Confession: I DETEST the word ‘throuple’ with intense passion. The sound of it assaults my soul with all the discordant torture of the sound of… Do we still say nails on a chalkboard? Chalkboards went extinct in US classrooms shortly after I graduated, didn’t they? So at this point something like half the population doesn’t know how awful the sound of something scraping on them is. Wow. Anyway, I hate the word ‘throuple’ and refuse to use it. I’d rather no one use it. I hear it and wince in pain. It is a horrid word in need of banning. Mighty Thor, I implore you to bring down the weight of great Mjölnir upon this terrible word, demolishing it so that the world may be spared from its horrors!
If you’re about to ask me, “But aren’t you in one?” DON’T. I am in a triad, thank you very much.
But if you would rather ask, “Andy, wherefore do you so despise this word?” you may may proceed. But I’ll answer even if you don’t. And I’ll admit my first reason is a shallow one. It is simply this: The word is aesthetically displeasing. It brings to mind a bacterial infection rather than a loving relationship. “Looks like throuple. Here, have some antibiotics!” Blech. I am not alone in feeling this way.
The second reason I want it gone from our language is much more important. ‘Throuple’ is very obviously derived from the words ‘three’ and ‘couple’.
You may now want to ask, “What’s wrong with that? Is your relationship with your two partners not a three person version of a couple?” And the answer is, “NO, IT ISN’T! It’s its own thing, with its own dynamics. The very idea that a triad is a three person couple is a monoganormative and harmful.”
I will acknowledge that my triad was born when two people who were already together became involved with a third. That’s actually a pretty common beginning. But the resulting unit was something new. To act as though it was ‘a couple plus one’ is to remove value from the third member to join the group, implying they’re not an equal part of it, not even that important a part when you factor in the degree to which our society overvalues the concept of being part of a couple. (Note: this is something not only protested in nonmonogamy circles but also by people who are perfectly happy being single their entire lives. Whether you’re partnered with six people or zero, all society should care about is whether you feel happy and fulfilled.)
Additionally, the concept of being a couple has attached baggage stemming from its perceived alignment with societal expectations. Most obviously, there’s an expectation of being shut off from the rest of the world. Yes, polyamorous pairs will possibly identify as a couple despite that connatation, but I still find it problematic. Even when my triad was actually a walled entity rather than the happily expanded piece of a larger polycule that it is now, I never appreciated the idea that I needed to define what we were in a way that would make it more palatable to the mainstream.
It is possible you can find a group of three people who prefer ‘throuple,’ possibly because they enjoy the monoganormative, limited worldview, trying not to shock mainstream sensibilities aspects of it. They may even insist you to apply the word to them. Don’t do it. Those people are wrong and should be prohibited from having opinions. (That’s a joke. Please refer to people in the way you have been asked to refer to them regardless of what anyone on the internet says about it.)
I will end my rant with one simple request. Please refer to my partners and me as a triad. Thank you and have a nice day.
