CPAA Polycon Gets Coverage

Joseph Brean reported at nationalpost.com on Polycon, which is taking place in British Columbia this week. It is the first national conference in Canada, hosted by the Canadian Polyamory Advocacy Association.

LYLE STAFFORD / Postmedia News file 
CPAA director Zoe Duff is in a “triad,” as she put it, living with two men for the past five years. They all date other people, but the triad is the core.

Sessions at Polycon, as it is billed, focus on legal issues, networking, managing jealousy, “poly-feminism,” and a report based on interviews with both new and more experienced attendees of a polyamorous “sauna night” at a Toronto home.

Sounds like a great conference.

One session describes how to set up a “line family,” described by Richard Gilmore and Elon de Arcana as “a multi-generation poly family that adds new, generally younger, members as the older members pass on or members depart. In this way the family never ends and family investments, businesses and property holdings continue to increase in value. This provides a stable environment and good economic start for children and a secure retirement for older members of the family.

While we wait for full marriage equality, polyamorous people should use whatever legal and financial mechanisms ethically acceptable to protect and provide for themselves and their families.

Like other niche communities, judgmentalism and moral superiority abounds among polyamorists, and minor differences are elevated to wedge issues. 

That is the subject of one talk, by life coach Samantha Fraser, is how not to be a “Poly Elite Douchenozzle.”

“In any pond, there’s people who are going to be, ‘I do it better than you,’” said Zoe Duff, a director of CPAA. “Within the poly community, there are people who think that you need to do it this way, and there’s people who think you need to do it another way.”

Yes, the "poly community" is widely diverse. They only thing uniting all poly people is that they are in, or oriented to, relationships in which there are ultimately at least three people involved. With diversity in what polyamory "looks like," in addition to philosophical, socioeconomic, political, religious, etc. differences, there are going to be conflicts.

The article includes some negativity, but overall it is good to see some coverage of this conference.