do better, long term, in a 3-way kind of relationship, but that % has to be a minority among people that try this arrangement, and a microscopic % of the overall population. And I still think it's more stressful than a typical 2-way relationship, but they're able to overcome it anyway because of their desires/personality.

I'm not going to pretend for a second that I don't have strong pro-monog biases given I'm in a so far successful relationship, so feel free to take that into account if you wish, but I'm trying to think objectively here, and I'm confident I didn't feel any differently 2 years ago.

shocking

I think what saw's trying to say is that it'd be pretty hard for him to adapt his relationship optimization spreadsheets if he added one or more people the equation.

It's definitely an NP hard problem.

Edit: meh deleting my comment because I didn't really bother to read the conversation. Carry on.

Deets needed if they're as funny as usual.

This, so much this.

Yeah, every time BB just vaguebooks I am disappointed. Every actual story is just amazing.

Dear Montecore,

I've followed your advice and think I might be ready to settle down though at 40 I might still be a bit young. Any thoughts on when it's appropriate for me to find a nice girl to marry and start a family with?


Curiously,
Soulman