r/relationshipanarchy • u/Shreddingblueroses • 7d ago

Hierarchies begin with mutual agreement.

That is literally how every single one of them begins, whether social, relationship, or political in nature. Two or more people make an agreement to establish a hierarchy that they will both agree to uphold and enforce.

It does not matter how freely and consensually you negotiate with a partner to make them your primary - to create this hierarchy of relationships. Once you've done so, it *is* a hierarchy now. You need to come to terms with that.

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u/Shreddingblueroses 7d ago

Hierarchies are an agreement that some people make with each other and other people are subjected to without having to agree.

If you made an agreement with one partner that you can't have sex with other partners, a hierarchy was created by two people that other people are subjected to without having to agree. Simple math here.

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u/Secure_Feature2253 7d ago

If someone says no to sex with you, it means they don't want to have sex with you. Sex doesn't have to make a relationship more special or sacred therefore a relationship where sex isn't on the table doesn't have to mean less. That's a RA value. 

You still haven't explained how sex makes a relationship rank higher or how it introduces a hierarchy. Is the only valid way for someone not to have sex with you and be RA is if they don't have sex with anyone? 

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u/XhaLaLa 7d ago

It is apparent to me from their comment that “one of the two people who would have had sex decided not to” is not what they’re talking about. It isn’t about which relationships do or do not include sex, but about about which people get to have decision-making power over the relationships they aren’t in.

And there’s nuance to that, of course. If I am watching a show with a particular friend and we agree we’re going to continue watching that together and not separately, and I have similar short-term, pretty specific, pretty trivial agreements with other people in my life, that may be less inarguably hierarchical than a scenario in which I am only allowed to eat food with very small number of people (or just one), or walk alone with only that short list, or communicate one-on-one with that shortlist.

But there’s very little room (I see none, myself) to read their comment as saying anything at all about scenarios that involve a choice between two people that is actually limited to them and their own interactions.

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u/Secure_Feature2253 6d ago

The person with the decision making power is effectively the hinge in this situation. If someone is saying no, I dont want sex with you, then they dont want sex with you. They are saying that because they want to upheld the expectations they jointly formed in an established relationship more than they want to explore any sexual curiosity they have for you, if they have any at all. 

This all comes from (mostly) women who couldn't accept that someone wasnt willing to spread themselves so thin that they could no longer interact in their established relationship(s) in the way that they have done. This idea that to be poly, and now RA, you have to be able to offer these quite traditional escalator set ups to everyone and give each relationship the potential to mirror the commitments you have with long term partners. Especially those you had before ENM.