90. Cult
Gawd bless him, yesterday morning on This Morning on ITV (UK), Eamonn Holmes‘ life appeared to be full of woe. It was all caused by three awesome, articulate women, talking to him and co-interviewer (IT’S A WORD) Ruth Langsford about polyamory. The idea seems to cause him some distress.
Jemima Willcox was there to talk about her book (ebook available on Amazon here), which is a collection of interviews with polyamorous people. She was joined by two friends, and all of them did a bang up job when accused of being victims, cultists, naive and doooooooomed.
Let me save you some pain. (If you’re a masochist and don’t want spoilers, here’s a link to the debate in full. ETA: For people outside the UK, here it is on YouTube.)
Agony aunt Denise Robertson called polyamory a “lovely little scheme” (condescending much?) and said that it would all end in tears. Eamonn Holmes referred to Jemima’s book as the Bible for polyamory, despite objections from the author and references to other works. These stunning, emotionally mature and intelligent women were told that it only worked because they were in their 20s and that when they wanted to settle down and have kids they’d fail. Denise Robertson said that if polyamory worked, we wouldn’t as a species have been monogamous for all this time.
So, here’s my proposal. OPERATION HUG.
You’ve got two options, in order of priority.
1) Hug Eamonn Holmes’ head. He obviously needs some reassurance that we’re not all nutters, and that we can actually love lots of people, so we should share the love with him. (Ruth Langsford seemed more balanced about it all.)
If this isn’t possible…
2) Write a nice email to Eamonn Holmes and Ruth Langsford, or the This Morning people in general, telling them about your loving families and long-term polyamorous relationships. Young and old, with and without kids, out and closeted. We may be few and far between, but we have so many stories to share. Their email address seems to be viewerservices@itv.com unless anyone else knows any better? Also, they’re on Twitter: @itvthismorning
Discussion (26) ¬
You are very forgiving. I suggest cold murder.
I do love you, Flickywickywoo! 😀
That discussion just opened on a foul note and there were these three beautiful women sitting there, being shat on by people’s pre-conceptions and judgemental opinions.
Sadly, the video has already been pulled.
What… really??? Damn. I hope someone put it on YouTube.
I’m just checking, and the video seems to still be up, for me. Where are you, anon? Could it be a regional thing?
California, so perhaps it is.
To be fair to Eamonn, he did play devil’s advocate against a couple of Robertson’s points. It was really his bewilderment, rather than non-acceptance (that’s a word…), that defines the prejudice in his hosting.
And this is a big problem. Every time a relatively ‘unheard of minority’, especially when it comes to ways of life, is getting some form of press, it gets treated as an alien concept. There’s little or no neutral presentation of the issue.
This is true, he did seem more baffled. Denise was more aggressive and dismissive about it. That’s why Eamonn gets the head-hugs, I reckon – he wasn’t exactly nasty, just utterly perplexed!
Ruth seemed pretty keen to decry it, as well. But Denise was by far the most aggressive. Not a very nice attitude to have towards anyone.
Noticed that This Morning have a Twitter (@itvthismorning, of all things), and have just made the mistake of reading the feed of responses on the Polyamory topic. Some good support (that I’d mostly already seen while lurking today) but a fair amount of hating. :/
was there when I looked just now. May not work outside the UK
Hey there.
I just need to correct you, I was the lady in the brown dress and i published the book Eamonn was reading from. Maxine runs Polyday.
We where really happy with the results, and how Eamonn was very enthusasic about us and the book, when leaving the interview we spoke to him and he demanded his crew to bring us back for when they spoke about twitter and facebook comments. It was a very short piece trying to get across yes we share one person but we have many other people we wanted to talk too.
More info on the book can be found on my website.
I suck! I’m so sorry, Jemima, I will correct it now. No wonder my internet researches were so faily…
Edit: Fixed. And I am totally going to visit your website. Oh, actually, should link it. #thinkingaloud
The book – The Polyamory Project is by Jemima: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B005GNW95A , not Maxine xx
Excellent. I will link it now. Thanks!
Just to say: the book is be Jemima Willcox!
Someone just mentioned that to me on Twitter; eep, sorry Jemima!
Heh, I haven’t gotten around to writing the bible of polyamory yet! 😉
(I think you may have fixed the first paragraph, but not the second)
I’ll be writing up my take on things after Polyday. It was a pretty interesting day!
Noted! Again, thank you. I feel very faily for having gotten alllll of the facts wrong. :/
On an unrelated note, when I saw you on This Morning, I knew I’d seen your face before, and now I know where; I recognised you from your photo here…!
Erm, or for first and second, read second and fourth! 🙂
Sad, no video in U.S. I believe
Don’t forget, we can also send head hugs over the intertubes to @EamonnHolmes
There’s that whole attitude of “well, silly little girls who don’t know what they’re in for, I’m old, I know what I’m doing” to which I say the the fifth tenet of the Weaver: Respect is earned through accomplishment, it does not accrue from longevity and impending dotage.
That old lady was just so rude. 🙁
This brings to mind how the interviewers on the morning show dug their teeth into Cathie Jung.
Makes me sad to watch.
But those three ladies seem so awesome. 😀
For people who would like to see the video worldwide, you can find the link here:
http://thepolyamoryproject.wordpress.com/2011/08/26/the-polyamory-project-book-on-itvs-this-morning/