5 ms·

For the simple fact you can bring an STD home to your partner, it's not going to work in practice. "Honey, remember that mistress I was banging last month?" "

For the simple fact you can bring an STD home to your partner, it's not going to work in practice. "Honey, remember that mistress I was banging last month?" "Yes... darling" "She has HIV, you probably have it now too..." "Ok darling...no problems"

toomuchtodo 3y ago
Protection with non primary partners and STD testing (I'm a fan of monthly, YMMV). Some people take further steps (PrEP) depending on your activities and risk appetite. HIV transmission rates in hetero sexual activities is very low (<1% per unprotected sexual exposure) [1]. Infidelity rates in "monogamous" partnerships are already substantial (~10-25% depending on study) [2], poly only changes the honesty and logistics. [1] https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1254031 https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1254031 [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infidelity#Incidence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infidelity#Incidence
- sarchertech 3y ago
  You’re comparing a monogamous relationship where there is a 10%-25% chance that one of you will have at least 1 extra partner, to a situation where at least one of you is regularly seeking out new partners. All else being equal the risk of contracting an STD is going to go way up. And there are other STDs to worry about than just HIV. Numerous drug resistant bacterial infections are on the rise. If the increased risk doesn’t bother you, that’s cool, but you can’t pretend it doesn’t exist.
  - toomuchtodo 3y ago
    I’m not pretending the risk doesn’t exist. The data demonstrates the risk is low when safe sex is practiced. Practice safe sex and get tested often if you have multiple partners regularly.
    - sarchertech 3y ago
      I’m not talking about pretending the risk doesn’t exist. I’m talking about pretending the increase in risk doesn’t exist with > poly only changes the honesty and logistics
      - toomuchtodo 3y ago
        Of all the monogamous people I know who have cheated on their partner, they are not practicing safe sex based on my inquires (but all have lucked out so far not getting pregnant or STD). I extrapolate out accordingly based on public STD health reporting and infidelity rates across the broader population. The data shows monogamy is aspirational, from a sexual perspective. Poly folks are more intentional about safe sex, at least in my experience. Of course, having no sex or being in a strictly monogamous relationship where you’re 100% positive no one is being unfaithful is the lowest risk activity. But with 40% of pregnancies unintended annually in the US, infidelity rates, STD stats reporting from state public health systems, ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. I am a scholar basing my thesis on the data. (hard to take the monkey out of the human, we are simply fancy mammals)
        sarchertech 3y ago
        > Of all the monogamous people I know who have cheated on their partner, they are not practicing safe sex based on my inquires > I extrapolate out accordingly > I am a scholar basing my thesis on the data. Those statements are entirely contradictory. Your methodology is not even remotely in the vicinity of scholarly. >The data shows monogamy is aspirational If 75-90% of monogamous relationships are successfully monogamous, I’d hardly call that aspirational. > But with 40% of pregnancies unintended annually Without know how many of those are monogamous couples, that statistic is useless. If you want to get pretty close to the actual risk difference, take a look at the difference in STD rates between single and married people. Even adjusting for age, race, and income, single people are astronomically more likely to contract STDs than married people.
  - klyrs 3y ago
    > where at least one of you is regularly seeking out new partners This isn't always the case. My sample is a bit biased as I rarely interact with cishet folks outside of work, but in my circle, quite a few nonmonogamous folks are quite stable with the 1-3 partners they have for years or decades at a time. As others point out, scheduling is a real limiter and unless you're just doing one-night-stands, it's easy to get "polysaturated" where, yeah, that boy looks cute but I don't have time for him. But what I can do, that I couldn't in a monogamous relationship, is come home and gush about the cute boy I flirted with.
    - whaleofatw2022 3y ago
      Poly is for some just a scheduling fetish.
- amanaplanacanal 3y ago
  In my experience poly folks are way more ready and able to talk about this than mono folks. Regular testing and using barriers seems to be the baseline, while the nominally mono folks don’t deal with this because why should they, they’re monogamous!
  - whaleofatw2022 3y ago
    Yup. 'Paperwork' is fine to talk about in the poly world, as is honest communication about how to work around it. I've even had partners in the past with HSV1 or HSV2 and have tested negative for years after, because we were safe and worked around outbreaks.
- ChatGTP 3y ago
  Do people really use protection that often in the heat of the moment? I'd say the primary use case would be sex work, outside of that I know a freakin ton of people who aren't slightly interested in missing out on the full experience.

toomuchtodo 3y ago

Protection with non primary partners and STD testing (I'm a fan of monthly, YMMV). Some people take further steps (PrEP) depending on your activities and risk appetite. HIV transmission rates in hetero sexual activities is very low (<1% per unprotected sexual exposure) [1]. Infidelity rates in "monogamous" partnerships are already substantial (~10-25% depending on study) [2], poly only changes the honesty and logistics. [1] https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1254031 https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1254031 [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infidelity#Incidence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infidelity#Incidence

sarchertech 3y ago
You’re comparing a monogamous relationship where there is a 10%-25% chance that one of you will have at least 1 extra partner, to a situation where at least one of you is regularly seeking out new partners. All else being equal the risk of contracting an STD is going to go way up. And there are other STDs to worry about than just HIV. Numerous drug resistant bacterial infections are on the rise. If the increased risk doesn’t bother you, that’s cool, but you can’t pretend it doesn’t exist.
- toomuchtodo 3y ago
  I’m not pretending the risk doesn’t exist. The data demonstrates the risk is low when safe sex is practiced. Practice safe sex and get tested often if you have multiple partners regularly.
  - sarchertech 3y ago
    I’m not talking about pretending the risk doesn’t exist. I’m talking about pretending the increase in risk doesn’t exist with > poly only changes the honesty and logistics
    - toomuchtodo 3y ago
      Of all the monogamous people I know who have cheated on their partner, they are not practicing safe sex based on my inquires (but all have lucked out so far not getting pregnant or STD). I extrapolate out accordingly based on public STD health reporting and infidelity rates across the broader population. The data shows monogamy is aspirational, from a sexual perspective. Poly folks are more intentional about safe sex, at least in my experience. Of course, having no sex or being in a strictly monogamous relationship where you’re 100% positive no one is being unfaithful is the lowest risk activity. But with 40% of pregnancies unintended annually in the US, infidelity rates, STD stats reporting from state public health systems, ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. I am a scholar basing my thesis on the data. (hard to take the monkey out of the human, we are simply fancy mammals)
      - sarchertech 3y ago
        > Of all the monogamous people I know who have cheated on their partner, they are not practicing safe sex based on my inquires > I extrapolate out accordingly > I am a scholar basing my thesis on the data. Those statements are entirely contradictory. Your methodology is not even remotely in the vicinity of scholarly. >The data shows monogamy is aspirational If 75-90% of monogamous relationships are successfully monogamous, I’d hardly call that aspirational. > But with 40% of pregnancies unintended annually Without know how many of those are monogamous couples, that statistic is useless. If you want to get pretty close to the actual risk difference, take a look at the difference in STD rates between single and married people. Even adjusting for age, race, and income, single people are astronomically more likely to contract STDs than married people.
- klyrs 3y ago
  > where at least one of you is regularly seeking out new partners This isn't always the case. My sample is a bit biased as I rarely interact with cishet folks outside of work, but in my circle, quite a few nonmonogamous folks are quite stable with the 1-3 partners they have for years or decades at a time. As others point out, scheduling is a real limiter and unless you're just doing one-night-stands, it's easy to get "polysaturated" where, yeah, that boy looks cute but I don't have time for him. But what I can do, that I couldn't in a monogamous relationship, is come home and gush about the cute boy I flirted with.
  - whaleofatw2022 3y ago
    Poly is for some just a scheduling fetish.
amanaplanacanal 3y ago
In my experience poly folks are way more ready and able to talk about this than mono folks. Regular testing and using barriers seems to be the baseline, while the nominally mono folks don’t deal with this because why should they, they’re monogamous!
- whaleofatw2022 3y ago
  Yup. 'Paperwork' is fine to talk about in the poly world, as is honest communication about how to work around it. I've even had partners in the past with HSV1 or HSV2 and have tested negative for years after, because we were safe and worked around outbreaks.
ChatGTP 3y ago
Do people really use protection that often in the heat of the moment? I'd say the primary use case would be sex work, outside of that I know a freakin ton of people who aren't slightly interested in missing out on the full experience.