From: Sabine Atkins (sabine@posthuman.com)
Date: Tue Nov 14 2000 - 21:28:29 MST
Aaron Tyrrell wrote:
> We practice an open relationship, which gives us the freedom to creatively
> explore our sexuality and love with other people without divorce, jealousy,
> regret or any other negatives (except herpes which a good extropian would
> cure). I think that open relationships would save most marriages, or at
> least make them more fun. Most extropians don't get married due to aversion
> to monogamy, gayness or social withdrawal. Open relationships make marriage
> compatible with all but the latter.
I can respect this point of view, but I don't agree with it.
I was going through life with the opinion that I'll never find the right
person for marriage. But this was because I was looking in the wrong
places (night clubs, work, travel etc). When I found the Extropy
Institute mailinglist, I saw that this could be the right place for
finding the man I could marry. I don't mean that this was the only
reason I subscribed the mailinglist for, though :-) I just saw the
possibility. And it turned out that I had really found the right place:
After a long time of loneliness, I found the right person there.
I don't think that an open relationship makes a marriage more
progressive in an extropian kind of way. I admit, I could be biased here
but I never got the notion from open relationship marriages that they
really worked. I always got the impression that at least one person in
those relationships was having a "looking for an emergency exit" in
mind.
In my opinion, open relationships are the easy way of being married.
It's easy and distracting from the things an Extropian should (in my
opinion) really focus on: Being a catalyst for new ideas, finding
solutions for life-threatening problems, exploring the universe in a
scientific kind of way. Two Extropians who "join forces" have a much
greater impact here. And this impact is even more increased if the two
people who are involved really know each other, which often allows
balancing out one person's weaknesses with the other person's strengths.
Of course, it was much easier for me, a female Extropian, to find a man
I could marry as it is for extropian men.
--
Sabine Atkins -- http://www.posthuman.com/
Director, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence
-- http://singinst.org/
Member of Extropy Institute, DE:Trans, Cryonics Institute
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