This doesn't make total sense to me.. We can't judge the group through generalities. We're talking about exceptions I believe. What if there was a guy who was willing and able, in every sense, to take care of 3 families perfectly... Would you rather give him the nod or prefer that he gets one family, and the other two women/families end up with 1 mediocre guy and one former domestic abuser?
Kudos. You are stating what should be obvious, but apparently isn't. Women are quite capable of having two men in an intimate relationship, including living with them both. Perhaps more. Personally, I think more than three is a crowd. How one wants to define that kind of relationship depends on one's point of view. Is it unusual? Of course. Can everyone manage it? Absolutely not, but if we were all alike, it would make for a pretty dull world, in my opinion. I just see nothing wrong with it as long as the people involved are happy and do no harm to others. The problem with "polygamy" (I prefer "a relationship with multiple partners) is that where it is practiced tends to be entirely skewed towards male domination, and I find that an abomination.
With women beginning to pull in more money, one could become a sugar momma for all the unemployed guys out there... Polygamy and arranged marriages were pretty common in non-western cultures up until the 20th century. The accounts weren't brutally slavish, but it was definitely male and prestige centric. I think for polygamy to work with our current social norms, everyone in it would have to buy a communal mentality. It would hedge the romantic aspects of a marriage, but it could make up for it by reducing the insecurities and insanity that comes with the fear of an unrequited soul mate that leaves you behind. Not sure if that type of polygamy been tried before with cultural acceptance, but marriages in the name of romance is fairly new too. Maybe instead of framing the debate on whether people could handle something like polygamy within romantic confines, it should be considered a different and parallel way for people to live their lives.
If the Supreme Court says corporations have the same rights as people shouldn't people have the same rights as corporations? They should be able to devise their own organizational structure and culture. Maybe Delaware should set up a open marriage regulatory system and all polygamist could go there to get married.
Try to think back to before, I dunno, the mid-90's. Marriage historically has had little to do with love or even companionship. It was about money (for women), social status (for men) and stigma-free offspring.
How is it any different now with a 50% divorce rate. Has there ever been a successful polygamous community. They wikk eventually collapse with two few men getting too many wives.
I think our friend Frederick Engels has some wise words for us: [rquoter]from The Origin of the Family, Private Property, and the State In the Heroic Age the Greek wife is more respected than in the period of civilization; for the husband, however, she is, in reality, merely the mother of his legitimate heirs, his chief housekeeper, and the superintendent of the female slaves, whom he may make, and does make, his concubines at will. It is the existence of slavery side by side with monogamy, the existence of beautiful young slaves who belong to the man with all they have, that from the very beginning stamped on monogamy its specific character as monogamy for the woman only, but not for the man. And it retains this character to this day.[/rquoter]
This only works in times of war when many men died at a young age which shifted the population balance. The last thing a society needs is a bunch of single men running around loose.
This is assuming that if polygamy was legalized that everyone would run out and start marrying multiple partners. And also assumes that it only would be men marrying multiple women... and not the other way around. I don't think that either of those are true. Obviously more men would be doing it moreso than women, simply because of gender roles (men are still the protector/provider for the most part). But to think we'd all the sudden have a bunch of single guys running around without women to mate with is kinda... out there. I think if you gave people the choice, polygamy wouldn't be a very common thing. At least not enough to have some kind of weird end-of-civilized-society impact. It's really natural selection at its finest. The men with the most desirable traits (be it wealth, looks, smarts, power, etc) end up passing along their seed more than men that don't...
Depending on how many spouses are involved, at what point are a personal exemption for each merely a logical continuation of tax policy and at what level does it become the government subsidizing the polygamist lifestyle? I have not thought all of this through, but it is an interesting question anyway.
Why l would any guy share a women with another guy? I don't think men are programmed that way. They will do one of two things: 1.) Dump the women 2.) Off the other guy
This is false. Male jealousy is a relatively recent development of human society, preceded by group marriage and general sexual promiscuity. Men don't want "their" women to screw other guys because they want assurances of paternity.
OH SNAP! that was one of the best Engels pwns I've seen all day. Philosophy Majors, having wild untamed facial hair and playing basketball while stoned since the dawn of ****ing time.
