Re:
"Again, going back to my ethnicity issue, I can understand it being problematic that people believe I'm a terrorist, but my issue should be with racial stereotyping, not that people think I'm Muslim/Algerian/Turkish."
That makes sense to me.
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Okay, idea: When outing oneself to the uninitiated, perhaps one could say, "I'm not a swinger, but I am a polyamorist." Then one could just answer whatever questions the other person might have about that statement.
If the other person answered me by saying, "It's the same thing," then I suppose I'd say, "Well you have to understand, swing is more about casual sex whereas polyamory is more about emotional attachment."
Suppose the other person then tells me, "Who are you kidding? You polyamorists are just as fixated on sex as swingers are." Couple of ways I could respond, one of which might be, "Well gee, I think the human species as a whole is rather fixated on sex -- and I'm not sure that's necessarily a bad thing."
In any argument that develops, I don't want my objective to be winning the argument. Instead, I want to try to make sure that whatever I say is stuff I can feel good about saying when I think about it later on.
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If I understand what's being argued in this thread, the problem is that too many swingers are too fast and loose with sex and as a result polyamorists get a bad reputation because it's assumed that polyamorists, too, must play fast and loose with sex. The implication, essentially, would be that the percentage of unprincipled swingers is greater than the percentage of unprincipled polyamorists, and therefore polyamorists are receiving undue criticism for a greater amount of bad behavior than they're actually guilty of.
If I have misunderstood what's being argued in this thread, then I am willing to receive criticism/correction so as to get a better understanding of the issues. But in the meantime, my response (to my own assumption) is that I don't know that many swingers, so I don't know how "guilty/dirty/shallow" they are as a whole. I tend to be an optimist about such things, but if the pessimistic view is the correct view in this case, then I'll admit it's a shame and a bum deal for ethical polyamorists as well. Still, what can I do, other than try to explain what being polyamorous means to me personally when I out myself?
If swing per se is being looked down upon as being less noble than polyamory by definition, well, that's nothing new among polyamorists. I personally feel that swing per se is just fine, even if it's not my cup of tea (or even just not the path I happened to end up on in life). I don't mind defending swing in one conversation if the other person isn't yet ready to learn about how poly differs. Understanding what responsible non-monogamy is, in my opinion, is higher-priority knowledge to impart to others than is the difference between poly and swing. I can get around to explaining the difference between poly and swing in some future conversation.
The important thing, I think, is just being able to know that in some small way, I helped (or tried to help) another person gain a better understanding about some subject that is in some way related to polyamory. Swing is related in the sense of being another type of (presumably responsible) non-monogamy. That's close enough for now, given how much ignorance about non-monogamy exists in our society.
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Like london said, the rules are different when you're swinging. Polyamory breaks the rules of monogamy by saying you can have sex with more than one person as long as you're emotionally committed to whomever you have sex with. Swing breaks the rules of polyamory by saying you can have sex with more than one person as long as you want to have sex with them.
I choose not to swing, but not because I think it's a morally inferior model of behavior. Polyamory just happens to be the model of behavior that works for me in my life. So no, I don't mind swingers or what they do at all. And I don't mind ending up in a position where I'm speaking up in their defense. I trust they'd do the same for me.