But it’s not a subtle change. Polygamy and polyamory are vastly different. They have nothing at all to do with each other except that they both happen to be about something other than monogamy. It’s like saying that fast food and fine dining are subtly different from each other because they are both about eating. One is a power and economic structure, the other is an independent and egalitarian relationship style based entirely in negotiation and co-creation. The latter did not arise out of the former because they have nothing to do with each other.
Having sex or an intimate love relationship with someone you aren’t married to has not been considered socially acceptable until very recently in the West, but there are cultures all over the world that don’t practice strict sexual monogamy even though they may have social monogamy, so that’s not only a modern affluent Western invention. It’s not polyamory in the sense of how we use that word in the modern West, but it’s also not true monogamy or polygamy either.
