I know it’s irrational, I know it sounds silly. I know there is no ultimate benchmark of behaviour whereby one could draw a line that divides people into conclusive ‘good’ or ‘bad’ categories. I know that it’s needlessly patronising – infantilising, even – and that by accepting the label I put myself in a position that’s wildly at odds with the feminist principles that guide the rest of my life. But still: I want you to tell me I’m a very good girl.

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I’ve been honoured to host some fab guest blogs on ethical nonmonogamy over the years – like this guide on how to cultivate compersion or this lovely piece about the realities of open relationships. Often, though, it’s as intriguing to learn from other people’s mistakes as their successes. So just as I’ve tried to write guides on how to be bad in bed before, this week’s guest blogger, Alex, is here to tell you how not to do polyamory. Or in his own words…

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I’ve had a lot of internet fights in my time. I cut my teeth on an incredibly racist and misogynist forum back in the days before Twitter, then I joined Twitter, then I started to blog. Fight after fight after fight – I’ve kicked off at so many people! People who were causing harm, and others who were trying to tell me that I was causing harm. Sometimes I’ve argued well, sometimes badly. Sometimes I am right, often wrong. Some things I’ve said have been justified, others terrible. You get the idea. At no point during any of these fights did I ever intend to cause harm. But that doesn’t mean no harm was ever caused.

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The fantasies which happen in my head are consensual. The fantasies which happen in my head are often non-consensual. It sounds like a logical fallacy: how can something be both consensual and non-consensual at the same time? The answer is that, of course, the ‘non-consent’ in my fantasies is only an illusion: the participants in my head are not real, the only real person here – the only one who needs to consent – is me. But when those fantasies leak out of my head onto the page or screen, readers – real live people – become a part of what’s happening, and their consent matters as well. Let’s talk about the ethics of writing consensual non-consent fantasies.

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This might sound weird, but I’m actually pretty sick of talking about consent. As a fan of sex, what I really want to talk about is desire. Want. Lust. Need. Craving. But I can’t talk about all those cool things without also having to explain the basics of consent. Because some pricks still cannot drag themselves over this, the lowest possible bar. Consent! Fuck my life! It’s the most boring sexual basic! Consent is vital, of course, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t also dull. Like that bit at the start of a cupcake recipe where they tell you what temperature you should set your oven to – it’s not the most interesting part of the recipe, but without it you can’t make cakes.

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