Does Being Polyamorous Mean You Are Queer?
When you’re straight and new to polyamory, it’s important to learn the difference between queer practice and the queer community
Does being polyamorous mean that you are queer?
It’s a question people who self-identify as straight and are beginning their journey into polyamory may find themselves asking. Because while some of us were lucky enough to have a strong circle of friends from the LGBTQ+ community before beginning our journey, this isn’t true for everyone. You might have come from an almost exclusively heteronormative community where you have never had the opportunity to engage with the LGBTQ+ community on any real level. Or, if you are unlucky, you might have grown up in a particularly prejudiced or religious community that was actively anti-LGBTQ+, and that has left you needing to unlearn a lot of negative conditioning.
If this is you, then it’s natural, as you discover how closely the polyamorous and LGBTQ+ communities overlap, to ask if this means being polyamorous makes you queer.
So, is polyamory queer?
Yes.
Does being polyamorous make you queer? Or part of the LGBTQ+ community?
No.
All clear now? Probably not. So, let’s take a look at polyamory’s relationship with queerness and the LGBTQ+ community.
Full disclosure, I am a straight, cis male.
So, I hear you ask, who the hell am I to be talking about being queer?
Well, let me be clear. This article is not about me straight-splaining queerness. If you are looking to learn about that community and what it means to be a part of it, there are many, many wonderful queer creators online who can do that for you.
This article is written for straight polyamorous people who might not have any personal experience with the LGBTQ+ community and are unsure who to ask. I can remember when I first moved to London and found myself in a world that was diverse and varied in so many ways, including, over time, making friends who allowed me to learn more about the queer community. It was overwhelming, and I wasn’t sure what I could ask without offending someone or looking like an idiot.
My goal is to take my awkward experience and channel it through polyamory to give you a grounding on this question and why it’s both simple and complicated.
A (Very) Quick Exploration of the Word “Queer”
For those new to interacting with the queer community, one problem can be that the term “queer” can be a little vague.
The word “queer” has a long and complicated history. A quick YouTube search will give you many wonderful videos from queer creators to learn about it in more detail, but the short version would be that it is a word that once meant “odd” or “weird”, which in the 18th century became a derogatory word to describe what we would now call the LGBTQ+ community, but has in the last few decades been reclaimed by that community as an umbrella term that covers the spectrum of sexuality and gender outside the heteronormative.
But the thing about an umbrella term is that it can be hard to define exactly what it covers. The more we discover and explore the vast spectrum that is human sexuality and gender, the harder it becomes to use one word to define it all.
“The word queer can mean different things to different individuals, but the most common definition is someone who is not cishet (cisgender and heterosexual), or someone with varying experiences of orientation, gender, and/or sex. However, equating queer with non-cishet is considered ignorant of cishet individuals that are queer in an aspec way.” (new.lgbtqia.wiki)
“But because the word queer means something different to everyone, it's hard working out whether you should be angry at someone for using it in a way you don't expect them to.” - Dora Mortimer, "Can Straight People Be Queer?"
So, is polyamory queer?
Polyamory is Queer (You Are Not)
There is a lot of discussion around whether polyamory is queer. Some argue they were born that way, and so deserve to belong to the LGBTQ+ umbrella, but that is far from a universal belief and a discussion for another time.
But the quick and dirty answer is that, yes, polyamory is a queer practice, but practising it doesn’t give you the right to call yourself queer. And to better understand why this is, we need to discuss the concept of “queer heterosexuality.”
What is Queer Heterosexuality?
The concept of Queer Heterosexuality is a controversial one that came about through discussions in the radical feminist community in the late ’90s and early 2000s. In a nutshell, it refers to ways that straight people can actively work to refute the traditional heteronormative cultural and societal norms. This can range from things as simple as dressing in non-traditional clothing, to men actively engaging in “feminine” traits such as being open about their emotions, to purposefully raising children in families that intentionally shun the model of the “nuclear family.”
And, of course, polyamory.
This term queer heterosexuality is considered controversial or offensive by some in the queer community who see it as an appropriation of the word “queer” and/or queer culture as a whole. Others, however, argue it is a vital part of attacking and restructuring the patriarchal and cis-heteronormative world around us. If only the LGBTQ+ community can be queer, they argue, then this will only lead to a “queer” world and a “straight” world rather than creating a single, better world for everyone.
So Why Can’t I, a Straight Polyamorous Person, Call Myself Part of the Queer Community?
To answer this question, I'm going to turn to poet Jameson Fitzpatrick:
"I can't imagine the difficulty of being a straight, cis person who isn't fooled by the foundational fictions of hetero- and cisnormative power structures and doesn't wish to perpetuate them—except to say that I can't imagine that difficulty could possibly be greater than the various violences that many queer people still face today.” - Jameson Fitzpatrick, "A Queer Take on James Franco’s ‘Straight James / Gay James’"
Yes, there are many people who have suffered discrimination due to being polyamorous. But no matter what we might go through, straight people will simply never experience anything similar to the discrimination and violence that the LGBTQ+ community have and continue to do.
For someone who is homosexual and queer, a straight person identifying as queer can feel like choosing to appropriate the good bits, the cultural and political cache [sic], the clothes and the sound of gay culture, without the laugh riot of gay-bashing, teen shame, adult shame, shame-shame, and the internalized homophobia of lived gay experience.” - Dora Mortimer, "Can Straight People Be Queer?"
While straight, cis, heteronormative folks may find it unfamiliar and challenging trying embrace queer heterosexuality and push back at a patriarchal, cis-heteronormative world, that doesn’t mean we don’t still benefit from all the protections and privileges that world grants us.
The same goes for people who are members of other oppressed or discriminated against demographics. In the words of my friend Ali (repeated here with permission):
"I'm discriminated against for being a woman, and in another era, I'd have been oppressed for being Jewish, but it doesn't make me queer. Even if I feel I share a lot values with the queer community."
Being part of the queer community is simply something that straight folks cannot truly understand. So, while polyamory may be a queer practice, and the queer community might embrace us as friends and allies, we do not have the right to claim that community without invitation.
We Don’t Need to be Queer
If beginning your journey into polyamory has left you feeling like an outsider or ostracised from a community that doesn’t accept your new lifestyle, it’s natural that you’d want to find a group of people who understand, accept and embrace you.
But we don’t need to coopt one. We have our own! We have our own flag. We have our own celebrations. And they are all amazing!
The polyamorous community may be hard to find, especially outside of larger cities, but it’s out there. For me, it’s been the most rewarding part of my polyamory journey. I’ve made more friends through polyamory than I’ve made new partners.
And yes, there will be a large overlap between the polyamorous community you find and the LGBTQ+ community. But that doesn’t mean it’s the same thing. But you never know, it might lead to some new realisations which shake things up for you in a whole new way…
(P.S. You Might Actually Be Queer)
Of course, you might actually be queer.
If you have come from a very heteronormative world, especially if it was one that was actively hostile to the LGBTQ+ community, you might well have hidden your queerness from yourself. You wouldn’t be the first, believe me. Many people only recognise that part of themselves after they have been exposed to it. I know several people who felt safe enough to finally recognise their authentic queer selves because the overlap between the polyamorous and queer communities put them in a place where they finally felt safe enough to see the person they had always been.
Not that this happens to everyone. I’ve been polyamorous for over fifteen years, and I am still straight. It doesn’t change you. It simply gives you a safe space to explore who you are.
And so, if you still have that nagging feeling that the queer community is where you belong, you might have more to discover. Good luck. From my experience seeing people I know who have made that discovery, that community will be ready to embrace you, and I hope you have a wonderful time.
There is nothing wrong about coming from a sheltered, heteronormative world. I did. I grew up in a small country town, and it wasn’t until I moved to London and was exposed to a more diverse community that I learned where my place in that community was.
This meant that by the time I began my journey into polyamory, I was lucky enough to already have a large circle of friends from the LGBTQ+ community, and so I have always had a sense of that world and an understanding of why I am not a part of it. And while being polyamorous has brought me to a deeper understanding of what I now know is queer heterosexuality, I know I will never be part of the queer community.
That’s not to say they haven’t embraced me. I’ve been told I have “queer energy.” I’ve even been told to my face by a member of the LGBTQ+ community that being polyamorous means I have the right to call myself queer, and they would fight anyone who says otherwise. While it means a lot that someone would say that, I will never use that term for myself. (We’re like vampires, we can only come in if we’ve explicitly invited.)
Being welcomed by the queer community doesn’t make me queer.
Being polyamorous doesn’t make me queer.
And I don’t need to be, as long as I am an ally of those who are.
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