Polygamy

Evolving into loving, generous human beings doesn't always come naturally, but we learn almost from birth that more is better, our capacity for love is infinite, and sharing is the right thing to do. The new sibling who seems to consume all of the time our parents formerly reserved for us does not, we are assured, mean that we are loved any less. If we bring our only friend home from school too many days in a row, we are often scolded that more friends are better than just one "best" friend. This carries over into puberty and dating too. Most parents would prefer that their children form no exclusive relationships with a member of the opposite sex until they're about 30. And as the parent, we couldn't (and wouldn't) choose a favorite child. We love them differently, but the same amount, even the one who brings our checkbook to school for show and tell. We realize we have more than enough love to spare for all of our children.

Once we reach adulthood, we can, of course, continue to live life's valuable lessons, learned at the knee of society's expectations and be caring, loving, generous human beings or we can reject, ignore and deny our ability to love more than one person at a time, and pick just one person to love, honor, cherish and share a bathroom with for the rest of our lives as long as we both shall live, forever and ever, amen.

Monogamy, while currently revered as the societal norm, has, like the institution of marriage itself, evolved from the practice of polygamy over thousands of years. Monogamy, however, appears to be an unnatural state of affairs for most species, including human beings. It is also difficult to sustain, if divorce and infidelity statistics, as well as our proclivities in the pursuit of prostitution and pornography are any indication. Clearly, our society sends mixed signals when it comes to love and our desire for sexual intimacy. Divorce is legal. Polygamy is not. Pornography is legal. Prostitution is not. Monogamy is legal. Adultery, in many states, is not. Cultural values encourage us to love multiple people equally, but there are lines we must not cross. We cannot love romantically and be sexually intimate with more than one person at a time. We may purchase sexually intimate performances by or between strangers, but we may not purchase the performance of sexual intimacy from strangers. We may marry as many times as we're able to find a willing participant, but we may only marry them one at a time. It is no wonder then that we become confused about right and wrong, wants and needs, love and intimacy. Why do we not only repress our natural sexual tendencies, but further reinforce this repression by placing monogamous restrictions upon ourselves? Where does emotion begin? Where should government regulation end? And where do religious beliefs fit in?

Some of the reasons we marry have remained constant over the years and are not exclusive to either polygamy or monogamy. We marry for love, for money, for religious, for societal acceptance and to create a family.

It is estimated that 30,000 to 50,000 people in the U.S. today practice polygamy. It stands to reason then, that a 2003 Gallup poll indicated 92% of Americans are against polygamy (Soukup) since the majority does not practice it. In general, and because it is more prevalent, both statistics refer to our negativity toward polygyny. Polygamy has two sub categories: polyandry (more than one husband) and polygyny (more than one wife). There is little data on polyandry; it appears to be practiced infrequently in few species and only sporadically in human beings (most notably in Tibet where women tend to marry brothers for economic reasons (Levine) and in the honeybee species where one queen is served by many male bees whose only goal in life is to procreate). It is commonly believed that most women would not want more than one husband, though one woman, in response to an unscientific opinion poll, confessed she would consider, in addition to her current spouse, a live-in handyman, even though she wouldn't necessarily want to marry him (Roper).

According to one study, Wright 1994 in "Why Monogamy?" (Kanazawa, Still), the evolutionary theory of marriage, reduced to our most basic instincts, suggests that women marry for money, and men marry for looks. The assumptions are that men want as many superior children as it is possible to produce, and women want to make sure the man has the resources and wherewithal to stick around and support their progeny. If the ultimate goal is procreation, it would follow that men would marry as many wives as possible to produce as many children as possible, and women would marry the one man who is wealthy enough to support them and their offspring in the style to which she would like to become accustomed.

Yet, in U.S. society today, it is more socially acceptable than ever to have children outside of marriage; women are more independent and self-sufficient than they have ever been and, thanks to sperm banks, they no longer even require a male presence to produce children. Still, rich women and poor women, fertile and infertile, young and old, continue to marry, both monogamously and polygynously.

Currently, of course, polygyny is illegal in the U.S. and has been since the Edmunds-Tucker Act of 1887 was passed. The act "criminalized unlawful cohabitation, even in the absence of formal marriage." It is interesting to note that the Act also excluded from juries people who believed in polygamy, took away polygamists' right to vote, effectively removing their right to contest the law, and divested the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon church) of most of its property (Dow, Maldonado, Jr.). The real motivation for the act, according to Bernard Weisberger ("What makes a marriage?") was to "break Mormonism's union of church and state before Utah could be admitted to the Union."

In a more recent case, Warren Jeffs, a current self-proclaimed "prophet" of a group of Fundamental Latter Day Saints in Utah, reportedly married to 50 wives, was captured on August 29, 2006 after making the FBI's most wanted list and eluding authorities for several years (Goodwyn, Berkes, Walters). The media has made much of Jeffs' polygamous lifestyle, and many assume that the charges he faces are for practicing polygamy. He is not, however, being prosecuted for polygamy. He was indicted on two counts of sexual assault on a minor and one count of conspiracy to commit sexual conduct with a minor in conjunction with a marriage he arranged between a 14 year old girl and her (single) 19 year old cousin. Mr. Jeffs, like many self proclaimed prophets (and cult leaders), seems to have carried his fundamentalist beliefs to the extreme, stepping over not only religious and legal lines, but violating basic morals and principles, perhaps believing himself invincible and above such mundane concerns. Even Mark Henkel, the founder of TruthBearer.org, a Christian pro-polygamy organization, does not support Mr. Jeffs' practices and teachings. Extremists who manipulate and misrepresent religious practices, creating a new order to conform to their own perversions, always seem to capture the media's (and thus the nation's) attention, which, in this case, has further given polygamy its reputation of depravity. But that is not the only reason people fear and distrust polygamy.

Historically, polygyny was (and, in some societies still is) most often practiced by Muslims and some Mormon sects, two religious societies which tend to relegate women to second class citizenship (i.e. wives as property of husbands, wives allowed into heaven only by invitation from a happy husband). Polygamy was also practiced in China, which devalued females to the point of widespread and commonplace female infanticide while the "one child per family" law was in effect. Allegedly, laws were enacted against the practice of polygamy because the practice itself, rather than the guiding religious and societal beliefs, exploited and oppressed women. However, women have continued to marry polygamously, and happily, by choice, and regardless of its illegality. So who are the laws really protecting?

Some scientific studies have shown that it is women, rather than men, who generally choose polygyny even in patriarchal societies. One of the most obvious reasons is a practical one; perhaps based upon a common female lament, "a good man is hard to find." Assuming women want to get married, and there are fewer men than women, (because of war casualties, high levels of criminal incarceration, gay men exiting closets, or the fact that women generally outlive men) a realistic need for polygamy is created. There are as many reasons women would choose polygamy as there are reasons people choose to marry at all. It is insulting to women to assume that they are victimized by their own choices, and enact a law to protect them from those choices by disallowing them to be made.

Again and somewhat simplistically, Satoshi Kanazawa and Mary C. Still promote this same theory in "Why Monogamy? They state that "...the institution of marriage spontaneously emerges out of women's individual choices to marry polygynously or monogamously. If resource inequality among men is great, women choose to marry polygynously, and the polygynous institute of marriage emerges. If resource inequality among men is small, women choose to marry monogamously, and the monogamous institution of marriage emerges. The theory explains the historical shift from polygyny to monogamy as a result of the gradual decline of inequality among men."

Aside from the materialistic aspects, some might wonder what possible advantages polygyny would provide for women, but as anyone who has ever been married knows, there are many possible benefits to a spouse's occasional absences - no one to fight over the remote, no one to consult before making plans to eat the whole package of Oreos for dinner, and singing off key without fear of disturbing anyone else. There are women who might understandably value the sharing of and, thus the lessening of, their own marital responsibilities. In many polygynous societies, men provide their wives with separate households, visiting each wife as time permits. This results in what might be seen as a part-time marriage, somewhat akin to a woman whose only husband travels to earn a living. It is likely the more peaceful existence for multiple wives, as they may never meet their husband's other wives. Yet that is not always possible, and multiple spouses have learned to co-exist in the same living space peacefully and cooperatively, assuming there are an ample number of bathrooms. There are the benefits of the ability to share concerns and experiences, the value of a live-in babysitter, and someone else to clean all those bathrooms or cook dinner when they just didn't feel like it. And, following the logic of why women marry men (and mercenary and mind-boggling as it might seem), it has also been pointed out that many women might prefer 1/5^th of a rich Donald Trump than 100% of a poverty stricken Brad Pitt.

William Tucker agrees that polygyny is more far more unfair towards men than it is toward women. The "winners" under polygyny, according to Tucker's article, Monogamy and its discontents, "are high-status males and low-status females." Even assuming there were an equal number of men and women (currently there are more women than men residing in the U.S.), mathematically, if men were allowed to marry multiple wives, more women would be married, and more men would ultimately remain single, childless, unhealthy and, presumably, unhappy. And that is only one of the most obvious disadvantages for men if polygyny were legal.

In an interview with polygamist Tom Green, by Tom Zoeliner, "How to Keep Your Wives Happy," Green, who was sentenced to five years in prison in 2002 for practicing polygamy in Utah, is theoretically married to five women, and has 29 children. Mr. Green, it should be pointed out, is not a practicing Mormon and did divorce each successive wife before he married the next one. He also, however, lived with all of them simultaneously, which is also illegal in Utah. Mr. Green, in living with five women, took on five times the responsibilities of most married men, not the least of which is are his obligations to effectively communicate with multiple spouses. Psychology Today, in "Secrets of Married Men," declares that men are at a distinct disadvantage in relationships, verbally and emotionally because, "the average woman uses 7000 words a day and five tones of speech. The average man uses 2000 words and three tones." It must be a challenge to communicate effectively with just 400 words per day per spouse, and that assumes he doesn't speak to any of his children at all. Green was somewhat relieved of his financial obligations as all of his wives are gainfully employed; even married couples who both work have a hard time making ends meet. He must possess an excellent memory in order to refrain from calling one of his wives by another's name and to remember five birthdays and five anniversaries every year and he must possess an overabundance of stamina in order to keep five women happy. Most men might conclude that the hardships outweigh the benefits of multiple wives. Perhaps Mr. Green pled guilty to the charges of polygamy in order to obtain a much needed rest from married life.

Clearly, then, men are the true "victims" of polygamy, and must be protected under the law. It is the men, however, who are prosecuted when the laws are enforced. The men who marry more than one woman at a time are the criminals even with the knowledge and consent of all the women. So, if women above the age of consent choose polygamy, and men are the unprotected victims of multiple wives, why do the laws against polygamy exist, and why are men considered the criminals? What is the real purpose of the law?

It's true, certainly, that, like laws against adultery, arrest and prosecution for polygamy is as rare, or rarer, than the practice of polygamy itself. Those who practice polygamy are circumspect in their lifestyle and, as a result, become isolated from their monogamous neighbors and society as a whole in spite of the lack of the law's enforcement. This self-inflicted seclusion and separation from society can be a recipe for disaster. Those isolated from the mainstream tend to distrust and shun the people and organizations put in place to protect them, in order that they may protect themselves and their lifestyles. Thus, when problems do exist, such as abuse or exploitation, within polygamous marriages, the women become dual victims; victims of their husbands, and victims of the very laws which have been put into place to protect and defend them. It is the law itself which causes the crimes against women to remain unaddressed and uncontrollable.

Legalizing polygamy seems likely do little harm to society in general, but it would protect women who did choose it by providing them with societal acceptance, and thus society's most basic protections and benefits. It is unlikely that decriminalizing polygamy will cause major traffic jams to or long lines at city hall since most of us don't like to drive in traffic or stand in lines, but the most basic reasons polygamy would probably never be the norm were expressed best by individuals, Elizabeth Newell and Dan Fallon. Elizabeth echoed the sentiments of many women, when she proclaimed, "No way. I want my husband to love only me." And, Dan might be speaking for married men everywhere, when he observed, "One woman is enough to drive you crazy." # # # Works Cited

Dow, David and Maldonado Jr., Jose I. "The Mormon Question: Polygamy and Constitutional Conflict in Nineteenth Century America (Book Review)." Constitutional Commentary 20.3 (Winter 2003): 571(39).

Estroff Marano, Hara. "Secrets of Married Men." Psychology Today Magazine. (26 Jul 2006) http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/index.php?term=pto-200...

Goodwyn, Wade, Berkes, Howard, and Walters, Amy. "Warren Jeffs and the FLDS." NPR (23 Oct 2006) http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4629320

Kanazawa, Satoshi, and Mary C. Still. "Why Monogamy? (Statistical Data Included)." Social Forces 78.1 (Sept 1999): 25.

Levine, Nancy E. "The Dynamics of Polyandry. Kinship, Domesticity, and Population on the Tibetan Border." Chicago: The University of Chicago Press (1988): xvii+ 309 pp.

Roper, Elaine. "Re: Your opinions (seriously or not)." MSN Writer's group posting. 19 Nov 2006 Write Stuff Discussion Group

http://groups.msn.com/WriteStuff/general.msnw?action=get_message&mview=0&ID_Message=37049&LastModified=4675598605569795276

Soukup, Elise, "Polygamists, Unite! They used to live quietly, but now they're making noise." Newsweek (20 Mar 200) 52.

Tucker, William. "Monogamy and its discontents. (challenge to western sexual values) (Cover Story)." National Review 45.n19 (Oct 4, 1993): 28(8).

Weisberger, Bernard A. "What makes a marriage? (history of marriage and Mormonism)." American Heritage 47n7 (Nov 1996): 14(2).

Zoeliner, Tom. "How to Keep Your Wives Happy. (polygamist Tom Green)." Men's Health 14.2 (Mar 1999): 144(1)