Guest post: A Poly Book in the Human Library

A friend of mine recently participated in a local event called the Human Library. Apparently this idea has been catching on for some time, and you can read more about the concept of people as "living books" humanlibrary.org.


Here's what she had to say about her experience as a book about polyamory:

I was part of a human library event that was two days long a couple of weeks ago. The event required me to take a vacation day from work, but it was a vacation to remember, so I am glad to of used the time. First of all some back ground on how it worked. The entrance way to the university library had comfy chairs and side tables where we could all take our readers to talk. We sat in chairs to one side behind a desk where there was a binder of all our book titles and an intro. People would come by and look at the binder and decide who they wanted to know more about.

Topics ranged from California same sex marriage laws to someones experience moving from Ontario to Florida during a tornado... and someones experience of ageism on campus to another who was experiencing what it was like to be a Chinese person come to school in Western Canada ...very diverse. I was by far the most taken out book it turned out. Exhausting! My friend was there for a time also talking about poly but from the intro kind of angle and she left early so I was it for the afternoon.

It was so much fun and so interesting what people wanted to talk about. I was willing to share about my experiences as a mistress/domme, my journey of discovery of my sexuality and my journey to get to where I am today in my poly relationships... most people were into hearing about the latter although there were definite over laps. I talked a lot about my experiences as a younger woman and how I created my goals for family and how I began making my dreams come true... true to me, no one else and how we can all do whatever our creative minds decide... there is room for all of what we want to do, regardless of what it is...

What I found most interesting were the students from abroad that were interested in and thought poly made sense, but didn't know how to normalize it for themselves. Why students from abroad I have no idea. I talked a lot about jealousy too and how to handle it. There were some people that just plain looked confused and defensive and that brought up odd feelings for me as I felt myself feeling less assured that I am "okay" and noticed I started closing down. Instead of doing so I asked them questions and brought out their relationship style and marketed the concept of we are all different. That seemed to work.

It was fascinating to be taken out by people who didn't know me and who were brave enough to engage in a process like that. When they flipped through the book they had no idea who they were going to get when they looked a the assembly of people sitting there. It was a bizarre feeling... we all wore shirts that made us all look the same... they said, "don't judge a book by it's cover" on them. They were all "man" shirts. Very unflattering... heh, seriously though, why can't they make a shirt that is unisex. Could they not of had womens t-shirts made? That was my only complaint.

There is a plan to do this event next year and I will be really excited to do it again... look out for it!

Rumour has it...

I've heard rumblings of a Victoria poly men's group in the works.  Apparently they call themselves the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (LXG for short) and will be starting up regular discussion nights soon.

Knowing how extraordinary the men in our poly community are, I'm excited to hear about this much-anticipated gathering!  Good luck, gentlemen..  please let us know how you progress!

~Kiki

Loving More workshop: Facing a Monogamous World

This is the last installment of workshop reviews from the Loving More Poly Living conference in Seattle, 2010, that I attended. I feel like I was saving up writing about this one for reasons which didn't really become clear to me until I woke up this morning to read a poly friend's blog post which was answering what amounted to a hate-letter from a monogamous-identified woman who obviously felt very threatened by the very idea of polyamory.


Mixed in with my disappointment and anger at the attack was the feeling, for me, that there is still a long way to go in educating the mainstream population about not just polyamory, but about basic human rights and decency (I'll leave out the desire to see better grammar, though as an English teacher lack of punctuation does tend to colour my opinion of the person doing the writing).


Anyway, this is all a rather personal preamble to my review of a very stimulating and inspiring workshop presented by Pepper Mint, a San Francisco educator, organizer, activist, and social theorist in the polyamory and BDSM movements.  Pepper's contribution to polyamory includes advocacy and organization of local poly events in San Francisco, as well as his excellent blog,  Freaksexual.


His workshop offering at the conference centred on an interactive discussion brainstorming ways in which living in a mono-centric world affects our lives as polyamorous people. 


The workshop's opening statement:  "Most of the problems we face being non-monogamous come from living in a monogamous world" pulled no punches.  We are in a misunderstood (and often ignored) minority.  Not only are there cultural biases (and institutionalized ones) against polyamorous relationships, these biases create power imbalances which perpetuate the feeling of being different (or even persecuted) if you choose to have more than one partner.  


Pepper also reminded us that not all biases come from without -- we ourselves, as products of a monogamous social paradigm -- have embedded and unconscious assumptions about possessiveness, territoriality and competition within relationships that require us to do a lot of extra emotional work to be comfortable with our own poly desires.  


Finally, there is the phenomenon of expectations and even "etiquette" that is created within the sub-culture of polyamorous communities themselves.  We need to remind ourselves that simply because we enjoy the company of other poly people because they make us feel included within the context of a larger mono-centric world, there is no poly "rule book" or "one true way" to be polyamorous, though you often wonder reading poly forums and faq's referring to poly "definitions" and practices.  


I enjoyed the honesty and tough issues that were brought up in this workshop; it's not an easy thing, especially in an environment where you're feeling safe and accepted among your poly peers, to admit that it's a big, often cold and sceptical monogamous world out there that for the most part isn't terribly interested in people doing anything different from the norm.  To be poly in a monogamous world is to be different, and it's up to each of us to choose whether we want to hide, or advocate for change.  Either choice involves hard work and a certain amount of courage.  

Cunning Minx and Pepper Mint at Poly Living, 2010.

November's Victoria Poly 101 monthly discussion: "Finding and building poly community"

Finding and building poly community

Thursday, November 25 · 6:30pm - 9:00pm

Please note new location for this discussion: University of Victoria, Elliot 162, Victoria, BC

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What poly groups are out there? What is their focus (eg. dating, socializing, activism, discussion.. )? What other alternative or alternative relationship style groups are there (eg. swingers, queer/bi, asexual, sex positive, kinky.. )?

Having recently returned from the Loving More Poly Living conference in Seattle, WA, I have lots of ideas for poly community (and beyond) to share with you. Come bring questions and ideas to discuss about our own local community and more.