If you hear or see the same things over and over again in poly communities, or when you talk about polyamory, you can at least have fun with it by playing Bingo! Certain things have happened so often to so many people that they've become tropes and clichés. When one of the tropes shows up, usually in the form of an oft-repeated phrase, you check off the square that has that trope listed. When you get 5 in a row, you have Bingo! If you can mark them all, you have Blackout!
When you come across one of these truisms about poly communities, you can play Bingo with the tropes associated. This is usually done more metaphorically, where someone who is annoyed with a particular collection of tropes references a game of Bingo as a way to point out that this is a predictable, repeated offense or conversation. However, sometimes actual Bingo cards are created and you can either play the cards at home while in an online forum, or, if your group has a good sense of humor about itself, your real-life group can actually have a set of unique Bingo cards available at events and attendees can mark them off and shout "Bingo!" when their card is completed. Sometimes there are even prizes.
I have created some of my own Bingo cards over the years. It started out with me printing a bunch of cards to take to discussion meetings and poly conferences. But that got expensive. Eventually, people came up with online generators that can do all sorts of things, including Bingo games. So I turned some of my Bingo cards into online, interactive cards that you can play on your computer or mobile device, or you can print them out for use in real life events.
To play, click or tap on a square whenever you see or hear the content of that square in a group, forum, personals ad, etc. To unselect a square if you want to clear the card or you made a mistake, just click or tap that square again. If you would like a new card with the squares rearranged and perhaps different content, click the "New Card" button above the card. You can also print these cards for your own use, or visit the "home" page where you can create your own cards. Here are the ones I have created:
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