Willow Smith opened up this week about her experiences with polyamory on a recent episode of Red Table Talk.
The 20-year-old sat down with her mom, Jada Pinkett Smith, and maternal grandmother, Adrienne Banfield Norris, to share her truth about her relationship choices.
What is Polyamory?
Polyamory is defined as being involved in more than one romantic relationship simultaneously, with the consent and knowledge of every person involved. The word is derived from the Greek word poly, which means many, and the Latin word amor, which means love. Some polyamorous couples see a select group of people that may stay relatively stable. In contrast, others choose to have a broader range of polyamorous relationships that may bounce around among different people.
When did Red Table Talk start?
Pinkett Smith and Norris created red Table Talk as a way to allow a safe space for Willow to share her truths and for Jada and Adrienne to show her what a mother-daughter relationship could look like. Jada and Adrienne kicked off the talk show in 2018, and Jada talked to The Hollywood Reporter about her new endeavor.
“We just wanted to create a safe space. Times are changing so fast, a lot of beliefs that we have built foundations upon are changing and deteriorating, and we’re having to replace them with new thoughts, new ideas, new beliefs, regarding how the world is changing,” she shared. “Now, as women, it seems as though we’re having more freedoms now more than ever, and it’s like, ‘What do we do with them?’ To just create a safe space at the red table where we really can have real, raw, unfiltered conversations about what’s changing, and how those changes are affecting us and the process that we’re going through in order to deal with those changes.”
The first episode to air involved a deep and emotionally honest chat with Sheree Zampino, Will Smith’s ex-wife and mother of Trey. Jada told The Hollywood Reporter about that decision and why it was important to show Willow that part of her history.
“The first episode is with Will’s ex-wife Sheree, where we talk about 23 years of co-mothering, and the journey that my mother and Willow had taken on that with me, and our relationship and what we’ve been through, and our mother-daughter relationship and then Willow and I. It’s really just brought us three together, and just other aspects of my relationships and my life. It’s just been so healing, and I wasn’t expecting that part necessarily.”
What did Willow Smith say about being polyamorous?
In the chat on Wednesday, Jada delved into Willow’s admission that she is polyamorous, asking her daughter to share more about how she came to that decision and choice. Willow explained how her polyamory evolved, saying, “With polyamory, I feel like the main foundation is the freedom to be able to create a relationship style that works for you and not just stepping into monogamy because that’s what everyone around you says is the right thing to do.”
Willow continued to explain her choice, talking about the research she put into polyamory, knowing that many marriages fail because of infidelity, saying, “….also, doing research into polyamory, the main reason why monogamous relationships are….why marriage…why divorces happen is infidelity. Let’s say you haven’t always been the kind of person who wanted to have sex all the time, but your partner is, are you gonna be the person to say, you know, just because I don’t have these needs, you can’t have them either?”
Willow added that for her, it’s not really about getting to have more sex with different people but having the freedom to be with different people and not have to conform to the restrictions that come with being monogamous.
Red Table Talk’s new episodes stream weekly