"Big Love," about a fictional man and his three beautiful wives, piqued our interests and our curiosity about polygamy. Now there is the TLC reality show "Sister-Wives" about a man and his three wives living in a plural marriage and, while the Brown family is not nearly as interesting nor as likable as the fictional Bill Hendrickson family in "Big Love," the curious will tune in to see this real-life family dynamic of one man and his wives.
Men in traditional marriages may at first smile at the fantasy of "three women all wanting me!" but reality sets in and they imagine the financial and emotional stress of having more than one wife at the same time in their lives on a daily basis. Wives in a one-on-one marriage, on the other hand, feel that having to share their man sexually, emotionally and financially, is something relegated to purely ancient patriarchal societies. Yet the curiosity about polygamous marriages remains. Why would anyone enter into a plural union?
Polygamy as a form of marriage has been around for a long time. To be sure polygamy is mentioned in the books of many world religions and still practiced in some countries as both a custom and a religious belief. In ancient times, it was a practice that was not only for religious purposes but political ones as well. It helped to connect tribes and dynasties through marriages in the hope that a man might think twice before attacking the lands of his in-laws, many though he may have. On a purely practical reason it was seen as insurance that a man would have children. Death in childbirth for both mother and child was a terrible reality and a man's chances for fatherhood were better if he had more than one wife.
It was an accepted form of marriage by members of the Church of Latter Day Saints, also known as Mormons, in the United States until 1890, when it was outlawed. It is still practiced today, albeit illegally, by some who have broken away from the main body of the church. Please note that polygamy is not sanctioned nor condoned by the Church of Latter Day Saints.
Since most couples, men and women, find a polygamous relationship strange to say the least, there is still the curiosity about how and why some people would even want to live this type of life. Why a man would want to have more than one spouse and why a woman would be content to be a sister-wife.
While I have written about the many types of marriages that couples enter into (love marriages, mature marriages, gay marriages, second marriages, arranged marriages, sexless marriages, etc.), I am hard pressed to find something that most of us would see as beneficial in a plural marriage.
To me, marriage means love between one woman and one man. I want the commitment between us to be based on love. I want to love and be loved by one man and to know that I am the only one cuddling up to my husband at night. I want to feel that I am the only woman in his heart and in his arms, on his mind, and in his life. I do not want to share him.
To be even more honest I would say that I don't know if I could live with other women as a "sister-wife" sharing everything and one man. For me personally, it simply would not work.
But, to be fair as a lifestyle writer, I must state that I was not raised to believe that polygamy is an acceptable form of a marital union. I was raised to see marriage as a way of expressing love between two people, and two people only, one husband and one wife.
Anyone not born into a certain way of life has a difficult time understanding what they consider strange traditions. This is especially true when it comes to religions. The great Native American of the Nez Perce tribe, Chief Joseph, said, "It is easy to laugh at what you don't understand."
That may be true but still some serious questions about the polygamous life need to be asked:
Is polygamy beneficial to all parties concerned?
Is it detrimental to women, causing an inequality in the marriage dynamics?
Can it perpetuate forms of abuse?
Besides having been raised in an environment and religious belief system where polygamy is as accepted as a family dinner on Sunday, why would anyone else choose this form of marriage?
The laws of most western countries state that a polygamous union is illegal and will prosecute against those who are in plural marriages, yet the practice persists.
While the premise of the TLC show is interesting, with the family trying to make us believe that polygamy is as normal as apple pie, it does not show the reality of plural marriages as it is behind closed doors. All marriages, whether two spouses or plural, do not show their darker sides in public.
The idea of having one person love you and you loving that person in return is simple. There is a charm and sweetness in that phrase, "we two are now one." I can't see sharing that phrase with anyone else.
To read more from Kristen Houghton, peruse her articles at Kristen Houghton.com and visit her Keys to Happiness blog.
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Jessica Holmes: When Moms Make Whoopee
First, technically there is no federal law against polygamy.
Polygamists and most states define having multiple simultaneous licensed marriages as bigamy, not polygamy, so despite the actual meaning of the words bigamy (having two spouses) and polygamy (having multiple spouses), the words have kind of morphed into a pseudo-legal jargon of bigamy (having more than one licensed spouse at the same time) and polygamy (having more than one social or religious spouse at the same time). Polyamory is basically similar to this definition of polygamy, but many polygamists consider polyamory to be the same as an "open marriage" and "swinging".
In all 50 states, it is illegal to be in more than one licensed marriage simultaneously (bigamy); however, states can differ a great deal on being socially or religiously married to more than one spouse at the same time (polygamy). This gets into "common-law" marriages (observed by a handful of states) and "co-habitation" (also used in a handful of states). Utah has used its co-habitation laws to go after polygamists. Kody Brown of Sister Wives is being investigated using co-habitation laws and it was what was used to go after Tom Green in 2007. Other states, about 7 IIRC actually have few if any statutes which can be used to prosecute social/religious polygamy.
I can't help but wonder about the effects of this religion and culture on these women's self-esteem. I come from a strict, conservative religious background, where the man is the head of the house and the woman does nothing but stay in the kitchen, pregnant and barefoot. It took years for me to undo the damage to my own self-esteem, and see myself as an equal, rather than just "the wife".
I know there are those who say that monogamy isn't natural but I, and it seems quite a few others, feel it is. There are such words as commitment and love and that is the key issue.
The family in the show, didn't seem to have that kind of power dynamic. The children and the women of the house control everything. The guy didn't even have his own room, or his own closet. The women in the relationship were all different, and pretty much did what they wanted, when they wanted. None of them looked like they were under anybody's thumb.
To be fair- Don't assume that the man in the relationship always has it so much easier then the women involved in the relationship? The man has a pretty heavy burden as well. In that culture it is the mans responsibility to be the exclusive provider for all those women and children. The women all work together as a team to run the house and raise the children, but the man is all on his own.
Most men now days in monogamous relationships cant even fathom providing for more than one wife and three children exclusively. Polygamy isn't an easy lifestyle for anybody who chooses to enter it.
The latest research in primatology and evolutionary psychology is that a sustainable intimate relationship is not only an oxymoron, but is unnatural, and at odds with our innate instincts. It has about as much chance of success as abstinence.
It really has little to do with who we are, or how well we are suited to our significant other. Neither monogamy nor pair-bonding works in the long run because it is a social fiction. The entire marriage model is wrong, which is why it continues to fail. No amount of counseling can undo our evolutionary heritage as discriminatingly promiscuous animals, much like our genetic cousins, the bonobos. Both females and males have multiple partners.
Obviously, if their hypothesis is correct, which will be the subject of much debate, our social mores do not fit with our nature, leaving us without a set of acceptable options - an untenable position, to say the least.
From my related research in the fields of nutrition and primary illness prevention, our models in those areas are also social constructs that are at odds with our heritage. A discussion and references can be found in "The Wellness Project."
Roy Mankovitz, Director
http://www.MontecitoWellness.com
For an article in Forever Young, I interviewed over 100 couples with long-standing marriages or relationships, some over 40 years, and the same premise of one and one seems to be working well for them.
beavers than bonobos. We are sort of like industrialized beavers
when you look at our work habits and how we raise our children.
Beavers mate for life, by the way.
Love is not the point of all marriages. Basing a marriage on romantic love is a relatively new idea marriage in fact. Love isn’t the point of a polygamist marriage. Having as many children as possible is. That’s why its so hard for us to understand, and so difficult for them to understand why we just cant let them be in peace. We just have different ideas about marriages and what they are supposed to be about.
Anyway, different strokes for different folks…
As long as everyone involved is above the age of consent, so be it.
uhmph.
Somehow I get the feeling polygamy is on the fast track to legalization, leaving the gay marriage movement in the dust...How sad.