What Makes a Resilient Throuple?

This third and final blog in a series explores what makes for a resilient traidic relationship. The first blog explained why threesomes are the most common form of consensually monogamous group relationship, and the second explored common interaction patterns among three people. This blog details why depictions of consensually nonmonogamous (CNM) threesomes usually mirror polygyny in that they include three cisgender, able-bodied, conventionally attractive people who are often white, and especially emphasize a gender makeup of one heterosexual man with two bisexual or heteroflexible women. While there are certainly some very happy triads that fit this model, results from my Longitudinal Polyamorous Family Study indicate a very different pattern emerging.

One Man, Two Women

There are several reasons why the stereotype of one man with two women is widespread. First, men have more social power in general and influence in the media specifically, so men are the ones most likely to shape the media messages that create this stereotype. In the United States, many heterosexual men are fascinated by “girl on girl” pornography in which two (or more) conventionally attractive women perform sexual acts on each other for the enjoyment of the man who then enters near the end of the scene to have intercourse with one or both/all of the women.

This stereotype of the one man/two women triad comes in part from what polyamorous communities term unicorn hunting, in which an established female/male couple seeks a third partner to join their duo. Unicorn hunters almost always look for a bisexual or heteroflexible woman who does not have other partners, children, or serious connections that would interfere with her integrating into the couple’s life. Some of these couples also impose what polyamorists call the one penis policy in which the women are “allowed” to have sex with each other and “their” man, but not other men. If any of the women in a one penis policy relationship have sex with another man, they might be accused of cheating, while the man often has access to additional female partners. This leads to a common myth that CNM is sexist. Generally, unicorn hunters have few rules in place about nonbinary or transgender people and instead emphasize interactions among cisgender participants.

The one penis policy often means that the man is insecure about the openness of the relationship and the women are more likely to both be focused on him moreso than each other. Other FMF (female, male, female) triads have more permeable boundaries that include lovers of any gender, and still others are sexually exclusive or “closed” in a polyfidelitous relationship. FMF triads tend to be the most resilient when the women establish a deep intimacy with each other that is independent of their connections with the man.

Image: two men and one woman standing outside

Source: Brett Sayles/Pexels

One Woman, Two Men

Rather than the stereotypical one man with two women triad, my findings indicate that the most common and stable form of polyamorous triad among the parents in my research sample (primarily the youngest Baby Boomers and Gen X) is composed of a woman with two male partners. In contrast with the one penis policy common in some FMF throuples, these triads with two men and one woman very rarely have a "one vagina policy." Much more often, all members of the triad are able to date others of any gender they desire.

Frequently. the women in these triads either date sparingly or not at all, and the men often find additional partners outside of the triad. At their best, the men develop an intimate bond with each other outside of their connection to the woman. This bond between the metamours (the men who are each partnered with the woman but not in a sexual relationship with each other) is so important to the stability of these triads that I named them polyaffective relationships and identified that bond as the core of the stable polyamorous family or polycule.

Image: three people in a boat on the water

Source: Belle Isle State Park/Wikimedia commons

Nonbinary, Transgender, and Genderqueer Folx

Among the Millennials and Generation Z (a.k.a. Zoomers), the stereotypical one-man-with-two-women triad is less common for an additional reason. Not only do these younger people tend to have a less rigid power hierarchy associated with gender, but many of them also reject stereotypical gender completely.

These younger generations are far more gender diverse than their elders, with some people remaining in the gender category they were assigned at birth but expanding what it means to be a man or a woman, and others transitioning to a different gender, blending multiple genders, or rejecting the concept of gender completely.

When one or more of the members of the triad has disrupted these conventional gender expectations then the composition of the triad also shifts from stereotypical gender forms. Zoomers and Millennials are changing the face of gender, sexuality, relationships, and the associated power hierarchies that go with these complex and intertwined categories. In so doing, they have also largely reconstructed the stereotypical FMF polyamorous triad into something much more fluid.