Game-aware guys being "poly" or "open"

(A response to Nash's comment.)

Guys who know they can get laid have a very different experience from guys who don't, and from this basic difference follows many differences in views, outlooks, and beliefs. I'm not saying a guy must go out on a random day or night and come back with a chick a few hours later (I can't, of course), but a guy who knows he's got options differs from one who doesn't, or whose options are marginal. The options can come from game, ecosystem, doesn't matter... "scarcity" versus "abundance" are often discussed in these contexts. A guy is as good as his options.

I'm not as big a fan of "poly" identification because most people who identify as poly are ugly, which seems to be true of women as well as men. But with an otherwise attractive chick a guy wants to keep on rotation without real commitment, who might not want to do randoms, saying "poly" and finding another couple or couples to date can work.

I don't get hungup on the particular terms "poly" or "open" because I don't care that much. If "poly" lets me keep her on rotation for a longer period of time as a FWB / lover, because she knows my love is too great for only a single person, just like hers, that's fine with me (and that has happened). "Ethically non-monogamous" (ENM) and "consensual non-monogamy" can be used as labels too. Good sex without obligation on my part? Okay, yeah, sure, whatever it takes, yeah, I'm ENM poly, good enough for me. Pass the joint, will you?

Nash says,

for me the “poly” community is a fucking mess. I live in CA and I am surrounded by these folks… and it’s an ugly shitshow. I watch guys “try” this all the time, and they are a fucking sad bunch, mostly.

Can't disagree. That's the average and the median.

The average poly person is a fuckup and idiot, and I'm happy to acknowledge that. The worst advocates for poly are poly people themselves, and they are the most public and vocal advocates too.

To me, game, poly, open, motorcycles, online dating, paying for sex... these are all tools. I'm describing the tools, how they work, how they work for me, how they could work for others, how they are (frequently) mishandled. The tools a guy uses depend on his goals, and most guys flail because they have no tools and have given zero thought to their lives. I don't use all tools all the time. I've not paid for quite a while. That isn't because I'm too good for it or found the Buddha or whatever... I've been busy with more conventional pursuits, so I've not needed or wanted it.

Tools can be combined in various ways: having an incredibly hot girl in a semi-paid relationship who then goes to sex clubs can multiply the effect of both tools.... I only recommend thinking about paid relationships for guys who are 35+ and have more income than time. Younger guys should be out working on their game and improving their value, not paying for it. 

Game guys have found a great tool. But I think about how some of the other tools fit into game, and how game fits into some of the other tools. Most guys in game don't write much about the other tools, like non-monogamy. Most guys who like and write about paying for it, don't write about game. Red Quest is an effort to fill in some gaps in the conversation and idea space. 

I also don't ask and don't tell. When the recent girl asked me how many partners I've had, I didn't leap forward to say (if she'd pressed I would've said). But I didn't ask her the same question and when I told her I never ask that question of women, I meant it.

I am being something very close to inconsistent here, but that’s the way I am.

If you're inconsistent and know it, that's okay. I'm a little more worried about people who are wildly inconsistent and don't know, also known as the entire human population.

That Krauser post helped me write this post: When guys talk past each other, it's often good to go a couple levels deeper to try and figure out what is really going on (a subject I have more to say about in a future post). There may be some deeper synthesis beyond the surface. There are levels in the discussion, and a guy at one level may be invisible or incomprehensible to a guy at another level. A guy who hasn't had to deal with the girls attempting to angle him into a relationship, will probably not find my ideas about non-monogamy of great utility. The player who's lost otherwise nice fresh puss to "we need to be exclusive" is more likely to find these ideas revelatory.    

Personally, I'm less moved by pure novelty than some guys. Don't get me wrong, I like novelty, but I don't automatically lose interest in a chick after nailing her a couple times. This obviously depends on personality and other factors too. I got overly excited about this girl because our personalities mesh well.

Right now, society is in flux. Legal marriage does not work for a very large number of people, and no one knows what comes next. "Bitter divorce that screws up the kids" is a very common outcome, as are dead marriages that stumble onwards from inertia. So are couples who don't like each but stay together "for the sake of the kids." "Co-parenting" is on the rise. Almost no girls I talked to about non-monogamy back in 2011 or 2012 had it on their radar or in their cultural lexicon: today, many do. A lot of guys start in game, but game, pursued actively enough, becomes a path into seeing the matrix. Most of us recoil from seeing what's beneath the surface. Will you?