#MONOGAMY

[trannytheophage]

So my hot take with all the poly stuff is that very very few people are as purely monogamous as they claim they are. Compulsory monogamy and monogamy brain are real bitches to work through, but I think there's benefit in examining that.

Truly no judgement but have a think to yourself, chances are there are at least a few scenarios where you'd be willing to stretch away from the top left of that spectrum. Threesomes, fwb, deep emotional bonds with people your life would be incomplete without.

Just have a think yeah?

[miaisabelwinther]

[daybrightsims]

Alright, they've lived in my brain too long; Time to air out my thoughts about the polyamory in BG3

To give a little context: I am currently ethically non-monogamous with my primary partner of almost 7 years. I am not a monolith of thought when it comes to polyamory/ENM/open relationships. These are my own personal thoughts and feelings. I've also completed the game with Astarion and Halsin romanced. Spoilers ahead, read at your own risk.

TL;DR - I don't share the current opinion of whether or not Astarion is okay with Tav pursuing Halsin and the discourse around his agency and choices in the relationship are bumming me out and frustrating me.

I am getting increasingly frustrated about the conversation about Astarion being polyamorous/okay with Tav being with Halsin in the game, primarily because I think a lot of the "think pieces" are coming from 1) monogamous people who have only ever been monogamous, 2) monogamous people who have been burned/cheated on/forced into polyamory by a partner (I feel for ya'll, that wasn't okay), 3) people who are very VERY protective of Astarion, and 4) people who are blatantly uncomfortable with polyamory. My goal is not to invalidate anyone's experiences, but to share an alternate perspective.

I do think that Astarion is not only okay, but happy with Tav dating Halsin. I glean this from how he responds to being poly with ANY OTHER companion. If you ask him to share with literally anyone else, he will say no and give his reason.

Gale: He doesn’t want to be in a love triangle (which with Gale, it would be).

Lae’zel: He’s uncomfortable and Lae’zel would kill him (also true).

Wyll: He knows Wyll is old fashioned and monogamous.

Karlach: He knows Karlach’s feelings for you are strong and he doesn’t want to stand in the way of that (he even says he’d be cool with an arrangement but knows Karlach will need all of your affection based on what she’s been through).

Shadowheart: He would be cool IF Shadowheart had more experience and ya’ll were together longer. But he knows Shadowheart is fragile in her current state.

Minthara: He REALLY doesn’t like this idea and will dump you immediately.

I did also see that ***SPOILER*** they updated or are updating some of the spawn Astarion language to have issues with your affair with Mizora should you pursue it, and it requires a persuasion/deception role to keep you two together.

Up to this point in your relationship with Astarion, he has become more comfortable voicing his opinions and concerns with you. He is learning to value his autonomy and his non-physical relationships. He will tell you when he doesn’t want to do something. In fact, he’ll break up with you over pushing his boundaries. He is fine with you pursuing the Drow twins and fine with you sleeping with Haarlep, even comforts you when Haarlep uses your form. So when he says he is okay with you pursuing Halsin, he means it. Yes, he voices his insecurity with you that you may be pursuing Halsin because you and he haven’t had sex in a while. But he acknowledges that Halsin has experience in this arrangement and doesn’t pose a threat to your relationship. Plus, if you kiss Halsin in front of him, he’ll say “don’t mind me, I’m just enjoying the show.”

To me, the idea that this is the ONE thing that Astarion doesn't have agency over in an arc of showing he can speak up for himself is you sleeping with Halsin is an idea that takes more agency from Astarion. He is a grown man. A 240 YEAR OLD man. That trauma he's endured does not mean he needs to be babied or coddled because he can't make his own choices. I think that's an unfair assumption to put on him that Halsin and Tav being together is the ONLY thing he can't enforce his boundaries on.

If he didn't want you to be with Halsin, he would say no like every other monogamous character in the game.

If you want a good example of someone saying yes just because they want to keep you, look at Karlach. You can tell she is HEARTBROKEN when you ask her, but she says “I don’t want to lose you”. That is not an enthusiastic participant in a polyamorous relationship. Astarion says “yeah, go for it! Just give me some reassurance”. Polyamory is not immune to insecurity. I've asked for reassurance in my own relationships and so has my primary partner. That’s not unenthusiastic. That’s realistic as shit. If you ask him about the relationship after you finish his questline, he doesn’t need reassurance because you’re having sex again. That’s also super realistic.

Am I sensitive to this as someone who practices ENM? Almost certainly. It's hard to see a lifestyle I live be villainized and claimed to be "forced" onto characters. I was actually really excited that I could pursue both Astarion and Halsin, and that Halsin places so much importance on consent and not misleading your partner. And it sucks SOO much to see one of my favorite characters be reduced to "oh, he's only doing it because he's afraid to lose Tav." It makes me almost feel bad for liking the interactions between them and enjoying to option. Do I think people mean to make me or other poly people feel bad? No.

But it does.

Headcanons are headcanons. I get it. People are absolutely allowed to interpret the poly aspect of BG3 how they want to. People are allowed to feel uncomfy with how it's portrayed and not pursue it. But it still bums a queer ENM Astarion and Halsin lover out.

Now excuse me whilst I live out my Astarion x Halsin x Tav polycule fantasies in the form of fanfiction.

[feeldco]

[gayvampyr]

you can be polyam and cheat and those two things are neither mutually exclusive nor prerequisites of the other. cheating isn’t defined as breaking the rules of monogamy, but rather breaking the trust of your partner(s) and relationship. polyamory involves open communication. very annoying to see people conflate the two

[gigglingauspice]

was having a conversation with a friend about what a “normal” amount of partners to have is. This is about any kind of committed partner— not just romantic or queer platonic, but sexual, alterous, wavership, and “undefined but my partner regardless.”

If you have more than nine partners, good god do I respect your time management.

[gaaaaaaaayypr]

Facts lol

[bleedingichorhearts]

𝕾𝖊𝖙 𝖁𝖆𝖑𝖎𝖉𝖎𝖙𝖞

𝕬𝖚𝖙𝖍𝖔𝖗: What if I combined them all into one, for maximum efficiency? I blame this one, @kit-williams and this one, @barn-anon for this.

𝕿𝖆𝖌𝖌𝖊𝖉: @egrets-not-regrets, @bispecsual, @gallifreyianrosearkytiorsusan, @sleepyfan-blog.

TW // SMUT/NSFW, NonCon and Dubcon, Baby Trapping, Drug, Yandere Themes, Death, Body Horror, Cannibalism.

|°ᴛᴀɢ ʟɪꜱᴛ ᴀᴘᴘʟɪᴄᴀᴛɪᴏɴ°| |°ɪᴄʜᴏʀ’ꜱ ᴀᴏ3°| |°𝕄𝕒𝕤𝕥𝕖𝕣𝕃𝕚𝕤𝕥°| • {Chapter II}

Blasius slowly turns his head to the side from his crouched position. His mouth opening for a better scent thread as he sniffs the air heavily and chuffs.

So soon? He shakes his head, rising from his crouched position. Casting a shadow over the broken body below him. Such an eager little mate.

Glancing back down at the mauled body. Blasius brings forth an main appendage between his armor plates and licks the warm crimson staining his gauntlet. Savoring how rotten it tasted. Something he had almost forgotten about. How atrocious some could be, hopeless and decaying.

Something his little mate was not. Unlike this waste of flesh below him, unable to bring his little mate what she wanted. What she craved for. He can see it in her eyes, in her scent. How could this one not?

He was ignorant of course, too witless to acknowledge her effort. Too endorsed in his time running away from the nest and coming back smelling like another. His little mate was distressed when she figured out what he was doing. Yet, she still believed that he had some “good” left in him. Putting more of her dedication to prove that she was the worthy mate, when it was the other way around.

This false male was the unworthy one of breathing in the same air as his little mate. Undeserving of her attention, her love, her gifts and lingering touches of her commission of fidelity. It drove him crazy that she wasn’t paying attention to him as she poured her devotion into this male who uses her as a side trophy.

He wanted to give his little mate all that he had to offer. He wanted to return that love and attention she put on that failure of a human. He wanted to gift her all the things she found an interest in, but never acted upon it. Craving for that male to gift it to her, to acknowledge her. He wanted to provide what the male would not, could not.

It was no secret this man was a disappointment to any female that he encounters. He can hear the difference between the real and the fake moan’s his little mate does when they are coupled together or how his little mate has to take care of herself afterwards. Having yet to climax herself, but the male was also a disappointment by being infertile. Not that his little mate knows of that.

It is one of the reasons she has gotten a toy however, to sedate her ever growing desires. To finally have something to finish her off and at first, he wanted to rip the toy to shreds. Watch it decay beneath his fingertips, but he stops mid-way of finding the silicone c*ck in her closet. Realizing this singular tool has had a lot more to it than just for making his little mate climax on it.

So, he puts it back in its place where he found it. Leaving it to his little mates next use.

Blasius hums deeply as the appendix of the open body below him bursts, a quiet wheeze coming out of the mouth of the body as it splatters against his greaves. A mix of puss and blood inching down his armor to his sabatons. Another appendage coming out between his plating near his knee to clean up the mess the weak, organic body had made. 

He uses another main appendage to reach inside the cut opening in the males body, pushing underneath his sternum and ribs, providing wet sounds and a squelch each time the appendage slips underneath another rib. Reaching the top of the body’s rib cage, he digs the appendage downwards between the lungs and wraps around the windpipe and tugs. A sickening squelch-like pop sounding out. 

Pulling his appendage back to him. He wraps the rest of his appendage around the organ and lifts it up to his face, observing it. Sniffing it before he rumbles lowly in refusal. Whipping the rotten lung away with his appendage. Hearing it splat somewhere else.

That was not something he would preferably eat. Healthy organs are the better route of eating, they taste better. Saccharine even. They envelop the tongue like thick wine. Not that he found eating humans was a satisfactory, just a tasteful treat. He found far better sweets in this world to sedate his hunger than he would in his own world, but that rotted lung wouldn't give him the treat he was looking for.

Perhaps, his liver would work better? They were always far cleaner than the rest of the body’s he’s taken a snack on before. Maybe a little bitter with their alcohol consumption, but that doesn't deter him, he’s had worse before. If anything, that marinates more flavor into the organ.

Sliding his appendage between the body’s ribs and organs again. Wet sounds followed while he wraps his appendage around the liver twice. Pushing the other organs aside and over the opening of his torso and stomach. Feeling how the male's organs still pulsed with life. His dull eyes still staring up at his figure. A mule this one was.

With a particularly harsh tug, the body’s liver popped out with a sickening crack of his rips flying apart. His sternum breaking in half as bone shards littered inside and outside of the blood spewing body. The dirt drinking up the body’s lifeline like desert sands would do to water.

Blasius purrs quietly, approving of this body’s liver as he sniffs it. His mouth opening to wrap his tongue around the organ and lay it in his mouth before squeezing it with his tongue. Feeling it pop in his mouth and splatter before he chews, savoring the taste and the memory’s it came with it.

At least, the memories with his little mate in them. Ranging from how sweet his little mate was and how remarkable she was. Offering her food, her home to this male. Never blowing up on him when she clearly wanted to. Some of the many things that he hates the male for, but that was not a matter anymore.

Nurgle, and the intercourses with her. He knows he could have done way better than this male, but to envision her nude and submissive before him? His appendages began to salivate, including his mouth.

The things he would love to do to her.

Her scent wafts over him as he swallows hard. Shivering as his appendages become eager, desiring, and aching. Pushing up against his armor almost painfully. Telling him he wasn’t actually envisioning her scent of her arousal at all. This was real.

He takes a step away from the mutated body, not looking back as his appendages inside of him twitch in anticipation. Those wild packs of wolves that roam around here should eat the rest of the body up like nothing by tomorrow's dusk. Leaving absolutely no trace of him to be found.

Blasius uses his appendages to clean the rest of his armor off to temporarily relieve their eagerness to come out while he slowly follows his little mates arousal back to her nest. He knows has some time to get there before she climaxes and he must be presentable to his little mate after all. He knows how… unnerving he could look.

He hears her soft moans before he even enters into the nest. His senses heightened to seek her out through her strong arousal that begged him to fill his little mate as he inhales deeply, leaning down through the front door.

Nurgle, he is here little mate. He is here to provide. Let him provide for you.

He hears her cry out in ecstasy and that makes him move a bit faster through the house. Holding his breath as he moves swiftly between furniture. Quickly, opening the door and lean down through it to his little mates nesting spot.

The first thing he sees is her riding the false c*ck up and down into her core at a fast pace. Her skin glistening with sweat at all the effort to make herself climax. Her heated breaths staining her own skin as she moans out again, closing her eyes and throwing her head back.

He rumbles quietly and takes side steps into the grounds of his little mates nest. Watching as she chased that high. Kneeling down to the ground in front of her bed. Observing how her folds fluttered around the c*ck. Her muscles constricting around it as she cried out. Her juices leaking down the c*ck.

Yet, she doesn’t turn on the toy? Isn’t that what it was for? To fill her up her womb? Isn’t that what she wanted?

So, he turns on the toy instead, a gasp escaping his little mate as the toy pumps his c*m into her. Selection by selection, until there was nothing left in the toy.

Unfortunate, no worries. He has more to provide.

She makes a move to get up from the false c*ck, but he growls. His appendages coming out, spooking his little mate as he takes her by the hip and pushes her back down on the fake c*ck. Watching as she squirms on it, his c*m leaking around the edges from her hole and down the false c*ck.

He didn’t get drug from that questionable Ultramarine for no reason.

She whines at him, and as much as he would love to hear her cry out to him. He sticks an enthusiastic appendage down her throat. Silencing her cry’s as he shoves moves her shifting hips back down onto the false c*ck again.

Shhh, little mate. Let me take care of you. Your… partner won’t be around anytime soon to please your needs like I will. To caress your skin like I will. To protect you like I will. To provide to you like I will.

To have yours and mine procreation.

[miaisabelwinther]

[one-time-i-dreamt]

An extended family member of mine was crushing on and proceeded to be in an active monogamous relationship with Vaas Montenegro from Far Cry 3. She was very happy in it and I was supportive.

[nalyra-dreaming]

Are Louis and Lestat in an exclusive romantic relationship on the books? Show!stat likes 'variety' and the way I took it is as an open relationship, like they go out and have their fun, but the romantic attachment is exclusive and just the two of them, instead of a polyamorous relationship that has love among multiple people... Anyway, I'm asking because I'm trying to understand show!stat better lol. I don't think the show has been clear about it, but maybe they want us to be confused? That's their goal? Because I believe Lestat only goes to Antoinette after he gets the impression Louis is slipping away. And that he takes Louis' shame in vampirism as shame in being with him too? So I get him trying to find a distraction or whatever. But I struggle with understanding this, not because he's 'with' two partners, because I believe all relationship configurations are valid and well, if they live forever, maybe they need a more diverse sex life than us and sex doesn't equal love lol. But even in his 'non-exclusivity', Lestat is still... Exclusive? Like, he just seems to go to Antoinette. But he also doesn't seem to really care about her either, like, I know we only got Louis' POV and not his, but he let her lose a finger and kicked her out of her own home to have sex with Louis? If he was sleeping around it would've made more sense to me, like, yes, he needs diverse partners, scenarios, kinks etc to entertain his sex life. But this feels like having a side piece only because Louis is distant, but being ready to drop her as soon he feels like there isn't an obstacle anymore. Like, if Louis embraces vampirism, finds some peace with his existential crisis an grief and gets to a good, comfortable place in his life, maybe they can be fully together now. And if/when that happens, I'm not sure if Lestat would need more? Anyway, this makes me so confused, because he has this aura of an extroverted, social, sexy, life of the party etc kind of guy that you'd stereotype and associate with being eternally single, sleeping around etc. But he also took so long to try again after what happened between him and Nicky, then he was fell in love with Louis and stayed in NOLA because of him, they familial and domestic life with Claudia for years and were genuinely happy before everything... There are parts of him that feel pretty traditional and simple too. So I'm like that Oprah "what's the truth?' meme lol. Anyway, thank you and sorry this got so long.

:)) Lestat is… monogamous at heart. I think Sam said that at one point. He loves deeply, and fully, and fatally.

He loves Louis.

Their relationship is not the easiest. We have only seen an edited, distorted picture of it for now, we also know now that Louis (at least thinks) he made it awful for Lestat because he wanted to make Lestat suffer (as he was suffering).

Vampires have (what I call) feeding flings. What Louis does in SF. Fuck and kill. What Lestat obviously does, too, bc Louis expects Antoinette to burn when he comes back.

The problem is that she doesn’t. Because she’s more than a fling. She is a symptom of their problems. In the book Antoine later tells us (yes, in the book Antoine survives) that Lestat came to him to talk about what moved him, which he felt he couldn’t at home, because he felt he would be ridiculed. Lestat in the show alludes to that when he rants about Claudia in Antoinette‘s bed (in the hotel). Antoinette was a retreat.

As such she is both less and more than an affair, something that is made clear by her getting turned later. We are led to believe he only turned her out of convenience, but Lestat always only turns people from or for love.

The edited tale tries to play up the cheating and jealousy aspect, but that is not (all) there is to it. Louis‘ and Lestat‘s main problem came imho, when Louis stopped feeding properly and stopped biting Lestat - the vicious circle that came with the lack of intimacy and bridging of the maker/fledgling barrier.

I talked about that here:

So the truth… the truth is it’s not as simple as we are led to believe. In their good times Louis had no problems inviting prey into his brothel to (fuck and) kill. Or the soldiers in s1. Louis did not even comment on them being in their bedroom :).

I think I would put it: they’re as monogamous as vampires can be?^^

And we‘ll probably see more hints wrt s1 in s3 :)

[submissivefeminist]

If your partner is insisting that this is how polyamory is done, I'm gonna insist you find a better partner. The One Penis Policy is misogynistic, transphobic, and fetishizing in all the worst ways. ⛔🍆

[thatbadadvice]

Help! I Am Entitled To Do A Bone!

The Ethicist, New York Times, 14 October 2023:

My wife became pregnant soon after we met, when our relationship was “fluid” and non-monogamous. We agreed to raise the child together and, at my urging, to have an open relationship. However, our relationship since has been monogamous. My wife was injured during the birth of our second child and now finds sex painful and avoids it. (We had a terrific sex life before the injury.) When I broached the topic of having other partners and reminded her of our agreement to have an open relationship, she became irritated and said that having kids changed things. Subsequent discussions resulted in a stalemate. I very much enjoy my wife’s company and love her and our two kids. I have no intention of separating from my family. Nonetheless, I harbor resentments that my wife reneged on her commitment to me, and this, together with the lack of sex, is creating a wedge between us. Would it be ethical to take a mistress, given her earlier promise, and if so, can I do this discreetly so as to avoid tension and perhaps divorce? Or should I tell her I am planning to pursue this course of action? Or does the inherent risk of infidelity mean I should accept near-celibacy indefinitely? — Name Withheld

Dear Name Withheld,

The restraint with which you signed yourself "name withheld" rather than the more accurate "big fun deep-dicking from which I have been blocked by my hateful bitch wife" is admirable in the extreme. You are a credit to your gender, sir.

But on to the matter at hand, specifically, your hand, to which you have been relegated in lieu of the aforementioned big fun deep-dicking. Your wife waited to drop the vicious bomb of possession upon you until she had roped you, an unwitting fancy-free man of leisure (entitled to all the benefits thereof indefinitely and in perpetuity), into marriage and fatherhood of not one but two children — children you could have in no way have known would result from your consistently and entirely monogamous coupling over many years, and moreover, could never have expected would complicate the terms of the thing y'all talked about one time about boning other randos?? And now this self-interested harpy dares to refuse to you the clear promise of sex with absolutely anyone other than her at any time ever, which she made and guaranteed in surety after you'd been fucking for a minute? A promise you had in theory enjoyed by writ and at length in your mind based on a conversation y'all had years ago before the entire terms and nature of your relationship changed in deep and meaningful ways to literally the one other person involved in said relationship, to wit, the worst person?

A bait-and-switch of the kind your cruel and fickle wife has pulled on you cannot, should not, be tolerated. Are you — is any man, really — obligated to just not fuck his wife in addition to whoever else he wants to fuck ever? Just because she "finds sex painful"? Sex isn't painful for you, and doesn't that matter just a little bit more? Isn't it her job to have kind of a bad time so that you can have a good time? Isn't that what it is to be a woman and a mother? And she just casually eschews her duty to put up with whatever the fuck you propose? Because WHY? Because "having kids changes things"? I ask you: changes things for who? For the person who carried children in her body and experienced deep and lasting personal and physical injury? Or for you, the person who matters most?

It seems your wife has an unfortunately topsy-turvy view of partnership, one in which she believes two individuals are allowed to dictate the terms of a relationship that may change over time due to a variety of mitigating factors that one or both of you may or may not have control over. Would that she realized that her sexual needs are not merely incidental to yours, but actively irrelevant. If only she would simply give you that one, small thing (in addition to two children).

But alas, she seems sadly fixated on her own needs to the exclusion of the fact that you would like to do a bone upon her or frankly anyone, you are not picky, as long as she doesn't leave you or take your children away or do anything really to upset the world as you would like it to be, which is a classically controlling woman-type thing that women do because they are so self-involved.

Obviously you're really grappling with the profound ethical implications of lying to your wife about taking a mistress, and you're trying to find literally any other solution to just finding a girlfriend and fucking the shit out of her and hoping your wife doesn't find out. That's clearly the very last thing you want. But since you've shown such magnanimous restraint in not doing so, you probably should just do it and see what happens, it'll probably all be totally fine! And if it isn't, eh, idk? Were you supposed to just survive on beejays and handies forever? You tried your very best not to! And that's what will matter most to your children in the end.

[jeunefillerangee]

My biggest beef with polyamory is when people try to pass it as being anti-patriarchal. The argument is that monogamy was only expected from women until very recently, which of course is true. But why the solution for it should be giving women the same sexual privileges men had and still have? When we talk about men not respecting monogamy, especially in previous generations, we are not talking about sexual freedom. We are talking mainly about abuse and prostitution. Most women don't find it difficult to be monogamous, their problem is being partnered with men who don't love or respect them enough to be faithful. The anti-patriarchal solution is make men respect monogamy the same way women do.

[gigglingauspice]

Been seeing some interesting answers on this poll... so, once again-- This is about any kind of committed partner— not just romantic or queer platonic, but sexual, alterous, wavership, and “undefined but my partner regardless." Any kind of serious, long term partner.

if you want nine or more partners-- good lord. good luck, and godspeed. if you want no partners, i wish you a very pleasant 'everyone leaves you alone about it'