Is the main objection to polygamy that having multiple sex partners is immoral or that the whole arrangement is subjugation of women (because usually it’s multiple wives not husbands), or some other reason?
Thanks, I got the humor, what I’m wondering about is what’s the predominant reason people in general object to polygamy, regardless of whether it’s Islam or Mormons or whatever.
A bit of both. The Greeks and Romans had a cultural taboo against polygamy which Christianity inherited, which means that Christians have historically been opposed to polygamy (which was not the case in Pre-christian northern Europe) on moral grounds. There is also the issue that historically polygamy has been associated with patriarchal societies in which men are allowed or expected to have multiple wives, but women are not allowed to do the same. Additionally, it is also culturally associated with treating women as property of the husband. Personally I don’t have any issue with polygamy if everyone is free to do whatever but the way most cultures practice it, it’s unfair to women. Then again, that could also he said of “traditional” marriage in a lot of monogamous scenarios too.
Depends on whose objecting. This arrangement pretty much only works at scale with a combination of religious brainwashing, inequality between and amongst the genders, and a healthy dose of male mortality especially from war.
Inequality among a gender:
For instance if bob and Sam both make 70k 5 women aren’t all marrying one or the other in most instances.
Inequality between the genders:
Given a complex life path beyond follow in husband’s shadow no matter what or become a parish the chance of instability with more people increases with each member added.
So the first obvious person to object to broad enactment of this idea ought to be women raised to buy into this when it’s not their best option.
Next is society for such groups brainwashing kids.
Then there is the downside of the enabling inequality. Anyone not on the top end of the financial spectrum ought to object to that.
Women ought to object to the idea that they ought to share.
Men not in the top 5-20% ought to object to competing for the remaining women not attached to high status males. Note this is what incels say they are mad about now but there is so much to unpack re their broken brains and it’s just not at this juncture real.
Society should be mad at the very large number of unattached men who normally cause trouble.
Some such societies deal with this by trading women like Pokemon cards and driving off excess men. This doesn’t work without wars to kill them off or somewhere to drive them to.
Basically everyone but a smallish minority of men would be worse off which is why this is non existent in modern functioning society.
There little net effect on society with a small incidence of polygomy just like with lead in the water.
If someone supports gay marriage they have no basis for opposing polygamist or incestuous marriages outside of how it subjectively makes them feel. Marriage is historically a religio-cultural institution. Without that context there can be no restrictions that don’t also violate foundational secular values such as personal freedom. Secularity and modernism gatekeeping marriage is a hilarious mental gymnastics routine. These days marriage is just something to keep lawyers in business anyway. The government should just get out of the marriage business entirely at this point.
I think in western culture it might be a bit of both, and also a bit of xenophobia - it’s different, so it must be bad. I’d be interested in knowing more too. Very good question.
Mormons used to (some still do) practice polygamy and we had just as much, if not more of a problem with their practices as we do with “foreigners”.
From my perspective as another polyamorous person, I think polygamy is kinda fucked up, at least in the ways it manifests today. It’s an inequitable power dynamic that relies on the exploitation of women. I’m all about subversion and defiance of hierarchies. Polygamy reinforces those hierarchies
Just to be clear, I see polygamy as bad only because of the women oppression aspect. But the world is a big place and history is long, so I wouldn’t be surprised if at some point there was some system that allowed for polygamy without oppressing women. Mentioning mormons - don’t you think they can be seen as another weird different group - and therefore be also object of xenophobia? Notice I intentionally didn’t use the word racism, what I mean is just the sentiment that people doing things differently than my group must be deadly wrong.
Sure, but that’s universal. Most of the Islamic theocratic have this problem, and it’s a point of general focus… but Islam is their excuse, not a functional cause. It’s not like Mormons did it any better.
You do think that women should be able to marry more than one person? So above story wouldn’t be a problem for you if one of the women had a husband and a wife?
From my personal experience a lot of muslim women do not consent to their husband havinv more than one wife (in Islam the woman has to consent), so it’s something that happens only when the women agree to it.
It’s a complicated question to answer. Consent can’t be given under duress, and the rate of abuse in polygamous marriages is astoundingly high. If there was some magical way that the state could verify that everyone is consenting with a true option to say no without their life being ruined, that would be great. However having the state decide who can marry would go really poorly at some point. As a result, I think we’re left with the western status quo where we throw the baby out with the bath water and ban the whole thing. It’s kinda like how some people can be responsible handgun owners but others are murderers and the potential downsides are great enough that nobody gets the privilege. Same for selling cocaine.
Somehow I doubt your sincerity. Most people who bring up women’s rights when it comes to Muslims only bring up women’s rights when Muslims are involved. Like conservatives who would happily defund every women’s sports programs but use women’s sports as a cudgel to hurt trans people.
It’s really transparent and disingenuous, and you give off those same vibes.
Based on one comment? You’re pulling that out of your ass because confronting your own inconsistencies makes you uncomfortable. Feel free to stalk my comment history of you want.
Also way to tell on yourself that you don’t respect women’s rights.
Consent under duress or desperation is not consent. That’s why I’m pointing out that if the polygamy only ever goes one way, there is an obvious power imbalance that prevents consent from being possible.
You can’t consent to a religion if leaving it causes you to be shunned by your family and community.
Then almost no one consents to their religion worldwide at all, barring a relative handful who leave the dominant faith in their community and are essentially disconnected solo practitioners of whatever, because joining or marrying into a different religious community is essentially just choosing a different group with the power to shun you for leaving their faith in turn.
You can’t consent to a religion if leaving it causes you to be shunned by your family and community.
Then, according to that logic, not a single person who believes in a mainstream/typical religion is consenting to it, because many families and communities will shun you if you leave their religion. That is a social construct and may or may not happen depending on many factors.
Are you specifically talking about the concept of apostasy in Islam and how it’s supposedly punishable by death?
You’re making a sweeping general statement.
Polygamy is just Polyamory taken to vows.
There is a problem with a lot of the people that practice polygamy in an unethical way, but not polygamy itself.
There is a problem with a lot of the people that practice polygamy in an unethical way
That is what the person you responded to said. There is a problem with the cultural of polygamy here because it’s done in an unethical way.
but not polygamy itself.
That is also what the person you replied to said. They clarified specifically that if both genders are free to practice polygamy in the same way there’s no issue.
Probably depends on who you ask. I’m polyamorous and I think in almost all cases where someone says polygamy and not polyamory they’re engaging in an immoral power dynamic. My experience being poly though I’d say most people take offense to the multiple partners thing and polygamy is just what they’re familiar with as a concept
This. When I was poly my friends and fam were cool with it, but they’re not religious. Every religious person I knew who found out was not too pleased with me.
Is the main objection to polygamy that having multiple sex partners is immoral or that the whole arrangement is subjugation of women (because usually it’s multiple wives not husbands), or some other reason?
Muslim men can have multiple wives (maximum 5 I believe) as long as they can provide for them. Muslim women are only allowed to have a single husband.
The joke is that the school thought that the kid’s family was super progressive meanwhile in reality it was super patriarchal
Thanks, I got the humor, what I’m wondering about is what’s the predominant reason people in general object to polygamy, regardless of whether it’s Islam or Mormons or whatever.
People confuse polygamy with polygyny.
Polygamy is when one person can marry multiple people.
Polygyny is when one person can marry multiple women.
Polyandry is when one person can marry multiple men.
There’s no specific word for when one person can marry multiple nonbinary people.
Polyphony?
Sounds good 🎶
Didn’t they make donkey kong?
A bit of both. The Greeks and Romans had a cultural taboo against polygamy which Christianity inherited, which means that Christians have historically been opposed to polygamy (which was not the case in Pre-christian northern Europe) on moral grounds. There is also the issue that historically polygamy has been associated with patriarchal societies in which men are allowed or expected to have multiple wives, but women are not allowed to do the same. Additionally, it is also culturally associated with treating women as property of the husband. Personally I don’t have any issue with polygamy if everyone is free to do whatever but the way most cultures practice it, it’s unfair to women. Then again, that could also he said of “traditional” marriage in a lot of monogamous scenarios too.
Depends on whose objecting. This arrangement pretty much only works at scale with a combination of religious brainwashing, inequality between and amongst the genders, and a healthy dose of male mortality especially from war.
Inequality among a gender: For instance if bob and Sam both make 70k 5 women aren’t all marrying one or the other in most instances.
Inequality between the genders: Given a complex life path beyond follow in husband’s shadow no matter what or become a parish the chance of instability with more people increases with each member added.
So the first obvious person to object to broad enactment of this idea ought to be women raised to buy into this when it’s not their best option.
Next is society for such groups brainwashing kids.
Then there is the downside of the enabling inequality. Anyone not on the top end of the financial spectrum ought to object to that.
Women ought to object to the idea that they ought to share.
Men not in the top 5-20% ought to object to competing for the remaining women not attached to high status males. Note this is what incels say they are mad about now but there is so much to unpack re their broken brains and it’s just not at this juncture real.
Society should be mad at the very large number of unattached men who normally cause trouble.
Some such societies deal with this by trading women like Pokemon cards and driving off excess men. This doesn’t work without wars to kill them off or somewhere to drive them to.
Basically everyone but a smallish minority of men would be worse off which is why this is non existent in modern functioning society.
There little net effect on society with a small incidence of polygomy just like with lead in the water.
If someone supports gay marriage they have no basis for opposing polygamist or incestuous marriages outside of how it subjectively makes them feel. Marriage is historically a religio-cultural institution. Without that context there can be no restrictions that don’t also violate foundational secular values such as personal freedom. Secularity and modernism gatekeeping marriage is a hilarious mental gymnastics routine. These days marriage is just something to keep lawyers in business anyway. The government should just get out of the marriage business entirely at this point.
I think in western culture it might be a bit of both, and also a bit of xenophobia - it’s different, so it must be bad. I’d be interested in knowing more too. Very good question.
Mormons used to (some still do) practice polygamy and we had just as much, if not more of a problem with their practices as we do with “foreigners”.
From my perspective as another polyamorous person, I think polygamy is kinda fucked up, at least in the ways it manifests today. It’s an inequitable power dynamic that relies on the exploitation of women. I’m all about subversion and defiance of hierarchies. Polygamy reinforces those hierarchies
Just to be clear, I see polygamy as bad only because of the women oppression aspect. But the world is a big place and history is long, so I wouldn’t be surprised if at some point there was some system that allowed for polygamy without oppressing women. Mentioning mormons - don’t you think they can be seen as another weird different group - and therefore be also object of xenophobia? Notice I intentionally didn’t use the word racism, what I mean is just the sentiment that people doing things differently than my group must be deadly wrong.
Find me just one example of a Muslim woman with two husbands.
That wasn’t the ask though? They were asking about polygamy in general…
It’s an easy one-sentence way to point out the inherent subjugation of women.
Yet it muddies the water with Islamophobia.
Call me whatever you want, I believe women should have equal rights.
Sure, but that’s universal. Most of the Islamic theocratic have this problem, and it’s a point of general focus… but Islam is their excuse, not a functional cause. It’s not like Mormons did it any better.
Agreed. I’m not sure what point you’re trying to make.
Do you agree? Really? Cause your intimation seems to be that anyone who doesn’t agree with you 100% doesn’t believe women should have equal rights.
You could expound on your point a bit more, but it’d probably take more than one sentence. Please try.
You do think that women should be able to marry more than one person? So above story wouldn’t be a problem for you if one of the women had a husband and a wife?
From my personal experience a lot of muslim women do not consent to their husband havinv more than one wife (in Islam the woman has to consent), so it’s something that happens only when the women agree to it.
It’s a complicated question to answer. Consent can’t be given under duress, and the rate of abuse in polygamous marriages is astoundingly high. If there was some magical way that the state could verify that everyone is consenting with a true option to say no without their life being ruined, that would be great. However having the state decide who can marry would go really poorly at some point. As a result, I think we’re left with the western status quo where we throw the baby out with the bath water and ban the whole thing. It’s kinda like how some people can be responsible handgun owners but others are murderers and the potential downsides are great enough that nobody gets the privilege. Same for selling cocaine.
Somehow I doubt your sincerity. Most people who bring up women’s rights when it comes to Muslims only bring up women’s rights when Muslims are involved. Like conservatives who would happily defund every women’s sports programs but use women’s sports as a cudgel to hurt trans people.
It’s really transparent and disingenuous, and you give off those same vibes.
Based on one comment? You’re pulling that out of your ass because confronting your own inconsistencies makes you uncomfortable. Feel free to stalk my comment history of you want.
Also way to tell on yourself that you don’t respect women’s rights.
If everyone involved consents, should that be anyone else’s business?
Consent under duress or desperation is not consent. That’s why I’m pointing out that if the polygamy only ever goes one way, there is an obvious power imbalance that prevents consent from being possible.
Are you arguing that all polygamous Muslim marriages are happening under duress?
If so, that’s a sweeping generalisation and a false statement. The polygamy being one-way doesn’t necessarily mean it’s not consensual.
Then why can’t people consent in the other direction?
Because the parties involved embrace a religion that prohibits it, and they willingly consent to that restriction by extension.
Again, consent under duress is not consent. You can’t consent to a religion if leaving it causes you to be shunned by your family and community.
Then almost no one consents to their religion worldwide at all, barring a relative handful who leave the dominant faith in their community and are essentially disconnected solo practitioners of whatever, because joining or marrying into a different religious community is essentially just choosing a different group with the power to shun you for leaving their faith in turn.
Then, according to that logic, not a single person who believes in a mainstream/typical religion is consenting to it, because many families and communities will shun you if you leave their religion. That is a social construct and may or may not happen depending on many factors.
Are you specifically talking about the concept of apostasy in Islam and how it’s supposedly punishable by death?
You’re making a sweeping general statement. Polygamy is just Polyamory taken to vows. There is a problem with a lot of the people that practice polygamy in an unethical way, but not polygamy itself.
That is what the person you responded to said. There is a problem with the cultural of polygamy here because it’s done in an unethical way.
That is also what the person you replied to said. They clarified specifically that if both genders are free to practice polygamy in the same way there’s no issue.
Excuse me? If you want one find her yourself.
I answered your question of if my objection was about the subjugation of women, and I pointed out how subjugating women is the problem.
Probably depends on who you ask. I’m polyamorous and I think in almost all cases where someone says polygamy and not polyamory they’re engaging in an immoral power dynamic. My experience being poly though I’d say most people take offense to the multiple partners thing and polygamy is just what they’re familiar with as a concept
This. When I was poly my friends and fam were cool with it, but they’re not religious. Every religious person I knew who found out was not too pleased with me.