I know that there are several poly- words, including polyamory and polygamy, but am not knowledge about the distinctions. I thought polyamory was a catch-all word for "romantic relationships where people can have more than one partner, with the knowledge and approval of all other partners." Or something to that effect. And polygamy is a particular kind of polyamory where the partners are married. I could definitely be mistaken about those words' meanings, though.
Since poly was brought up by the OP in the context of gay marriage and civil unions, I used polygamy. But I certainly didn't mean to imply any sort of connotation by the use of "polygamy" rather than "polyamory."
A thought occurred to me today as I skimmed an article in a rationality forum where the subject of gay marriage cropped up; seeing as the issue has been hotly contested in various public fora and especially the courts, what about poly? After all, many if not all the arguments for gay marriage apply to poly marriage as well.
Questions for LWers who are currently in a such a relationship, or have an opinion to share:
Do polies want to marry each other or do such relationships not lend themselves to permanence above a threshold of partners? Should polies campaign for the right for a civil union anyway? what are the up and down sides of this? etc