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Why does monogamy exist?

| I've been on this Earth for close to 30 years and nobody has been able to give me an answer other than "it's how it's done" or "it's natural".

Yet people seem to insist on the idea that they should "own" one another or otherwise be exclusive - even if there's no prospect of breeding, for instance.

It feels wrong from the outset to not be able to maximize your own and your partners' enjoyment of life by leaving your options open. ...


| ... If you were to be less charitable, it feels like a product of relationship insecurity on part of either of the partners.

So why is it an institution so prevalent in modern society?
(Moralg/u/rls not welcome.)


| I assume being in a poly relationship just don't come naturally to most people. Like, most people don't think they can be equally caring to/equally cared by multiple partners? And majority rules, so that's just how the institutions are set up.


| Because jealousy is a bitch and trust issues are sometimes really hard to deal with.


| We evolved to be temporarily monogamous in order to raise offsprings however we are still prone to be naturally polygamous. You can observe this by the way our emotions develop during a relationship. The love we feel towards our partner is strongest during the first couple of years but it slowly fades away causing many to split. The ones who stay together do so out of habit, fear of being alone or due to the sunk cost fallacy.


| >>790990 or they just get along that well.

But yeah marriage mostly was in the ye olde times a way of showing that the woman was yours. And while value and laws have drastically changed since then it's just a leftover tradition. Plus >>790971 is right being in a poly can bring alot of downsides like feelings of inadequacy or even paranoia


| I think the reason it's been so important through the ages is inheritance - historically even polygamous/polyandrous marriages were present in more cultures than general polyamory was, because you could still trace lineage strictly that way, and widespread sex/relationships outside of marriage even more common, but in institutionalized marriage at least one side of reproduction sort of has to be a single verifiable person


| Of course there are a ton of factors going into the specific way it looks in any society


| I think monogamy will become less frequent in the near future.
It's far more conevenient and comfy, to be "casual" and love everyone you like around you, without having the restrain of being entitled to other person's liberty and viceversa.


| Being so possevive in romantic/sexual relationships is causing damage to our society, meanwhile those that get together, only split up after very short times, so they are not enjoying monogamy relationships either.


| >>791012
>or they just get along that well
I'm cynical that such outcome is possible, perhaps it may apply to a small minority but it definitely doesn't extend to the average couple which you observe together. One could even say that getting along well derives from habit. After all, how else could one get accustomed to their partner if they can't tolerate them to an extent?


| I would have imagined it has more to do with the raising of children. In a monogamous relationship you have children with one partner and raise the child in conjunction which there are many benefits both mental and physical to raising a child in a stable home with both parents. Veering from this into polygamous relationships and single motherhood leads to alot of issues for children. Which those issues lead to broken,tramatized,or unstable children without both parents.


| >>791054 it isn't a set rule you must have 2 parents or that it may be the best in every situation. Though when applied on a large scale it is far better than the alternatives of single parenthood(of which we can see the issues of large scale single motherhood being very evident in studies showing higher rates of crime,suicide,mental illness, and of course academic achievement)


| >>791055 also not to mention the fact that sexual intercourse can be a risky endeavor. Especially in the past with STDs and pregnancy. Making casual sexual intercourse kind of dangerous. So monogamous marriage kind of just made things stable so the next generation had parents. Women didn't get knocked up and left as soon as it was found out. Fathers knew that they had kids who were theirs(unless mom was being a hoe) along with alot of other long term stability factors.


| Sharing a password with one person you trust is risky. Telling them they can share it with other people means it's not your password anymore, but a public access.
The point of "monogamy" is to give the other something you wouldn't give anyone else, because they're special to you. If you share it with many people, it's just not special anymore.


| By the way, all arguments about stability and kids or whatever are bullshit considering societies with polygamy exist and existed, so they are viable, like it or not. The problem isn't about kids, but about the concept of love, intimacy and trust.


| >>791077 Nice! So can we have polygamy in our society now? I don't want something "special" I just want to be free and on my own.


| >>791076 even if you aren't one of them, many people do find that they can have love, intimacy, specialness and trust in relationships that fall under the broad umbrella of "polyamory"

I also think we have to draw a divide between traditional polygamous/polyandrous marriage (which is a structure of fixed relations like our monogamous marriage, just organized differently) and the idea of breaking those fixed relations to recognize more kinds/patterns of loving relationship than one


| >>791117 What I'm saying is that most people in intimate relationships want to share intimacy (duh), but you can't have the same intimacy with two different people (because they are different, simply), and so each one of them will only have "one side".
If expectations are different, it can work, but you can't divide a cake in two and end up with two cakes of the same size.


| You're a fucking retarded cuck to even ask this shit OP. The purpose of sexual attraction is sex, the purpose of sex is reproduction, raising a child is better with a solid parental pairing and not a society of whores and douchebags never growing up and just fucking around. Monogamy is normal because it makes sense, it is a healthy and easy to maintain standard for the good of our next generation and comfort for everyone who is past wanting to sleep around. Grow the fuck up.


| >>791125 Makes sense, I just think that a lot of peoples' sense that expectations have to be the same comes from ideas not anything inherent to people. If somebody said that they expect all their friends to be on exactly the same level, and fit totally into their conception of what a 'friend' is, we'd think they were weird and controlling. Some friends are closer and some are more distant, but that doesn't reflect their worth as a person, just how closely out lives intersect


| Similarly, there are a wide range of things that we lock into the concept of 'Relationship' and insist that they all go together - sex, emotional intimacy, physical intimacy, commitment, romantic atmosphere... We devalue relationships that are further from that set ideal relationship but the fact is how any two peoples' lives best fit together varies. I don't think they all have to be the same, or that that difference necessarily devalues people


| Uh, the point of all that is that I think a lot of why we reject that difference is cultural, not inherent to people


| >>791136 not much is inherent to people I think, though


| >>791130
Sorry, I believe you didn't read OP's post correctly.
At the bottom, it says moralg/u/rls not welcome?
Please go away.


| >>791151 tbh this gurl didn't say anything morals-related, just a bunch of crap. Guess they never had history books other than the bible.


| As someone who has been in a throuple before, monogamy is far less problematic. I broke up with my boyfriend and girlfriend because resentment ans jealousy built up over months. Throuple works on paper but in practise it's delicate. I'd never get into such relationships again. Monogamy is it for me personally.


| because it's more probable that a women will have many partners at once than a man will have, leading to jealousy and an instability in the relationship, where you'll have to divide the time (or get practically none) with the person you love, while they are happy out there with more love than you'll ever get.


| polygamy is practically cheating when you look at it, or even worse, NTR. you're allowing yourself to stay away from the person you truly love and practically just resort to dreaming about them while they're being affectionate with other people more often than they're with you


| Because Monogamy is based and redpilled and polygamy is cringe and bluepilled

Total number of posts: 30, last modified on: Fri Jan 1 00:00:00 1633080264

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