Polygamy - a solution for some.

Polygamy - To most Americans the word brings to mind images of a repressed group of women living in subjugation and exploitation, while a single man wallows in the attention - sexual and otherwise - of his numerous adoring females. However, there are those who disagree, quite adamantly with this simplistic view. An article by journalist Elizabeth Joseph, herself one of several wives to a single man, outlines some legitimate reasons why "plural marriages" can make sense - and enforce stability - in our contemporary culture. Read her paper, Polygamy - the ultimate feminist lifestyle, with an open mind. How would a polygamous situation affect sex within a marriage? Let's say the idea of sexual jealousy is removed; it would seem the effect could be positive, wouldn't it...Objectively...in some ways? Any thoughts would be welcome. For more pro-polygamy arguments...Some right on the mark, others, somewhat "out there"... have a look at polygamy.com .

October 1, - In response to this post, one of my readers, the always astute Cathleen Farr, sent me this very informative position paper she wrote on the subject of Polygamy. It presents the history and practical reasons for Polygamy as well as the cultural taboos against it. It's ultra objective and you'll certainly gain a better understanding of Polygamy by reading it.

Polygamy: Two is Company, Three’s Allowed?
By
Cathleen Farr

There was a young fellow from Lyme,
Who had three wives at one time,
When asked “Why the third?”
He said, “Ones absurd, and bigamy sir, is a crime!”

Though practiced secretly by some, polygamy - or the state of having two or more spouses at one time - is illegal and relatively rare in the United States. We in America live in a monogamous society where people are forbidden by law from having multiple spouses concurrently. Polygamy is however a legal and widely accepted lifestyle in a number of countries throughout the world. The Muslim religion, prevalent in the Middle East, allows polygamy. In many parts of Africa, even among practicing Christians, polygamy is condoned. In numerous other societies it is, or has been at some point, customary. How do these arrangements work? Why would someone opt for such a lifestyle? The reasons are varied and not always simple. To begin to understand, one must look at the definition of polygamy and how it has evolved.

Polygamy can take one of two forms, the most common of which is polygyny, the marriage of a man to more than one woman. Since polygynous marriages were referred to as polygamy in early Mormon society, where it was practiced for a period, polygamy has often been confused with polygyny, especially in the United States. The other form of polygamy is polyandry; here the emphasis is on a woman deciding to take two or more husbands. This is by far the rarer form of polygamy. Few societies sanction it - among those who do are the Toda and the Nayer in southern India and a number of Tibetan groups as well as some Amazonian Indian tribes.

One reason often used to explain the existence of polygamy is that it absorbs an excess of marriageable individuals in a situation where the ratio of one sex to another is unbalanced. Polygyny has occurred often in the aftermath of wars where numerous men have been killed. A recent example of this occurred in Kuwait following the First Gulf War. Islam, the predominant religion there, permits a man to have up to four wives, provided they are treated equally. In the seventies and early eighties an increasingly westernized population began to interpret this as an impossibility and polygyny was actually banned in some Middle Eastern countries and looked down upon in Kuwait and many other countries. However, after the Gulf War and with a growth of Muslim fundamentalism, polygyny has seen a resurgence. Muslim clerics and Kuwaiti government officials are now preaching that it is a man’s duty to have plural wives in order to protect the women of the society who have become war widows. A similar situation is cited as the reason for polygamy in the early Mormon Church. When Joseph Smith -- the founder of the Mormon religion -- took the movement out west in the early 1800’s, the hardship of life on the frontier claimed the lives of many of the group’s men. By the time the Mormons settled in Utah there was a surplus of women. In order to ensure that all Mormon women had the opportunity to marry a Mormon man and to increase the population of Mormons, Joseph Smith claimed to have had a divine revelation in which he was told by God to encourage polygamy to solve this problem. Within a couple of generations the population was again balanced and the practice was outlawed by the Mormon Church.


Though illegal in the western world, there are a number of individuals who practice polygyny in the United States and other developed countries. Many do so under the guise of religion, specifically the Mormon religion and a movement called Paternal Christianity. In general these people claim to interpret the Bible as allowing polygyny - following from the fact that men should be the heads of the household and women should support and serve the men. They suggest that it strengthens the position of women by allowing those who wish to have a career and a family the ability to do so without having to resort to day care. A search on the World Wide Web will point to numerous sites portraying seemingly happy polygynous families. Most of these sites include testimony from apparently content polygynous wives singing the praises of built in childcare, help with household chores and even wifely duties that these arrangements bring. A recently established movement called the Promise Keepers is gaining wide popularity among conservative Christians and is frequently evoked by advocates of polygyny. Though they don’t specifically advocate polygamy the Promise Keepers are Paternal Christians and give an air of legitimacy to rouge groups of polygynists. After visiting these sites and numerous others -- even one which offered matrimonial adds to people interested in these types of relationships -- one could almost believe that polygyny could catch on in the United States.

Polyandry occurs for different reasons. One is economical. In many developing countries marriage is very expensive. The poor in these societies sometimes find it economical to share a wife. Another reason is that it can be a device for the conservation of inheritance, particularly land. This applies to fraternal polyandry, the most common form, where the eldest brother in a family will marry a woman and subsequent younger brothers will marry her too. On the death of the father of the family, each son gets a stake in the family property rather than having it subdivided until the holdings are insignificant. Parentage of children born of polyandrous unions is defined by custom. In some societies where fraternal polyandry is practiced, the eldest brother is automatically considered the father of the first child, the next oldest, the father of the second and so on. In other groups the wife is allowed to name the father of each child. No one husband has exclusive sexual rights to the wife. In most societies the first husband has priority and later husbands must obtain his consent for sexual relations with the common wife.

Polyandry is non-existent in America and the western world and is practiced only in the most primitive societies. The very same religious individuals in the U.S. who advocate polygyny, abhor polyandry as lustful, disgusting and sinful. Our society has evolved with a family structure where the man traditionally supported the family financially while the woman looked after the household and took care of his needs. Few women would relish the idea of multiple husbands to look after even if it did add to the family income. Even among the poorest in the western world there is no need to share the expense of childbirth or day to day living because there is a social welfare system in place to provide support in these situations. It is doubtful that polyandry will gain popular support in the west any time soon.

Monogamy is the preferred married life style in the United States. We have been raised to see something of value in the exclusivity of monogamous matrimony and would not relish sharing our spouses and hence our power within the marriage. The legal systems in the western world are not at the moment equipped to handle issues such as inheritance and custody as they would be applied to polygamist unions. Therefore, polygamy will no doubt remain a marginal lifestyle in the west while continuing to exist and in some cases flourish in other parts of the world.

The true meaning of marriage.

I've posed the question to quite a number of intelligent, successful married people over the past week. I made it very basic...in fact, I dumbed it down to the max: What is marriage?

The responses have been less than definitive. As in: "Uhhh...It's a contract...uhhh between two people. ummm yeah, that's what it is". Or "marriage is a union between a man and a woman, sanctified by a religious institution...I think... like, anything else would be, like, a civil union, right?"

Remember, these weren't brain dead surfer dudes. As I said, these were intelligent, successful people, however when confronted with this seemingly very basic question about a seemingly very basic part of our lives they were, shall we say, dumbfounded. But think about it... how would you answer this question? Before you do I would suggest you go to Salon.com and read, What Does Marriage Mean? a particularly perceptive article on the subject by the extraordinarily talented Dan Savage. His premise, presented in an entertaining, down-to-earth, accessible manner, is that marriage has become terrifically difficult to define. Would anyone disagree?

'Sex is like money; only too much is enough.'

The title of this post is a quote from Couples, by John Updike. To my mind, no discussion of Sex and Marriage would be complete without referring (often) to the writing of John Updike.


Arguably the most talented living writer in the world, Updike writes about sex and marriage...A lot...in prose so extraordinary that his use of language sometimes completely eclipses the banal comings and goings of his characters. The ultimate Updike paradox is that within marriage, sex inevitably looses it's luster and becomes routine, while extramarital sex will almost inevitably end up angst-filled and destructive. His characters often wrestle with this paradox and ultimately all make their way to the inevitable conclusion that in a marriage, as nowhere else, there are irreconcilable opposites which must be accepted and endured... sometimes even enjoyed...but never resolved. Two novels, Couples and Marry Me are particularly pertinent to our topic, in addition, they're both set in the early 60s and sexy in a way today's novels rarely are. Read them, even if it's only for the prose.

Is marriage an oppressive societal institution?

Monogamy : Culturally Imposed?

This post is actually an article by David P. Barash and Judith E. Lipton, that appeared on ThirdAge.com - I present it here because it, and the book it introduces, are so pertinent to my topic.

A 'Free Pass' for Your Affair?

By David P. Barash and Judith Eve Lipton, Coauthors of The Myth of Monogamy

Think of it as a glitch in the world of "family values." The monogamous family is under siege, but not because of a homosexual agenda, political ideology or the misbehavior of a small number of high-profile individuals (you fill in the blanks). Rather, it's the shared instincts of human beings -- all of us -- that threaten to undermine the commitment to "forsake all others" and remain sexually faithful "till death do us part."

In recent years, as DNA fingerprinting has been applied to animals as well as people, the revelations have come fast and furious: Even those species long believed to be the perfect poster-child paragons of devoted monogamous fidelity have been revealed to cheat. When biologists have done genetic analysis on young birds, 10 percent to 40 percent of the offspring are shown to be fathered by someone other than the identified social partner of the mother.

In short, there is a whole lot of hanky-panky going on in the animal world. The myth of the monogamous species has been exploded, and the natural world is revealed to be more complicated and interesting than scientists themselves had believed.

On the other hand, it may be reassuring to know that at least one species appears to be truly monogamous: a parasitic flatworm. The male and female encounter each other as adolescents, their bodies fuse and they remain sexually faithful forever after. We'd like to think they are happily united.

In our book, The Myth of Monogamy, we describe these and other findings, showing their parallels to human beings. For example, philandering isn't just a "guy thing." There is no question that women, too, develop a roving eye -- and sometimes a wandering body. Indeed, it is even possible to predict who will be at greatest risk.

Another myth is that happily married couples, deeply in love with each other, will not be tempted. Virtually everyone is, or will be. It's part of our biology, like walking on two legs. In short, monogamy isn't natural -- for either sex.

But this doesn't mean that it isn't a good idea. It might well be for human relationships what Winston Churchill said of democracy: the worst possible system, except when you compare it with the alternatives. Moreover, just because something isn't natural doesn't mean that it isn't possible. After all, people learn to rein in many of their "natural" inclinations, learning to say please and thank you, wait in line and even become toilet trained.

People certainly can aspire to monogamy, and sometimes they can even achieve it. Yet along the way, they would be well-advised to acknowledge the reality of their own inclinations (as well as those of their partner) -- if only so they won't be blindsided by those biological instincts that virtually all living things appear to share.

A polarized population?

Are we in fact polarized along male / female lines when it come to our attitudes regarding sex in our marriages? For the most part, I would say, yes. Particularly in marriages of 10 years or more, which is what I'm focusing on here. In such marriages women consistently come in on the side of "less is better" and men solidly lean towards "more is not enough". A generalization, to be sure, but one that's based on what I observe consistantly, everyday. I've spoken to quite a number of married men and women on this subject. Despite the ads for male enhancement drugs (where there is frequently a wife-type insinuating that she's finally getting what she wants from her once reluctant partner, due to his newly found erectile prowess) most women I speak to have never longed for more sex. They clearly prefer quality over quantity, and most eventually acknowledge that quality sex is probably not going to come from someone they've been co-habitating with for a decade or more. It's an unspoken truth, but going through life's ups and downs with someone, seeing them at their worst and having them see you at your worst...while might create a warm, strong bond... does not inspire sex. It inspires the kind of feelings you have for your siblings, or your parents, or your children. Sex becomes counterintuitive for most women at this point. Men on the other hand, are much more capable of using their imagination in a sexual situation. Sexual fantasy is second nature for them and as a result they can override any image that might act as a turn off; they can override an unromantic environment, a tense mood or a 10 + year history of being side-by-side in the trenches. They will seize the opportunity to have sex virtually any time they can... And relish it!

How is this dichotomy best handled? Does anyone have ideas on this? If so please comment. In the mean time I'll continue to share my thoughts on this in... Sex and Marriage : Untold Truths.