#015: Exploring the Meaning of Marriage with Stephanie Coontz
The Mark Groves Podcast
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The Variability of Polygamy
In societies that are polygamists, where the man is the one who's marrying multiple wives, almost all of those societies eventually become violent because a few men get all of the partners. But we know of many societies that have existed that way for a long time and it doesn't necessarily lead to huge amounts of violence. People often ask me, are we naturally monogamous? Are we naturally polyamorous? I would say that human beings have both of these desires and different societies encourage or try to suppress one or more of them. Every society struggles with the ambivalence about those and we solve that ambivalence in different ways.
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