free-lover

plural free-lovers

1. alternativeAlternative form of free lover.

   The list is a long and sobering one and includes anyone whose presence or beliefs ran contrary to the established order—labor leaders, Communists, free-thinkers, free-lovers, Socialists, Okies, you name it.

   1990 February 15, Mike Spencer, “Racism Story Recalls a Fighter for Tolerance”, in Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles, Calif.: Los Angeles Times Communications, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 09 Jul 2025

   2 more examples

   A man enters a drugstore seeking a remedy for a persistent erection. “What can you give me for it?” he asks the woman behind the counter, with some embarrassment. “My sister and I will give you the store and two hundred dollars,” she says, “but that’s our best offer.” […] According to historian Mari Jo Buhle in Feminism and its Discontents, such jokes were among the popular responses to the sexual emancipation of women at the turn of the century, when [Sigmund] Freud’s acknowledgement of female sexual passion reinforced the utopian vision of feminist free-lovers.

   1998 June 14, Elaine Showalter, “In Search of Female Identity”, in The Washington Post, Washington, D.C.: The Washington Post Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 27 Aug 2017

   Twenty-first-century American conservatives are seldom confused with 19th-century enthusiasts of “free love.” But when the U.S. Supreme Court recently heard arguments about same-sex marriage, conservative opponents of such marriages bemoaned a spreading tendency that the old free-lovers and some of their radical contemporaries warned about more than 150 years ago.

   2013 April 5, Anand Giridharadas, “The Changing Meaning of Marriage”, in The New York Times, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 06 Apr 2013