Tracing the Sexual Revolutions

In October 2022, a New York City judge decided that polyamorous relationships — that is, sexual-romantic relationships involving more than two persons — were entitled to the same legal protections as relationships of two persons.

Ruling that the live-in lover of a deceased man must be allowed spousal inheritance rights — despite the fact that at the time of his death, the dead man was also in a same-sex marriage with another man (whom he did not live with) — the judge held that the “problem” with previous rulings in favor of same-sex marriage and the legal recognition of same-sex relationships was that they “recognize only two-person relations.”