PAARC

The Poly Ribbon displayed on a website indicates that the owner of that site supports the acceptance of polyamory as a socially accepted lifestyle. It does not necessarily mean that the owner of the site is practicing such a lifestyle, merely that s/he is in support of it. A link to this page serves to promote general awareness of the lifestyle and of this campaign.

The ribbon itself is based on a flag originally created by Jim Evans. A small version of the flag is shown in the border at left. As Jim states, the colors are significant: "blue, representing the openness and honesty among all partners with which we conduct our multiple relationships; red, representing love and passion; and black, representing solidarity with those who, though they are open and honest with all participants of their relationships, must hide those relationships from the outside world due to societal pressures. The symbol in the center of the flag is a gold Greek lowercase letter 'pi,' as the first letter of 'polyamory.' The letter's gold color represents the value that we place on the emotional attachment to others, be the relationship friendly or romantic in nature, as opposed to merely primarily physical relationships."

Polyamory, translated, means "many loves." Briefly, a polyamorous person is one who feels it is natural to romantically love more than just one person at a time. A polyamorous person may have more than one person that s/he considers to be a "spouse," for example. Polyamory is about love, without constraint by the dictates of society, defined only by the parameters that we, as individuals, impose upon it.

Polyamory isn't "swinging." The difference between the two is quite simple. In swinging, the emphasis is on sex. And while sex is as important to polyamory as it is to monogamy, the true emphasis is the same as that of monogamy: love.

Polyamory is not "cheating." It is a relationship structure built with the knowledge and approval of all partners involved. No secret relationships exist in polyamory. Openness, honesty, communication, trust... All the things that are key to a monogamous relationship are vital to polyamory.

Polyamory is not out to replace monogamy. Just as monogamy doesn't "fit" certain individuals, neither does polyamory. The two practices are not mutually exclusive, nor opposed in any way. Like most things in life, it's a matter of personal choice.

PAARC was put online in 1997, during what I refer to as the "height of the ribbon craze." There were a crazy number of causes being supported by ribbon campaigns back then, and I just jumped on the bandwagon with this one. If you're interested in putting a ribbon graphic on your own page, with a link back here, grab one here.

At one point, PAARC Central was born... a huge repository of links to poly sites. I think at one time it was the largest on the 'net. But I didn't have the time to devote to maintaining it, so many of the links became obsolete, and many new ones came online. Today, it's easy to find such lists, and the loss of this one makes no difference, in my opinion.

There's also a PAARC group on Yahoo! It's not very active, but click here to go to the page for it.

The original lapel pin, plus new bumper stickers, mugs... even a necktie! Just click here.