On a recent episode of “Red Table Talk,”  Willow Smith came out as polyamorous. Asked how she felt about it, her mother, Jada Pinkett Smith said “I think anything goes as long as intentions are clear.”

When Willow’s grandmother (Adrienne Banfield-Norris) asked what it offers, Willow  avoided the question, asking if she’d ever loved the people in a group all the same. Gammy quickly replied with an unequivocal, “No.” Rather than explore the issue further, Willow shut down the conversation. But that dialogue needs to continue.

Polyamory Defined

Dictionary.com defines polyamory as “the practice or condition of participating simultaneously in more than one serious romantic or sexual relationship with the knowledge and consent of all partners.” While Willow claimed to be the least sexual of her friends, she understands her partners’ needs. If a romantic interest wants more sex, shouldn’t that individual get their needs met? 

Sound reasonable? It’s not. The practice turns sex into a commodity, demeans women, and prevents women and men from finding intimacy.

Polyamory Problems

As a young woman in love with a Norwegian navigator, one night I tried to convince myself it wouldn’t matter if he had other women while working on a cruise ship. After eight months at sea, he’d be coming home to me. But that meant a denial of reality. If someone else shared his bed, I couldn’t help but wonder. Was she prettier? More fun? More intriguing? What about when he didn’t want to come home to me, but went to her instead? I’d be the one left devastated.

With mom and gammy agreeing, Willow stated that any jealousy was her problem and meant she needed to work on herself. Perhaps that’s true, yet what self-respecting woman wants another woman satisfying her man? Polyamory goes beyond the bounds of jealousy to the reality of trust. That lifestyle choice undermines the foundational security of a relationship. But when sex becomes a commodity rather than an intimate connection perhaps that sense of security doesn’t matter either.

Polyamory Reality

For young women who aren’t enamored with sex, polyamory seems a convenient option. Yet the reality is that it cheapens an act designed for the ultimate “oneness.”

From the beginning, our Creator formed sex to bring together one man and one woman in the completeness of unity. This unique integration fills our hearts and minds in an exclusive relationship. Julie Roys explains why in her book, Redeeming the Feminine Soul: God’s Surprising Vision for Womanhood:

In Ephesians 5, the apostle Paul refers to the one-flesh union of husband and wife as “a profound mystery” revealing “Christ and the church” (v. 32).  The sexual union of husband and wife is also a symbol of Christ’s union with His church (p. 40).

Roys offers other biblical examples of this imagery culminating in Revelation 19:9, when “the Church is presented to Christ as a bride to a bridegroom at the ‘marriage supper of the Lamb.'”

Imagine such a high view of sex that it reflects our Creator’s relationship with His bride! In that context, an exclusive relationship tempers lust. It also prohibits the deningration of women.

Polyamory Lacks A Powerful Purpose

In his article “Sex After Christianity,” Rod Dreher wrote:

Paul’s teachings on sexual purity and marriage were adopted as liberating in the pornographic, sexually exploitive Greco-Roman culture of the time—exploitive especially of slaves and women, whose value to pagan males lay chiefly in their ability to produce children and provide sexual pleasure. Christianity, as articulated by Paul, worked a cultural revolution, restraining and channeling male eros, elevating the status of both women and of the human body, and infusing marriage—and marital sexuality—with love.

It’s no different today. Young adults could benefit from a rebellion against current cultural standards. Turning sex into a commodity with multiple partners has led to intense dissatisfaction by both women and men. It has also led to rampant pornography use with younger children and increasing violence. In turn that has fueled demand for modern-day slavery. By refusing to bow to the pagan gods of deviant sexual appetities, young adults like Willow could advance a higher view of sexuality with a divine purpose–that of the unity and oneness so many individuals crave.

Trying to separate the original purpose of sex from the humanity of an individual destroys all but physical pleasure and even puts a damper on that. However, inside the safeguard of boundaries our Creator put in place, there is no greater oneness, intimacy, or joy.