Musings: What Kind of Black Man am I?: Failed Metaships and the Double Bind of Black Masculinity for African American Polyamorous Men

I. The Makings of a Failed Metaship

In the summer of 2019 I developed some amount of affection for a woman who had a boyfriend. Expressing her reluctance to exchange phone numbers, and out of respect for her monogamous romantic relationship, we opted to exchange social media handles.

In spite of what many may think, polyamorists are not predators praying upon the downfall or failure of one’s romantic relationship. As such, the social distance that could be maintained through occasional Instagram likes and story reactions was not only comfortable but also welcomed. For, at the time, I too was partnered with a woman who I deeply respected and loved.

I left the day party contented — overwhelmingly satisfied with the amount of social media handles I collected as this signaled audience growth for my online book club.

On the ride home, as we often do, me and the homie discussed the potential of each collected handle developing into more substantially intimate relations. This of course was accompanied by skeptical banter and the default expectation that nothing would come of any of these depthless connections. I was prepared for, … nothing.

II. The Meta that Got Away

Although there was energy of mutual interest and attraction in our initial connection, I didn’t expect anything to come of it. I thought she was, and still is, a very attractive woman. My own aesthetic merits, admittedly, are often far more difficult to find.

Be that as it may, the course of the relationship began as one might expect — the occasional “like”, heart eye emojis here and there, and the tastefully dropped comment for the whole world to see (well, at least the one that extends as far as our followings take it). Yet, after a few substantial DM conversations, numbers were exchanged and the depth of conversation and affinity grew.

We became friends. Indeed the kind of friends who would talk about anything — hair, popular culture, music, and our relationships (amongst other things). As intimacy deepened, I remained ever mindful of the fact that her relationship was monogamous both in name and deed. This was true even in light of the fact that she had expressed her partner’s interest in non-monogamous dating and relationships.

To my surprise, over the course of our friendship the idea occurred that perhaps her partner could benefit from conversing with me. “He is a Black man interested in non-monogamy” I speculate she thought, “and you Justin, are a Black polyamorous man who researches this stuff.”

I consented to a line of communication between he and I to be established. With my consent, came the cautionary warning that my role in providing information to him around non-monogamy and polyamory would not be the kind of information often found on HOTEP Instagrams that teach “Kings” to find their “queens”. I informed her that my own polyamorous politic is far more egalitarian than those spaces present.

From my vantage point, he and I hit it off from the very first conversation. We talked about love, monogamy, and non-monogamy, sure. But we also talked about fatherhood, sports, and the regions of the United States that we grew up in and what that was like. We talked about capitalism, capital, and resources. As time went on, months past and he and I kicked it a few times and forged would I took to be a genuine and authentic friendship.

To be clear, this was all very exciting to me; I hadn’t very easily made many new friends in adulthood that were Black men. I was vulnerable. We were vulnerable.

From this reciprocal vulnerability, I thought it important for us to not lose sight of the fact that I was attracted to the woman that was his partner. While simultaneously respecting the boundaries that they had set for their relationship, I made my intentions and attraction clear. I also made clear my rejection of OPP or “the one penis policy” in my non-monogamous relationships. My advocacy for the rejection of OPP is rooted in the suggestion made by Mimi Schippers in Beyond Monogamy. Schippers suggests that for cisgendered heterosexual polyamorous men, the rejection of OPP contains transformative potential for confronting various forms of control and possession — the same mechanisms that prop up the double standard that it is OK for men to have multiple partners but not for women.

One evening, the homie called me and informed me about his decision to end his relationship with his partner. In the very same conversation I was asked whether or not my affections for her had changed. I informed them that they had not; upon hearing this I was also informed that he was deciding to end our friendship due to discomfort around my affections for her.

Why the discomfort though? Why can’t we be friends and date the same woman? Why couldnt he be a supportive friend for me, in my pursuit of his (now former) relata, as I was for him?

For him, the answers to these questions were to be found in masculinity construction. What kind of man would remain friends with another man who wants to date, let alone have sex with his partner or former partner? As Black boys, we’re taught that when loyalty (to one’s friendship) and affections conflict, we are to always choose the former. Bro’s come before hoes, right?

III. The Double Bind of Black Masculinity

More than anything, my attempt to sustain a friendship and failure at establishing a “metaship” — the language polyamorists use to describe one’s partner’s partner — prompted me to think about what we might call the double bind of Black masculinity for African American polyamorous men. (I should note that while my comments are reserved for cisgendered heterosexual African American polyamorous men, they may have broader applicability outside of this context as well).

As I see it, the double bind looks something like this:

• On one hand African American Polyamorous men get lauded as “players” and “womanizers” who bask in the enjoyment of having multiple women while simultaneously disallowing the same freedom to their partners.
• On the other hand, African American polyamorous men who do make room for their partners to seek out other affections, particularly from other cisgendered heterosexual men, are somehow less of a man because of it.

These make for quite the polarity indeed. Regarding the first arm of the bind, I have dedicated an academic paper to the exploration of the denigrating affects that the label “player” has for African American polyamorous men — including becoming estranged from oneself and having ones agency restricted. That is, although the label of “player” may sometimes be used as a badge of honor amongst the most toxic of masculinities, when applied to African American Polyamory men the label falls short of upholding one’s sense of masculinity.

For many African American polyamorous men, the work to repudiate practices associated with “playing” and “womanizing” is a laborious task; one that should not be easily overlooked. Superimposing the label of player onto African American polyamorous men who have undertaken this endeavor is violent, as it denies us our closely held right to self definition. Agency is muzzled and bullied into silence.

It is the second arm of the bind that I find most troubling for our purposes here. In many a public forum, I have wondered out loudly, “What comes of my masculinity when I consent to my partners dating other men?” — only to be met with perspectives that quickly usher my consent to the mountain top of emasculation. Somehow I am made into less of a man each time the truth leaves my lips.

Straightforwardly I realize that this is much to do with possession and control. “I just don’t see how you can be okay with another guy fucking your girl!”, they’ve said. I am quick to remind others that my relata are not possessions of mine; nor are they mere objects for my consumption.

I recognize the comfort that might be afforded to insecure Black masculinities that seek to find a particular kind of assurance from romantic love. For Black men who are reminded at every corner of the society that they are not enough, unimportant, and possessors of life that don’t matter, the last thing they wish for inside of their intimate relationships is to be reminded of and have to confront the same insufficiency.

I often wonder how much of this has to do with what Tommy Curry calls “mimetic white patriarchy”. That is, the suppressed aspiration of Black males to achieve whiteness. How far gone must we be to seek solace from the lack of control of one’s own life in the tyrannical control of another’s?

While I think it important to lean into the thought of insufficiency qua partner, for we will never be able to meet all of our partners needs (thank goodness for their friends!), I should also note that our partner’s entertaining and/or pursuit of another man’s affections needn’t signal anything about us being insufficient qua person. The thought of insufficiency uncomfortably requires us to remind ourselves that we lack the kind of control that is so intimately tethered to power. I imagine this being absolutely terrifying for many Black men.

But how does this less of a man make?

We might be better served, as a collective, with views of masculinity that allow it a safe space for vulnerability surrounding this insufficiency. I am of the mind that this kind of vulnerability is indeed as transformative as Schippers suggests.

One finds deep irony in how we’re told to construct our masculinities around romantic relationships. In romantic love, as Tyree Summers mentioned on the Love Zone Podcast, “men are supposed to be protectors”. The virtue of bravery often goes unspoken about in the character of those who are protectors; afterall, protective cowards are oxymoronic at best.

I wonder, how much cowardice is present in the lives of those who unreflexively rely on monogamy, with all of its possession and control, as a functional tool for evading conversations about extrarelational relationships. How much of this reliance simultaneously shrinks the space for a radical courage?

Monogamous man needn’t be cowards prima facie. I am sure they are many monogamous men who exhibit courage in other facets of their lives; and perhaps even in all matters save for love. Still, far too often, do these very same man attack the masculinity of other men who have differing relational politics.

IV. What Kind of Black Man am I?

What kind of Black man am I, then? Trey Songz has taught me of the social capital that is associated with being “Mr. Steal Your Girl”, but is “Mr. Share Your Girl” one who is undeserving of the surname?

For polyamorous Black men, whose standing as patriarchs is always and already compromised by their Blackness, this double bind of masculinity represents an impossibility of being. We are both hypermanly and not man enough.

Here I offer no solutions for navigating the space. But instead I extend an invitation to Black men to think critically about how heteronormative love may squander our chances for black liberation.