nankingdecade:

Exclusivity is one of the things you can choose to commit to in an interpersonal relationship. You can also commit to:

• communicating openly and honestly with them
• respecting each others’ boundaries
• being in for the long haul
• working through relationship issues together
• working on yourself to be a healthier partner
• supporting each others’ life goals
• love and companionship
• spending a certain amount of time together every week/month/year
• etc

Commitment means you made an arrangement and intend to stick by it, and that arrangement doesn’t necessarily have to include monogamy. It is incorrect for people to assume that non-exclusive relationships are “not committed.”

calm-thought:

You are not out of step. You are not falling behind. You are taking the time that you need and there is no deadline for personal development. People who have reached certain “milestones” before you are not “better” than you; they are on their journeys, you are on yours.

left-reminders:

Let’s put it this way:

I believe that, as a society, we have enough resources to feed and house everyone; each person should be provided with a livable minimum that will allow them to secure a comfortable and happy existence. I believe that many jobs aren’t necessary in the grand scheme of things as well, and that ultimately food services should be automated or reworked so that people don’t have to spend huge chunks of their lives flipping burgers for the profit of fast food millionaires. If we were to actually employ some know-how as a society (possible in a society steered by democratic planning and worker/community control of industry), we could employ everyone, utilize machines to help workers with their jobs (rather than as competition for the benefit of the rich), drastically cut down the work week, and allow people to pursue whatever their interests and talents push them towards. Socialism isn’t about “the fast food worker and the surgeon making the same amount of money”. It’s about pushing society towards a state of affairs where money isn’t the plutocratic arbiter of our life choices, by decommodifying the social realm as much as possible.

Like….I want you to understand that there aren’t just some inherent castes of people who flip burgers or perform surgeries; those castes are shaped by the way capitalism stratifies people and funnels them into jobs and opportunities. In a more just society where people had more free time and qualitative access to education and resources, we’d probably see millions of people tied down to no particular job in the capitalist sense of today. “Burger flippers” would also be artists, builders, farmers, etc. Specialization would still happen, definitely, but where it does occur would likely be accompanied by social prestige and intense satisfaction for the craft – that comes with the territory when the people involved actually make the decisions (rather than submit to the decisions of bosses or property-owners). I’ve seen it argued before and I’ll reiterate it: I’d rather be entrusted to a surgeon who cares about helping people than one who’s only involved to become rich. And it’s not like surgeons and doctors will be destitute under socialism or something – they’ll be as able to self-actualize and enjoy the fruits of society as anybody else, if not moreso in some small ways (through that aforementioned prestige and respect and all that stuff).

This “you want everyone to be paid the same” argument misunderstands what socialists are aiming for; it’s too myopic and can’t help but assume socialism is just capitalism with hyper-redistributive taxation. Think outside of the box a bit, anon.