The marriage of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle made me a romantic again, but love is not always roses and tiaras. My partner recently went through a crisis where his wife withdrew her consent for our relationship a year and a half into our relationship. She felt that our relationship was a threat to their marriage and that he could not love her in the way she wanted if he continued his relationship with me. After struggling for more than a year, he decided that it was too much for him to fight with her every day and he needed to prioritize his family, so he withdrew from our relationship. As much as he tried to maintain our relationship, in the end, there was no way he could satisfy her and me, so he chose the path of less resistance. I wrote this “manifesto” in response to what I saw as a not ethical or loving way to deal with conflict in a poly relationship. If anyone is wondering what to do when a partner tries to control your relationships, or if your partner tries to force you into opening your relationship, I hope this helps to clarify the ethical framework.

1. No one has a right to tell you who you can have a romantic relationship with, or how. As late as 1967, it was illegal in many parts of the US for a white person to marry a person of color, and as late as 2014, it was illegal to marry someone of the same sex. Today these laws are regarded as bigoted and unethical. The right to marry your chosen partner regardless of their gender, race, or religion is considered fundamental and belonging to everyone. Exceptions still apply to cases like minors and blood relatives, but even those are being challenged.

2. Your family and friends do not have the right to control your relationships. People you already have relationships with do not have the right to tell you with whom and how to have your romantic relationships. Parents may have strong preferences about who they want their children to be partnered with, and sometimes children decide to abide by those preferences because they do not wish to alienate their parents, but in Western, developed countries, parents don’t make that decision for their children. Children also sometimes have preferences about who you are in a relationship with, but they do make decisions about partners for their parents. Parents can and often do help their children adjust to partners they object to, but ultimately parents make the decision. Friends and other less intimate relationships have even less right to interfere.

3. An exception is your spouse, because you mutually agreed to forsake other partners when you got married, and that agreement is enforced with a legal contract. Should you breach that agreement, your partner has the right to invoke divorce and bring legal and social ramifications upon you.

4. However, agreements can be altered if they no longer serve the individuals involved. Agreements are written to serve the people involved, and they sometimes need to be updated in order to address new circumstances. Marriage contracts by default stipulate monogamy, and changing that requires explicit consent from both partners. Some couples agree to alter the wedding vows, and some couples decide to change their agreement after the marriage through discussion, or after an infidelity.

5. Changes to agreements need to be consented to by all parties involved. When someone decides to change an agreement, drastically alter it, or terminate it all together, they must raise the changes to the other parties involved, and the other parties need to consent in order for the agreement to be valid. If two people in a business partnership agree that they have equal say in decisions about their business, one person cannot decide that he will make major decisions for the other, without the other’s consent. A tenant cannot stop paying rent without the landlord’s consent. It sometimes happens that one person decides to renege on an agreement, and if the agreement has legal force, then the agreement holder can bring legal action against the agreement neglector and force them to uphold the agreement. An alteration to an agreement that has not been consented to by all parties is not valid.

6. Manipulating a partner into giving consent is not ethical. If the person who wants to changes the agreement cannot get the other person’s willing consent, they may resort to tactics to wear down their partner’s resistance. Tactics could include 1) making them feel guilty about things their partner has done, 2) gaslighting them into thinking that the agreement was something other than what was agreed to, 3) withholding benefits from their relationship, or threatening to withhold those benefits, 4) using their children, finances, possessions, or their reputation as tools of extortion, 5) Resorting to physical, emotional, or psychological abuse, 6) Generally making their life difficult or unpleasant. Through these means, the person may eventually obtain consent from the other person. Consent obtained under duress is not consent, and using tactics to obtain someone’s consent this way is manipulative, unethical, and not loving.

7. If one person stops upholding an agreement, the other parties involved are not obligated to uphold the agreement. If a business partner starts doing business in a way that is not agreed to by the other partner, then the other partner has the right to terminate that business partner. If a renter stops paying rent, then the landlord has the right to evict the tenant. In a romantic relationship, when one person stops being loving to their partner, then the partner is not obligated to continue being loving to them at his own expense. They may still feel love for that person, and try to talk them into upholding their agreement or come up with a new agreement, but they are not obligated to provide the deliverables in their agreement if the partner has ceased to provide theirs. Of course, people go through illness, depression, disability, stress, or other hardships that make it difficult or impossible for them to do their part in a relationship for a while, however, those cases can be differentiated from ones where the partner is simply uninterested, unwilling, or incapable of upholding their obligations in a relationship.

8. Love does not mean that you have to uphold an agreement that is no longer valid. Love is 1) not harming the one you love, 2) Supporting their personal growth, even if sometimes that means causing them pain and inconvenience, 3) Respecting their freedom and autonomy, even if you do not agree with their choices. Love is not 1) changing your values for the other person, 2) causing yourself harm, 3) restricting your autonomy to a degree that it causes you unhappiness. If someone loves you, they should not be intentionally causing you harm, restricting your growth, or suppressing your freedom. If they are doing that then you have every right to let them know what they are doing and demand that they stop.

9. All needs are not equal. People have different needs in relationships and compromises are sometimes necessary to meet them. However, needs are not all equal, and just because someone has a need, does not mean that one should sacrifice her own needs to satisfy another’s. For example, one partner’s need to work will sometimes supersede the other partner’s need for fun. A need to maintain relationships that are important to one partner may supersede the partner’s need to not be inconvenienced. A need for sexual freedom may not supersede the other partner’s need to feel safe physically and sexually. The importance of each need is relative compared to the needs that are compromised to meet it.

If we think about a relationship as an agreement, the way a business relationship is an agreement, then it becomes clear what can and cannot be done. When an agreement is disregarded, altered, or terminated without discussion or consent, it is a breach of contract and an ethical failure. Just because one is in a romantic relationship or married does not excuse someone from behaving unethically and abusively.

Professor Marston and the Wonder Women, directed by Angela Robinson, came out in October 2017, and has been hailed as a groundbreaking, trailblazing film that positively portrays polyamory. “For Professor Marston’s Bill, Elizabeth and Olive, polyamory isn’t a one-off tryst; the three start a life and family together,” writes Jill Gutowitz of Vice, “Their relationship is balanced, equal and brimming with mutual respect. Each character is starkly different, they each experience lust and desire, and their relationship is by no means just Bill’s idea. Elizabeth and Olive share a romantic love of their own.”

Polyamorous critics gushed even more. Leigh Monson, a self-identified poly movie reviewer, said, “I cried tears of joy at this movie.” Minx of Polyamory Weekly said on her podcast, “This is a fucking awesome movie for poly people. It is the most beautiful portrayal of polyamory that I have ever seen.” Gaby Dunn, a bixsexual YouTuber and author (I Hate Everyone But You) who has advocated for polyamory much of her adult life, declared, “I have never seen polyamory centered or treated with respect in a movie before ever in my life. It was beautiful to see that yes, you can love more than one person, and have a family, and be happy.”

Professor Marston is a trailblazing movie in that it depicts polyamory in an empathetic and feminist way. Previous movies have depicted polyamory as cheating, sex-oriented, deviant, or a comedic distraction. No other movie has featured a committed, long term polyamorous relationship that is truly about love and the struggle to practice it at a time when it was deeply taboo. The fact that it’s based on a true story is even more remarkable. The movie is also masterfully done with nuanced and sympathetic characters. However, to say that it depicts a healthy polyamorous relationship based on mutual love and respect is a bit misleading. My partner and I both found it pretty disturbing at times, and the fact that it was so empathetic and love driven made what we deemed abusive behavior between the main characters even more upsetting.

I also want to preface this review by saying that this is not a review of the relationship between the actual creator of Wonder Woman and his partners. From what I understand, the director took much artistic license in portraying a relationship even the members of the Marston family understood very little of. The three historical figures were very private about their private lives. This is a review of the story that the director chose to tell. 

The relationship between the trouple starts out on unequal footing. Bill Marston is psychology professor at Harvard who works with his wife to study human sexuality. They toy with the idea of having a third, and joke about what a cliche it would be for Bill to have an affair with one of his students. When they first see Olive, a student in one of their classes, they discuss her as a sexual object. “I would like to study her,” he says, as if she were a specimen under the microscope. “I’m your wife, not your jailer,” says Elizabeth, not exactly encouragingly. They view Olive as an innocent, sweet girl that they can recruit for sexual experimentation. In poly circles this is called unicorn hunting, a much reviled practice that typically exploits a young bisexual female in order to satisfy the sexual curiosity of a typically older couple. “The stereotype at least is that unicorn hunting couples are looking to treat a partner as an object in their relationship,” said Alex, an interviewee for The Business Insider, “They want someone — maybe anyone, reducible to their gender, sexuality, and availability — that fits into their lives and fits their relationship without thinking about the needs and human perspectives of the person they’re looking for.” This fits Bill and Elizabeth’s attitude to Olive pretty well. They want someone who will fit into their lives; they don’t consider how their relationship will impact her.

Olive becomes a research assistant to Bill and Elizabeth Marston, and the couple immediately begin to use their dominant position to coerce and seduce her. First, before Olive has even started her employment, Elizabeth confronts her and says, “Don’t fuck my husband.” The poor girl has a genuine interest in the couple’s research, and she is immediately accused of being a homewrecker. Not a good way to begin! Next, they take part in a bizarre scene where Olive is forced to spank a sorority sister while the Marstons watch. Afterwards they pressure her to describe her emotions during the incident. It’s obvious that Olive is very uncomfortable with this, and when Olive flees the room crying, they dismiss her as not being tough enough for science. Olive is so distraught that she considers quitting her job, but she goes back to them, apparently drawn by the couple’s magnetism, or her own masochistic enjoyment at being submissive. Still treating her like an experiment, they hook her up to a lie detector and basically force her to confess that she’s in love with both of them. When Olive flees again, Elizabeth goes after her and they kiss. At this point Elizabeth invites Bill to join them.

The three become romantically involved, but the couple privilege continues. When the Marstons are fired from Harvard, Elizabeth insists that they have to break up with Olive because their relationship is “nice in fantasy but not reality.” Bill basically agrees with her and they literally turn their back on Olive and walk away, except Olive cries out that she’s pregnant. We can imagine that had she not been pregnant, they would have left her in the dust while congratulating themselves on how they escaped a close call. But since they are such ethical non-monogamists (sarcasm), they take up house together and move into a new neighborhood.

To not raise any eyebrows, they make up a story about how Olive is a widow whom Bill and Elizabeth took in. Granted, this is almost a hundred years ago, but it is revealed at the end of the movie that the real nature of their relationship was never made public to their friends and family, not even to their own children, even after having lived together for decades. Today, this would be unacceptable to most committed polyamorous partners who want to be acknowledged as legitimate partners. However, Olive did not seem bothered by her closeted status. While they live together, Bill and Elizabeth do paid work and Olive cleans, cooks, and takes care of their four children. Even if this arrangement had been consensual, by putting Olive in a state of economic dependence, she basically had to do whatever they wanted or risk losing everything.

The most shocking abuse of couple privilege comes towards the end of the movie when the family is accidentally outed by neighbors and Elizabeth’s son is beaten up at school. “You have to go,” Elizabeth says baldly to Olive, “the safety of our children is at stake.” Bill does nothing to stop her. So Olive, after spending a decade with these two, raising their four children together, is kicked to the curb as soon as the couple’s respectability becomes endangered. They punished her for society’s bigotry, and in order to not put themselves at risk, treat her with the same contempt that society would heap on Olive.

Once they got rid of her, the two of them would still have the safety net of their marriage, but what about Olive, and her children (who are also Bill’s children)? What kind of problems are they going to have now that she’s become the other woman, with no home, no family, and no means to make a living? Is this how you treat a partner you’ve loved for more than a decade? The fact that they would even consider such an action cast doubt whether they ever regarded Olive as an equal partner.  

The movie tries to recover from this egregious mistake in a tear jerking scene where Elizabeth and Bill beg on their knees for Olive to come back. Olive, at this point, has been living on her own for months, and she agrees to come back if they get her a new stove and give her a break from housework on the weekends. And then, my friends, they lived happily ever after.

My partner and I left the movie in shock. We agreed that Bill and Elizabeth’s actions towards the end of the movie exemplify the worst of polyamorous relationships: extreme couple privilege, disregard for their partner’s well-being, taking advantage of Olive’s weaker social and economic position without giving her respect and commitment. Like many partners in open relationships, Olive was ultimately dispensable, someone who could be sacrificed to protect the couple’s interests at any moment. There is no way that this polyamorous relationship would have worked if Olive had been a less submissive partner who stood up more for her rights. By portraying Olive as happily going along with everything, the movie creates the dangerous impression that everything Bill and Elizabeth did was ok and this is how a second partner in a polyamorous relationship should behave.

This movie was also disturbing to me because my partner and I had undergone a similar experience that year. We had been together for almost two years and were living together when his wife decided to revoke her consent for our relationship. I was subsequently kicked out of the house (and out of the country by Canadian border agents), and she threatened to divorce him if he didn’t leave me. My partner came to the realization that her actions were cruel and unethical, and he eventually apologized to me for not defending me against her attacks. I’m still not fully recovered from the trauma of it all. The experience has, if not put me off polyamory completely, made me deeply wary of the harm that couples can cause to others when they attempt polyamory without giving up couple privilege.

I recommend this movie for its artistry, its moving depiction of an organic relationship, and its groundbreaking depicting of polyamory. However, the praise that has been heaped on it by mainstream and poly audiences actually makes me feel less understood as a poly person. Granted, polyamorous people often struggle mightily and egregious mistakes are often made, but what this couple did to Olive at the end would be unconscionable to ethical polyamorous people today. Most polyamorous relationships also do not involve sexual attraction between metamours, or a metamour who does all the housework for you. Most polyamorous relationship involve much more difficult negotiations regarding sharing a partner with someone who you are not in love with. The fact that Elizabeth did have a relationship with Olive, and she still treated her with such disregard, is the opposite of a healthy, loving, polyamorous relationship. The lack of outrage over Bill and Elizabeth’s actions in the media is a silent indicator that even within the poly community we have a poor understanding of what a healthy polyamorous relationship should look like.

The past few years have been the most painful and the most transformative in my life. I’m starting to feel the urge to write again and, having come through the fire, would like to share my current vision for how I choose to show up in all of my relationships. It’s a moving (and often elusive) target so I’m very open to feedback and expect it to evolve over time.

I choose to accept you exactly as you are
because you are full and complete on your own
and you are the ultimate captain of your being.
Our journeys braid together with neither leading nor following.

I choose to be fully present with your joy and your suffering
because empathy is how I recreate your experience inside of me
which allows me to recognize and love your essential uniqueness
and find that place where our souls overlap.

I choose to seek first to understand your behaviors and thoughts
because if I experienced your background and life history
I would think and behave exactly as you
and love is born from understanding.

I choose to explore my edge of vulnerability with you
because courageously speaking my truth allows you to see me
as a spiritual being having a human experience
and vulnerability is the birthplace of intimacy, joy, and creativity.

I choose to dismantle the barriers to my experience of love
and forgive my wounded child and my stories of “not enough”
recognizing they are exactly those places inside me that long
to consciously evolve and manifest divinity in the material world.

I choose to perceive only expressions of love or calls for love
because it keeps my heart open and curious
and allows me to relax into a basic trust
that we live in a friendly Universe.

I choose to affirm my desires as flames arising from my divine spark
because it is important for me to express my deepest self with you,
to take full responsibility for my pleasure, and act in full integrity
so I can fill my heart and give to you from a place of complete generosity.

I choose to love you without attachment
because I wish to release you from expectation,
be open to the inevitability of change
and fully appreciate the present moment.

I choose to be 100% responsible for my own needs and feelings
and let you be 100% responsible for yours
because I cherish your autonomy and freedom
and know we are at source for our own happiness.

I choose to deeply care for your well-being
because your happiness is important to me
and I wish to engage with you in ways
that allow you to feel loved and respected.

I choose to nurture visions of your highest potential
beyond even what you might imagine for yourself
because it is through feeling held and lifted
that we can dream into more beautiful ways of being in the world.

I choose to ignite and energize our “we-ness”
because it is intelligent and wise beyond our selves
and allows us to participate in humanity’s awakening
and the evolution of God.

I choose to stay open to the mystery and potential
of you, me, and us
confident in my not knowing
how the universe will unfold.