Why Monogamy Doesn’t Work
For those of you familiar with me already or are regular readers of this blog, this post is going to be very old stuff you’ve heard many times before, so you’re welcome to take the day off today. This blog has received a lot of new readers lately, so for their benefit I’m going to quickly walk through the essentials just to bring everyone up to speed. It will help put my other posts here in context.
My primary point: Monogamy is a very bad idea for the vast majority of the population of the modern western world. It doesn’t work and causes more harm than good.
My secondary point: If you know this and get monogamous anyway, you have no right to complain to anyone about your relationship problems. You dug your grave, now enjoy it.
The debate is actually two different sub-debates. The first is regarding long-term monogamy, or “Disney monogamy”, that I define as any monogamy expected to last at least three years or longer, and with zero expectation of cheating or a breakup/divorce or the relationship “going bad” at some point.
As an example, moving in together or getting married are examples of Disney monogamy, since that’s when monogamy is expected to last “the rest of your life”, or at least for many, many years.
The second sub-debate is regarding short-term monogamy or serial monogamy, which is a monogamous relationship where you might like things to go past three years, but don’t really have that expectation or need. If you break up before three years, it might be a little sad, but it’s more or less okay with you, and then you move on to get temporarily monogamous with the next sucker, uh, I mean, person.
Long-term Disney monogamy absolutely does not work. Depending on your age and where you live, there is a 50% to 68% chance that you will eventually get divorced or break up at some point, and usually this breakup will be emotionally painful and destructive and may cause serious financial damage to one or both parties, as well as seriously emotionally damage children if there are any involved.
Of the people who beat the odds and stay together, more than half of these people end up cheating or getting cheated on. Which means…guess what…by definition you aren’t monogamous any more, and monogamy has failed once again.
This bears clarifying because a lot of people really misunderstand this (or refuse to admit it). Let me be clear: If you are in a relationship where you have tolerated a cheating partner, you are in an open relationship whether you admit it or not. You are not practicing monogamy. You can say you’re monogamous all you want. You aren’t. I’ve had a lot of people defend their “monogamous” relationships to me only to later admit that they’ve recently cheated or their partner has cheated. I always find that amusing.
Of the small percentage of modern-day people who get together, stay together forever, and never cheat, more than half of these people end up in a bad marriage where they just “put up” with each other because they fear a divorce more than their continual suffering. Many of you have grandparents or elderly parents who fall into this category. They’re together, but they’re not happy together.
There are stats available everywhere to confirm the numbers above. If you don’t believe me, by all means don’t take my word for it. Do the research yourself and you’ll see I’m correct. You can start with the free ebook on this topic I wrote several years ago. It’s right here.
When all the stats are crunched, it leaves approximately 13% of the population who can make long-term monogamy work. Hilariously, almost 100% of the population, likely including YOU, think they’re in this 13%. Have you ever seen those surveys that show 75% of people think they’re “above average” in looks? It’s the same moronic phenomenon with the Disney monogamy stuff. Everyone thinks they’re special. Uh, no. Only a few people are special. That’s why they’re called special. Moreover, being “special” in this case is not a very good thing. I shall explain.
Let me now prove to you why you’re not in that 13%, and why that’s perfectly okay and not as horrible a thing as you think. We know from stats and research that these 13% almost always:
A) have low sex drives
B) are boring people very satisfied living a boring life
C) tend to fall in love with other low sex drive, boring people
If any one of the above categories do not apply to you, any one of them, then you are not in that 13%. Your desire for sex and excitement or your partner’s desire for these things will eventually, maybe not right now but eventually, terminate the relationship or destroy the monogamous aspects of it by cheating.
Thus getting into a long-term monogamous relationship or marriage and expecting it to last forever monogamously or expecting it to make you happy long-term is a very silly, dangerous, and destructive thing for you to do, and not only for you, but for your partner and current and future children. Better options are getting an open marriage, or a swinger marriage, or never getting legally married (just move in together, have kids, and write up a parenting plan), or if you want to take the worst option, become a permanent serial monogamist. Serial monogamy is still problematic, but it’s better and less destructive than Disney monogamy by far.
Which brings us to the second argument regarding serial monogamy, i.e. monogamy that is not expected to last very long. Serial monogamy is way better than Disney monogamy, but it’s still not ideal because it creates massive amounts of drama and emotional ups and downs in peoples’ lives. Once the NRE honeymoon period ends (usually lasting around three months), drama slowly begins, intensifies, then an eventual breakup occurs, then a new relationship begins with someone new, and the silly cycle repeats.
The serial monogamy lifestyle is chaotic, dramatic, tedious, a hell of a lot of work (in some ways, more work than Disney monogamy, since Disney monogamy is at least monotonous and predictable) and while it may satisfy certain needy emotional needs, it does not make people long-term happy.
However, if you are one of those high-emotional types who truly “like” relationship drama (and I know there’s a lot of you out there!) then I suppose serial monogamy is an acceptable thing for you. However, as I said at the very beginning, you do not have the right to whine, bitch, and complain about your dramatic relationship problems, because you have chosen monogamy specifically for these problems. If you hit yourself in the head with a hammer because you “kinda like pain”, I don’t ever want to hear you complain your head hurts. Feel the pain you’ve chosen and shut up. If you don’t like the pain, stop hitting yourself with a hammer and do something else.
I’m sorry to be so simple, but that really is how this works.
People who get into monogamous relationships even while fully understanding the problems of said relationships also tend to be people who place a lower value on their future happiness. Their happiness now is all that matters. They will say things like, “Why are you bothering me about something that might happen years down the road? I’ve never been so happy! If I get a divorce/breakup or get cheated on down the road, who cares? I’m happy NOW. So leave me alone.”
These are people who “don’t mind” if they get divorced or cheated on or have a huge horrible breakup…just as long as it happens far down the road at some distant point in their future.
One of the core aspects of an Alpha existence is long term happiness. The only way to achieve this is to value your future happiness every bit as much as your present happiness. Thus a true Alpha (not a Needy Alpha) avoids monogamy, as well as long term legal commitments to women in his personal life, specifically for this reason. Being happy now but angry later is no victory. But that’s a big topic for another time.
So while I do consider short-term serial monogamy a notch or two “less bad” than long-term Disney monogamy, that’s not saying much. One doesn’t work at all. The other is a constant up-and-down roller coaster of highs and lows. Open relationships (FB or MLTR), with an OLTR or OTLR marriage as the endgame goal, is a much better path for the vast majority of people in the modern era and in the western world. (I am not talking about past eras, and I’m not talking about cultures outside of the western world.)
Millions of people all over the western world now have open relationships or (discreet) open marriages. I’ve talked about these on this blog and in my ebooks extensively.
Of course I’ve left out a lot of the side points, but this is just a summary. Every excuse you can think of against what I’m saying I’ve addressed before in my other writings, including that free ebook I mentioned. Again, if you think I’m completely full of shit, if you think I’m making all this stuff up, that’s fine. Google around and locate the all data, studies, and statistics on your own. You’ll find the exact same statistics I’ve described (plus or minus a few percentage points based on the individual stat or study).
Regardless, saying “monogamy doesn’t work” is only the first step. It’s only defining the problem. The real mission is to determine other more realistic, more happy, less harmful life paths that still satisfy your emotional, societal, sexual, and Disney needs. There are many and I’ve written about all of them. FB, WD, MLTR, OLTR, live-in OLTR, OLTR marriage, swinging, etc.
Contrary to what you’ve been told your whole life, you have many other viable options in life besides monogamy, even if you want to “settle down” and have kids.
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You mentioned the ups and downs of serial monogamy. Do you find any value in emotional highs and lows or do you try to eliminate them from all areas of your life (for example: not caring which team wins, not celebrating personal accomplishments, etc.)?
Further, what do you think of the Bruce Wayne character in the Nolan films? The concluding film in particular paid close attention to the pain he had to suffer in order to experience the thrill of being Batman. Kind of like serial monogamy, assuming it reaches the two extremes.
I arrange my entire life to keep the highs and eliminate the lows. The pursuit of lows because “how do you know what happiness is if you never feel bad?” doesn’t make any sense unless you’ve literally never felt bad in your entire life. Any adult over the age of about 25 has experienced enough lows to know what a “low” feels like. Therefore there is no need to keep on experiencing lows. Just highs. For example, this post:
http://www.blackdragon-blog.com/2011/07/29/how-fast-it-takes-you-to-do-something-stupid-stimulus-vs-response/
I almost forgot – Batman. In that movie I don’t think he wanted to be Batman because of the thrill. Instead he felt a sort of dark obligation and even a little self-hatred. Note how Alfred was afraid that that Bruce wanted to fail. Talk about being someone addicted to lows!
Good point. He had likely already experienced most of the thrills and wasn’t driven much by them anymore. I think that there can come a time, as in Bruce’s situation, when the low in a person’s life is more emotionally compelling than the high and thus the low is preferred to the high; or rather, the low has actually become the new high. I doubt the ending’s practicality for this reason. Bruce sitting around at outdoor coffee shops for the rest of his life probably isn’t realistic unless he completely rid himself of the addiction.
The other post is interesting, particularly when you mention the “rational step,” which Heath Ledger’s Joker addressed during the interrogation scene (saying something like, “people are only as good as the world allows them to be”).
Monogamy, same as open relationships, is a tool to be used in order to have a ” fulfilling life”. It works for some and not for others ( i think less than the 13%). We don’t know how well open relationships work because it’s not widespread. But the catch comes to having contradicting needs (wanting to fuck other people and wanting not to cheat or to be cheated on) and not figuring out how to deal with them. The reason people don’t have happy, fulfilling lives is because they are to “stupid”. If an open relationship type of life would be more widespread i think there would be many statistics you could bring up to prove that it leads to long term unhappiness. It’s a far much more complicated system and people would have many pitfalls in which to fall.
I could be monogamous if I was stranded on a desert island with only one woman. I would be the 100%. 😛
I remain convinced but troubled. I have thought this through on my own and arrive at the same conclusion. It helps that BD makes a more complete argument backed up with stats.
However, the problems is that most people live by old rules. I don’t know how BD pulls it off consistently, but most people expect monogamy, and the problem is they get upset when you don’t.
For someone already in a relationship, who want to move away from monogamy, the girl is going to be hurt. I truly don’t wish to cause that. I argue in my mind that it is her own fault for not seeing reason, and if she does get upset, it is of her own unwillingness to accept a more rational approach in life. But when it comes down to it, I don’t want to hurt her.
I’m not being beta and feel like I’m afraid of losing her; I have other prospects that I want to go for. I’m not having oneitis and feel that she is the 1. I simply, genuinely don’t wish to make her suffer emotionally and bring pain to her life.
At the same time, I want to meet and fuck other women and feel like it is my right, and the natural, rational thing to do.
If only everyone can get on the same page, we will all be happier.
Wils,
As Min pointed out, no one will ever be on the same page, no matter the structure (monogamy, non-monogamy) employed. It’s this oftentimes troubling reality that makes the whole idea of relationships possible. It would be boring as hell if there was no mystery, no disagreement among people, and so the reason for the misunderstandings is the reason, also, for the understandings. What I’m saying is this: it will always be like this so you better accept it if you want to live a happy life.
– Rog
@ Mih – You’re right. Though millions of people are nonmonogmaous, there are still not enough of them and they haven’t been doing it long enough for us to have any real stats on how happy or unhappy it would make people. However, that’s irrelevant. It’s irrelevant because we already know the status quo is making people unhappy. Therefore to not change because a new system might also make people just as unhappy isn’t a valid justification. The current system isn’t working, therefore we should try something new and see how it works. Clinging to a failed system makes no sense.
@ Wils – 92% of the women who “breakup up”, next, or LSFNTE me return to me. If nonmonogamy made women that “hurt”, why would so many come back for more? This is not as “hurtful” to women as you might think. Moreover, women are more “okay” with open relationships than men are.
Actually go out and give nonmonogamy a real shot for at least one year, then come back and tell me how much it “hurts women”. You will be surprised to find it usually “hurts” them far less than monogamy eventually does.
Well, it’s a scary realization when you already have a marriage and children. When you see how she is bored with you and begins to seek outside ‘attention’ to validate her and it doesn’t matter how much ‘alpha frame’ you try and muster because she knows everything about you. You are no longer enticing and she knows all of your faults and just the simple familiarity and security makes her unable to see you as attractive no matter how hard you try. After waking up to primal attraction mechanisms and the realities of monogamy, I try my best to ‘game’ my wife to keep this thing together, but it does seem futile at times. This is where I am. I try my best to be the alpha attractive man she needs and wants, but it obviously works much better on other women who aren’t committed to me.
So, we are fed the fairy tale from a young age and many of us end up with the fairy tale life. It’s after the marriage/house/children that we see how she is bored with us and basically friendzoned us and you are right, it’s 100% in our control. We just sometimes need the experience before we get it, which isn’t a great position to be in. I WANT to make monogamy work with her and have a fulfilling, passionate relationship and I believe she does as well, but we are fighting nature and evolution here. If we had started from a place where we both got it, even if we wanted monogamy, at least we would be self-aware and would have a higher likelihood of keeping the passion. There is a percentage, although very small I agree, who are self-aware enough to be monogamous, but still keep the passion alive through a shit ton of hard work. That’s very rare I agree.
That’s exactly the situation I’m trying to prevent. Well said.
There isn’t much of a plan for us already in it then is there? Unless we just accept living with a friend the rest of our life, are we all just holding off on divorce for as long as possible? Once you become aware, it’s really difficult to not see it this way.
Get divorced. I did. And I’ve never regretted it. Not once.
@Blackdragon and DB
You are right and wrong at the same time.
How you define the goal of a relationship, defines the outcome. Monogamous is a proven way to raise children.
If your goal is to have several children, live with them and provide them a working family the serial monogamy approach is not an option. Children want their same mother and their same dad around from a very young age to well into their teens.
That said my own year long research into the matter concluded that in the long run, a monogamous relationship runs into the problem of age. Everything else you did mention CAN be fixed. Painless I might add.
However wifes past 50 and men past 50 simply are on a different physical level and there is really no easy fix for that.
The muslims have a solution for this problem in the option of having a second (or third) wife along with your “main” wife. Often the wife will suggest a certain young girl to their husband or even gift him one for birthday. This is a smart solution as it will keep him sexualy busy even when her own needs diminish and at the same time provide an extra pair of hands to help with the household.
I do consider this model to be the best worldwide and I believe it is not without a certain sense of irony that esp. women prefer it. Western women.
For the time beeing the best advice I would give DB is to stick in his current marriage and care for the children, be a good dad and all that, while at the same time have a maitress for his sexual needs. With or without your wifes knowledge.
Regarding the book, chapter TMM.
You write: “Women are biologically wired to get bored with the man
they are with within two to three years,”
The question remains; WHY is this so? The answer is both logic and simple. If the male is not able to cause a pregnancy within 2 or 3 years, nature considers him a failure. As a response the female will start looking for more fertile options elsewhere.
No it’s not. Not in the modern era. The divorce rate in most cities is well over 60%. Monogamy is a proven way to screw up children. (If you’re talking about the 1950’s that’s a complete different story of course. I’m talking about 2013.)
That’s great, but that’s not monogamy. Thus you prove my point.
“That’s great, but that’s not monogamy. Thus you prove my point.” lol That is true. I think it is important to re-stress the fact that you said monogamy with even 1 act of cheating is not monogamy. I know people can disagree with that and argue the logic of it, but for the sake of YOUR argument and definition of it, it works. That being said I don’t completely agree with you, as no one should completely agree with anyone on relationship issues anyway. I’m not a big fan of monogamy as a paradigm myself. It is anti-true and anti-natural. Every fiber in a normal persons body says it’s attracted to more than just one person and would enjoy being with other people at least for shallow physical gratification but not necessarily full on emotional connection with more than one person. The problem with monogamy is that is demands an unrealistic thing. A level of exclusivity that is not only shallow but selfish and against true desires. The wife, the girlfriend, the boyfriend, the husband, will all at some point or another want to become physical with someone else. They don’t always act on it though and that’s all good and dandy, but the confliction that creates can cause a suppressed sense of self and personal happiness and identity. Most attempts at monogamy fail (when they fail due to cheating or outside desires) because of a mere physical need to be with another and not necessarily a full on emotional affair. Those do exist though, and when they do it is apparent that people are never really settled down on ONE single option. Monogamy tells a lie, and it’s an agreement on a lie, a lie to each-other, and a lie to oneself. It agrees to things it cannot possibly live up to and has the audacity to pretend it is upholding those demands at all times. You CANNOT promise that you won’t be attracted to anyone else, you can PRETEND. You CANNOT promise that you won’t have sex with someone else, you can only AGREE to let the other person know if/when that time comes. Realistically this would set the stage for far more functional relationships and set the expectations correctly from the start. People put this “perfect love” demand on their partners and it requires that your love be absolute and unwavering from the very start! How impossible is that?! As if one can even predict or control the chaotic and ever changing circumstances that are ahead in their lives. The agreement in a relationship should be set to expect an eventual time when you two will not equally want to spend time with each-other or equally be interested in only sleeping with that one person. See it’s easy to make these promises at the time, because 1) you think you have to, its the right thing to do etc. or 2) YOU HONESTLY FEEL THAT WAY. You mention it as the honeymoon phase but in disagreement with you I must point out that the “Honeymoon phase” that I am thinking of can last a very very long time. And on top of that your cycle that leads to the first break up and into the next serial monogamous relationship may be with THAT SAME PERSON. You can start many new relationships with 1 person over a long period of time. And you can also BE MONOGAMOUS. And you can also HONESTLY ONLY WANT to sleep with them. You can that is. Here’s a good question though to ask yourself : if you really love her and care about her feelings then EVEN IF you had an open relationship , would you, could you exercise that freedom? Maybe you both agreed to be realistic and set the rules at a more obtainable level. But WOULD YOU DO IT? I love my girlfriend and I am not saying she is the best person in the world or that I’ll always be with her, nor am I saying that I wouldn’t LIKE to sleep with other women in theory, or that I don’t think about being with other beautiful girls, but I am honestly telling you that I CHOOSE NOT TO, FOR ME, FOR HER, because I would feel bad at exercising that right even if that was the agreement we made. And in all honesty she would probably forgive me and let me if I wanted to because she loves me but it would hurt her. And For that I don’t want to. I have had opportunities and I choose not to. Will I ever? I don’t know. I don’t think so. I have cheated on previous girlfriends before many times and have had two or more girlfriends at the same time. But Monogamy to me is an agreement you make with the other person to only be intimate with them and be honest if your not, it’s an agreement with yourself that if you truly lose interest you will admit it and move on. I don’t practice cheating anymore and that is for my sake. Can I picture being with the same woman forever? Kinda. But it’s unrealistic without that swinging or open idea you talked about taking place at some point. I obviously don’t have a Disney point of view, I’m against that. And I refuse to move in with her after being steady for more than a year. Am I sick of her by now sure. But you do what you do for how long you can do it. Monogamy isn’t perfect, nor is it forever, but IT AIN’T BAD, it ain’t bad at all! Monogamy provides a level of intimacy that you can only obtain by at least temporarily focusing on only being intimate with that person. When you Love someone and sleep with them and you are true to them and they are to you, the sex itself is 100 times better than any frivolous sex you can have with women. And in today’s western civilization I think serial monogamy is better than none considering abstinence is NOT an option and condoms suck. Stds are running rampant and in today’s society more THAN EVER IN ANY OTHER one should consider getting themselves a steady piece of ass. It’s more fulfilling, it’s better for your sex life, and if it gets bad you can move on. But not even engaging in that or attempting it at all would take the good parts of mating out of mating. Who wants to serial DATE?! I don’t! Who wants to be serial lonely? Not me! Kids don’t get screwed up from divorce that is pussy talk. Kids get screwed up from screwed up parents who lack life and communication skills. No there is no cupid, santa-claus, or forever monogamy but part time is a hell of a lot better than the remaining options. Maybe you will say that this doesn’t conflict with any of what you said , because it’s covered under the “not really monogamy” umbrella. Of course perfect and TRUE monogamy “doesn’t work” IT DOESN’T EXIST. The only kind of monogamy we should and can even talk about is the kind that DOES exist and that kind IS full of hiccups and imperfection. But if your prescription is to avoid monogamy all together then I wonder if you have ever felt love and loved someone like I have? Personally this serial monogamy is a great way to keep trying till you are too old to give a shit and the last girl wins. You CAN be happy. You can be happy with this one, and then that one, and then that one. And that is true happiness. However long it lasts so be it. I do agree with you on people forcing it though, I am not condoning that crap at all. Old people and married couples and anyone else just putting UP with it should be more honest with themselves and the other. As a society we need to admit openly and stop pushing religion on the issue. MONOGAMY does not work as a fantasy ideal or the way everyone wants to make it work, but it DOES work in its OWN WAY. And it is the art of discovering THAT WAY and then harmonizing with it that should be our goal. I just want everyone to be happy and pursue their hearts desires and monogamy MUST exist for that to happen, in some form some way sometime.
I just have a question, my partner and I have been having a discussion for years about how he needs to have another lady in his life. I am trying to accept this and he is trying to teach me that “marriage” and/or “monogamy” is all a program. I’m trying to learn a new program, but it’s very difficult. Do you have any advice for women who are not multi-partner women, but their significant other IS? How to handle it, how to “de-program” your own mind, etc. Thankfully he is very patient with me because he is waiting for me to understand before he makes any moves because he does want me as a life partner. He just wants 2 life partners, not one. Please help me. I’m desperate to understand this mindset.
Thanks!
I don’t have specific advice for women, since women view these things differently than men. Most men understand that sex is a biological need that doesn’t equal love or connection, but for women that’s tough to accept when they’re already in a serious relationship.
If you’ve got $9 you could go buy my book, since it covers a lot of this emotional management, at least from a male standpoint, and there is some overlap with women.
This might be a few years too late, but here’s my take:
I’ve come to this article after a conversation with one of my friends about his feelings and got interested, I found a lot of conflicting data regarding the issues of monogamy and polygamy at once — but one thing is certainly clear – the decision is a concious choice, and should be respected as such.
Many of the arguments against monogamy refer to it being unnatural, or that sexual impulses, desires, and a million other things will eventually drive the relationship into the abyss, or perhaps, unhappiness.
This argument conveniently ignores all the ‘unnatural’ decisions we make, for example, not having children. I’m certain that we have an innate urge to procreate, and it is arguably stronger than our sexual drive, since, when you think about it — sexual drives are built upon our urge to procreate.
Despite that, we see a growing number of childless people that are completely contempt with that decision. Moreover, they would be unhappy otherwise.
When you think about it, many of our instinctive urges are actually overtaken by our concious decision and thought. We sometimes choose things that are bad for us, even though instinct tells us otherwise, and sometimes we choose things that are better for us, even thought instinct tells us otherwise.
Just to get rid of the anectodal evidence, I’m a very happy, sexually active 40 year old without any children, who has been monogomous with my highschool sweetheart. We never got married because or had children as concious decisions – and that was the right choice for us. We live a very versatile life, travel often, and are very sexually active. From all the friends we made along the way, I know quite a few that live similar lives through being monogomous.
Monogamy should be a concious choice, and it doesn’t mean you’ll be miserable just because you don’t follow a set of rules given to you by someone else. It might be difficult to imagine, but people perceive the world very differently.
The attempt to categorize people who want monogamous relationships into subgroups is nothing but the result of a psychological schema of your brain. Monogamy definitely works, without being miserable, for all types of people who choose and what one partner for their own life.
Just because some people choose to not have children doesn’t mean long-term monogamy suddenly works. One has nothing to do with each other.
1. Exactly how long have you been with this woman? And has it been consistent or were there “breaks” in there?
2. During the time you’ve been together, have you ever been sexual with any other women?
3. During the time you’ve been together, has she ever been sexual with any other men?
Ad hominem, even veiled ad hominem, means you have no actual points to make. The readers can now decide which of is is most likely correct.
I never said monogamy will make you miserable. As I said in the above article, short-term monogamy can work just fine for certain people. It’s long-term monogamy that won’t work. You’ll either break up / divorce or one of you will cheat.
(note: I’ve been away for work-related business halfway through writing, so excuse me if my thought pattern skips or seems misplaced)
Just because some people choose to not have children doesn’t mean long-term monogamy suddenly works. One has nothing to do with each other.
That’s not what I’m saying at all. I’m saying that the argument of it being unnatural given our instincts and impulses doesn’t hold on its own, since it’s evident that even our strongest primal urges doesn’t neccesarily mean it’s good for us, nor does it mean that it’ll overcome our concious decisions to avoid the path it leads us.
To reiterate, the argument presented is usually that because of our natural impulses, instincts and desires – and the fact that we’re not ‘programmed’ for monogamy, presumably, means that monogamy cannot work. This is false because the natural impulses, instincts and desires don’t dictate our lives and they’re not neccesarily healthy, mentally or otherwise, nor does it mean you cannot deflect them.
I don’t like to talk too much about my personal life online, so I’ll keep it brief;
1. We’ve been together since I was 16, she’s about a year older than me. We never had any breaks, we’ve always been consistently together. I lost my virginity to her and vice versa.
2. & 3. – I’m not sure what you define as ‘being sexual’ – since that can fall into many categories. I’ve never had sex, or touched with sexual intent another woman. However, we live a pretty open sexual life, that is, we’re not afraid to share our own sexuality with others verbally, or talk about or own sexuality within our circle of friends.
If you’re asking if I have ever thought about someone else sexually, the answer is yes. Of course, that doesn’t mean I would want to act upon it, even if my partner accepted it, wanted me to, and so on.
I wasn’t attacking your argument through critique of youself, but making a claim and observation. Psychological schemas are not an argument, but a fact of human pschology, and you’re not any different. To put it bluntly, categorizing ‘monogomous people’ into subgroups is fallacious. Infact, I’m a prime example of someone that answers to none of your categories. Me and my partner have sex often, even more when we don’t have to work as much and I doubt I can be regarded as ‘boring'(which really begs the question, who decides who is boring? How? Isn’t boredom a matter of subjective opinion? Can it really be classified?)
None of this is scientifically sound, it’s conjecture on your part, again, resulting from psychological schemas and confirmation bias. First, you categorize people into a subgroup of ‘low sex drive’, which is non-sensical on its own, then you add in a ‘boring’ variable that is undefineable, and lastly you attempt to connect the two. Look, using some vague percentage to even get to those assumptions is a bad way to use data in the first place.
Just as an example, you state that over 50% of married couples get divorced, and then proceed to conflict monogoamy and marriage. 50%(or more) than marriages ending in divorce isn’t an argument against monogamy, it’s an argument against marriage, and even so – it incorrectly assumes that marriage falling apart is due to the social construct of marriage rather than misapplication of marriage.(i.e marrying because of pregnancy, marrying inside abusive relationships, marrying out of religious reasons, marrying for economic reasons, marrying for citizenship reasons, marrying because of social pressure, etc)
For me, monogomous partnership isn’t about a cost vs benefit analysis. I don’t care if polyamorous relationships are ‘better’ or ‘worse’ than raising children, I don’t care if it’s ‘natural’ or not. It’s not about that, it’s about mutual partnership, love, in a way that cannot exist(for me) outside monogamy. It’s completely subjective, and it has nothing to do with my attributes or weither I’m ‘boring’ or have low libido.
How do you define ‘long-term’? Since, as explained, I’ve been with my partner for over 30 years and we’re still going strong. We’re not married, we don’t have children, we’re both economically independent, both sexually active, and we live quite fullfilling lives by traveling and vacationing often.
The real argument at the end of the line is that we make a concious decision, that isn’t black and white, there’s no ‘wrong for all’, there’s only ‘wrong for you’.
It sounds like you’ve made long-term monogamy work. That’s great! However you are still a very rare, very bizarre exception to the rule. How many other people do you know these days in the Western world who got together in high school, were both virgins, never had sex with anyone else for their entire lives, and are still together 30 years later? Thus my point.
You’re attempting to take your vary rare case and present it as typical and normal. It is not. Typical and normal is the exact opposite of what you’re describing.
I agree that I’m an oddity in the sense I’ve never dated/had sex with anyone before, claiming otherwise would be absurd.
Though, reading this article again, I notice a lot of its flaws. For example, aside from conflicting monogamy and marriage, you also fail to mention that regret getting divorced is just as common as actual divorces. Here’s one excerpt of a bigger analysis in a number of studies: http://www.divorce.usu.edu/files/uploads/lesson4.pdf
Here are some key findings:
1. At least half of couples regret getting divorced
2. Studies have found that divorce doesn’t lead to happiness
3. Studies have found that conflicts between spouses did infact continue after divorce
4. Studies have found that getting divorced doesn’t decrease the amount of cases of depression, unhappiness, stress, or affects the children in any significant manner.
This is an incomplete list, and I’m sure you can browse the web for additional information, both supporting and conflicting with your position. One thing is clear, however, monogamy isn’t the problem.
Monogamy isn’t the root cause of the above, the cause is people not actually caring about their happiness. Someone prioritizing happiness would less often do things he ends up regretting, have fewer conflicts, minimize the amount of cases of depression, unhappiness, stress, and when considering, among other things, whether to practice monogamy, would most likely reject it.
You say you’re OK with monogamy, but in all likelihood, you’d be at least as happy with polyamory. “I refrain from doing X, and I’m doing just fine” is not an argument against X, it only indicates non-X is a non-life-threatening option.
I, for one, am pursuing the BD way, and the results have been great from the very beginning. From you I hear that I can abandon all but one of my women (does it have to be the one I lost virginity with? I’m still seeing her, so that’s an option) and promise exclusivity and be OK… maybe, but what it is that I’m going to gain?
That is irrelevant to my argument above. My argument is that long-term monogamy doesn’t work. Human beings cheat or get divorced. What happens post-divorce is not relevant to my point. The point is people get divorced.
Black Dragon,
how can you conclusively say monogamy does not work. When there are Billions of married couples who live faithfully to each other for many years until they both die.
The measurement of happiness is subjective and not quantitative.
Through the dawn of mankind. Many different cultures, religions, and ethnic groups practice monogamy and produce productive children.
KingChris, monogamy works in the same sense bad food in poor African regions works: it lets people survive and produce children. But there’s healthier food and a happier lifestyle.
What are the pros of monogamy anyway?
Oh, I don’t know, little things like…
1. Sky-high, historic, and rising divorce rates all over the Western world.
2. Sky-high, historic and rising infidelity rates.
3. Sky-high, historic and rising rates of people unhappy in their marriages.
Etc.
I’m not talking about history. I’m talking about today, the 21st century. I’m not talking about 1952 or the ancient Babylon. I’m also talking about the Western world, not places like India.
Read this.
What a silly little article.
Your first flaw was trying to conflate monogamy with marriage – yes, marriage is usually an expression of monogamy – but it is an entire human social construct that has changed and adapted throughout the years, and not a representation of human biology.
Divorce and marriage rates were very volatile, and it wasn’t just linked to culture – but also to worldwide events.WW2 has brought huge amounts of marriage, and its end was accompanied by a sharp decrease in marriage.
For arguments sake, lets accept the above and conflate marriage and monogamy.
You mention that people don’t divorce for the wrong reasons – stability, comfort and relative contentment, but you fail to mention that many get married for the wrong reasons in the first place. A couple that only married because the female got pregnant is a marriage doomed to fail. A marriage that was done in haste is doomed to fail. Therefore, a certain percent of marriages shouldn’t be included in your statistics – since these marriages aren’t a fair representation of a monogomous relationship done right, but humans acting irresponsibly or otherwise.
It’s also worth noting that many people regret their divorce, and would leave their current partner(s) if they had a chance to return to the previous monogomous marriage. Which even further exacerbates how flawed this argument has become. Why would a divorce which is considered a mistake be considered an argument against marriage?
I’ve noticed that you mentioned that what happens post-marriage isn’t relevant – but that’s not true. I’m sure you know a polyamorous relationship cannot work with someone envious, jealous that isn’t open minded. I can then falsely point out that polygamy doesn’t work and you could rightly point out that for polyamorous relationships to work you’ll need honestly, trust, and other qualities – and that polygamy wrongfully practiced isn’t indicative of whether polygamy works or not in general. The same principal apply here – monogomy done right works.
It’s worth to note that humans aren’t naturally true monogomous creatures. These sort of animals usually mate with one and only one mate. This doesn’t mean that monogamy is therefore unnatural to humans or harmful, much like humans aren’t naturally herbivores but they can complete strive on a plant-based diet, and maybe even be healthier as a result .
And as with many things, humans are fully capable of adapting to various lifestyles(monogomous or otherwise) and claiming one arbitrary truth, is, erroneous at best and dangerous at worst.
Then why is it a flaw?
I agree, but how could we possibly exclude these types of marriages from the statistics? We can’t. We can only go with the data we have, and can only go with what human beings actually do.
Because marriage, by societal definition, lasts for the rest of your life. Thus, divorce means the failure of marriage, by societal definition.
If you disagree with the societal, most commonly accepted definition of “marriage,” then you are re-defining marriage into a temporary scenario where a divorce is more or less planned in the future. That’s fine, and I’ve discussed that here, but that then shifts the entire discussion into an entirely different topic.
Wrong.
A. Polyamory is not expected to last the rest of one’s life with the same person. Marriage is and monogamy sometimes is.
B. Polyamory can’t fail by one having sex with someone other than the primary partner. Monogamy can (and based on the stats, usually does, assuming the relationship lasts long enough). As I’ve explained many times, monogamy with a monogamous couple that experiences cheating has failed, even if a divorce or breakup never takes place. Cheating can’t happen if you aren’t monogamous.
Correct.
But it does mean that it makes long-term monogamy extremely unlikely for human beings, despite our best intentions or efforts. (I agree that short-term monogamy can work.)
Then read the statistics linked in comment right above yours, and explain to me how humans have “successfully adapted to monogamy” when divorce rates, and cheating rates, and rates of people unsatisfied in marriages are all at all-time historic highs, and are continuing to rise. I can’t wait for your answer (if I ever get it).
This is a no true Scotsman-type fallacy. Sure, if you only consider monogamous relationships “done right”, then the set you end up with looks like resounding success. But what exactly to do to get it “right”? There are no reliable guidelines out there. Everyone who tried to compile a list of such guidelines has run into these problems:
1. If you ask people in successful marriages (whatever definition of success you might use) for advice, you get a kind of survivorship bias. It’s quite possible they did the critical things correctly purely by chance, not realizing what these were, making them and yourself none the wiser. Also if you revisit the same families in 10 years, chances are that quite a few of the marriages will have crumbled, so they weren’t successful after all.
2. They aren’t going to provide honest and complete information anyway. Many won’t admit they aren’t really happy, many will conceal an important sexual aspect of the relationship because of social stigma, many wouldn’t know the relative importance of techniques they (possibly unconsciously) use, many would lack experience with different partners to provide a comparative analysis of techniques that work vs those that don’t, and of course hardly any would have done A/B testing.
When the market conditions are such that it’s very hard to choose a single asset to invest in, experts recommend diversification. In fact, they recommend that in any conditions. Why would relationships be any different?
Because marriage is a social construct that was defined, pre-defined and reconstructed throughout the years. Its significance, prevelance and success/failure rates have been constantly changing and varied through cultures. Consider that for many years marriage was considered a sacred practice that didn’t allow homosexuals/lesbians, or that marriage was used in order to maintain relationships and create alliances in medieval ages between families.
Infact, even the modern marriage is wildly different within the same culture from 50, 100 and 150 years ago.
Monogamy is a defining behaviour, that usually has biological roots. That is, you want to argue for or against monogamy – you must argue your point from a biological and physiological standpoint. Marriage simply doesn’t demonstate either.
This is not relevant to the point. How many polyamorous couples cheat on their loved ones? That is, breaking the agreed upon rules between the two(or more) partners?
How many people are unable to communicate and negotiate properly, thus leading to failure of polyamorous relationships?
If you haven’t caught on, I’m not expecting a numerical answer nor am I expecting any reasonable estimate at all. The point being is that for polyamorous relationships to work – you’ll need trust, honesty, respect, loyalty, boundaries and agreements(etc) that fit both partners – and as all things, it requires some form of progressive mentality. The failures of polyamorous relationships due to lack of qualities mentioned above isn’t a case against polygamy.
This is similar in a way to your argument – marriage that fails because one(or both) partners lack qualities that will make it work isn’t a case against monogamy.
Look, you can’t exclude people that are staying married for “convenient reasons” or “put up with eachother” while also include people that got married for the wrong reasons and divorced.
Here’s how we can get ahead in this conversation – how do you define a “succesful” monogomous relationship? I have a problem with how you handle it – since on one hand you’re content saying that it doesn’t matter how divorce happens or its aftermath – if marriage fails, it fails.
On the other hand, you exclude people that stay married “just to put up with eachother” – that is, if marriage succeeds, it doesn’t succeed(sometimes). Even worse, you’re perfectly comfortable reasoning on why people stay married(low sex drive for example) to support your argument against monogamy, whilst simultaneously shrug off why people get married in the first place(and why it is doomed to failure with the wrong reasons).
Precisely because marriage isn’t directly linked to monogamy – marriage and divorce rates aren’t a linear constant that just happen to drop down recently. These trends are affected by a lot of variables, some of them not having to do with social changes – but baby booms and immigration and the economy – divorce has seen “all time highs” and later seen “all time lows”, same with marriage, and the rate between them(marriage / divorce). There’s really nothing that guarentees that these rates will reverse in the following 20 or so years just like they have in the past.
Respond to Anonymous:
You have missed the point. This article is precisely exhibiting the issues you’re mentioning. See, it tries to claim why monogamy won’t work for you – by citing the fact that you either have a ‘low sex drive’, end up divorced, cheat, and so on – this is precisely a no true scotsman fallacy. There are no reliable guidelines for “done right” monogomous relationships but there is a total exclusion of “done wrong” monogomous relationship.
In other words, just because you cheated doesn’t mean that monogamy isn’t for you. Sure, it means you’re not monogomous but it doesn’t mean that monogamy has failed you. This is the same logic that applies to everything – just because you use hard drugs doesn’t mean that a healthy lifestyle isn’t for you in the same way that stealing doesn’t mean that earning what you want isn’t right for you.
Take an extreme example to illustrate the point – if you marry because of religious reasons, but then fall of religion while your partner stays religious – and you end up getting divorced, doesn’t mean that a monogomous life isn’t right for you. In an alternative universe – it’s completely possible that if you had married someone irreligious, or if you both had fallen off religion – you would have stayed together.
This possibility doesn’t have to be common or have actually happened, only within the realm of possibility for it to illustrate the point – the same person with in a different set of circumstances ends up being married or divorced – and it had nothing to do with monogamy not working.
Diversification means you invest less in each stock rather than go all-out on one stock. Of course, in this example this means you dedicate less to each person, and in return – you get less from each of them.
I’m saying long-term monogamy doesn’t work. Married or not isn’t super relevant.
Yes, it is supremely relevant. Marriage is expected to last the rest of your life. Dating someone in a nonmonogamous relationship usually is not. If marriage doesn’t last the rest of your life, you’ve failed.
Again, these are not my rules. These are society’s rules. Which are stupid.
That happens sometimes I’m sure, but the odds of this happening are far lower than the odds of a human being cheating in a 100% monogamous relationship. Plus, in FB or MLTR relationships, there are no rules to break; you’re only talking about OLTR or swinger relationships. There are many kinds of nonmono relationships; there’s only one kind of monogamy.
Yes, but A) that relationship isn’t expected to last the rest of your life and traditional marriage is, and B) you are far less likely to “cheat” (break the sexual rules of the relationship) if you’re allowed to get laid on the side vs. none of that at all.
You keep trying to imply that open/poly relationships are exactly the same as monogamous ones, or monogamous marriage, and they aren’t.
Why not? They all got married and monogamous. Your nitpicking and word-splicing is a little pathetic.
If it’s a traditional marriage: Neither partner ever cheats ever, they literally never get divorced ever, and they stay reasonably happy with each other forever. That is the goal of monogamous marriage, as stated by society (not me), in the year 2016.
If it’s a serial monogamous boyfriend/girlfriend relationship that isn’t expected to last past 3 years or so: Neither partner ever cheats ever, drama and fighting stays reasonably low during the relationship, and the breakup is very amicable.
Yes, sweetheart. If it fails, it fails. You can scream to the rooftop about why it failed, but it still failed, and I’m still right. 2 + 2 = 4, even if you think 2 + 2 should never have been added together in the first place.
Did you read what you just wrote? Yes it is. Show me all these millions of people who on their wedding day are telling their spouses they can fuck other people. You’ve lost it.
Absolutely none of that relates in any way to my point. Monogamy and marriage do not work today. I’m not talking about 100 years ago or 100 years from now.
Again, I’m not talking about a hypothetical distant future. I’m talking about today. If today you get monogamously married, you’re an idiot (or you enjoy problems).
If your arguments to defend monogamy is saying that marriage isn’t directly linked to monogamy (haha!), or that marriage used to work in the past (duh, I know that), or might again in some hypothetical future (I’m not talking about that), then I win. Monogamy and (traditional) marriage do not work today.
And those qualities are…?
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I’m saying long-term monogamy doesn’t work. Married or not isn’t super relevant.
We’re getting somewhere now, thanks for admitting that being married isn’t relevant to the point – which is long term monogamy.
Mm, I’m not sure what data you can provide here. Especially since breaking trust takes many forms aside from cheating. Obviously, if your relationship allows nonmonogomous sexual relationships then that form of “cheating” wouldn’t be cheating, and thus they’re less likely to cheat.
This doesn’t contribute to the success or failure of polyamorous relationships. Even with the acknowledgement that they’re not meant forever, you still have expectations from your partner(otherwise you’re single).
I’m definitely not confident that polyamorous are on average better than monogomous relationships when it comes down to trust, confidence, and other various figures.
I’m not arguing that if it fails – it doesn’t fail, but rather you inconsistency towards the subject. That is, if it fails – it fails, but if it works – it still fails(because you’re not happy, but you have low sex drive, because you stay out of convinience, etc)
The problem is that you define the success with a variable of happiness, but you don’t define failure with it. I’m just looking for some consistency with your definition of ‘success’.
If an unhappy marriage doesn’t count as a success for monogamy, then being unhappy with divorce shouldn’t be counted as a failure.
Absolutely none of that relates in any way to my point. Monogamy and marriage do not work today. I’m not talking about 100 years ago or 100 years from now.
I understand your argument, I’m saying your method of proving so is flawed. Having high divorce rates and low marriage rates aren’t neccesarily a problem with monogamy because they’re influenced by outside factors that might not be related to the success of marriage – such as birth rates. The success rate of marriage can stay identical or even get worse while seeing increased marriages and decreased divorces.
Bottom line – divorce/marriage rates are highly correlated to variables that skew the results and do not accurate point to the success of marriage at a given time.
If your arguments to defend monogamy is saying that marriage isn’t directly linked to monogamy (haha!), or that marriage used to work in the past (duh, I know that), or might again in some hypothetical future (I’m not talking about that), then I win. Monogamy and (traditional) marriage do not work today.
I haven’t really got a chance to defend monogamy. I’m trying to argue why your current analysis of monogamy is inherently flawed because you use inaccurate data and false equivalences. I’ve already said in my initial comment that humans aren’t biologically, purely monogomous.
Traditional marriage may fail, but it doesn’t indicate monogamy fails. Of course, polygamy still needs more data and research and I’m sure once it inevitably becomes more popular, we can argue which is better.
Your entire comment above made no sense and made no actual points. Now you’re just saying absurd things saying things if an unhappy marriage doesn’t count as a success for monogamy, then being unhappy with divorce shouldn’t be counted as a failure, which anyone reading can clearly see is nonsensical.
You’re also, by your own words, not even trying to defend monogamy (because you can’t, because you know I’m right) and are instead, for the second time, trying to nitpick my very clearly stated arguments to death. You also didn’t answer Anon’s question, because you know there is no magic techniques you can employ to make long-term monogamy work (because long-term monogamy doesn’t work).
I’ve given you many chances here to make your case that long-term monogamy works in the year 2016, and you haven’t, so I’m done. Feel free to believe whatever you want, and I’ll let the readers decide.
In the non-western world, long-term Disney monogamy DOES NOT work. here is why:
a) These parts have been westernized by modern technology, cross-culture, etc
b) These parts have modern women due to the the rampant advocacy for gender-equity.
c) cheating is common especially in monogamous relationship
d) I live in Kenya and hence am accustomed to the dating scene.
e) The biological characteristics of male and females is equal to those in the western world
f) Traditional weddings are relevant only when it comes to dowry
g) If you disagree, refer to d..
h) the list is endless
Hi BD,
Firstly, greetings from London, bro. I’ve been reading your blog for about 5 months now and let me say, this is has been LIFE CHANGING. Honestly, completely changed my worldview and for the better. I’ve purchased and been reading your book “Unchained Man”, and it’s basically become my de facto bible haha. Thank you for taking the time to share all this wisdom to us men who really need it at a time where men aren’t really loved (especially you white guys, who have it bad actually, and this is coming from a black guy)
Secondly, to my point, I wholeheartedly agree that monogamous marriages don’t work but here is the caveat, they don’t work LONG TERM. In the short term, i think they do due to NRE. This is going to sound so guy Disney but I think a man should enjoy a purely monogamous marriage during the NRE stages, having sex ONLY with his wife and having no FBs. Now, before getting married, him and his wife would agree that they will asses their marriage candidly and honestly every year and, if both them or one of them start to get that itch to have sex with other people, then they both agree for the marriage to become an OLTR one under parameters and conditions both agreed by them. Again let me stress that it’s important that this is agreed before marring the woman. If she can’t agree to this, then the man should NOT marry her and the woman in question should remain as an MLTR.
I think it’s weird getting married to a woman, during NRE, and still fuck other women on the side. As a man, you’re not really going to want to have sex with another woman because you’re in deep NRE with your newlywed. What is important is that you’re very aware that this NRE you’re experiencing is temporary and you already know your marriage will become an open -one eventually and your wife has agreed to this.
I wanted to get your thoughts on the above?
Cheers,
London Boy
In my experience the problem with the social expectation of monogamy is not in bringing your SO to break free from it and agreeing with a non-monogamous lifestyle. The problem is that your plates will be extremely butthurt when the epiphany moment comes.
Let’s just say that your SO uploads a pic with you two on fb, then the house of cards will collapse.
BD says to vet them for 6 months, you can vet them even for 6 years, never bring them on dates, just fuck them, no marshmallow time but when the phantomatic SO/gf/wife materialises plates will be utterly unable to accept it for they’re all primadonnas. Even though it’s always been extremely clear and your even if your behaviour matches your words.
You’ll end up “losing” them, shrug your shoulders, find new plates and then poof they’re back.
Another point is that your SO might decide to sabotage your storage of plates out of the blue. Should that happen the very thing you really want to do is to drop her in the first place. It doesn’t matter how successful she was in curtailing your supply of plates, if the attempts are your plates stream she’s out.