246 - Non-Monogamy Misperceptions (with Cate from Swinging Down Under)

Think you know everything about non-traditional relationships? Think again! This week we are tackling some of the most common misconceptions and assumptions around polyamory and swinging with special guest Cate from the podcast “Swinging Downunder.” We're a proud member of the Pleasure Podcast network.

Transcript

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Jase: On this episode of the most the multiamory podcast, we're talking about misconceptions and assumptions. However, instead of looking at how monogamous people tend to perceive polyamory, we're going to look at the way that non-monogamous people can misperceive each other. To help us with that we're speaking with Cate, who is one of the hosts of the non-monogamous podcast Swinging Downunder. Cate and her partner Darrell have been running the podcast for almost five years. We're like almost the same age.

Sharing their personal stories mixed in with interviews from other non-monogamous sex-positive or curious couples, educators and more. They have a passion for sharing the good, the bad, and the embarrassing in order to help others on their non-monogamous journeys. Cate, thanks so much for being here.

Cate: Good day, guys. Thank you for having me, really appreciate it.

Emily: Say it's called Downunder because of that because she is from Australia.

Dedeker: Yes. The listeners are not going to understand the mountain of obstacles that we had to overcome to make this episode happen today.

Jase:

Dedeker: Just know that there has been blood, sweat, and tears already and so many audio issues and so many technical issues and so many internet issues. We've had to jury-rig so many weird things, but we're here. You can hear in fear, basically to do a little call back to Drunk Bible Study. We're here, we made it here. We're recording today, if we have any audio issues or any weirdness, give us some grace, because it's been a long day already for all of us just getting here.

Jase: It's been a long day for you and it's only like 10:00 am right now.

Dedeker: I know, it's only like two hours into the day, technically.

Dedeker: I'm actually in the studio with Cate in person, which is always such a treat whenever we have a guest to get to record in person. We're both in Singapore right now. I actually want to start there with you, Cate, that you started the podcast in Australia, right?

Cate: Yes, that's correct. We started in Australia.

Dedeker: Then you move to Singapore just a few years ago and continuing the podcast continuing to stay active in the lifestyle. I just want to hear a little bit more of your experience of what that was like and what challenges you faced moving from a country to another country that's significantly more conservative when it comes to any kind of non-normative sex.

Cate: It was definitely a challenge. It still is a challenge, it remains a challenge. I think one of the highlights for us is-- There's just two, the first one is restarting a tribe. I think we found communities of like-minded people because it's where we feel safe. It's where we feel invigorated, we like to meet people that are on the similar vein to us. Restarting a tribe anywhere in the world or anywhere when you've moved cities is daunting, it's tough. You've got to start again from square one. Then to your point, you add in, stir-- We're baking a cake here. The batter is the tribe and then we're stirring in some chocolate chip cookies.

Also the fact that Singapore and Asia in a whole can be quite conservative. People have some misunderstandings of what the lifestyle or just non-monogamy, in general, is about. We're coming across people that are just starting to explore this, but maybe really don't understand a lot about it. It's double-fold difficult for us. It's always fun to try to create a community and so we're trying to stay positive, I guess, here in Asia, but it's tough.

Dedeker: Well, I want to talk about that a little bit more too, because we get messages and e-mails and stuff from listeners often in very rural areas where it's like, "We're polyamorous or we're swingers or we're non-monogamous in some form, but we're just in the middle of nowhere. How do we find people today? How do we find a community?" Often we have encouraged people that if it's safe for you be the one to start that meetup group or that discussion group or something like that. I wondered if you could speak to that at all because it seems like that was what you had to do when you came to Singapore.

Cate: Yes, that is correct. We tell people the same thing. If you can't find something out there that you're looking for or maybe the groups in your city aren't exactly going to fit your style or your tribe then yes, if you can step out of your comfort zone and maybe create something. That's a great piece of advice. We've done that here, we're still doing that here. Essentially, when we came we realized that there were pockets of non-monogamous people, pockets of curious singles curious couples, but really nobody steering the ship, so to speak. We have a big BDSM and kink community here.

We have a polyamorous community here and then you have the swingers. Then you've got people coming in from out of country. We've been creating every three months these little mingle events. It's not a play party, it's just people to come along and be their authentic selves. No matter what that looks like what shape it takes, in a bar situation, just really just normal, have a couple of drinks, dance and be in a room where you are just being yourself. It's just a bit more safe and more comfortable for people.

Emily: Is it also nationals who are part of this community or is it generally just the ex-pat community?

Cate: No, we actually have a lot of Singaporeans actually starting and people starting their journey at a younger age. Then people starting the journey at 55 years old. We do have a lot of ex-pats and we have mixed-race couples as well. Everybody is welcome to come to the mingle events, and we are seeing probably about a 60% local population coming along to our events.

Jase: Wow, that's great. As we've talked before on this show about the polyamorous community in Japan, is challenging partly because of a language barrier too, but that there's a separate ex-pat community and a separate Japanese community that only overlap with each other. That's really cool that you've been able to do that.

Cate: We found that a little bit here as well. We would see some parties that were, ex-pat only. Even sometimes now we do get questions, I had a question come through e-mail the other day, we actually have a Halloween party tomorrow. Somebody said, ''Will there be Caucasians there?'' My response was, there's going to be everybody there. I said, ''Hey, I'm Caucasian, I'm hosting. I'm definitely going to be there,'' but it's that mentality of who's going to be there. I don't necessarily think that's coming from a hateful place. I just think that again, you know what you know, and you're more comfortable with learning from people who perhaps have your own cultural upbringing.

But we do try to encourage that everybody just mingles and learns from each other rather than bringing some of those like age, race, et cetera barriers.

Emily: Your show is called Swinging Downunder. Something that I know we talk about it on the show just a lot of misconceptions that people have surrounding the polyamorous community. We don't specifically speak about swinging all that much on our show, I'm really interested to know what are some of the more common swinger tropes that maybe someone who is maybe more traditional or vanilla, what they might think swinging is? What is incorrect, maybe about those tropes?

Cate: There's definitely a bunch of them. Some of them that we receive is, "Gosh, you must be really unhappy in your marriage or relationship to be swinging."

Dedeker: Alright, classic.

Jase: Yes. Love that one.

Cate: Another one is that, "Or your husband is forcing you into it." We get a lot of that.

Emily: Of course, we get that too.

Cate: It's interesting how the women for some reason don't have a voice. The third one is that it's just about sex. I guess this is where it can overlap a little bit with some of your communities as well. People just saying, ''Hey, you're out having a lot of sex all the time with all these different people. You don't even know the names and you're just turning up and having sex in a hotel room or a party." There are definitely some people who enter the non-monogamous lifestyle like that, but it's few and far between that we've experienced people to be like that.

Dedeker: What about the pineapples thing? That's the trope I always think about.

Emily: Pineapples?

Dedeker: You're not familiar with that Emily?

Emily: No.

Dedeker: Its the trópe at least, the way that I've heard it. That was supposedly the secret signal of swingers that you would be in the .

Emily: If you bring a pineapple?

Dedeker: No, you put it in the basket where you would normally put your baby.

Cate: Upside down. It has to be upside down.

Dedeker: a pineapple.

Emily: Really?

Jase: came up to me when I tried it.

Dedeker: I thought that also my understanding of the trope was-- Again, I don't even know what's fact and what's fiction. That also extended to even just pineapple imagery could be a kind of on the DL signal to other people that you're a swinger. How do you feel about pineapples Cate?

Emily: Are they the sexiest fruit?

Cate: It's funny that you bring that up because, yes, there is that old adage that, upside-down pineapple in a shopping cart means that you're a swinger. The lifestyle, the community has really embraced pineapples for some crazy reason. Also, you know, how in society we go through these things. For example, unicorns, were hugely popular over the past 12 months. For some reason, right now, if you walk into any homeware store, you're going to see pineapples on pillowcases on everything. In the last community is like, "Hey, fantastic, more stuff for us with pineapples." I don't really care about pineapples. I don't see that as a swinger. There's the black ring on the right hand, which I'm currently wearing today as a sign that you are in a non-monogamous relationship.

Jase:

Dedeker:

Emily: neither.

Cate: You didn't? Okay. Yes, a black ring on the right hand. Unfortunately, a lot of military members actually wear black rings because they easier to cut off in combat if they have any accidents. You really got to be careful that you're not just randomly walking up to people who happen to like wearing a black ring.

Jase: Right. Or they just love pineapples.

Emily: Yes, it's so fascinating that there are these little signals to try to put out into the world that you're interested or available or whatever in these ways. I'm also interested in what common misconceptions from within the non-monogamous community that swingers get. Are there people from the more polyamorous side of the spectrum that might say that swingers are not enlightened enough or they have more rigid rules or things along those lines? Or are there other misconceptions?

Cate: There is, I think just generally, the non-monogamy community as a whole, tends to look at other areas of non-monogamy and make judgments and make misconceptions. It's not just swingers to polyamorous people or polyamorous backwards. I think we also look upon people in BDSM or kink realms and they look back on us and we all looking around saying, "Hey, although these people are in the non-monogamous lifestyle, they're not approaching it the same way." Swingers and polyamorous people or even the spectrum of swinging, some people like to have those one-night stands and that's their jam.

Or maybe they go away on a holiday once a year, and they say, "Hey, I don't want to call myself a swinger because this is a hobby, and I do it once or twice a year and that's it." Hey, you over there, that's having one-night stands, you're just deprived." I think similarly, swingers think the same way about polyamorous people. Like, "You just don't understand. Well, we can compartmentalize what we're doing, but we don't get what you guys are doing," and vice versa. Polyamorous people may look at swingers and say, "Hey, we didn't really understand what you're doing either."

Love is love, thing. I think just generally, there are a lot of stones thrown in glasshouses in the non-monogamous communities.

Dedeker: It's a good way of putting it.

Jase: I've wondered about this and been like why do we do that? Part of me thinks that it might come from the fact that a lot of us when we choose to do something that's not the normal thing, that we just especially at first, every day are getting challenged on it and having to defend it. Feeling we have to explain why this thing we're doing is okay. I feel like sometimes we can end up in this situation where it's like I've worked so hard to defend this one particular thing that I'm doing, that then it's like that has to be the only way that's good and so, I can judge these other things to say that I'm not that.

I feel like sometimes it can come from that just bombardment of having to justify the fact that you are living this way at all.

Dedeker: Yes, well, I think after enough time, I know for myself, having the polyamorous experience that after enough time with people misperceiving that it is me going to sex parties or orgies or stuff like that, that you get so used to being like, "No, it's not orgies. Orgies are terrible." I've never said that phrase in my life, but you get the sentiment that I think that it's like you misplace the burden of proof almost to a certain extent on this thing that it's not. In doing so, then that it becomes the throwing stones in glass houses, for sure.

Emily: It's interesting to me that those who are already in non-normative lifestyles, how they may still want to go back to normative places in ways or be perceived as normal in various ways. Then yes, like you said, throw stones at other people who are maybe even more different than they are. That is a fascinating thing that we tend to do that just as a society and rather unfortunate, I think, in many ways.

Jase: Yes. For this episode, we wanted to get into both sides of this. Some misconceptions and misunderstandings about polyamory from swingers and vice versa. Cate, you did that as well with your listeners. You reached out and tried to find out some of those things.

Cate: Yes, I reached out to an inner community that we have and I said, "What are some of the misunderstandings or misconceptions or misrepresentations of polyamory that the swinging community has?" And just said, "Hey, do you think that there is misunderstandings somewhat out there is? Do you think that people, feel a little bit more, like you said earlier, enlightened or less enlightened or feel maybe one's more depraved or one should be more accepted as well? Trying to evaluate what you're doing." We did have a couple of people that responded with some interesting points.

I think at one point or another, even in our journey we either felt this way or we've spoken to people that have felt this way. As you say, you enter this and that's your normal. Once you're stepping out of that, there's almost that protective barrier that you put around yourself because you have compartmentalized that alternate lifestyle.

Jase: Yes. We were thinking for this episode that we can start going into some of those. Do you want to start us out or do you want us to start out?

Cate: I'll give you one here. This is actually from one of our listeners, who knows. They're basically saying that, "For us, polyamory is too much work, in addition, to something we feel is not for us." These people are basically saying that we vacation, swinging is the right space for us. There's no too much emotional aspect. It's too much work and effort. It's already challenging with just us too and we don't see polyamory, multiamory as any more enlightened than swinging. It's just was right for us and what's right for other people." That's a bit of a balanced response in the fact that they're saying this takes time and effort.

Our time and effort is spent maybe in lifestyle, on vacations or a couple of times a year, whereas, polyamory must be so much more time and effort and takes just more emotional time and those sort of things. I think that's another common understanding of the swinging lifestyle. We look at polyamorous people and we say, "You're spending so much time and energy, how can you possibly juggle all of that? We do this over here and we're doing it once a month or once a year or whatever it is. You guys are doing it full time, how is that possible?"

Jase: Yes, that's a great one. We get the same thing from monogamous people, too because they just take their current relationship and multiply it by two or three, and they go, "That's not possible."

Dedeker: Well, I want to counter that a little bit, just in talking about-- Cate, you said that, you and Darell had actually felt the same way at some point in your perceptions of polyamory, and did that shift over time?

Cate: It definitely has over time. I think once you start digging a little bit deeper into what this is-- because when you're monogamous or you're just starting out on relationships, you have no idea at the breadth of alternate or just relationships that are available to you. As long as you start researching things, and unfortunately, oftentimes, our misconceptions come from things like popular mainstream media or TV shows or videos, et cetera. Darell and I, as you said, Jase, you take what you have, and you multiply it. I think you have this idea that, "If I'm spending all this time and effort with Darell then, gosh, if I put somebody else in that's by two.

If that's another couple that's by four. You just start multiplying out. A lot of the things we did have a misunderstanding. Now, however, we know that there is a spectrum of swinging, there's a spectrum of polyamory and the way people approach that. I think that it does take time and unfortunately, some education to right some of those wrongs, really.

Dedeker: That's so funny because I'm realizing as I'm listening to speak that I think I have for a long time held a very similar misperception about swingers. Mostly because most of the swingers that I've personally known or worked with, who are clients of mine, they are the people who the side of the spectrum that they fall on is going to parties every single weekend. Literally every single weekend, all the freaking time. These are also the people that I know personally also teach kink classes and stuff like that. They're also going to events in a teaching capacity and stuff like that.

I've literally had the same thought in my brain of, "How do you have the freaking time, I could not get myself to go to a party and be sexy every single weekend? Oh my gosh, how do they do it these swingers?" That's so funny. I've literally just pieced that together right now.

Emily: Yes, and the fact that you said that some people view it as a hobby and that they only do it maybe once or twice a year, is really surprising to me. I didn't even think about it in that capacity. I know for myself I also always thought that swinging meant that you were a long-term couple or married and that was the specific relationship that everything else was just having fun or maybe having more common relationships. Is that true? Or am I totally off base there?

Cate: That's a really funny topic because in and of itself, there are singles that classify themselves as swingers, but then some swingers don't think that they should. Even within our community we're not happy about that sometimes. It can be brand new couples too. What we're seeing now particularly in Australia is that younger generations are entering a relationship together and saying "Hey, this is what I want to do, this what I want to get out of my relationship." It doesn't need to be a married couple, it doesn't need to be a longtime committed couple. It can just be a couple that's just partnered up and then they want to go and explore this.

Going back to the point about hobby swingers or vacation swingers, that's actually a real thing. Some people will just go , maybe they take that once a year trip to hedonism or desire, at a clothing-optional lifestyle-friendly resort, and that's their thing. They swing there when they're on vacation and that's it. They didn't do anything the rest of the year. Then yes, there are some people who go to parties every weekend and I agree that's exhausting.

Emily: I can't even imagine.

Jase: Just the amount of extraversion and energy that it takes is impressive to me.

Emily: It's just like recoiling in a certain club.

Dedeker: Well, it's such an important reminder to remember this whole spectrum thing. Thinking about the hobby swingers, the vacation swingers, where it's just once a year, it reminds me of the book that-- It was a very controversial book that came out a couple of years ago but it was about this researcher talking about, basically straight men who have sex with men, but who do not identify as gay. Straight men, who have had male-male sexual experiences, either in their youth or again, maybe once a year in their adult life, but don't identify as gay and being like, how do people handle that? How do we label that?

It goes beyond our sense of the labels that we have, and that's what it's reminding me of right now of, unfortunately, it is such a spectrum that it is-- I think it becomes just harder and harder to label and to corner people and pigeonhole people into a box there.

Cate: Absolutely would agree with that. It is interesting and people do approach it in different ways. Would you like to hear what Darrell and I classify ourselves as? This is a long one?

Jase: Yes, I'd love to hear this.

Dedeker: I'd love to hear that.

Emily: I'm very interested.

Cate: We are ethically non-monogamous socio-sexual swingers. Do you like that?

Dedeker: Yes, that's good.

Jase: I do, actually, that's cool. Can you break it down for us? Can you break down into parts?

Cate: We have that on one of our dating profiles and then my next sentence is, "I know, right? What the fuck does that mean?"

Emily: I love it.

Cate: Ethical non-monogamy in the sense that we want to-- The relationships that we have with people, we want to leave them in a better space than when we met them. We don't sleep with people that are perhaps cheating on their spouses. We don't sleep with people that the partners aren't in it for the same level of interest or maybe there is somebody who's a little bit forcing the other person and we want to have these relationships where they're valuable. We are actually bringing something to that individual or that couple and so that's the ethical part.

Then the socio-sexual part is where the way that we approach the lifestyle is we'd like to have pants-on and pants-off friendships. This has meant perhaps where we can debate a little bit about what is polyamory and what is swinging I guess a little bit as well. Right now we have a couple in Sydney, Australia where we have known them for four years, very close to the start of our journey. We're pants-on and pants-off friends. We will do an escape room together, we'll do wine tasting together. They were at our wedding, we also happen to sleep with them from time to time.

Those are people that you know have been in our lifestyle, in our relationship for a long time. Then we have people that we maybe see once a year or we might go to a lifestyle club, a swingers club and then we may play with them as well. Socio-sexual meaning that we find an intellect wit and a physical attraction all bundled up together. We like to meet people, form a little bit of a relationship and then perhaps have some pants-off fun.

Jase: That's actually a nice segue into one of the things that came up for me when we were putting this episode together is that one of my original misconceptions about swinging is that the predominant way to do it was this, like, "We can have sex with other people, either together or separately, or however we do that, but it's like, we're not allowed to have any feelings or we can't be friends with them. They can't be anyone that we know. Or it can never be with the same person twice," or that there's these various rules to protect the relationship.

Then I found from going to play parties and things like that and meeting more of the community who do identify more as swingers and asking them like, "Hey, what's your deal?" And finding out that none of them do it that way. I don't think I've actually met any swingers who have that very strict divided, walled off kind of way of doing it. Is that representative? Was it ever? What's the deal there?

Cate: It is representative of some people. Absolutely. Then you talk about the spectrum, we've met people that they will not meet the same couple twice to your point. That is one of their rules. "We won't swing with anybody we know, we're not going to meet the same couple twice, we're going to go to a club or we're going to go to a hotel party or something like that and that's it and we're going to have a little bit of sexy fun, and then we're going to leave." That's the way that they've approached the lifestyle. It's not better, it's not worse. It's just how they approach it.

Then you have people like us to form longer-term relationships. You have people some people don't want to kiss again, "I may catch the feels." Actually one of our respondents who we've known these guys since 2016, this is a good segue, they actually lead into that very thing. They say that early on, some people including us, and they're ashamed to say, "We're afraid of polyamory or polyamorous people," because it was ignorance on their part. They said that the more that they've learned since they've joined the lifestyle, and by meeting amazing people who have modeled great poly relationships, they realized that it is a good relationship model for some people.

Now, that particular couple, their story is funny because when they first joined the lifestyle, they said, "We never want to make lifestyle friends. We don't want to. I don't want to know these people. I don't want to have any relationship. I don't want to know that they've got two kids and a dog and a white picket fence. That's their business." Now, these guys actually have long term friendships that they've formed over the years they've been in the lifestyle. I think there is an element. Some people do join, and they say, "These are our rules and the reason we've got those rules is to protect us, protect our primary, protect our relationship."

Then some people just join for the opposite. They know that this is the way that they want to approach it. That doesn't mean one's more enlightened than the other. It just means that that's their particular approach, I guess.

Emily: You said the word 'rules' quite a bit, which is totally understandable, I think given swinging and that it does seem to, as you said, in some instances, protect the primary relationship. Do you think overall, swingers tend to have more rules than other types of non-monogamous couples or people?

Cate: I'm not sure a more. I really don't know because I probably haven't seen the breadth of relationships and really spoken to other people about what their rules and boundaries might be outside of just swinging. Definitely, when each person starts exploring the lifestyle they do sit down and they say, "Hey, what are our rules and what are our boundaries?" Rules being protected sex always. I'm fluid-bonded to my primary only." Then they'll be the kissing rule, then they'll be the oral-- "Do we do oral, do we do kissing, what does it look like?"

I think definitely we do sit down and we go through those, and each couple has their own but I don't know whether we have more or the same as other people, I guess.

Dedeker: I don't know. Just from my small sample size of the clients that I work with, I feel like I've met some swinging couples who have very few rules and are really pretty chill and seems like there's a high level of trust and fluidity. Leniency is the word that's coming to mind. I don't know if that's the right word but have that within their own relationship. Then I've worked with some couples or people who identify as polyamorous who have a lot of really intense rules. Definitely, the whole spectrum thing.

That reminds me, Cate, we talked about this, personally a couple of days ago, I feel like you mentioned something about there having been at one point a little bit of this perception within the swinging community that polyamory is almost like this toxic waste. Like, "Don't even go there if you want to protect your marriage. Don't even let it get on you."

Emily: Fascinating.

Cate: Polyamory is a sure-fire way to ruin your relationship. Again, I think it's because people do compartmentalize and you can say, "Hey, we're joining this swinging lifestyle because we're going to go have some fun--" What is it? "every weekend to annually versus--" I'm going to protect my relationship in the sense that there's things I give my partner and my primary that nobody else can give them. Now some people think that includes sex and I guess that's not what swingers do.

Then other people think, "Well, it's because I'm sharing my hopes, my dreams, my desires, my wants, my bad days, my good days with this person and hey, gosh, if I enter into a polyamory relationship, that other person may also give those things or share those things with my partner and therefore, what am I?" I think sometimes we struggle with that identity of what we are in a relationship and that's why a lot of swingers will go, "Howdy hell." If you are starting to look down at polyamorous realm and somebody is catching the feels and spending too much time with another swinger, then they can just sweep in and they'll be that new primary or these sorts of things.

Jase: It also makes me think about the research that's been done about swinging and about polyamory. There's a lot more research about swinging just because it's been a phenomenon for longer. One of the things I've noticed about it too is that when you're studying swinging because it does-- I guess even though you said there are some individual single people who identify as swingers, but that it does seem like the community is largely based around these couples who swing and that measuring the success of that fits. It's like we take our same tools we use for studying monogamous people and we apply it here.

There's a lot of positive research because of that showing that non-monogamy and swinging has this positive effect on people's relationship rather than this destructive one that people are afraid it will have. It's a little tricky with polyamory or relationship anarchy or a version of non-monogamy that isn't centered around just one couple. It's like how do you measure that. How do you measure the success because it's not just about how long did this one relationship last or how attracted are these two people to each other or something like that.

Dedeker: Definitely. I have no idea if anyone in the swinging community ever feels this way at all. Definitely, something that I've come up against with people who are specifically new to polyamory. People who know that they want to pursue having multiple loving relationships or they are monogamous and they're wanting to open up their relationship to having multiple partners in that way that for some reason, I don't know how this got started, but some people perceive swinging is like the baby step on the way to full--

Emily: It's the gateway drug.

Dedeker: It's the baby steps on the way to “full-blown polyamory” and that's where-

Jase: There's a lot involved in that statement right there.

Dedeker: There's so much to unpack there but that’s when I see people running up against this thing of like, "Well, before I can be okay with my partner going out on a date and having a sleepover with their new girlfriend separately from me, I have to be okay with watching my partner fuck someone else in front of me and that's just going to be the natural progression of how I'm going to build up my skill set," even though it's like two separate skill sets. At least that's my perception. Do you see any of that from your side?

Cate: Yes. Some people look at it like it's Lego blocks. You've got that green grass on the bottom and that's your starting baseline and maybe that’s same-room sex. That's your platform. Then you've got some light touching and some oral and that's your first Lego brick and then you stack it up from there. We see a lot of swingers doing that they say like, “Where soft-swap only," meaning that they’re oral and they kissing and that sort of thing no penetrative sex. Then all of sudden, it's like, “Now we're full-swap and so we're penetrative sex and so we've made that next migration and added that next Lego block over”.

We always say to people, “It's not a race and you don't need to move from point A to point B. This is not a Monopoly board it's just whatever your journey is”. I think, yes, some people do say, “If we stop progressing through this--" and then maybe you've got a four-year-old friendship and you're pants-on and pants-off. We've had people say, “Your next step is polyamory," to us. As opposed to saying it's okay to be where you are. Also to that point, you don't need to have a stationary point and you certainly don't need to go forward or backwards.

I think a lot of people say, “Well, once I've started that, that's it. That's who I am now and that's how I need to identify”. As opposed to saying, “I can be wherever I want to be as long as it's working for me on an individual basis in my relationship, then we can move here, we can go there, try that out. That wasn't for us, move back, change and adapt”.

But we definitely do see that some people will say, “You're eventually going to end up polyamorous”.

Emily: That's why I do question sometimes like the use of labels in general. I think they are really important and it's nice to have so that you can say your whole long, “I don't remember swinging person non-monogamy”. At the same time, you may be all those things and then also somebody looks at your relationship and will just make this assumption like, “Well, that means that you're going to become polyamorous eventually”. Which is interesting and it's like, “Well, no. I do what I want”.

Emily: It is interesting just that we do want to label ourselves. We feel a pressure almost to put a label on something and yet it doesn't always tell the whole story and it doesn't have to.

Cate: I think some people do use labels to find tribes and for like-minded people as well and that's the quickest way to do that. It's to say, “I'm going to go join a polyamorous community even though sometimes we also happen to swing when we go out and do things on the weekend or whatever”. I think labels, yes. They're good. There's reasons for them but I think inherently that they're flawed because maybe that's not you all the time, there’s different versions of me every day.

Emily: Exactly.

Jase: I want to get to some of the questions or some more of the things that you got from your listeners but I first had a terminology question. We talked about the soft-swap and full-swap, so I'm like it's a good time to ask another terminology question.

Dedeker: on there.

Jase: Something that I also found is that specifically with people who are my age or younger, mid to late 30s and younger that I found a lot of people not using the word swinger to describe themselves.

Cate: I love this, yes.

Jase: Then the question I have asked in return is, "What would you call it then," and they're usually like, “I don't know, we just do this thing”. While I respect that like we're just having this conversation about labels, it has come up for me when people have interviewed me, for example, about non-monogamy more generally and that comes up and I'm like, “Swinging is a thing too even though there are also some people who do what I might call swinging but they don't call it that, and I don't really know what they do call it”. I just wondered are there some new hot terms that we should be aware of?

Emily: It could be a word.

Cate: Oh, God can I net out just for like a teeny-tiny. You’re absolute, you hit the nail on the head. I'm 34 and my generation and younger don’t like the term swinging. If you think of the word swinging, sometimes it brings up these negative connotations of like a dude with lots of chest hair, gold chain, wearing this ridiculous shirt, keys in a bowl and says, “Oh, God”. That's why the younger generation don't necessarily want to be perceived as a swinger because they look at that and they're like, “That's not what we do. We’re pants-on pants-off friends," whatever.

Actually, and why I'm going to net out is if you look at Search Engine Optimization on the searching for swinging or swinger, it's on its way down, it's trending down. What is trending up is things like monogamish. You've got people that are searching for non-monogamy, you've got people that are searching for polyamory, polyamory light.

Dedeker: Polyamory light?

Jase: Like if you were colors, I like it.

Emily: It's polyamory.

Cate: Then you've got people that are looking for these things like open relationships, these terms that are coming a bit more through. Monogamish though seems to be one that's trending with the young generation because, again, maybe they're hobbyist swingers, maybe they don't want to be termed that and so they're just doing something and for them you're right. They don’t say, “I'm a swinger". They just go, "I'm just having a little bit of fun like why do I need to label it?”

Jase: Right. Okay, awesome. Thank you. Do you want to give us another one of the questions from your-

Cate: I do. This is actually one of my favorites. This is from Kelly and I love the way that Kelly is identifying how people look at each other even from monogamous people through to the non-monogamous realm. Kelly says that sometimes she feels that polyamorous folks may feel more enlightened than swingers in the same way that swingers feel more enlightened than non-swingers. For example, I know the term vanilla is not exclusive to the lifestyle, it does have a certain patronizing connotation. I think it's somewhat natural tendency to sometimes feel enlightened if you've chosen an experience that someone else has not.

She goes on to talk about people that have traveled the world, tribes, different food, and how you might look at somebody who's never left their country and say, “Poor you”.

She says, “What's important is to keep that feeling in check and realize that people aren't making their choices from the same experience, so don't judge based upon what you've chosen to do”. Now, what I loved about what Kelly's written here. She's almost saying there's monogamous folks and swingers looked down on those monogamous folks and then polyamorous people have a better IQ and EQ and they're looking down on upon us all.

What I loved was her talking about vanilla because even in the swinging lifestyle, there are some people out there using that term and they'll say, “Oh, you're vanilla swingers and we are more enlightened even than you”. What that can mean the way the people might look at it as in that it's a “traditional” term of swinging which is one heterosexual couple having sex with another heterosexual couple and that's it. Some people that are more into the BDSM kink, LGBTQI communities within the swinging realm might then look down on those people that are just in those heterosexual swapping situations and say, “Oh, yes, they’re vanilla swingers. They don't have the IQ and EQ and sexual provider that I have because I'm out doing flogging, and I'm pegging", and all of this stuff.

I really found Kelly's terminology there and her position to be really interesting because I do think that sometimes that does come up in non-monogamy that feeling of "better than".

Dedeker: I think as human beings, it's really surprising sometimes how much our brains are wired to just be constantly checking what's the-

Emily: Keeping up with the Joneses and being competitive.

Dedeker: That or like what's the chain of command? What's the food chain? Where do I fall in the lineup? Our minds are so constantly trying to figure out, "Who's below me? Who's above me? Who's just below me, who's just above me? Who am I significantly higher up than? Who is significantly lower than me? Who's significantly higher than me?" In every single arena; in our work, in our sex lives, in our relationships. I think that there's something about recognizing that that's what our brains do. Our brains, I think at some point, probably in our development, in our evolution that was important for us to be able to know where we stood socially but that's maybe not something that serves us anymore.

I think that's where that comes from is that we have this natural tendency toward just, "Where do I fall in the lineup? I'm going to really rub that in your face at every opportunity that I can get".

Jase: Yes. I also think, like I was saying earlier, trying to defend ourselves against people questioning our beliefs or our relationships, that it is easy to throw someone else under the bus. We've talked about this on our show before. It's an unfortunate thing that happened as part of the gay marriage movement is that it's like, "Look, we're monogamous just like you, toss all the polyamorous swingers everyone else under the bus". To be like, "Yes, we can get married now too, right, because it's just like you". I've talked to a lot of people who have been part of The Pride Parade Movement specifically that.

They've talked to me about how in the past few decades, it went from very diverse types of relationships, transgender people, cross-dressing, swingers, everything in part of the parade, to being very, it's just couples, it got cleaned up in a way to make it more palatable to your rights. Interestingly, I think polyamorous people and swingers can do the same thing to each other. On the one hand, the polyamorous people can go, "They're just about sex and ours is about love and relationships and that's better because that's more like what you guys do".

The swingers can go, "Those guys are weird. They're having multiple relationships. This is still my husband or my wife. That's the most important thing so we're just like you". That's the same thing and we can toss each other under the bus to normalize ourselves.

Cate: Yes, that's so true.

Dedeker: We're all tripping over each other to get the approval of random directors or something.

Emily: Just a random person. Yes, exactly. Who cares?

Jase: I was also in a polyamory discussion group a few years ago, where the conversation got totally derailed over this whole debate about the term vanilla, and then also in the polyamory world the term logo, which is also used.

Emily: They're both fairly derogatory in ways. Even vanilla, I mean, it can be used to say like "Well I don't love BDSM or whatever x, y, and z thing. I'm more traditional". I think that it can be thrown around and in a derogatory fashion, which is not ideal.

Jase: We're starting to get toward the end of this episode. We were thinking that it could be fun to go through-- We've talked about these big philosophical issues. To maybe go through some of the little misunderstandings, the little myths that swingers might have about polyamorous people and vice versa.

Cate: I feel like you guys have three to one here, now. I need a bunch of polyamorous people. Can I get somebody on my team?

Dedeker: Oh gosh. I will. As in your team of misperceiving polyamory from a swinger's perspective?

Cate: Yes.

Emily: Let's do it.

Dedeker: We'll do it all together.

Cate: I'll start here. That polyamorous people have to live together.

Emily: That swinging people are all married.

Dedeker: Yes, that's good. That it's actually maybe a cult.

Cate: I like that one.

Dedeker: That one's tied very closely to the living together. This is not just from swingers, obviously, but sometimes they can generate these images of everyone living together in the same house and it's like compulsory group sex. All those things like that.

Jase: Well, ironically for you saying that polyamorous people are all living together having group sex all the time, mine for swingers would just be that they're having sex all the time, that they're all sex addicts.

Cate: All right, I got a funny one for you. Polyamorous people don't shave and don't need to get rid of their body hair and stuff like that because they're just in other long-term relationships. They don't need to look sexy.

Jase: I was going to think because it's a bunch of hippies.

Emily: They're and they're hippies.

Jase: I thought you're going with it's a bunch of hippies but it's because they don't have to try anymore about that.

Emily: Oh gosh, that kind of thing. The people who are swingers just do their swinging in dungeons or at sex parties.

Jase: I want to call a timeout for a second because this is an interesting one. Cate, you mentioned before about there being, sometimes a divide between the swinger community and the BDSM community. I feel from my perception, it's being connected to people in all of those communities. My perception has been like, everyone who's in BDSM is what I would call a swinger. I'm exaggerating but it feels to me like there's a ton of overlap there. Maybe a little bit with polyamory but open-play partner type thing. I'm like, "All you guys are swingers". I would assume it would be, "You all do that".

Dedeker: Honestly, I totally thought that too. I went 100% thought that too. I was like, "Whatever, lump them all together. They're all doing the same thing," until I started getting some clients who were in the BDSM scene, and yes, had multiple play partners, but who's never necessarily like genital play. It was scene work, bondage stuff, and kink stuff but maybe not what we would "traditionally" call sex. No penetration of sex or stuff like that but it was play, and that was what works for their relationship. That, for me, really broke through that.

I was like, "There's this totally other different way to do it. It's not necessarily they're just doing the whole same thing the whole time".

Jase: The first time that I ever went to a dungeon that had specifically a no-sex rule-- This is one of the first dungeons I ever went to. For me that was that moment of like, "This isn't about that. This is about something else", and that was cool. Sorry to interrupt. I wanted to mention that earlier and then I forgot.

Dedeker: The misperception of polyamorous people put out there is constant drama. They're having constant drama.

Cate: Solid one, good.

Emily: That there's only big resorts for swinging people and not for like any other types of non-monogamous relationships which actually may be true. I don't know. I actually have no idea but I feel you said, "Hedonism and desire".

Dedeker:

Emily: When you're over desire, for sure. I don't know if there's any other.

Jase: Other types of monogamy. I think there are there.

Emily: Other types of monogamy.

Dedeker: Sorry, I'm going to hijack this question away from Cate, and throw it back at Emily first. What would that look like? A resort built for--

Emily: I'm asking in my head too. I have no idea. That's a great question. A bunch of poly processing groups where people turn down their feelings. You may have some activities like Dungeons and Dragons.

Dedeker: That's just a bunch of nerdies .

Jase: There's a bunch of lot of things out in the park grounds.

Emily: Yes, exactly. You go home after that and there's nothing else.

Jase: Actually, it sounds awesome. I would totally go to that.

Emily: I'm sure you would.

Cate: It's actually funny because one of the misconceptions about polyamorous people too is that they're perhaps a little bit more undesirable physically as well. They are absolutely a little bit more nerdy, They're undesirable physically. Maybe they're introverts and that's why they're not in the same realm. I know because of your time, and I want to give you guys two that's probably going to make you laugh. One is that if I become polyamorous then the other people are going to spend all my money. I have to share my bank accounts. Somebody's going to go and spend all my cash.

The other one is, if you have children is like, "Oh, God, what happens to the children? How they're going to parent my children and then how I'm going to have this dynamic of telling them? What are the rules of our household, and things like that?" There's some funny ones I thought you might like.

Emily: It's a misconception that nobody has autonomy in polyamory, which is really interested to me.

Cate: Yes, you're becoming one. One of us.

Emily: It's like you want to form.

Dedeker: Yes, it's tied to the whole cult, thinking. It's going to be the cult or the Borg or the collective or something. They're all merge into this big collective of six or seven people or whatever.

Cate: Transformer.

Dedeker: Exactly. The money one, that's the first one. I've never heard that one before of that assumption that if multiple partners means, of course, we all share a bank account, and then it just all falls apart because we can't manage six streams of income into one place at once, I guess. That's interesting. I never thought about that.

Jase: Yes. Other ones that come up for polyamory is stuff like that I have to date everyone that my partner dates. People ask me all the time about what my--

Emily: Does Dedeker have to approve everyone?

Jase: What my approval processes like, for Dedeker's new partners.

Emily: You're like, "Excuse me".

Jase: I feel like with swinging too there's also the thing that men are only allowed to be straight in swinging. It's definitely a myth that comes up. I have heard that in the past there are swinger clubs that basically have that rule pretty much written out there. Have you found--

Emily: Women can be bisexual but men can't have--

Jase: Men can't do any touching of men.

Emily: Why?

Jase: Cate, have you found that to be changing over time?

Cate: Yes. I think more clubs are doing their best to become a little bit more inclusive of how everybody approaches their lifestyle and their sexuality. To the point now where what we're seeing is more like, "Tonight on Friday whatever is LGBTQI friendly night," as opposed to just going, "That's every night". Do you know what I mean?

Jase: Baby step on the way.

Emily: What's the issue there that people are worried about?

Jase: That men are terrified of being gay.

Emily: It's a little bit gay.

Cate: There's many reasons why people are concerned about that. Again I think it just comes that maybe that was the way people approached the swinging lifestyle 10, 20 years ago and how things are adapting now again with the younger generation coming through, sexuality is a lot more fluid and I think that we're starting to see that. I just think it's just people realizing what they want and maybe that's okay. Historically, when it was that couple and couple turning up at a club having sex and then going home. Then now it's changing and adapting.

I think it's good that clubs are doing that, they are specifically saying, "It's okay. Let tonight's bisexuality night". There's this Skirt Club that kicked off in New York City which is just so--

Emily: That's a club?

Dedeker: Yes. Correct me, Cate, if I'm wrong but from my perception of it is it's these like high-end play parties that are for women only and not just gay women but for the whole spectrum of sexuality but just that they're women only.

Emily: That's really hard.

Dedeker: I knew you would say that Emily.

Cate: I think so it is changing and adapting, but I think right now maybe those clubs do feel like they need to label that particular night to make people feel okay with it. How that looks in a year, two years, five years, we don't know. We'll see. By the way Emily, at the Skirt Club at the end of every weekend they have to post up on Twitter and I think Instagram like all of the left items back at the club, all this high-end lingerie that's just been left strewn around the place, so keep that in your visions.

Emily: Wow. Gracious. Erotic

Jase: Wow. As we're coming up to the end here we want to ask you, Cate, if there was one thing-- To put you on the spot here, if there's one thing that you wanted other people who are in the sex-positive or non-monogamous community to understand or to take away from this episode what would that be?

Cate: To be a champion for everybody's own decisions and to be compassionate about what those decisions are. No one is better than the next person. No one's more enlightened or less enlightened and that goes for monogamous people too. Just because that's what you've chosen, or they've chosen doesn't mean they're right, wrong or otherwise, it's just what they've chosen. Learn from people, ask questions, and get inspired by the fact that those people they've chosen that and so that's fantastic. They know what they wanted in life and what more could we really want. Be compassionate.

Dedeker: That was great.

Jase: That's great.

Emily: Absolutely.

Dedeker: I love be compassionate for sure. Well, can you let our listeners know where they can find more of you and your work? Also, I understand you have a very exciting event coming up next year so please let us know more about that as well.

Cate: They can find us on our website. It's swingingdownunder.com. Obviously, we're on a little podcast catch us as well but the website's the best bet for finding us. I spend a lot of time on Twitter and Instagram too so if you really want to get social let's hang out there. Not to plug it, we are excited we do have a big event coming in Miami next May. It's called Podcast-A-Palooza and you can find details on our website for that as well. We're super excited. Again more content creators are coming together and more people are out there just talking about these alternate lifestyles and relationships and to hopefully educating some people on what's available and what's out there.

Dedeker: Awesome. Excellent. Stick around. We are going to do a bonus episode in our bonus episode for our Patreon subscribers. We're going to be talking a little bit about what really happens at play parties the thing that everyone wants to know. Stick around for the bonus episode.

Jase: To all of you listening out there, is there anything that we missed that you think is like, "This is such a good misunderstanding that polyamorous people and swingers have about each other".

Emily: Such a bad misunderstanding but yes.