Polyamory Enters the LGTBQIA+ Pantheon (This is Good)

In this Based Camp episode, Malcolm and Simone Collins dive into one of the most provocative cultural shifts happening today: the growing inclusion of polyamory as a protected sexual identity alongside the LGBT+ framework.

They explore:

* The historical “slippery slope” arguments from the gay rights movement (and how the left once fiercely rejected them)

* Why polyamory is now being mainstreamed in progressive spaces

* Biological, psychological, and cultural variance in monogamy vs. polyamory

* Striking parallels (and differences) between polyamory and same-sex attraction

* Why Malcolm now argues we should treat polyamory similarly to being gay — not as something to celebrate or condemn, but as a neutral biological/psychological variation

They also discuss family structure, reproductive fitness, leftist organizations like Black Lives Matter, legal changes in cities like Somerville and Cambridge, historical quotes from Dan Savage and Evan Wolfson, Catholic priests and lesbian nuns, biker culture in gay history, and much more.

A raw, nuance-heavy conversation that challenges both progressive orthodoxy and conservative reflexes. Expect tangents on everything from Mormon cuckoldry porn searches to ramp foraging and steak dinners.

Episode Transcript

Malcolm Collins: [00:00:00] Hello Simone. I’m excited to be here with you today. Today we’re gonna be talking about L-G-G-B-D-T-T-T-I-Q-Q-A-A-P-P

Which was used by the Canadian Teachers Federation materials as example, wait no

Simone Collins: wait.

That there wasn’t a joke.

Malcolm Collins: No, that’s not a joke. One. That’s a, that’s a real one.

Speaker 2: They provided $0 to deal with the ongoing genocide of M-M-I-W-G.

Malcolm Collins: I could go through it all, but I think it’s probably more interesting for me to just get to the point of all this, which is the recent and, and increasing inclusion of polyamory as a discriminated sexual identity within the whiter, urban monocultural, or progressive framework.

Simone Collins: Okay. That’s interesting. Yeah. That it’s like, I guess, well, it is. Some people frame it as [00:01:00] a sexual orientation, so. I guess then it belongs there.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah, well, I, I wanna talk about this, I wanna talk about it from a few angles. One, we are going to talk about it from the perspective of the early days of the gay rights movement.

Sorry, not even early days until around 2009, 2000, like 13. So, so up until like more recently the LGBT movement was fervent about the, this slippery slope argument on the right, that if we normalize. Same sex relationship today. We’ll be normalizing polyamorous relationships tomorrow. And they were very aggressive.

We’ll go over quotes and stuff. This is not the case. The movement will never turn into this.

Simone Collins: Wait, people actually said that. Really?

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. Yeah. Well, I mean, I always talk about, like, I remember when I was in school and I talk about my time in the GSA, the the Gay Straight Alliance. And I remember somebody being shouted out of the room because they suggested [00:02:00] that trans people may want to participate in sports of the gender they identify as.

And they were shouted out of the room because people said, that’s a far right slippery slope.

Simone Collins: You would ever do

Malcolm Collins: that argument. No one would ever do that. No one would ever argue that. You’d have to be crazy to think that. And oh, somebody would only present that as an idea in bad faith.

Simone Collins: Hmm.

Malcolm Collins: So they get shouted outta the room and I was like, Hmm, interesting.

Simone Collins: Indeed.

Malcolm Collins: So, I wanna go over it from that angle. I wanna go over it from a different angle as well, which is like, why is it culturally happening? Because I think it’s a, a shift in the way we see and think about sexual identities. Hmm. And finally, what I’m going to argue is I fundamentally think it’s a good thing, which is gonna surprise people

Simone Collins: to, to support it, to add it, to,

Malcolm Collins: to consider being polyamorous.

Mm-hmm. The same sort of lifestyle choice as being gay.

Simone Collins: Ah, [00:03:00] okay.

Malcolm Collins: And I’d actually say that I support it. Pretty much Exactly. As equally as I support being gay. Yeah, okay. Which is sort of like a, I wouldn’t advise it, but you know, if that’s what you’re gonna try, I am not gonna like, look down on you for it.

Right.

Yeah.

So what I mean by this, so people may wonder what I mean by this and why I think it is fundamentally a good thing. And I, and I actually do not think it is logically wrong now that we are identifying it as the same type of thing as being gay.

Simone Collins: Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: There is obviously a variance biological variance in both the desire somebody has for additional partners when they are in a long-term loving relationship.

And the jealousy they feel when, you know, partners take other partners or like their, their ability to handle this. Yeah. I, I, I’d go so far as to argue that in some cultures seep people, because, you know, cultures interact with biology. Right. And if you’re in a culture where people take [00:04:00] multiple wives for many generations you are going to develop unique predilections, psychological predilections that people in other cultures are unlikely to have.

A great example of this that we go over is cing is really common in the Mormon community and statistically more common in Mormon areas if you look at like porn searches. Wow. So why would this be the case? Well, if you are in a community where multiple. Partners is common, and you as a female get hugely turned off or hugely jealous when you see your partner sleeping with somebody else.

You are going to be a more difficult partner. You are going to work less well with your sister wives and you are going to have fewer surviving and successful offspring. Sure. Yeah. Because the sister wives aren’t gonna help them as much. Whereas, and then people can be like, well then why are guys into it?

And it’s like, well, you know, evolution didn’t have that long to work in these regions. And so if it makes girls into it, it’s gonna accidentally make some guys into it as well. Right. You know? And so, you know, the, the, the. [00:05:00] The, there’s likely a biological component to this as well, like, I’m just being clear here.

It’s the same with same sex attraction, right? Like same sex attraction likely has a, a, a, a biological component and is going to be more common in some cultures and more rewarded by some cultures than others in terms of its reproductive fitness. Interestingly, by normalizing same sex relationships, you make same sex arousal dramatically more genetically unfit.

So for example, in the West, historically.

Simone Collins: Oh, I get it. Because basically you’re allowing people who experience same sex arousal to like not end up in heterosexual marriages and then not have kids. Yeah. Okay. Okay.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. Historically in the, in, in Western society, I guess you’d say more broadly same-sex attraction really wasn’t that much a hit to your genes because most same-sex attracted people just got married anyway and had kids anyway, right?

It was the normalization [00:06:00] of same-sex attraction that sort of nuked this as a a, a genetic trait that you super, super, super do not wanna have. If, if your goal is passing on as many of your genes to future generations as possible, but to continue here. But as we’ve said in other streams, so, so what I’m pointing out here is there is variance biologically in how much somebody might be compatible with a polyamorous lifestyle, and there is variance both genetically and, and you know, epigenetically and psychologically in terms of events that happened to you as you’re raised that are going to affect same sex attraction, right?

So, both of these variances, I think are equally arguable to be outside of an individual’s control. So I don’t think a you know, like what gay people would say historically is, well, I was born this way, right? As, as if the poly person was not. Potentially also to an extent born that way. It might have been less of a clear [00:07:00] gradient in terms of the psychological proclivities and arousal pathways.

But they were born that way just as much as a gay person was born this way. Or the gay person will say, well, this is part of my identity. It’s like, well, you chose to make same sex attraction part of your identity. You don’t have to do that. As we’ve pointed out, like in different cultures, like in the Catholic tradition they disproportionately join the priesthood with 25 to 50% of Catholic priesthood.

Simone Collins: A huge difference between how you feel and what you make your identity.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. You, that, that, that is, and people are like, what? So they’re forced to go? It’s like, no, they choose it. You are the one who wants to force them to have same sex relationships. Right. The Catholic church is like, well, you can go and do that.

It is sinful, but like, we’re not gonna make it illegal. But I, I don’t think in any Catholic majority country is being gay illegal right now. But here is another option of a way to live your life. And I’d be willing to bet on psychological scores. Like if you look at because if you look at while gay men are, are generally psychologically healthier [00:08:00] than like bi people or lesbians.

Look at our problem of, of like bisexual people. We need to talk Oh yes. Way off the charts on everything sort of, they are less psychologically healthy than the regular population. I bet if you contrasted same sex attracted people who joined the Catholic church as priests versus who went into same sex relationships.

The ones who joined as priests are probably like much happier, have much greater senses of fulfillment and are likely have fewer psychological issues.

Simone Collins: I’d be shocked to learn that people who are same sex attracted and became priests call themselves same sex attracted.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. But there’s been studies done on it.

Like they’re aware of it. Really?

Simone Collins: Oh,

Malcolm Collins: yeah. Yeah. I, when I say it’s 25 to 50%, I’m citing like, multiple studies here. Like it’s, there’s an entire week of

Simone Collins: people who became priests. S That’s crazy. Okay. I, I guess I thought they wouldn’t wanna admit it. You know,

Malcolm Collins: no, like, it’s not a sin to be same-sex attracted.

It’s a to act

Simone Collins: on it

Malcolm Collins: if anything’s an additional challenge that you’re overcoming. Okay. In, in fact [00:09:00] God, this, this is a whole its own rabbit hood. It’s, it’s the Catholic world and same sex attraction. But same sex attracted nuns were so common that they. Played the dominant culturally shaping role of lesbian culture in the same way.

I think

Simone Collins: you did a whole episode on that actually.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. In the same way that in the gay community biker culture played the dominant role in the male gay communities cultural endpoint in the in, in lesbian culture, it was nuns. And it mostly happened after Vatican two, when they moved them closer to the cities and the nuns who previously just did their thing far off in private, in the convent or whatever.

Now were interacting with lay people more. In this particular context. And, and, and many of them would often deconvert and, and go into like the lesbian scene and, and, but they keep a lot of the you, you may notice that, that a lot of like lesbian wear of, of like the older wear where it deviates from [00:10:00] mainstream wear looks weirdly like religious wear.

And, and this is where that comes from.

And I haven’t done an episode fans, you had to let us know ‘cause I’m happy to do that episode. It’s, yeah,

Simone Collins: no, I’m trying to remember if you did. I, you and I have talked about it a lot. I can’t remember if you did one. So we should check.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah.

Simone Collins: I don’t, I don’t remember you talking about biker gangs.

This, this is news to me. So,

Malcolm Collins: wait, you were unaware that biker games were a dominant cultural force in gay culture in terms of do, do you look at the way that gays dress? Like the chaps with all the leather and the

Simone Collins: Yeah, I, I guess I thought that was just like a, a a more associated with like the bondage community and less with the

Malcolm Collins: No, the bondage community is downstream of the biker gang community.

Simone Collins: Oh my God. Wait,

Malcolm Collins: like they, the, the, that aesthetic didn’t come out of nowhere. It, it, it came directly from older, I, I wanna say like 1980s, 1970s biker culture.

Simone Collins: Okay. Anyway, putting it.

Malcolm Collins: If you’re age during that period, like, and you’re doing the [00:11:00] whole like driving around, sleeping around thing, you know, living, sort of itinerant living.

I mean, it’s a natural culture to fall into. Sorry, this, I guess on way too big of a tangent, but the point I’m making here is when a gay person says but they, the poly people are not like us, there really isn’t any truly discernible way that it is something fundamentally different. It is a, a arousal slash psychological profile pathway.

Yeah. That has biological and psychological variants that you can choose to identify with or not identify with. That affects lifestyle choices that you may make, which then have larger effects on you in society, like potentially being discriminated against or how other people see and perceive you.

So in that category, like while historically I would’ve just like in, immediately I point this out ‘cause. I you know, a lot of these are positions I would’ve found mortifying in the past. If you go to me five, 10 years ago, I would’ve just reflectively said, well, one’s a sexual orientation and the other is a life [00:12:00] choice, you know?

And it’s like, hmm, no. They both have biological and psychological roles and they both have a aspect of choice of them. But secondarily, the reason I think it’s really healthy to put them in the same category from a psychological perspective is obviously the first things that people are going to say is like, well, even if you have this additional biological drive to go out and sleep with other people, even when you’re in a a committed relationship, you don’t have to do that.

Mm-hmm.

Right? And it’s like, well, it’s the same, same sex attraction. Right? Or you could say, yeah. Well, it’s dramatically less optimal to structure for like legal reasons, et cetera, to structure a family. Like what if we normalize polyamory, then like a bunch of men aren’t gonna get wives, for example, right?

Like there’s a bunch of negative externalities to doing this, and it’s like. Yeah. But if you consider the point of marriage being producing the next generation, which is a cost that goes to the, the individual, [00:13:00] you know, the state’s not helping with that. Then there’s a dramatic negative externality towards normalizing gay and lesbian relationships, right?

So in in that case, it is very much the same type of a thing. And if you teach your kids that the two things are the same type of a thing I think that they will have an easier time sort of healthily framing it in their heads, right? It’s, it’s the type of thing that you don’t need to react to with like, woo, how could you ever do that?

Right? Like, I think attacking people in these communities really only serves to hurt the wider. We’ll, we’ll call it the saying part of the, the cultural movement or the conservative part as it’s began to be called. But like, we don’t win elections when we’re just like randomly reactively mean, or you know, overtly signal that we don’t approve of specific lifestyles.

That’s the left

Simone Collins: thing.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. That’s the less thing, right? Like stop acting like a leftist purity Mongol. Okay. We can just say, oh, that’s probably not the [00:14:00] most efficient way to achieve your particular goals. And it might be the most efficient way, right? Like, if you are same sex attracted and you’re a woman as Simone always points out, like you can really rack up babies, right?

If you do it with siblings sperm, because then you can have two people pregnant at the same time in a partnership. The problem is, is that lesbian relationships are just super unstable. And I wouldn’t, if I was a woman, I would be worried about having kids with another woman because okay. So. Guys, just us.

Okay? Nobody clip farming here, okay? But women like being in a relationship with a woman there’s challenges to that. Okay? You know, we all gotta make our sacrifices here. And you could look at any of our episodes where we talk about like lesbian dating statistics versus gay dating statistics to be like, gay relationships are just like across the board, like psychologically better than lesbian relationships.

The more women you put in a relationship, the more you know abuse, the more you know, [00:15:00] emotional issues, the more disvalue each partner feels. Le lesbians have always been the conservative movements like hidden. Got you on the left, like now, now you’ve got to live, married to women. It’s actually a common article type.

I, I don’t know if you’ve seen these articles of like leftist women who decide that they’re bisexual and then try dating women and are like, oh my God, this was a mistake. No, they’re like, I now understand what men were complaining about. Like,

Simone Collins: yeah, yeah,

Malcolm Collins: these, these people are jerks.

Simone Collins: Yeah. I only need to exist with my own mind to know how horrible it is.

I, I don’t know why women need to experience other women to discover it. They have to live with themselves every single day, but. Go figure, I guess,

Malcolm Collins: I, another interesting thing I point here when I talk about if you’re like, well, how much biological variance could there really be in relationships? Right?

And I think I’m probably a pretty good example of that in [00:16:00] our, because you know, we started out in leftist circles when we got married. We were fairly leftist when we got married. And as part of our, you know, to today relationship contract, we would technically be considered a polyamorous couple in that if I wanted to.

Well, Simone, I, I told Simone I, no, you’re not allowed to sleep with other people. I’m allowed to sleep with other people if I want to. Right. Which is the way it often works when you have a high value man in a thing and, and people would be like, oh, so you must be like sleeping, right. No. Like, I’ve, I, I don’t try to.

Right. And, and this is pretty obvious from the community, right? If you look at these other creators even you know, constantly. And their discords, they’re like flirting with their fans right now. There’s another few creators that have been canceled for hitting on fans or flirting on with fans or whatever.

And I assume especially the people who are like deeper in the base camp community and hang out on the Discord or were like active in the subreddit before it got shadow banned. I mean, [00:17:00] it’s still pretty fun, but it’s, you know, that I’ve like never once done something like that, even though I’m in a position where doing something like that would be trivial.

And the answer as to like, why is biology, right? Like when I am deeply psychologically attached to somebody like Simone I don’t feel a biological desire to go out there and search for something else. And, and, and it’s clear that, you know, some people don’t feel that way. And so I, I, I just wanna make like that, that biological variance clear because I’m sure that some of our fans probably are in long-term relationships, love their partner and they’re like, yeah, but if I had like a platform or something like that, I’d probably take advantage of it.

Simone, I assume you probably feel the same way. Would you like want to like sleep around if you could?

Simone Collins: No, definitely not. Definitely not. I mean, even [00:18:00] when. People who I liked in the past expressed interest in me in that way, I would have such a strong negative reaction that I would literally like burn stuff.

So

Malcolm Collins: yeah, she lit a love letter on fire in the sink.

Simone Collins: It well, and photos and other things. This has happened multiple times. Oh

Malcolm Collins: really?

Simone Collins: Yeah. Just

Malcolm Collins: somebody

Simone Collins: sent you

Malcolm Collins: photos.

Simone Collins: Yeah. I just, yeah, I just have a very strong negative reaction to sexual interest from others, and I always have. Then I met you and I was like, whoa, I’m gay from Malcolm.

But yeah, I mean, I, I don’t know if that’s like an emotional attraction or I’m just, I find everyone else so repulsive and you’re just the one exception. I don’t get it, but there it is.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. But I, I, I wanted to highlight that before we go further into this. Actually, let’s steal man this. In what way is being polyamorous fundamentally different from being gay?[00:19:00]

Simone Collins: Well, I mean, no,

Malcolm Collins: no, no, no, no. I mean, what, on what grounds could somebody legitimately say,

Simone Collins: oh yeah, I guess so they’re very similar in that to deny them basically means that you’re not sexually satisfied, but you could still make your life work.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah,

Simone Collins: they’re very similar in which in, in, in non, in, in most formats it means that you’re going to have lower fertility, though in some rare formats, your fertility can be significantly boosted.

Malcolm Collins: Well, and polyamory can be very eugenic for a population.

Simone Collins: Yeah. Well, and it can help you have a lot more kids depending on how you do it. Yeah. So, but, but that is, that puts you in the minority of polyamorous situations. So, yeah, I guess functionally, practically they’re quite similar for sure. And yeah, I guess they’re very similar too.

‘cause the people we know who identify as polyamorous, definitely they don’t frame it as like, this is my lifestyle preference. It’s more like, no, [00:20:00] like, this is how my sexuality works. Like it Yeah, definitely to them, it, it, it, it, it is no different from the kind of, of, of visceral reaction you see from the people we know who are gay.

So, yeah, I, you’re right, that’s a. Fair. I agree.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. And I, I think that this is also, you see, some women in like the conservative movement and we’ve had some like fans reach out or whatever, and they’re like, oh, I can’t speak to a man. I’ll speak to Simone. Right. But I’m a woman, I can’t talk to Malcolm.

Right. And I find this very interesting or like, Mike, whatever his name is what the last V could

Simone Collins: Oh, Mike Pence. Yeah. Yeah. Who has this family rule whereby you never have dinner alone with another woman.

Malcolm Collins: Right. And I’ve noticed some of our fans have been surprised that you allow me alone with other women so freely, like with like ala for example, like other women who are sexual and known for being sexual.

Right. [00:21:00] And that you’ve never really had any concerns about that.

Simone Collins: I mean, if you’re Yeah, I, yeah, I’m well. I don’t know. I feel like a, a great default. If you really have faith in your marriage agreement or your commitment to each other, then you will have absolutely no rules because it’s, it’s that strong.

I feel when people ha have so little faith in each other or themselves that they do not feel they can be alone with another person, aside from their spouse of the opposite gender, they won’t be able to stop themselves to control themselves. I mean, is the marriage really that strong or,

Malcolm Collins: well, I mean, I, I can appreciate that.

Look, if, basically the point I’m making here is. It is not a big moral victory for me to not be cheating on you or not be hitting on fans because I just don’t have a desire to do that. Whereas for other people, they need to build more [00:22:00] structure into their lives to achieve that end. And, and both of those are, are viable pathways.

It just depends on how you happen to be built.

Simone Collins: I guess. I understand it, but also like, if that’s the case, I guess. Yeah, it, it, it does make sense. I guess it’s, it’s like, if I put it in an analogous situation of this person has a lot of trouble with food and if they’re around carbs, like they will just, if there’s a loaf of bread around them, they’ll just eat the whole loaf of bread.

If there’s ice cream in the freezer, they will eat the ice cream. Maybe that Mike Pence rule is more along the lines of, we just don’t keep ice cream in the freezer because if it’s there, he’s gonna eat the ice cream. And I, we, he doesn’t want to eat the ice cream. He’s gonna feel bad after it. I don’t want him to eat the ice cream.

It’s gonna, you know, he’s, he’s got heart problems or whatever. Like he’s, he’s overweight, but like, let’s not do this. Let’s just not bring in the temptation. And I guess that’s kind of like, a lot of sexual orientations or arousal pathways, like [00:23:00] you understand it’s a temptation and you may decide that indulging in that interest or temptation or arousal pathway is just not in your practical best

interest.

Malcolm Collins: Oh, this is such a fascinating meta point. Okay. So before I found out about naltrexone and, and got drinking under control at a normal point. Yeah. There were multiple ways I regulated my drinking and they were all around access. Totally. I would only go out and buy single beers for

Simone Collins: beer,

Malcolm Collins: right?

Simone Collins: Yes, yes, yes.

You

Malcolm Collins: don’t drink a ton, but I had

Simone Collins: to, you would, you would buy the largest like single drink container you could.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. You could buy some big beers.

Simone Collins: What was it? Was it a Macedonian leader who was like, told you could only have one glass of wine a day? So he got,

Malcolm Collins: I wanna say genis or something, or kt

Simone Collins: think he got like a bucket or something.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. So he had a giant goblet made, you know, or was one glass a day? No, but this is, this is what they’re talking about. Was that right? Like they’re [00:24:00] trying to restrict their access to this sort of stuff. And, and I have done that myself in the areas where I have genetic weakness. Right. Fortunately you know, cheating on my partner a bunch is not one of those areas.

But anyways, so, I, was I gonna say, but for other creators or people with communities dedicated to them having something like a Discord server that’s just there to like, talk about ideas that you’ve had

Simone Collins: is like being a binge eater with a fridge full of cake.

Malcolm Collins: Yes. Don’t

Simone Collins: refrigerate your cakes guys, by the

Malcolm Collins: way.

Sorry. A fridge full of cake. And they’re really the only things that they can do is make rules for themselves. Yeah. Like I don’t get sign on the discord after I’ve been drinking. I don’t sign on the discord after I’ve And people who are on the discord. No, I have been on the RD after I’ve been drinking.

Right. Like,

Simone Collins: oh no,

Malcolm Collins: what?

Simone Collins: Okay.

Malcolm Collins: I, I, I say stuff and delete it, but it’s generally stuff that’s just like, about my life that I’m not supposed to share or [00:25:00] something. But yeah. The, the, I I do not you know, creep in those, those moments.

Simone Collins: You’re not squeezing on women.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. But, but again, I like the drinking thing because I’m not above this biological impulse.

Simone Collins: Sure, yeah. But the

Malcolm Collins: reason,

Simone Collins: I guess there are areas where you know that if there’s availability, you won’t

Malcolm Collins: be able to help yourself without chemical control. I cannot control myself. But where this gets really interesting is the meta point here which is around, because some people didn’t understand why I just do not care about online pornography, right?

Like, um mm-hmm. Especially anything that’s drawn or AI created, like if a real woman is involved, like obviously there’s negative moral externality to that. Yeah. But if it’s just an arousing image, right? Or an arousing AI story that we just generated is our fab, right? People are like, why doesn’t he care about this stuff?

Is maybe he’s trying to like do you know, like fat women telling other women you look great. You know, so that they get fat too, right?

Simone Collins: Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: And, you know, like just trying to [00:26:00] sabotage like genetic competition. And I, I realized when they said that why our framings on this particular topic are so different.

If you are a guy who really struggles because there access to that stuff is out there you’re gonna want to create at least for yourself, extremely strict rules around it. And then you look at a position of someone like me who just doesn’t feel that, that that particular struggle at a huge level I am gonna be like, yeah, whatever.

Because the people who are overly struggling with that are eventually gonna be cold from the gene pool, right? Like, yeah. Give given, given how easy it is to access erotic material these days. And any. Strict rule around it, never being exposed to that stuff is going to disc correlate with being online.

Right. And, and unfortunately being online slash [00:27:00] involved with AI slash involved in technology, all of the things that generate that stuff magically is extremely tightly correlated with are your descendants going to matter?

Simone Collins: Yeah. Are they gonna get off planet or not? Yes.

Malcolm Collins: Technology, everything like that.

Right. It’s, but it’s a, it’s a rather cruel view for me to have, right. To just be like, oh, well you’re cooked if that stuff is a particularly big challenge for you. Right. Yeah.

Simone Collins: But it is also in line with our general philosophical belief. I mean, if you’re going to be cold, you’re cu If you are not predestined to matter, that’s a tough roll of the dice.

But that’s just how it is.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. And, and, and, and note here, what I mean by this is not a person who looks at corn once a day or plays around with an erotic AI storyteller is cold. I’m talking about the person who does that for nine hours every day. Right. If, if you’re, if you’re a person and this stuff is taking up 15 minutes of your time, 30 minutes of your time a [00:28:00] day it’s, it, it’s no more damaging to you than video games are.

Probably less. And, and, and just as masturbatory in terms of like time output, what I’m really talking about when I’m talking about the people who are cult or the people who just absolutely spiral out the moment they get access to this.

Simone Collins: Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: And there’s people like that who spiral out at the moment, they get access to video games, right?

Like, there’s different ways that the world around us can call us.

Simone Collins: Oh, yeah. No, we, we all know. I mean, okay, we’re, we’re old, you know, we’re, we’re millennials, but I think we all know people who. Disappeared during college due to Wow. You know?

Malcolm Collins: Yeah.

Simone Collins: There was at least one in every dorm floor who was lost.

Malcolm Collins: That would’ve happened to Asma Gold had he not gotten famous.

Right. You know, like,

Simone Collins: yeah. He was one of the few who, who went all the way through. He, like Dante, he passed through through hell and then just came through the sphincter. That is, that is him.

Malcolm Collins: Unfortunately, blizzard made it less addictive by making it terrible. So, you know,

Simone Collins: that helps.

Malcolm Collins: Nobody plays anymore.

But anyway, what I wanna go into now before is, is people say, [00:29:00] well, is the left really pushing this as a mainstream thing? So here’s part of the Black Lives Ladder mission statement. I think a fairly mainstream leftist organization, we disrupt the Western prescribed nuclear family structure requirement by supporting each other as extended families and villages that collectively care for one another, especially our children.

To the degree that mothers parents and children are comfortable basically saying they want to disintermediate the nuclear family and that means polyamory. That’s basically what they’re saying, right? Like they believe in,

Simone Collins: if I’m gonna steelman it, that could also be the corporate family, this extended family networking community that cares for each other and is a more sustainable and more historically accurate form of the family unit.

Yeah,

Malcolm Collins: potentially. I mean, I, I, I’ll, I’ll agree with your steelman to

Simone Collins: it. You’ll allow it. You’ll

Malcolm Collins: allow it. But now I want to, before we talk about, anybody knows leftists have fully incorporated polyamory as like a main part of [00:30:00] the urban monocultures project, right?

Simone Collins: Oh, you gonna, you gonna Lindsay West this or what?

Malcolm Collins: No, I wanted to go through what people used to say about polyamory first.

Simone Collins: Oh. Well, I mean, keep in mind as much as, as, as people act like it’s been around forever, it really hasn’t. I mean, it, it was referred to as my father reminds me ad naum that it was, it was free love back then in the eighties. It wasn’t polyamory.

I think that polyamory first emerged with the book, the Ethical Slut, really? Right. In terms of popular

Malcolm Collins: problem. No, there I had a, a longer timeline that actually quit, but the word emerged in the 1980s.

Simone Collins: Well, not according to my dad.

Malcolm Collins: Well, I mean, well I said emerged. Coined for the very first time in the 1980s, right?

Yeah. Like,

Simone Collins: yeah.

Malcolm Collins: It takes a while to get around and for everyone to agree that this is what we’re calling the thing.

Simone Collins: Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: But the timeline I wanted to go through was things like let’s start with Evan Wilson. This is the founder and [00:31:00] president of Freedom to Marry and the lead architect of the National Marriage Equality Campaign.

So a 2009 quote from him. Right.

Okay.

The right wing would love nothing more than for us to spend all of our air time discussing distractions such as polygamy, bestiality, and other, from their point of view, doomsday scenarios rather than engage in the public about committing the same sex couples being discriminated against.

So you could see here they’re already like. This isn’t the point. This is a, a, a relevant slippery slope argument. Okay. Dan Savage said, oh.

Simone Collins: Dan Savage. Alright. Alright,

Malcolm Collins: Dan. Dan Savage. Polyamory is not a sexual orientation. It’s not something you are, it is something you do and this is really fascinating, but it could be something you are, it depends on how you self-identify same attraction.

Well,

Simone Collins: yeah, he seems like such a, I mean, he’s, you know, famously sex positive and, and pretty based and pragmatic about sexuality, so this is, that’s actually quite [00:32:00] surprising. I didn’t expect him to be cited to sing something like that.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. Bisexuality Poly podcast writing in gay publication 2006.

This is a Michigan LGBT newspaper. I’ve been greatly disappointed at how the leaders of the same-sex marriage movement have distanced themselves from polyamorous. Though we are equally vilified by our mutual opposition, our existence in an incon is an inconvenience because we belie there assertion that there is no slippery slope.

The author, a poly activist, explicitly called out mainstream same-sex marriage leaders for deliberately distancing the movement from poly people to maintain the no slippery slope argument against the conservatives. So even while they’re making this argument, people in their own camp are like, okay, but we’re actually gonna eventually fight for that right now on where, and, and, and by the way, during the, ogre 2015 [00:33:00] case conservative justices, Roberta Scalia and Anatolio raised a slippery slope to polygamy argument in dissent LGBT organizations and advocates responded by rejecting any equivalence. So that’s fascinating. So now let’s look at the legal stance of poli polyamory right as it has gained more acceptance in society.

Sorry, I needed,

Simone Collins: you’ve got the brain wiggles.

Malcolm Collins: No break today.

Simone Collins: Oh, Malcolm,

do you want me to just you, you, you can, I guess you don’t wanna go to sleep after this, but

Malcolm Collins: I’ve gotta edit the episode for tomorrow. Mm.

Simone Collins: Maybe you can kind of train me in your preferred editing methods, and I can try to do this for you more. But do you want me to bring you dinner to your room so you can go to bed earlier?

Malcolm Collins: I’ll come down. It’s not gonna help that much.

Simone Collins: Okay. Do you want it earlier or later? Like, do you want a nap right away?

Malcolm Collins: Earlier, because if I nap now, then I won’t, I’ll get to sleep extra late so I, I never nap at night.

Simone Collins: Okay. Then I will, I’ll just do your dinner [00:34:00] first and let the kids play outside. And then do theirs next.

I,

Malcolm Collins: but agents can fully code now, guys.

Simone Collins: Yes, they can.

Malcolm Collins: You’re on PC and Chrome,

Simone Collins: Or a Mac, right? I mean, it’s just the Well, you’re on model.

Malcolm Collins: We, we haven’t tested all of the bridge stuff yet. I’d love it if you did test the bridge architecture with the apps Simonon. Okay. On your map. So yeah,

Simone Collins: I’ll mark that as my task for tomorrow

Malcolm Collins: 2011. Oh, sorry. The bridge. We have a bridge app you need to download, so like, it won’t work on phones, but it allows it to do stuff like run programs on your computer. Mm-hmm. In 2011, legal scholar Ann Tweedy publishes polyamory as a sexual orientation, arguing it could qualify for protected status. So 2011 was the first time somebody said, sort of legally, academically, we could fight for polyamory in the same way we fight for gays.

Simone Collins: But that was [00:35:00] pretty late. 2011 was, you know, that’s a long time after the 1980s when this concept first emerged.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. And then in 2015 during the Ogre Feld verse Hodges Supreme Court decision, it was widely said no. Like polyamory is never gonna be on a table as part of this movement mid 2010s growing media, academic discussion of polyamory in queer spaces, quote unquote EEG querying polyamory, but no major push for it yet.

Fall 2020. Polyamory Legal Advocacy Coalition or plac forms a coalition of lawyers, psychologists, and academics, including Harvard Law School LGBTQ plus advocacy clinic. Its mission explicitly includes ending discrimination based on relationship structure, seeing legal re recognition for multiple partner families.

And after that, they rapidly began winning it. The. Massachusetts Somerville became the first US city to pass a [00:36:00] multi-partner domestic partnership ordinance. Whoa.

Simone Collins: Okay.

Malcolm Collins: So you

Simone Collins: can that they would that sounds about right.

Malcolm Collins: Right. Then March, 2021, Cambridge, Massachusetts passes a similar ordinance. March, 2023 summer mill is the first US municipality to pass a non-discrimination ordinance related to family structure and relationship structure, explicitly carving out fault, the polyamorous families 2024 Berkeley and, and ca pass ordinances, adding family relationship structure as a protected class 2025 to 2026.

A wave of similar efforts on the West Coast. Examples include West Hollywood, Los Angeles areas. Finally, this anti-discrimination protection. Of polyamorous couples at Portland, Oregon, Olympia, Washington, Washington, et cetera. So you can see this is, this has become mainstream in, in leftist circles.

Mm-hmm.

And I think that’s good [00:37:00] because I want to teach my children about these temptations as a bundle. Both to de-stigmatize the allure of, oh, this is different. But also to de-stigmatize, oh, you’re horrible if you feel this. You know, some people just feel this way. It’s up to you whether you think that it will improve your quality of life to act on those feelings.

Mm-hmm.

And whether or not you can act on a feeling is in part downstream of your addictive qualities. Right. Like, how much is it’s just going to eat your life the moment you engage in it once.

Simone Collins: Yeah. Quick aside, like what’s the difference between being polyamorous and being a dude? Like, don’t, most guys like, wouldn’t the majority of men if given the option, prefer a marriage in which they were allowed to have as many partners as they wanted?

Malcolm Collins: I mean, I’m in a marriage like that, right. And yeah.

Simone Collins: Well, and I think most men, [00:38:00] and, and I will be clear, we have close friends who are female and polyamorous. I’m not saying it’s like majority a male thing, but like, isn’t the majority of men just, you know. Just Polly and I, part of the reason why I think there’s been so much reticence about,

Malcolm Collins: no, that’s one of the points I’ve been making is I think young men believe this because they haven’t been in a long-term committed relationship with kids.

If you asked me this when I was younger, I would say yes. Okay. ‘cause younger I felt that way. Now that I have five effing kids, I don’t feel that way, right? Mm-hmm. That I’m around a lot, and I mean, biologically, that makes sense. Am I in just sort of like, oh, I’m in an environment where women are casually breeding with me, then I should breed as many of them as possible, right?

Like historically, that makes sense, right? Mm-hmm. However, historically it also makes sense. Oh, I have a committed partner in five children. Yeah. I probably am just gonna make things worse for myself if I start seeking out other partners.

Simone Collins: Mm-hmm. [00:39:00] So you think that human biology basically has a. I don’t know, a tendency to kind of lean into whatever seems to be working well.

Malcolm Collins: Well, yeah. From a reproductive fitness perspective yeah. And it, it, it probably has various gauges for determining what’s working well. Mm-hmm. I mean, there’s a reason why I think people who might be in long-term committed relationships, but don’t have kids still see polyamory as a desirable lifestyle.

What I’ve noticed is my friends who are polyamorous and have kids generally stop yeah.

That’re

Simone Collins: right, even

Malcolm Collins: who are very aggressive promoters of polyamory. Once they get a few squids around, they’re like, mm-hmm. Don’t want that anymore.

Simone Collins: That’s reduce. I mean, I think also that like the presence of young kids is it kind of busts sex drive.

I think this is one of the reasons also why wet nurses were so popular in the [00:40:00] past. Because it was kind of understood that if you had, if you were in close contact with kids, like there would probably be less sex. That I think that that reduces interest. Yeah, that makes sense. So, you know, like send away the kids, send them to the farm with the woman, with the, the, the novels and it will all be fine.

I don’t know. Humans be weird.

Malcolm Collins: Humans be weird. I am all for this trend. I love that progressives are eating this pill themselves. Let them eat it. Right? This is where we need progressive society to go. You know, the, the, well, I mean

Simone Collins: I’m, I’m very interested in like this, this ultra high fertility subsets of gay, lesbian and polyamorous cultures that end up surviving.

Like the lesbians who actually do like, let’s double up pregnancies and like spam children and the gays who like develop the artificial wombs.

Malcolm Collins: It will be interesting to see I, I, I cannot comment. I mean, look, if guys are like, well, you know. Gay relationships are always going to be inefficient for X, Y, and Z.

I’m like, [00:41:00] but you know, hold on, like, check this out. Right? What if we could like engineer people to be gay? Right? And you know, birthing was all done through pods or something like that, right? Like, and then we didn’t need women anymore. Wouldn’t society be like, dramatically more efficient? Like just think about voting maps of like, if only men voted versus if only women voted right?

Like, we’re cooked because women are putting their thumb on the scale of civilization. Right?

Simone Collins: I mean, it would be interesting to see, I really would love to see natural experiments of, you know, this is a place that is like, you know, only, only female run and occupied and other spaces that are only male owned and occupied and run.

And you, you had that a little bit. In mining towns, like early Telluride for example, was probably 95% were super efficient in early Telluride. I know, I know. So maybe you had it a little bit then. But they were too small, too [00:42:00] isolated and too early for us to really use that for like that much four chan for Chan versus, but Tumblr was also massively influential.

That’s what you know, so I don’t know if that’s a great example.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. Massively influential on groups. That became very inefficient. The groups that Fortune ended up influencing became very culturally dominant.

Simone Collins: Yeah, fair enough. Well, I love you very much. I love you too. And I’ll make you steak with forage ramp butter for dinner.

Malcolm Collins: Yes. You’ve been foraging ramps in the local park and making ramp butter to eat with steak.

Simone Collins: I’m no, no.

Malcolm Collins: And do not forget to toast the Hawaiian buns with butter on it.

Simone Collins: Yeah. Well, I mean, I figure you want me to just toast them and give you softened ramp butter to put on them?

Malcolm Collins: No. I would toast them with the butter,

Simone Collins: with ramped butter on them and melt it into

Malcolm Collins: them.

Yeah. Yeah. Don’t you typically toast buns with butter?

Simone Collins: Yeah, but plain butter, I don’t know how the ramps are gonna toast.

Malcolm Collins: You could always have more ramps. They’re [00:43:00] no such thing as too much ramps, Simone.

Simone Collins: Okay. Sure. I mean, I’ll, I’ll toast it with the ramp butter on it then.

Malcolm Collins: I mean, I like eating ramps raw, so like, obviously people don’t know.

It’s a, it’s a, this is ramp season in, in Pennsylvania. If you’re on the northeast coast of the United States. And you are not harvesting ramps this season. You need to

Simone Collins: Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: What’s wrong

Simone Collins: with you?

Malcolm Collins: Yeah, what’s wrong with you? Don’t, you know, the new hipster thing is to,

Simone Collins: to forge the

Malcolm Collins: ramps.

Simone Collins: Yeah. It just, it, it’s just, it’s, they’re just there like we’re, we’re out there like, you know, digging them up and people are just walking by, like whatever.

Same with wine berries. They’re just there to, to take. Yeah. Do you know how much people pay for these in stores and they’re just there?

Speaker 4: See this? I got this selling corn comes out of the f*****g ground. I couldn’t believe it.

You see that it’s made of chicken. [00:44:00] It’s actually made of chicken. You kill it, you’ve got free chicken. You can sell it to people or don’t kill it. F*****g eggs come out their asses F*****g al.

Simone Collins: I don’t get it. We’re, we’re doomed. Society’s, doomed

Malcolm Collins: society. The, the wine berries one is really crazy. ‘cause these are like really tasty raspberry variants.

Simone Collins: Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: They’re all over where we live.

And the other people here, it’s like they do not see them. They will walk by a bush.

Simone Collins: Yeah. Like literally, like the paths are, are just lined with them, overflowing with these berries.

Malcolm Collins: And my guess is it’s just ‘cause so many people who live here are Indian immigrants they, they don’t know about them or they have a different culture around foraging.

I mean, keep in mind our ancestors,

Simone Collins: I know I, I watch white people walk by way more than like the immigrant population in this area. And when, like for example some of our Indian neighbors walk by. As we were and we’re like, it’s Ramsey. And they’re like, oh yeah, no, it’s great. Like they, they know,

Malcolm Collins: oh, they know

Simone Collins: it’s Ramey Good food, Indians, no [00:45:00] good food.

Don’t you even but it, it’s, I I I blame the white people. I don’t know what I, I mean, I don’t even know where ramps are native to the wine. Berries are Japanese invasive species, so

Malcolm Collins: there’s so much better than raspberries, though. The local, they’re cult bar of raspberries are not nearly as tasty as the wineries.

Simone Collins: I know, I know. It’s a, a true fact. I don’t know what to say.

Malcolm Collins: Anyway I love talking to you. I hope our fans have a spectacular day. Don’t forget to like, subscribe, try our fab. The new agent feature is pretty good.

Simone Collins: Oh yeah. And if you want over. I think it’s over 80 now. Certainly over 70 bonus episodes.

Or a new episode every weekend. Today. In addition to what you get during weekdays, this is why I’m so, you can become a paid subscriber on Substack and Patreon. And yeah, buy this man a nap, please. Someone

Malcolm Collins: freaking hate you.

Simone Collins: I love you much.

Malcolm Collins: I love you. I, I don’t think we’re gonna do two episodes today.

I’m just too tired. I’m not, I’m not on my game. I’m sorry. I needed to take a nap today [00:46:00] and I just haven’t had the time. I

Simone Collins: know, I know. Okay. Well, I’ll go make you dinner now. Maybe you can go to bed crazy early. You want to do that?

Malcolm Collins: I’d love to try that.

Simone Collins: All right, let’s do it. It’s on I’ll go down now.

I love you.

Malcolm Collins: By the way, what do you think now? Do you agree with my take on the polyamory thing like that? It, we should see it as the same as being gay, same type of thing?

Simone Collins: Yeah. It, yeah, it’s, it’s a very strong, probably, you know, biologically built based, like inbuilt preference for how you conduct your sexuality. So, yeah. I, it makes sense to me.

Malcolm Collins: All right. Well, I love you to death alone. You are a wonderful woman, and thank you for your time. Somebody in the comment said that you are so elegant as a wife and they just do not see elegant well, like, well thought through sane women talking about things.

Simone Collins: That’s very kind.

Malcolm Collins: If you, if you want other good, conservative married couples, [00:47:00] I mean, they don’t call themselves conservatives, all of them, but they freaking are. Mm-hmm. Clownfish TV is pretty good and daring is pretty good. Just,

Simone Collins: yeah, there’s, there’s a decent number of, I mean, I, you, you know, I also watch very leftist couples Fun

Malcolm Collins: Fridays.

You

Simone Collins: Lie Love Funny Fridays, I love Bundy. Fridays. I love what are they? The, the ex-Mormon couple that talks about, they’re not a

Malcolm Collins: couple.

Simone Collins: No, you’re thinking self on a shelf. I’m thinking about they both have long blonde hair.

Malcolm Collins: I don’t know who you’re talking about.

Simone Collins: Yeah. I’m so sorry. I forgot their names.

There’s, there’s a lot of, there’s a lot of cute couples out there. Of course we’ve got, you know, the Neman, the ballerina farm family,

Malcolm Collins: which

Simone Collins: I love. Yes. I love, I love to watch them because they’re nerdy. The the God, the husband’s name, I, I always forget his, his name. And I’m so sorry, but like his Instagram handle is literally hog fathering that he just wanted to have a pig farm.

You know, here he is the, you know, the Scion of the jet flu empire. He [00:48:00] just wants his pig pig farm. And he is like really stoked and like all of his Instagram reels are like, look at my cows, look at my pigs, look at my kids. And like, he just loves his life and he is nerdy about it. And they got like a Roomba.

For their, their cow area. And it like moves the poop around and it’s cute. And he’s just like, look at this. It’s so cool. Look, here’s a new baby cow. And you know, just, I love, yeah, it’s, it’s cute when couples

Malcolm Collins: find their thing. You’re such a nerd, Simone, that you watch this stuff on TikTok or wherever you’re

Simone Collins: not on TikTok.

Oh, no, no, no, no.

Malcolm Collins: I love you.

Simone Collins: Only the Insta. I love you too. Bye.

Malcolm Collins: Pray for steak ramp steak

Simone Collins: ramp steak ramp Steak

Malcolm Collins: River extra ramps this time. And feel free to use the whole ramp in these ones, not just the leaves.

Simone Collins: Are you sure?

Malcolm Collins: Oh yeah. It’ll, it’ll, and all

Simone Collins: wrap out recipes. It really, you know,

Malcolm Collins: it says only the leaves.

Simone Collins: Mm-hmm.

Malcolm Collins: Well, it’ll create a stronger flavor. And I felt that the flavor was a little weak was the last one you made. I would do like three x, but I think with the leaves you [00:49:00] can do two x and I mean with the roots. Okay. Save the roots for another day. ‘cause I like the roots on the own a lot too. You know?

And we can do Bullock tomorrow.

Simone Collins: Let’s do that. I wanna ma, I wanna stretch ‘em out. Got my hands dirty for that. Okay. Bye.

Malcolm Collins: Dig through the dirt like a dog,

Simone Collins: like some kind of their husband. Yeah. Animal

Malcolm Collins: dressed in your traditional outfit. It looks so cute. With all the kids around basket. Yeah.

Simone Collins: Like what are you doing? Okay.

Malcolm Collins: You know, he

Simone Collins: ever really off TV just spontaneously while studying today. It’s like, I love Daddy just randomly says things like that. Well, toasty so sweet too. He’ll just, has he ever just sitting next to you or something, been like, daddy, I kind of love you. He doesn’t [00:50:00] say I love you. I mean, he’ll say that too, but he often is just like, oh, you’re muted.

Malcolm Collins: Yes. So, Tosi does say that to me all the time. The, I love you from toasts. Sweet. That’s it. Sweet.

Simone Collins: Or, I kind of love you. I kind of love you.

Malcolm Collins: I was thinking of a very interesting idea that I’m gonna bake into a full episode.

But I want your thoughts so you can, you can gimme your thoughts. Trump derangement syndrome, like what? Actually causes it.

Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: With a focus on, I’ve noticed some people who are otherwise fairly right wing get Trump derangement syndrome. And a lot of the theories I have around Trump derangement syndrome focus on why do left wingers get Trump derangement syndrome.

Simone Collins: Yeah. But not why, why are people on the right getting it right?

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. I was just sort of thinking from the comments of short fat o taco on our last video where it’s very clear like he, he was unable to see positive things Trump had done.

Simone Collins: But you said, well, I, sorry. What he said was, I’ve always been a leftist.

I was [00:51:00] never on the right. So.

Malcolm Collins: Okay. I’ve, I mean, I guess, sort of it felt like he was part of the wider community that was moving to the right in his ideology. Mm. He just never, I guess, well, actually what I realized about him, and I might even do a, a full video on this ‘cause it’s really interesting.

Is he was really proud of the fact that he hadn’t updated any of his views as new information had come out. And, and things had changed. And like, like my positions are always the same, and I’m like, well, that’s not like something to brag about, right? Like I’m, I’m proud that as I got new information my worldview and perspective changed on things like trans issues, religion and immigration.

I used to be pro immigration, but that’s

Simone Collins: in the game of political opposition that’s frequently framed as flip-flopping and considered a dangerous thing to do, which of course is crazy. I mean, and in our intellectuals circles or whatever, people talk about it like, this is great, you know? Oh, strong convictions loosely held, they like to say.

So it’s seen as [00:52:00] this big virtue signaler in certain circles, but I think in the mainstream. World changing. Your view is considered to be flip-flopping and bad.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. And that he is somebody who is very interesting, almost like anthropologically. Interesting because his innate world perspective was literally just what was trendy for progressives to believe in the nineties.

And a lot of that group, like that group basically went in two directions. Like one group went the woke direction, which is how can I use this to like dunk on X, Y, and z outgroups. And then the other group just kept true seeking and updated their views as they gained access to new information. Right.

Yeah. And he’s this like weird third path of like, and after that, I just never had a new idea again. Which is interesting.

Simone Collins: Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: I will get started here. [00:53:00] Mm-hmm.

Speaker 5: But where is the lock?

Speaker 6: It’s in the block. It’s in the one block here. What do you think? And.

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