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# HELP! I Was Groomed By a Polyamorous Libertarian!
- URL: https://ungovernablemanfarmer.ghost.io/help-i-was-groomed-by-a-polyamorous-libertarian/
- Published: 2026-10-07T07:33:09.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-07T07:33:09.000Z
- Author: Ungovernable Man Farmer

***My Pre-Adolescent Brain on Robert A. Heinlein***

There are a few moments that fundamental change the entire trajectory of my life. Most of them I do not remember. I can vaguely point to the general time in my life when some of them happened. A very few of them I distinctly remember and I can place with some degree of precision because I distinctly remember the media that inspired them and have some evidence as to when I consumed it.

A few years ago, I actually went back through old church service records and I now know the exact date, or at least weekend I was shown the documentary on a pre-Youtube internet about NAFTA that would inspire me to vow to never willing participate in capitalism and what I would later come to understand as Neo-liberalism. To be honest thou, it probably didn't matter, it was a Quaker youth retreat an I am probably the least effective activist to come out of my cohort of peers. It fact it probably backfired since that disillusionment probably added to the rebellious streak had spun out into the rampant promiscuity and drug use that got me kicked out of the program before they could shape me into someone who could be actually useful to the pursuit of peace and justice for all human kind.

I know it was the Summer of 12th year that I watched a interview with a former PLO operative who described the tactics he had used when fighting the IDF. I vividly remember having the realization that the men running thru a war zone on foot to plant thermite charges on the opposition’s tanks were indeed deeply more committed and hardened warriors than the little bitches cowering in their modern armor. Dedication to machismo boiled my testosterone soaked brain and combined with the good ol’ American value of always rooting for the underdog completely overwhelmed my ethnic programming. I informed my father, that very afternoon, I was no longer interested in a ba mitzvah, a birthright trip nor would I be accompanying him to synagogue any longer. This was a major relief to him since he had only been attending temple himself “for the kids”. Several years later I also learned the reason the PLO had been so hardcore was that Israel had been committing an ongoing ethnic cleaning project in Palestine the whole time.

The one that really got me the most thou and left the most profound inpact was reading the final chapter of *Glory Road* at 11 years old. I know the rough date, because the receipt, which I had apparently used as a bookmark, was still there when I went to reread it 20 years later. I didn't get every far the second time. It is not a good book and was 200 pages longer than I remembered. The few pages I did read were almost entirely dedicated to whining about income tax. I did skip to the end to see if I had remembered one particular line correctly. It turned out that I had. “I would go see Star first, or soon anyhow, and kick that pile of strange shoes aside.” I had remember it so well, because reading it the first time was the moment I really started to question if monogamy was going to work out for me.

*Glory Road*, by Robert A. Heinlein is a bog standard sci-fi adventure novel about an all-American-badass, Easy, who is summoned by a pretty lady, Star, to go a by-the-numbers multiversal fetch quest to get the multiversal MacGuffin. She turn out to be \*spoilers warning a very obvious twist in book that is not worth reading\* Queen of the Multiverse. Star, the functionally immortal powerful space-witch-queen, of course, immediately falls in love with Easy and soon agrees to marry him and submit to his authority, because, did I forget to mention?, he is an all-American-badass. I can not stress enough that it is not a good book. I’m not even going to bother dunking on the “adventure” part of the “adventure” story, which most consists of them walking across a really big field, there is a reason I remembered it being a third of the length it really was. The bulk of the book on the whole did no, apparently, leave much of an impact on me, even though I going thru a huge Heinlein phase. The social commentary I did find profoundly impactful, however, I may not have realize how much so until I started forming my own romantic relationships many years later.

It turns out, according to Star, almost all cultures in the multiverse practice some of polyamory to some degree. In fact Earth is the only planet in the entire known multiverse were monogamy is the norm. Easy learns this the hard way while adventuring after his refusal to bang their hostess and her daughters, yes, all together, leads to a diplomatic crisis. I will give Heinlein credit for beating the the most common libertarian trope this time thou; our boy was extra put off by the teenager. *Glory Road* was nominated for the Hugo Best Novel Award in 1964.

A lot of Heinlein’s book feature some form of space polyamory and free love, often well past a reasonable extent. In my problematic fav, *The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress*, the loonies practice an arrangement called “Line Marriages” that is so complicated I have read the book 3 times and am still not really sure how it works. *Stranger In a Strange Land* is famously some of the most woo-woo free love hippy bullshit ever written, in which strong and liberated women serve the every whims of their male cult leader. As I child I was confused that so many boomer men, including my dad, held it up as The American Novel. Now it is painfully obvious. *Stranger* did in fact win Hugo Best Novel Award in 1962\. The notorious *Friday* is so steeped in rape apologia that I clocked it as a child and put it down, but to be fair it is also very prude-shaming. *Friday* is also credited with arguably being the first introduction to the concept of the a commonly accessible network of connected computers into popular culture, which is just too apt. Apparently, *Time Enough For Love*, is the work where Heinlein really gets deepest into it. I would not know, my copy as been unopened for over 20 years. It is really fucking long and I didn’t even make it through *Stranger*, which had snapped out of my Heinlein obsession before I got around to it. 

I don’t know why I found the shoes imagery so powerful. I’m pretty sure I had already read *Moon* and *Friday* and was way more interested in the organization of rebels’ cell network than their family units in the former, and had found the sexual content of the later to be uncomfortable. To be fair to Heinlein, the last few pages of *Glory Road* were the formative line is nestled is very badass in an all-American kind of way. In the end, Easy decides to leave an eternal life of infinite luxury to go risk his neck fighting space dragons with his grand-son-in-law for no clear reason. Maybe I was inspired in that moment, thou not by the rest of the book. If such a manly man was not concerned nor insecure about others fucking his wife, why should I. In fact “sweeping their shoes aside” is just another performance of masculine dominance over lesser men, amiright my fellow bros? Maybe it had something to do with the strain in my parents marriage that was really starting to show around that time. Maybe I was just at the age in a boy’s life were priorities start to change very quickly. Probably all of the above. Either way, that moment in particular triggered something.

I think I would ended up in here anyway. What ever was brewing was at least soon reinforced. Many of my favorite writers as a teenager both practiced and wrote about non-monogamy. Some far more ethically than others, it turns out. Alan Moore, Grant Morrison, Warren Ellis, Neil Gaiman, were all my favorite writers at some point. Moore still is. All of them have work that is to some extent controversial and problematic. Except Alan Moore, who has done nothing wrong, and if you disagree its just because you're a dumbdumb who can't recognize or understand true genius.

Since I have had kids, I have made many compromises and am now a relatively law-abiding citizen who lives a relatively normal domesticated life. Maintaining a non-monogamous life style is really the only real major deviance from the hegemonic expectation I have refused to surrender in pursuit of upholding my parental responsibilities. In fact the village that is currently raising my children, would not be nearly as high functioning as it if the all adults involved weren’t long practiced at making and managing unconventional agreements. Of all my literary heroes growing up, Heinlein was by far the most conservative and the one who’s stated politics are now the most oppositional to the ones I have formed since reading his work. Yet, he is also the writer who’s work first inspired the last truely radical praxis I have held onto the longest and the alternative lifestyle streak that is best materially serving my children, long after I have sold out on every other front.

Also it doe need to be noted, out of all the writers that led me down this life path, Heinlein might hold the most problematic body of work, but is arguably the one who has done the least material harm in his personal life. Certainty less the Ellis, who is at very best a serial groomer and Gaiman, who has been credibly accused of a host of sexual abuse including rape. Except Alan Moore, of course, who has done nothing wrong, and even if he did, Grant Morrison deserved it.

Oh, also, I know it was late summer right before my sophomore year of high school started when I first watched *The Big Lebowski*, and decided that my spiraling drug use was in fact not a problem and I should stay as high as fuck for as much of my life as humanly possible. That commitment has also had to be suspended until my kids are grown and capitalism is abolished.