hi all. its spring and a young mans fancy turns to thoughts of... polyamory. yes, as always, a flammable topic, one of the most flammable possible. the bible is filled with a lot of stories/anecdotes about infidelity, as well as greek mythology. most theological interpretations of the Garden of Eden story in the bible relate to sex. if there was ever an "archetype" that is burned into human (sub)consciousness, it is surely the issue of monogamy.

(what a great idea-- maybe in another post I might collect all the famous stories/legends of infidelity and the outcomes. that could easily make an entire book.)

I would argue that issues of monogamy actually activates the deep parts of our brains, the ancient "reptilian" center. it drives to the core of "who we are".

in fact just the mere choice of word "nonmonogamy" vs "infidelity" or "cheating" or "polyamory" almost instantly places/pinpoints one on the spectrum of beliefs and attitudes. in psychology this is called "framing" and it would seem the public is still only largely/weakly aware of the concept.

as usual Ive been wanting to write this post a long time & have been waiting for the right/ripe moment. I started my blog partly out of an experiment in talking openly about polyamory. (as openly as possible at the moment.) Id say its mostly a success with some "pushback" as they say diplomatically in business.

and you can see that I time my posts based on the zeitgeist. well I am not really a big adherent of astrology, but I do believe in zeitgeist and synchronicity, and maybe it all is similar in the end. (as yogi berra said, its "deja vu all over again".)

so, here I don my flame-retardant underwear....

yes, Ive been saving links & ideas on this post for a long time, but the trigger point was when I threw together a bunch of links a few weeks ago after some international front page headlines on Sarcozy and his wife Carla. yeah, you cant really get any bigger than that, except maybe Clinton, who was so 90s nonmonogamy.

now, polyamory is probably a lot like the issue of sex itself. there is intense fascination with the topic, and much verbiage, but what happens in real life is different than fantasy and speculation. I regularly read articles that say "sex is more promiscuous these days" or "sex is more conservative these days" and it seems almost on the same day. what is the reality?? its very difficult to say.

Ive made some of my positions clear in other posts but let me attempt to define a vocabulary here.

nonmonogamy -- a nonthreatening, nonjudgemental neutral term to indicate that there are other social practices other than monogamy. its sort of like talking about "dark matter" in astronomy. as if to say, we know its out there, but we dont know exactly what it is.

infidelity -- this is the standard/commonly used term for nonmonogamy esp in the US, but in my opinion it is a judgemental term largely related to the judeo-christian cultural bias. but, nonmonogamy challenges this and suggests that "fidelity" somewhat like "love" lies to some degree, subjectively and not objectively, in the eye of the beholder.

cheating -- this is much more visceral, cutting, basic term. to me, "cheating" can exist in a polyamorous arrangement. to me cheating is about betrayal of an agreement. of course the term is typically applied as a synonym for "infidelity".

polyamory -- this is a term that embraces the positive aspects of nonmonogamy, seeing it as (paradoxically) potentially beneficial for all parties involved. to me it meshes strongly with the concept of "sex positive", another warm & fuzzy term slowly gaining traction in the mass consciousness's vocabulary.

so, without further ado, my current favorite polyamorous couples list.

unfortunately, couples that confirm openly that they are polyamorous are extremely rare, and what tends to happen is that one "more open" partner leaks the idea in the media, and the other "less open" partner tends to squelch it. so clearly its a lot like "being gay, in the closet". I am not saying everyone here is definitely polyamorous, just listing all the highly suggestive rumors, and I think in at least some cases where there is smoke, there is fire =)

carla & nicolas sarkozy

the sarkozy's were married in a whirlwind romance that included EuroDisney, a rather "goofy" place by carla's discriminating standards. carla comes from a very regal family with an elite bloodline. there are rumors that sarkozy's prior wife agreed to delay a divorce so that sarkozy could get elected. how French, I guess. as usual, the rumor-flames are fanned like tittering in a highschool class by any mere hint that there is some concept of a nonmonogamous reality, in this case by carla.

carla was quoted as being "crazily bored by monogamy" in 2007.... carla is probably the world poster girl for nonmonogamy, having broken many really famous male hearts in her earlier days, including both eric clapton and mick jagger.... carla proves that "turnabout is fair play" and is the closest to a real life sex and the city Samantha of just about anyone... carla *outdoes* samantha....

Carla & Nicolas' 'Open' Marriage?
Is France’s first couple cheating? Rumors rampaging through Paris link both Sarkozys to other lovers. Eric Pape on the tweets that started the firestorm, Carla’s new stance on monogamy, and the French presidential tradition of infidelity.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-03-10/carla-amp-nicolas-open-marriage/?cid=hp:mainpromo6

About Those Rumors
From tweets to the world's front pages, the tales of infidelity about France's first couple are too good to resist—never mind the facts.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/234707

will and jada pinkett smith

in this case the rumors were started by the man of the pair, which would be as expected. again the wild press speculations were fanned by Will Smith saying in an interview,

“Our perspective is, you don’t avoid what’s natural and you’re going to be attracted to people.” he says.
“And if it came down to it, then one would say to the other: ‘Look, I need to have sex with somebody. Now, I’m not going to if you don’t approve of it’.”

http://www.nowmagazine.co.uk/celebrity-news/265795/will-smith-i-ll-tell-my-wife-if-i-need-to-have-sex-with-someone-else/1/

but then jada poured icy water on the rumors. jada was in one of the Matrix movies, so definitely a woman after my own heart. of course, only so to speak =)

She says, “I don’t have an open marriage and no, we’re not gay - and you don’t trust that? Well then there’s nothing that I really have to say to anybody about anything, because at the end of the day, I’m living my life, and I’m happy.”

http://www.theinsider.com/news/1929032__Marriage_sham_rumors_have_Jada_Smith_unfazed

my bottom line is that I think both of the Smiths are so concerned about their marketability and corporate-sponsored images that despite having very edgy personalities and possibly, also a relationship, they say only what is socially acceptable. in this way they are somewhat similar to Tiger Woods. and you know what? I cant blame them. the world is run by the crushing corporatocracy. as the japanese say, "the nail that sticks out gets hammered down".

the public is not really ready for open polyamory. its like tittering teenagers in a sex education class. why should anyone forfeit a multimilliondollar paycheck just to push the envelope of social acceptability a little? to reveal oneself to the world truly as one is, beyond the airbrushed image? they are right to be a little paranoid. in fact, I am looking over my shoulder right this instant as I write this as well =(

Erwin Schroedinger

few people are aware of this, but one of the great founders of quantum mechanical theory in the early 20th century was quite unequivocally polyamorous. schroedinger was sympathetic to einsteins doubts about QM interpretation in strong defiance of Bohr, and is the author of the famous "schroedinger cat" experiment. speaking of einstein, he also seemed to have a polyamorous side/tendency, but thats a whole other story.

as I understand it from a biography, and if I recall correctly, at one point he was living with 3 other women. he also fathered a child with a young woman lover while he was in his 50s. there is some more remarkable detail in a great new book about quantum mechanics, "the age of entanglement" by louisa gilder. needless to say, this flaming-poly aspect of his biography/resume/personality is rarely mentioned in physics books. and in fact his famous schroedinger equation was very probably devised while he was on vacation with a mistress.

I really like schroedinger for other reasons. he came up with his nobel-prize-winning equation when he was 38. an exception to the case or claim where most really significant work is done by physicists in their 20s.

hugh hefner

hefner is rarely ever referred to as "polyamorous" in the media, but thats definitely just a technicality. he's probably one of the most famous, openly polyamorous figures who's ever lived, and advanced the cause tremendously, giving it some aura of respectability, but certainly also tarnishing it with a 3-ring-circus-like atmosphere. a lot of his writing on the "sexual revolution" which he certainly co-instigated to a significant degree was/is basically a pro-polyamory argument.

"the girls next door" is one of the most popular shows on A&E channel, and presents an amazingly humorous, lite, family-friendly version of polyamory that even mothers can love. in fact he invites his gf's friends and mothers over to his mansion regularly. hefner improved his image tremendously with the show, and it seems he lost all his somewhat malevolent, threatening aspects with it after everyone could see exactly how it all looked/worked. actually reality tv shows also seem to have mainstreamed polyamory also with his being just one of many, but thats a whole other post.

but, hefner does embody the dark side also. his early secretary committed suicide under the pressure of a heavy-handed chicago prosecutor/prosecution. he's been through a *lot* of women. at one point he was addicted to amphetamines. he's getting divorced with his wife. he seems to have a very distant relationship with his own kids. theres no doubt lots of drug use goes on in his mansion parties, although he seems to refrain. he also suffered a stroke surely due to his driven, party-all-the-time lifestyle. I guess I could go on. but one look at the women he's been with, and ooh, it all sort of melts away.

hefner's case also suggests the male archetype that is necessary to pull all this off. be a "sugar daddy". hefner is the sort of ultimate sugar daddy epitome/archetype although they never use that terminology in the show.

brad pitt/angelina jolie

this is a very famous couple who are not married, so if they had other relationships, then so what? but the press behaves as if they are married. that was probably highly intensified after they had so many kids. and interestingly, there is some pretty strong evidence that women dont like Jolie because of her carousing ways and that it may be hurting her at the box office. in this case jolie is definitely the more wild one, and a virtually-confirmed bisexual.

there are constant rumors of a breakup, sourced with apparently very close insiders such as pitt's family, but it never materializes. it makes me think that maybe the two are such good actors, that they have begun to act out their own lives, which includes the script, "one big happy family". I do think from what Ive read that angelina has some possible mental health issues she should address. frankly, she sounds somewhat bipolar to me at times. also, she recently reconciled with her father after years of refusing to talk in an estranged relationship.

"I doubt that fidelity is absolutely essential for a relationship," she said. "It's worse to leave your partner and talk badly about him afterwards."

The 34-year-old mother of six added that she and domestic partner Brad Pitt never deny each other their freedom, even if that means being apart.

"Neither Brad nor I have ever claimed that living together means to be chained together," she said. "We make sure that we never restrict each other."

Hollywood's Latest Love: the Open Relationship
Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt, Lindsay Lohan, 'It's Complicated' Highlight Open Relationships
http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/angelina-jolie-brad-pitt-complicated-spotlight-open-relationships/story?id=9441030

eric schmidt and kate bohner

in researching this article I ran into the case of eric schmidt, CEO of google, and his mistress kate bohner who he apparently helped relocate to california to pursue her business. but the blogs started nattering about their relationship, calling her his "mistress", and that seemed to put the cold water on it. it would seem that many polyamorous relationships are kind of like Dracula and can flourish only outside the light of day. I am very plugged into tech trivia but even I hadnt heard this until I started doing google searches & ran across it by accident.

and by the way, there are some reports that stated that Gates had a somewhat secret, polyamorous side where he would visit one of his girlfriends even after he got married. gates as worlds richest man could be the worlds ultimate sugar daddy if he wanted to be.

another silicon valley executive Larry Ellison, ceo of Oracle, for years had many wild rumors circulating about his love life, including threesomes or whatever. he's had 3 wives, so he's certainly a "serial polyamorist" at least. giving him the benefit of the doubt that he actually really did "love" his wives =)

Google CEO's unemployed girlfriend
http://valleywag.gawker.com/5102078/google-ceos-unemployed-girlfriend

Google's CEO Demanded His Mistress Take Down Her Blog: Source
http://gawker.com/5477611/googles-ceo-demanded-his-mistress-take-down-her-blog-source

Google CEO Can't Keep His Ex-Mistress's Blog Down
http://gawker.com/5488563/google-ceo-cant-keep-his-ex+mistresss-blog-down

runner ups

pink /cory hart. pink is a really certifiably wild woman in a field that seems to encourage excess. I used to be attracted to her but Im feelin a little afraid of her nowadays. self destructive? femme fatale? yeah, theres madonna and britney and their own brand of excess, but have you seen pink in her in her video "fun house"? "I wanna burn it down!!" yeeks. scary chick. she sounds/seems even more crazed-angry than the previous record of alanis in her famous song "you oughtta know!!"

Pink is heading for divorce after regretting her decision to have an open marriage, it has been claimed.
http://www.askmen.com/celebs/entertainment-news/pink/pinks-open-marriage.html

tilda swinton

if I squint in a weird way and oscar-award winner tilda wears the right makeup, I think she looks attractive. but she has the distinction of being one of the very few famous public figures who has the true guts to just openly state unequivocally that she's in a polyamorous relationship-- and then the media pretty much moved on to whatever other shiny object was lying by the side of the road. she says its not for everyone but it works for her. end of story. halleluluja!! now thats *really* sexy.

Hollywoods exquisite alien
The famously otherworldly and enigmatic Oscar-winning Tilda Swinton talks to Amanda Fortini about her boozy new film, the joys of her open relationship, and why she would rather be a poet.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-04-30/hollywoods-exquisite-alien/

dolly parton

when I was a kid, dolly parton was considered one of the sexiest women alive. and the rumor is that her breasts were real. she's still very beautiful. in an open marriage to boot? who's idea was that? hers or her husbands? to me the idea that the woman would prefer the polyamorous approach is just totally nonsensical and foreign to every women Ive ever met or dated. but really, really hot.

Dolly Parton hints that she has an open marriage as she visits Rotherham
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-499332/Dolly-Parton-hints-open-marriage-visits-Rotherham.html#ixzz0hvtSQadT

Dolly Parton has admitted she's in an "open marriage" with her husband Carl Dean — and she's hinted that infidelity is the secret to the longevity of their relationship.
Dolly Parton's marriage secret
http://womansday.ninemsn.com.au/celebrity/celebrityheadlines/996142/dolly-partons-marriage-secret

monique

oscar-nominated comedienne monique got a lot of buzz stating in the NYT that she had an open marriage. after the uproar barbara walters followed up with an interview and she said that she had never had sex outside of marriage and that if her husband had sex outside of the marriage it "wasnt a dealbreaker". she also didnt shave her legs at the oscars. the headlines all over the web say "monique talks about her open marriage and hairy legs". oh well, you win some, you lose some. or is it the other way around?

Me, Campaign? Just Go to the Film
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/10/movies/awardsseason/10monique.html

the recent tiger woods/ sandra bullock train wrecks

some relationships are portrayed as "definitely not polyamorous/open marriages" by the press, but to these I say, we cannot really know for sure. a relationship is a kind of elusive abstraction at times. lets take a heisenbergian perspective on this for a moment.

who can really say what kind of relationship two people have? even our own relationships defy easy classifications, how can we say anything about anyone elses? maybe there is as much peril in determining a relationship status as there is in the (non)existence of God. or as facebook says, "its complicated".....

so on this subject, I will always be the 1st to admit theres an awful lot of ambiguity and gray areas.

as I mentioned with pitt and jolie, sometimes it seems like there is a media abstraction that has been manufactured by publicists. while pitt seems not so cunning, I can totally buy this about jolie creating something like that.

on the other hand, tiger woods and sandra bullock both seem so heavily marketed that you begin to wonder also if even their new media deconstructions are accurate. you could enter a kind of conspirational, schizophrenic break from reality where not even their new media-reported situations could be seen to fit the real reality. if the media was so wrong about their pre-scandal lives, how can we trust it to be accurate about their post-scandal lives either? leading at times to a mild media-induced paranoia as a result.....

I wrote about polyamory in 2009 with a long article with many references, saying 2009 seemed to be a "banner year", and then tiger woods went through his spectacular meltdown right at the end of the year. it was quite the spectacle I must admit, and I followed some of the details on the mistresses avidly for awhile. 

jim carrey went on the record [twitter, ha] as saying that tiger woods wife elin must have been an "enabler" and at least somewhat aware of his "extracurricular activities". of course, this could be either very unfair to her or possibly very perceptive. but, it does indicate a certain kind of polyamory where the couples dont really have an overt agreement, but do have some kind of covert agreement.

as I write this, tiger's wife has not announced a divorce, but it certainly seems like their marriage must be hanging by a thread. there was one rumor that she was extremely angry at the Nike ad and that she said it was the "final straw". a plausible scenario.

tigers life seems sort of lot like a stock market bubble that deflated. based on irrational exuberance. overvalued. subject to a "correction". esp in a marketing sphere/reality that has since collapsed.

now, the other obvious relationship to mention here is the Sandra Bullock/Jesse James train wreck, with her just announcing a few days ago that she's getting divorced. I made a lot of comments about this on various salon blogs. james relationships seemed to flourish as long as his wife didnt reach supernova-level notoriety that she did after she won the oscar. seems like hell hath no fury like a mistress scorned. or eclipsed by the wife.

and some pretty deadly irony. she said in one interview that she was glad her husband "had her back". yeah, with a knife!! and her last movie was "the blind side"!!

and then theres that amazing news that she had adopted a child earlier this year. surely that was done in close consultation with her husband. a kind of modern-day tragedy I would say. but, I heard rumors that she was involved with james before he broke up with his prior wife. things that make you go, "hmmm".

runner up: gwen stefani and gavin rossdale 

gwen stefani, a beautiful and exotic creature. her fashion taste is not alway to my preference, but she's undeniably sexy. from what I can tell, here's a woman who really paid her dues, touring for many years for not much money before she hit it big. 

side note-- I courted my sig.other downtown at the denver hard rock cafe and sang her "underneath it all". love that song. I like that part about "you've used up all your coupons and all you've got left is me". to me that line is about a womanizer, or "play lover" who had some fun but his reputation caught up with him and cant catch all the women he wants any more. and many other cool lyrics in that song

underneath it all by no doubt lyrics
http://www.lyrics007.com/No%20Doubt%20Lyrics/Underneath%20It%20All%20Lyrics.html

which brings up....

courtney love, wild crazy party girl (before the really wild and crazy ones showed up like paris hilton and hilary duff), exwife of curt cobain, went on howard stern's show & said she had a long affair with gavin rossdale, and that gwen stefani knew about it. it made headlines all over the place. but it wasnt clear from her quotation if she did it while rossdale was married or not.

the stefani's released a statement shortly after that which said all was well and their pre-marriage lives didnt have an affect on their marriage. oh, that really clears it up the ambiguity. could both rossdale and love be letting stefani hold on to a misconception? dunno about that. rossdale is quite the womanizer, obviously love was love-struck and he's got a love-child by another model. anyway, probably for awhile at least something resembling an open relationship. as for, open marriage? nobody's telling.

Honorable mention [compiled from online lists]

• Francois and Danielle Mitterand, and Anne Pingeot
• Anais Nin, and Henry and June Miller
• H.G. and Amy Wells
• Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, and Bianca Bienenfeld
• Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the Baroness de Warens, and Claude Anet
• erica jong
  author of "fear of flying"
  "scenes of an open marriage"
  http://www.ericajong.com/articles/ElleMagazine.pdf
• kate gosselyn?
  Kate's Secret Marriage Contract Allows Jon To Date
  The TLC star drew up a contract outlining the rules of their new relationship
  http://www.yourtango.com/200920757/kate-marriage-contract-allows-jon-to-date