Is monogamy natural for humans?

Apparently we’re in the middle of “divorce season” – more divorces are filed in January and February than in any of the other months of the year.  It appears that during the holiday season many couples evaluate their relationship and make the decision never to spend another (miserable) holiday together again. According to Statistics SA in 2016, 139 512 civil marriages were registered in South Africa, 3 978 customary marriages and 1 331 civil unions. 25 326 divorces were granted. There were more female than male plaintiffs, although males generally divorced at a later age than females. The median age for divorce was 44 years for males and 40 years for females. In 55% of the divorce cases, the children affected were under 18 years of age.

With all these marriages breaking up, one has to ask the question: Is monogamy natural for humans? 

Here are some interesting facts to consider:

• In the animal kingdom, monogamy is very uncommon. In fact, many of the species previously thought to be faithful to one partner for life; such as swans, geese and eagles, are apparently not – although they maintain long-term bonds with a single partner, they do not maintain sexual fidelity. Bald eagles are apparently the exception – they remain faithful until their partner dies. The black vulture also mates for life, seemingly because both of them have to raise their offspring. If one is caught “cheating” the other vultures will attack it!
  
  
• Among mammals, only a very few species are known to be monogamous. Prairie vole males stick with the first female to whom they lose their virginity, and will attack other females rather than abandon his first love! Wolves are monogamous, although female wolves will take on another mate if her mate dies or if he is too injured or sick to breed.
  
  
• Anglerfish take monogamous mating to a new level. The male bites into the flesh of his female mate, attaching to her body. His mouth fuses with her skin, and their bloodstreams merge. Once joined, the male degenerates, becoming strictly a source of sperm for the female. A female will often have several males attached to her at once.
  
  
• Spiders have a slightly different twist on monogamy. Males die during or after sex, but that’s because the females eat them. In a particular species, aurantia, a male will leave one of its mating appendages inside the female’s body during sex, preventing her from mating with other males.

In fact, according to some researchers, it’s more newsworthy when evidence of monogamy and sexual fidelity is actually supported in the animal kingdom. There is also increasing evidence that many men are not biologically or psychologically disposed to sexual monogamy. Despite the Western world’s expectation of monogamy (particularly believers in Christianity), many men of the bible including Abraham, Jacob, David and Solomon, were in fact polygamous. Currently less than 20% of world cultures require monogamy; the overwhelming majority allowing polygamous marriages (polygyny being most common – i.e. men having multiple wives vs. polyandry - less than 1% of women have multiple husbands).

Throughout history, many wealthy and powerful men have forgone monogamy for the privilege of having multiple female partners, typically through having multiple wives, concubines and mistresses. But, in modern Western culture, men with multiple wives are seen as sinners and lawbreakers. It does depend on what religion one follows, as there are differing beliefs:

• The Roman Catholic Church is against polygamy, stating that “it is contrary to conjugal love, which is undivided and exclusive.”
  
  
• The Mormons used to be polygamous but although discontinued by the Latter Day Saints Church in 1890, many “fundamentalist” Mormons participate in plural marriages.
  
  
• In 1955 the Hindu Marriage Act prohibited Hindus from polygamous marriages.
  
  
• The Islamic faith decrees that polygyny is allowed, with a limitation of four wives. 
  There are many Arab nations that frown upon this practice, however.
  
  
• Israel has made polygamy illegal, however there are some enclaves of Jews in Arabic countries who still practice it.
  
  
• Polygamy in Africa is widely practiced, notably in Nigeria and in Kenya, where a gentleman named Akuku Danger married over 100 wives and fathered something like 300 children before he eventually kicked the bucket in October 2010! Let us not forget our very own ex-President Jacob Zuma, who currently has five wives and has fathered over 20 children.

Famed psychoanalyst Carl Jung once wrote to Sigmund Freud that “The prerequisite for a good marriage, it seems to me, is the license to be unfaithful.” On doing an anonymous quiz on this topic with a number of men, sadly it seems that many married men (and women) are using that licence! Unless one has a strict moral code, it seems our increased connectivity is making it all too easy to stray off limits. Social networking sites, chat sites, internet dating sites and easy access to porn all helps to lead us into temptation. This is fuelled by our propensity for instant gratification (encouraged by advertising and media) and current society’s pervading “remote control” outlook – if you don’t like the channel you’re watching, just switch channels and watch something more entertaining!  Celebrity watching doesn’t help – most are awful role models.

The thing is – even when partners do not violate marriage expectations, with divorce rates as high as 60% in some cases, monogamy has less meaning than it once did. It’s more truthful to use the term “serial monogamy”, where individuals are monogamous as long as they’re in a relationship, but when that relationship ends, they move onto other relationships. So why is monogamy the expected, required, and enforced marital ideal? Marriage laws, according to most experts, have more to do with contract and property law. Monogamy offers important assurances regarding parentage that support and clarify inheritance laws and precedents. Some writers and historians suggest that monogamy represents a political and economic compromise, between the needs of the powerful and the need to have a self-sufficient, satisfied, and motivated workforce.

The bottom line is, although monogamy may not come naturally to us humans, it works for society. A commitment and bond between two partners meets our needs more effectively than any other relationship strategy currently in existence. In recently published anthropological research, “The puzzle of monogamous marriage” by Heinrich, Boyd and Richerson, the authors present evidence highlighting the significant social benefits of monogamy. They point out that in polygyny, powerful men gather the most desirable women for themselves, and less powerful men “go hungry”. In fact, throughout human history while 80% of women have reproduced, only 40% of men have! Those men who couldn’t compete, didn’t get to have even a single wife and thus did not have children. So what did they do with their time? Apparently, they got into lots of trouble! Societies where polygyny has been and is still practised, have higher rates of crimes involving males, especially violent crime.

There’s no doubt that we have a huge problem with violent boys and men in our society, and this is where we get to the crux of the matter – children (especially boys) need their fathers, and fathers are more likely to stick around if they are in a monogamous marriage. According to a 2011 study by the SA Institute of Race Relations, only about 35% of our children are growing up living with both parents. Increasing numbers of fathers are absent, and a ‘crisis of men’ in South Africa seems to be perpetuating patterns of abuse and desertion, which is likely to continue with future generations.

We need to address attitudes to parental responsibility and particularly, why parents (especially fathers) fail to acknowledge their parental responsibilities. What values are we passing on to our children and what hope is there for their future? Family breakdown shocks the whole foundation of the family and it often never recovers. Dysfunctional families are damaging the prospects of younger generations: children grow up with less, are less likely to be educated and more likely to be unemployed with relationship problems, continuing the cycle and creating fractured families themselves in future.