Happy Halloween!

Given the timing this year, I probably should have posted this days ago. Better now than ever, I guess!

Halloween is October 31 and it is celebrated widely and diversely here in the US.

Do you have any special plans for Halloween? Have you done or will you do anything fun or interesting this year at a Halloween party or event?

Whatever you do, please be careful and stay safe!

Here in the states, the stores depend on Halloween to sell a lot of merchandise. In typical years, there are parties, costume contests, what amounts to theatre in front of (and inside, sometimes) the homes of people as they try to scare or entertain neighbors and strangers with things ranging from silly to sexy, spooky to gory. In some places, kids (and often parents) in costumes go from door to door collecting candy or other treats.

Many amusement parks, ranging from small to the largest, do special entertainment in the weeks leading up to Halloween, and this is a favorite time of the year for movie studios to release horror movies, and for broadcasters to show ones from years past.

For some, there are religious or spiritual aspects to the day, and it might be called by other names.

Some interesting things can happen when people are having fun at costume parties, or cuddled up together watching scary movies. Maybe you'll be home with family or other loved ones, watching something good or playing some fun games?

So, as always, feel free to comment or share your plans or stories, including from years past. You can comment anonymously below.

Why Attempt to Suppress Affection?

Why would anyone waste time, energy, and other resources attempting to suppress affection or recreation between mutually consenting people?

Do you have a personal dislike of some forms of sex, or certain people? So what? Why do you even feel a need to tell people sharing love or play that you disapprove, let alone try to censor or criminalize them?

Who are they harming? Who are they endangering?

Life is short. Don’t waste yours trying to stop other people from being affectionate or playful with each other.

Don’t fight against equality; that’s a threat to freedom.

Rather, show solidarity and support the rights of all. You’ll find it makes you a better person overall. Love is better than hate.

Family With Benefits

This post deals strictly with sexual situations. If you don't want to read about that, skip it. [This was published during the recent pandemic, but almost all of it is still relevant.]

NOT a Good Reason to Deny (Polyamorous) Love #16

“Some men will be left out as polygyny increases.” This is based on the assumption that in a culture with gender equality, polygyny would still be more plentiful than polyandry. Anti-equality people, based on this assumption, insist that this will result in unmarried men devolving into criminals.

The mistake here is assuming that the second, third, etc. wives in a polygynous marriage would have wanted one of those unmarried men rather than legally sharing the man they did marry, and that the unmarried men would in turn want to marry them. Some of those men may want to marry men, or not marry at all. Why not allow people to marry the person or people of their choice? Why try to force people to settle? Also, the system is not closed. There are billions of people in the world and more and more people are reaching the age and status of eligibility every second.

There was a study attempting to link polygny to criminal behavior in unmarried/unpartnered men based in part on nineteenth century frontier America. Things have changed a little since then. And guess what? Married men commit crime, too. Most of the men in prison have been married, were married or had at least one girlfriend at the time they were convicted.

Maybe men in the hypothetical polygynous community who don’t get married are violent people. Is it better that they have a wife to beat instead of committing crimes on the street? I don’t want to be the one who tells a woman she can’t marry the man/men or woman/women she wants; rather, she has to marry a less desirable man so that he can take his aggression out on her.

The warnings that polyamorous or polygamous freedom to marry will result in an increase of violent gangs of unmarried men committing crimes falls flat when one considers the overwhelming data revealing both that 1) Men in the US are getting married for the first time later than ever, and 2) Crime rates in the US have decreased.

There is no good reason to deny an adult, regardless of gender, sexual orientation, race or religion, the right to share love, sex, residence, and marriage (and any of those without the others) with any and all consenting adults without prosecution, bullying, or discrimination.

Feel free to share, copy and paste, and otherwise distribute. This has been adapted from this page at Full Marriage Equality: http://marriage-equality.blogspot.com/p/discredited-invalid-arguments.html

Go to NOT a Good Reason to Deny (Polyamorous) Love #15 

Go to NOT a Good Reason to Deny (Consanguineous) Love #17

Navigating the Holidays

The year-end holidays are here. [I’m bumping this up early this year because it’s not too early to plan, especially when you consider Halloween festivities are underway.]

If you might be getting together with family for Hanukkah, Winder Solstice, Christmas, Kwanzaa, New Year's Eve/Day, or any other holiday coming up, you might be facing specific decisions and considerations, especially if you're in an interracial relationship or an age gap relationship, or are LGBTQ+, nonmonogamous, consanguinamorous, or are exploring/living out kinks and certain dynamics:

• Avoiding hostile people
• Keeping closeted
• Coming out
• Making a move

You are under no obligation to spend holidays with people who are hostile to you because of your gender, orientation, relationships, or kinks, even if they are related to you. Repeat that to yourself as needed.

That being said, if there is just one or two hostile people and there will be dozen or more other people, consider if you can go and simply avoid the hostile people. Some families and gatherings allow for that.

What you tell people, how, and when, is up to you. If you're not ready to come out to the people you'd be spending time with, you shouldn't have to. Or, if you think coming out now to one, more, or all of the people who will be there would be best, you'll need to prepare yourself for emotionally for that.

As far as making a move, if there is a person or people likely to be there you want to "get closer to," whether relatives or family friends, plan ahead for the possibilities. Will there be a way to get them alone? Would it be good to get things in motion ahead of time through texts, messages, video chats, calls, etc.? Or do you want to wait until you're face to face to get things in motion or back into motion, as the situation might be. Mistletoe and “stroke of midnight” kisses to ring in the New Year can present great opportunities.

Plan ahead and make the most of the season. What that means is up to you. For some of you, it will be making plans with friends and "found family" or your partner(s) and their families. Others will make the most of their opportunities by going "home." Plans can change, and that's fine. But do consider what you might want to do.

If you need someone to talk with or to give you feedback about your plans, or you just want to say hello to Keith, you can do so, as always, by emailing fullmarriageequality at protonmail dot com or message him on Wire at fullmarriageequality or on Facebook.

You can also comment with your thoughts, plans, or past experiences below.

Spirit Day 2024

Thursday, October 17 is Spirit Day. Among varying activities, people wear purple in support of LGBTQ+ youth, against bullying.

Nobody should be bullied, harassed, or discriminated against because of their gender, sexuality, or relationship diversities or those of their family members or friends.

Are you observing Spirit Day? Leave a comment below telling us about it.

Defend people against prejudice, bullying, harassment, and discrimination.

How You Can Help

The World Needs More Love

There's so much hate, prejudice, and bigotry. 

There is also love.

The world needs more love.

Support love.

Don't try to stop love, even if it doesn't look like what you'd want.

Let people love each other how they mutually agree.

Is Polyamory Just a Renamed Swinger Lifestyle or Open Marriage?

No. This is a common misconception.

Swinging, open marriage, and polyamory are all forms of ethical, disclosed, or consensual nonmonogamy, meaning none of them are cheating, but they aren’t the same thing as each other.

Swingers have casual sex at clubs, events, or parties, usually ones that are mainly there or being held for the swinging element. Couples (and triads, and...) who swing have agreed with each other to do so.

Polyamory involves having a dating, romantic, partner, or spousal relationship with more than one person in a way to which those involved have agreed. For example, three people might live together as partners with each other in a triad. Or, one person might have ongoing dating relationships with three different people, none of whom spend time with each other, but all three of them are aware and agreeable to the fact that the person they are dating is seeing other people, not for the purposes of “picking” one of them, but on a continuing basis. Each of them may or may not be seeing or living with other partners. Polyamory can take many different forms.

An open marriage or open relationship is a marriage or relationship that isn't closed to new partners. The people in the marriage or relationship have agreed that one, both, or all of them are open to finding new partners, whether separately or together, whether those partners are for casual sex (like with swinging, or hookups, or threesomes) or a spousal relationship (like with polyamory), or some other way.

People in an open marriage or open relationship might swing, or might be polyamorous, or might look for casual encounters that aren't part of swinging. But many polyamorous people are in closed relationships and aren't open to having new partners. Some swingers consider their marriage or relationship only open for swinging and not anything else; it's not a generally open relationship and neither or none of them are looking for anyone outside of the context of swinging.

So...

Swingers may or may not consider themselves polyamorous.
Polyamorous partners may or may not swing.
Swingers might be in an generally open relationship or only be "open" for swinging.
Polyamorous relationships can be open or closed.

Whether you know it or not, you know people who are in consensually nonmonogamous relationships. You know people who are, or have been, swingers. You know polyamorous people. You know people in open relationships. People of all walks of life find these forms of ethical nonmonogamy suit them and their relationships. Some of them are health care providers, firefighters, accountants, airline pilots, military personnel, engineers. lawyers, educators, clergy, or stay-at-home parents.

Nonmonogamous people shouldn't be discriminated against or denied their rights. Let people have the relationships to which they've mutually agreed.

Coming Out Day 2024 is Friday

Life can be tough for someone whose identity and orientation doesn’t fit in to a narrow little heterosexual, monogamous, "traditional"-gender-role box or whose relationship doesn’t meet the local sex police’s approved standards. Sometimes, a person or the people in a relationship want to come out of the closet. Sometimes they need to come out. For some of these people, it is a little less difficult if they do so as part of a communal event, such as National Coming Out Day.

National Coming Out Day is Friday, October 11. Here’s the official website, at least for the US. There is much helpful information there, regardless of where you live.

The more people that come out, the more the others around them will realize they do know and appreciate people who are LGBTQ+, or polyamorous or otherwise nonmonogamous, or consanguinamorous, and that such people and relationships deserve equality. So coming out helps progress.

On the other hand, it is understandable that any given person, couple, triad, or quad decides to stay in the closet for now. There’s still so much hate, so much prejudice and persecution, and even unjust laws that hinder the life and love of people who are good citizens and just want to be themselves. I support the decision of anyone who believes they need to be reserved for now for the sake of their safety and family.

The decision to come out is yours. Do you want to come out, and to whom? Your friends? Your family? Your coworkers? Your classmates? Your neighbors? Your crush? The whole world?

Also, if someone comes out to you, the decision to be an ally is yours. If your classmate, coworker, neighbor, friend, parent, child, or sibling comes to you and says they are gay, lesbian, bisexual, polysexual, pansexual, transgender, polyamorous, nonmonogamous, consanguinamorous or in a consanguinamorous relationship, what will you do? Will you choose love and acceptance?

Even if you are heterosexual, monogamous, and nonconsanguinamorous, you may want to come out as an ally for full marriage equality. That alone can take courage, but it helps.

If you are planning to come out, or you do come out, please feel free to share your experience here by commenting. You can do so anonymously. You are also welcome to contact Keith if you want someone to talk with. The best ways to do that are to email fullmarriageequality at protonmail dot com or message fullmarriageequality on the Wire messaging app.

Lesbians Day 2024

Tuesday, October 8 is International Lesbians Day.

Today and every day, it is good to remember that, like anyone else, lesbians should be free to share love, sex, kink, residence, and marriage (and any of those without the others) with any and all consenting partners. 

Lesbians should be free to live their lives, without fear of harassment, bullying, criminalization, or discrimination.

Thank you to all of our lesbian friends and allies!

A Reluctant Mother Discovers the Joy of Son

People of a wide variety of backgrounds reach out to me. I keep their privacy and can often be of some help to them with my perspective.

Every once in a while, someone will send me hate mail.

Several months ago, someone sent me a private message:

I dont know who you are or where you get off but i want you to know you have ruined a family. My son recently came to me, showed me yourwebsite and blogs here and then told me he wants to have sex with me and that incest is ok!!!!

He’s a teenager!

What do you have to say for yourself?!

I didn’t respond because I figured a rational discussion wasn’t a possibility. I just hoped that the son wasn’t going to be subjected to shame and “therapy” for having normal feelings.

Two months passed.

I received an email with the subject line of “I’m sorry.”

It read…

Hello,

I wrote a message to you, accusing you of things that werent your fault and i am sorry. It was wrong of me.

Sincerely

I wrote back and expressed thanks for the apology, as that took much courage and character, and engaged her in a dialogue.

Below is some of what she’s told me so far over the course of our dialogue. This is all published with her permission, with spelling and grammar corrected and redactions for “language” and privacy. My comments are in bold.

The discussion is unavoidably explicit.

*****

Coming Out Consanguinamorous

Introduction

"Coming out" means declaring or no longer hiding that you're consanguinamorous in orientation or in a consanguinamorous relationship. Whether, when, to whom, and how to come out is something that can weigh on the mind of a consanguinamorous person.

Getting to decide whether, when, to whom, and how to come out is a privilege that is sometimes denied people who are outed against their will or by accident. Consanguinamorous people should seriously consider how to protect themselves.

Please note this entry is about coming out in general, such as to family, friends, etc., not about coming out to a romantic/sexual/spousal partner. That has many different considerations and warrants its own entry.

Stay in the Closet If/Until...