A Thank-You Letter To The People On The Other Side Of My Lovers

One of the things hardly anybody talks about in poly is when your lover comes to you, crying, because their other partner just hurt them.
Shit gets surreal, because it’s time for you to play therapist.  And you’re not in a mood to play therapist, because the woman you love is upset because someone who’s Not You has just done something spectacularly shitty.  Your initial instinct is not “Well, let’s try to figure out what s/he really meant” but to drive over and punch him (or her) in the face for being such a meaniepants.
But no.  Part of a good polyamorous relationship is supporting your partner in their other relationships.  So you take a deep breath, and sit down, and talk it through with them.
And it sucks.
Because you know, relationship talks aren’t fun ever.  But at least when they’re about what you’re doing, it’s got some kind of easy benefit to it: when this is done, we’ll be happier together.  Whereas relationship talks with your lover about her lover’s foibles are exasperating, because the best reward at this point for success is that she keeps staying with a partner you’re not even sure she should be dating.
Fixing other relationships is also a bit of a trigger for most folks.  Because yeah, you know she loves you.  But there’s something about seeing her so upset about this other lover that makes you realize exactly how much this other person means to her… And there’s always that little tickle of, “If she cares that much, how can she have room left for me?”
The temptation is to go, “Just dump him.”  But no.  Instead, you wind up doing that one thing that’s harder than anything else – being fair.  Trying to separate what s/he meant from what s/he actually said.  Getting past this initial shock of pain and anger to try to figure out whether the sin is forgivable.  Sifting through past actions to try to anticipate what comes next to see whether the future will be acceptable.
For a guy who, at this moment, you don’t like all that much.
And all the while you’re hoping you don’t have to lead a horse to water, because if this relationship is truly broken, and you say, “You need to dump them” and God forbid it works out, sometimes they remember that.  You’ve seen other poly relationships where “You told me to dump him/her!” became a battleground later on as proof that you don’t really care.
No, you need to be supportive.  Remind them that dumping is an option.  Perhaps a strong one, if it’s that bad.  And swallow back that worry that if worst comes to worse and you have to say, “Look, I can’t deal with all the uproar this guy in your life causes any more, you gotta choose between him or me,” that she’s willing to choose you.
But getting her to dump them is not your main goal.  Your main goal is making her happy, and in that moment you envy all those poly couples who have a “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy where you never cross the streams, but that’s not you.  She shares all the relevant bits of her life with you, and you want her happy (which she is, when this other relationship is functioning properly), so you bite back the snarkier comments and talk her through things like a goddamned grownup.
You fix ALL the things.  And she goes off to talk with her other lover, and you lean back wondering whether you’ve done the right thing.
You have.  It’s an act of charity and love, expending your time and energy to help patch up her other relationships.  It’s an act of mature love that goes beyond the greediness of “This is mine” and into what I’d consider to be the true polyamory of not just tolerating your partner’s other lovers, but actively supporting and encouraging a fullness of life and love and happiness.
It ain’t easy, though.  I know; I’ve done it for Gini, and I’m sorry to say I’ve done that to other people when my own poly-intentions have slipped a bit, and Gini’s had to play psychiatrist for me more than once.
So this is my thank-you letter for everyone who pitches in when the other partners cause stress, the quiet support behind the curtain.  You’re why the good poly relationships work.  And you don’t get acknowledged nearly enough.

Why The Muppets Are Propaganda

“You know how crazy the right wing is?” my friends said.  “It’s gotten so bad, they think the Muppets are liberal propaganda!”
As evidence, they provided a video (from FOX news, of course) wherein a couple of talking heads discussed the sad, sad state of The Muppets targeting kids with crazy liberal messages.  “It’s amazing how far the left will go to manipulate your kids and give them the anti-corporate message,” they said, noting Tex Richman’s characterization as an evil businessman.  “I just wish the liberals could leave little kids alone.”
But here’s the thing: They’re absolutely right.
The Muppets are propaganda.
They’ve always been propaganda.
It’s just a propaganda you agree with.
The Muppets have always dropped pretty heavy-handed lessons about The Way You Should Live Life: Wealth or fame aren’t important – friends are.  Follow your dreams, kids, no matter what anyone tells you.  (Or, in the case of Fozzie and Gonzo, no matter what arguable talent you may have.)  Freaks are not only okay, but really cool.  Dignity is for the birds – no, seriously, just look at Sam The Eagle.
The Muppets are, to quote the old conservative paradigm, “subversive.”  Because there’s this idea that “propaganda” can’t possibly be entertaining – yet the truth is that the best propaganda is actually wonderfully fun to watch, yet has this underlying core of ideas that slip into your head.  And in between songs, the Muppets are constantly reinforcing their idea of The Way Life Should Be.
And I agree with them!  Holy God, I wish we lived in a more Muppet-like world, one where Gonzo and Rowlf and Professor Bunsen Honeydew – disparate personalities all – could all live side-by-side.  I wish our culture didn’t value wealth as an inherent sign of goodness.
Yet the Muppets are, amidst the explosions, constantly putting ideas into your head.  There are precisely three people in The Muppets who are rich – Gonzo, Miss Piggy, and Tex Richman, and two of them are explicitly made miserable and sour by their businesses, while Miss Piggy is presented at least partially as working to compensate for a lost love.  The Muppets’ poor business practices are, in fact, a point of pride in the movie (as Shortpacked! notably mocked here).  There is no Muppet who has corporate aspirations, aside from arguably Scooter.  They’re all artists and dreamers.
What’s that say about the average businessman?  It’s a quiet message, but it’s there: This suit is what you do not want to be.
None of that is bad.  But it does get bad when you get huffy and go, “Well, that’s not a message!  That’s just the way things should be!”  Which is exactly the same goddamned thing fundamentalist Christian parents say when they flood their kids with Veggie Tales and Davey and Goliath.  They’re not trying to give their kids a message, they’re just showing them how the world works.  Right?
The error here is thinking that your most sensational, inspirational, celebrational, Muppetational way of thinking is “just entertainment” because you agree with the messages it provides.  The Muppets is a liberal show, made by liberal people, and it’s got some damn good liberal messages… And yes, it’s aimed at kids, who are more likely to have some of those messages absorbed into their system.
Does that make the Muppets bad?  Hell no.  Do I think Jim Henson sat down in his Evil Subversion Lab and said, “Let us make a series that will sway kids towards COMMUNISM!” and then cackled evilly?  Hell no.  I think Jim was a guy who had a lot of personal feelings about life that emerged, organically, in his art – which is the way it often works.
But don’t deny that there’s a barb inside this furry fabric, one that hooks kids towards a world where you’re encouraged to look beyond people’s exteriors and to become a little more tolerant and a little less concerned with money.  That’s a wonderful message, as far as I’m concerned.  But it’s still something that is being taught, fairly overtly, and you ignore that truth at your peril.
Because you know what?  Liberal values are important to teach.  And to think of the liberal message as something inherent in the world is to forget that we are not necessarily born loving and kind and sharing – check any of the fights on the playground – and that really, this sort of teaching lessons is a part of responsible parenting.
I’m not saying we should brainwash our kids, but we should monitor what kinds of lessons we do teach them, and analyze what’s being presented in the media.  Because these sorts of behaviors are taught, quietly, through parents and teachers and the shows we allow them to watch, and it’s correct to sift through those voices for what they’re actually saying.  For many parents, what the Muppets want to teach is abhorrent – and while I disagree with them, to deny the Muppets carry a message is incorrect.
It sounds strange, but as a liberal, the Muppets are a voice for what we believe in.  To dismiss that is to forget that these lessons need to be taught.  And they do.  Which is why we need Kermit telling us what’s right in this damn world.

Am I Good In Bed?

So over on FetLife, the Facebook for Kinksters, there’s a thread asking you to rate how good you are in the sack:

A) I will rock your world. I’m so good you’ll be pissed off at all of your past lovers for all the time wasted that you could have been with me.
B) “The best you’ve ever had” doesn’t begin to describe me.
C) I’m so good you will want to put a ring on it.
D) I get no complaints
E) You wouldn’t kick me out of bed for eating crackers and leaving crumbs
F) Mercy fuck, and teach me some skills please.
G) Don’t bother with a mercy fuck. I’m beyond hope.

Now, I’d like to rank myself on this list, but the problem is that I don’t really think there’s a generic “good in bed.” There are certain baseline skills you can use to ensure that you’re not awful, skills which can be honed by practice, but everyone’s chemistry is so different it’s hardly worth comparing.
I mean, look, my wife and partners think I’m great in bed – but why wouldn’t they?  They’re dating me for the long term, which means they must have clicked with me sexually enough to go, “Well, I should get some more of that.”  And presumably, as I learn what they like, I get better with time.
Meanwhile, I’ve gone on dates with some women who it just didn’t work out with sexually… and as a partial result of that non-connection, they’re not currently with me.  That doesn’t mean they’re bad people, but why date someone who’s bad in bed for them – like me – when we could just be friends?
Plus, there’s the curve.  It’s hard to look someone in the eye after the intimacy of sex and go, “Whoo, that was spectacularly mediocre.”  I think I’ve gotten a sum total of one “You’re terrible” comment post-coitus in my life, even when I was achingly aware of how terrible this was for them.  Usually, you go for subtler things, like correcting them in mid-sex, or steering them towards different body parts, or even just declining a second go-around, rather than going, “Hey, can I post that sex on FailBlog?”
So you know, I’m awash in a sea of positive feedback, but it doesn’t mean that much to me because it’s self-selecting.  And I think some folks take that feedback to mean “Yeah, I am SPECTACULAR in bed!” instead of looking at the circumstances surrounding that feedback and compensating.
I know I’m good with certain people.  Does that mean I’ll be good with you?  Who the hell knows?  There’s that mysterious element of sexual chemistry, and sometimes that just doesn’t pan out.  Like I said, some careful attention to what your partner likes can smooth over a lot of gaps, but sometimes people are just hard to read.  Sometimes it’s just fumble after fumble no matter how you try.
You know when I know you’ll be good in bed with me?  When we kiss.  That kiss will tell me everything I need to know about how good we’ll be, because the kiss itself carries so much – how well we read each other, our sympathetic styles, the scent and taste of you.  One kiss, and I can tell you how good it’s going to be.. for me.
When do you know whether I’ll be good for you?  Hell if I know.  Maybe you know, but I sure as heck don’t. And I don’t think I can tell you from any generic chart.

Win A Bunch Of E-Books! (Probably)

I should note upon my return to blogging that my contest to win one of two WorldCon memberships only has about eight people who have suggested stories in 2011.  I know not all of you read science fiction short stories, but many of you do – and if you do, getting the likely e-packet of Hugo-nominated books is a damned good prize.  And you’ll be in a position to nominate and vote yourself.
So hey!  If you can, get over there before Monday and nominate some tales.

The True Number Does Not Exist

I’m too fat and puffy.  I don’t mind being a little pudge-pot as long as I can run up a flight
of stairs without getting winded, but that time has passed.
So it’s time to get in shape, and the problem is that all the metrics suck.
And let’s be honest: good metrics are a psychological tool.  It’s all very fine and well to say, “I’m gonna get healthy!” – but for those of us who actually dislike eating well and exercising and all the sweat that comes with it, having a single number we can look at every day and see its movement is critical.  We like to know that all of this pain we’re enduring is providing results, even if we can’t see them yet.
We need a number to go up or down.  That helps us keep going on the days all we’re going to get otherwise is pained muscles and a crabby stomach.
The standard goal is “Let’s lose some weight!”  But “losing weight” is a goal that’s all too susceptible to gaming.  There are all sorts of stupid ways to lose weight – throwing up all your food, starving yourself, rinsing out your colon – and they’re at odds with some of the healthy things you should be doing.  I, for example, routinely put on about five to ten pounds before I start losing again, because I gain muscle faster than I lose fat.
But man, is it depressing to see that number go up after a hard day on the treadmill.
For similar reasons, you don’t want “Clothing sizes” or anything else to be your metric.  It’s too easy to find a shortcut where you cut some size in a way that’s actually unhealthy.
On the other hand, the “pure health” goalpoints are unsatisfying for different reasons.  Part of what you want is to fit into your skinny jeans, so “I’ve run for twenty minutes straight” feels unsatisfying when you’re still Mr. Chunky-dunk.  I mean, I hate exercise in all its forms, so the fact that I can do it for longer doesn’t feel good to me.
So what should I use as “A single number that indicates that I am losing weight and gaining fitness in a healthy fashion”?  Is there a single number that one could chart?  If so, I don’t know it.
That’s the problem, I think, with America’s fat obsession.  Weight is easy to track, has highly visible results… and it’s easily fooled as a metric, so that focusing on it alone leads to other problems.  What we need is an easily-trackable measurement that tracks overall health with a dash of weight loss.  And I think if we could find one, we could start battling the idea that less weight == more health.