I absorb information. I’m like a little sponge that just wants to know more and more about the world around her. To be honest, I’m totally okay with that. I absolutely love reading non-fiction and fiction books, and learning virtually everything about some of the oddest subjects. (The flipside to this is that when it comes to basic subjects like geography, past presidents, and math, I am pretty much useless. The materials of sex toys? Roots of polygamy? The Titanic? Got’cha covered.) For this reason, I’m almost always reading books that present both sides of the issue. (Which, when it comes to sex toys, I’d like to say that reading “A Christian Woman’s Guide to Having Sex” is downright hilarious.) So for me, it makes sense that I’d be reading books about both polygamy and polyamory at the same time.

What? You think they’re the same? Not quite. The big difference: One is based on consent, while the other is based on force. It’s sorta like how “rape” and “sex” compare. Both involve multiple partners, yes, but one of them is something all participants agree on consensually, while the other is usually violently forced upon the participants. (I speak for the publicized “version” of polygamy. I know some polygamist groups exist that are consensual. But unfortunately, consensual polygamy is not what’s commonly known. While I reference “polygamy” without mentioning the non-concerning consensual parties, please let it be known that this article references only the non-consensual ones.)

Polygamy ends up being an issue in some of the Mormon sects of the United States. Utah is especially bad about it. From what I’ve learned, women and children are raised under the roofs of a community that allows little outside influence. The men are praised as the heads of households, and women are taught to be subservient. Children usually have little to no education. The compound is kept well-guarded by self-appointed “police” to assure that no one gets out (nor gets in, due to the fact that people would harm the sect). Women are taught to cherish their bodies only for their reproductive and caretaking value, while men only “make it into heaven” if they have good, well-behaving families and lots of wives. If attempting to escape, the polygamists sometimes have members of the police force who will bring you back. Women usually can’t escape with their children, and if they do escape with the children, the polygamists will sometimes bring in a high-powered lawyer to claim the father’s parental right. Plus, the women and children who escape have been taught throughout their lives that the outside world is dangerous and wants to hurt them. Young boys are usually forced out of the compound at a late teenage age to avoid becoming competition for the older men, and young women are usually forced to marry the older men non-consensually, and at astoundingly young ages.

Polyamory is also the idea of multiple partners, but in this sense, it’s supposed to be consensual. There isn’t always a set number of partners, and gender doesn’t matter when it comes to the “head” of the little group. Polyamory is also usually in much smaller numbers, and most polyamorists stress the importance of communication, and getting your own needs met.

I wanted to do extra research on the idea of polygamy, and so I went searching on the internet. What I encountered infuriated me enough to want to give up on this article all together. There are tons of articles claiming that polygamy is “good for women” because it provides them with the best genes, and because women’s chores require more than one woman to complete. A couple articles stated that polygamy is only illegal because then the ugly guys wouldn’t get girls. Really? That’s it? My god, people can be so stupid.

At the same time, I have a hard time really believing that what books and media portray is really the real story of polygamy. After all, if you look at the BDSM community, the media portrays us as all very violent, secret sadists who end up killing one another often. However, if I search, I find it’s much easier to find positive stories on BDSM activity than on polygamy. Polygamy’s stories always seem really odd to me. For example, all of the influxes of articles claiming that Polygamy is great, and the people involved really enjoy it. This sounds all too fake compared to the usual, negative stuff that is put out there.

It annoys me that the two (polygamy and polyamory) are always so closely tied together. In fact, most people don’t know that polyamory exists. They just assume that all multiple-partner couples are involved in polygamy. I feel this is unfair to polyamory. It gives it a horribly bad name. People assume that the bad properties associated with polygamy are also associated with polyamory.

One of the biggest examples of this is my mother. Her and I will go around and around about this topic (and have). I say that it’s possible to be in a consensual, multiple-person relationship, and she says that it always leads to polygamy and being involved in polygamist sects. She also claims that everyone in a polygamist sect is there non-consensually, and that none of the women involved ever wanted to be involved. Sometimes it infuriates me with some of the claims she makes: open relationships are just for people who are selfish, and it never ends up working out for any of them. It’s a topic I’ve learned to just not discuss at my house, if it can be avoided.

I don’t know what to think though. I know that the public opinion of polygamy isn’t good, and I’m inclined to agree with the stories that I’ve heard that generally state that polygamy isn’t usually consensual. Sure, sometimes it is, but the majority of the “I’ve escaped!” stories never label it as such. I just always feel like polyamory gets a bad rap from being associated with polygamy, and I feel bad for it sometimes. I do try to keep an open mind though, so if you have personal thoughts, I love broadening my horizons!

Resources If You’re Interested:

Polygamy: “The Chosen One” by Carol Lynch Williams (Fiction; about a young girl who tries to escape a polygamist sect), “Escape” by Carolyn Jessop (Non-Fiction; a memoir about her life in the polygamist group and trying to escape), WETv Program: “The Secret Lives of Women” presents episodes about both sides of the issue – positive and negative

Polyamory: “Opening Up” by Tristan Taormino (Non-Fiction; On EF; A guide to opening up your relationship to more than the two of you), “Open: Love, Sex, and Life in an Open Marriage” by Jenny Block (Non-Fiction; On EF; A woman’s memoir about her and her husband’s journey into having an open marriage).