When Polyamory Looks Like Swinging but Isn't

The difference between swinging and polyamory is one of the first questions polyfolk are asked by people who are unfamiliar with polyamory. Recently a subscriber to a yahoogroup we are both on wrote me privately. He and his wife are still working on defining polyamory for themselves and their life. He wrote to me in an attempt to clear up confusion about why another subscriber's frequent reports of having sex with a potential partner the first time they meet qualifies as polyamory. To him and his wife it looks like their idea of swinging.

I can understand why he is confused. There are a fair number of poly people who begin their poly relationships with sexual interactions. These tend to be people who are very sex positive and have no problem with being sexual for fun with someone new. I've even heard some say that they like to know up front whether there is sexual compatibility before taking the relationship further.

OTOH, some of us (myself included) prefer to get to know potential partners a bit before we become sexual with them. I'm very sensitive to people's energy and have learned that I don't feel good about being sexually intimate with someone only to find out later that there is something about their character or personality that turns me off. At this point in my life I favor sexual experiences that are heart-centered. It's possible for that to happen on a first date, but for me usually not.

I imagine the sex-first fellow would say that he does get to know his potential partners, who he usually travels to see, by e-mail and phone before they are sexual. Regardless, I've come to recognize and accept that some prefer to handle the sexual aspects sooner and some later. Those who prefer sooner differ from swingers in that they are specifically interested in developing a long-term, romantic, bonded relationship with their new partners, where swinging is a couple-centric activity that rarely leaves room for an ongoing emotionally intimate relationship. Most (but not all) swingers are sexually non-monogamous and emotionally monogamous. They tend to focus on the sex as a source of recreation and pleasure, and for them that's where it all stops, except perhaps that they may develop friendships and even platonic familial relationships with their swing partners.

Lest I offend any swingers with this description, I'm on record as someone who is very supportive of swinging as a valid choice. Occasionally swingers will also embrace polyamory, and vice versa. It's all good.