What’s Wrong with Polygamy?
Why should it be against the law?
In democratic nations people have the right to do anything that is not illegal. That puts the onus the people seeking to make any conduct or action against the law.
So, why make polygamy illegal? I would like first to emphasize that as far as I am concerned it would go all ways: multiple wives for one man and multiple husbands for one woman as well as multiples of both — and in a society ruled by me, all permutations of gender included as well. That gets us to the core of the matter, without the presence of significant but more peripheral issues. Even if polygamy were limited to, say, men having multiple wives, bringing patriarchy into the equation, that is something peripheral to polygamy itself.
Here the question is strictly limited to asking why having multiple spouses should in itself be illegal.
Clearly, that polygamy is “morally wrong” is one reason polygamy is illegal. It is probably the only reason. Even in a secular nation with a democratic political process, people’s beliefs concerning right and wrong inform their participation in the process. Such beliefs can be secular as easily as they can be sacral: a person doesn’t have to be religious to have moral beliefs.
If it is limited to one gender having multiple spouses, one problem might be that polygamy would leave too few potential spouses in the marriage pool. If it were open to all genders, however, that would seem to resolve that issue: the multiple spouses would not be limited to any gender. Besides, while that is a potential practical problem for a society, it does not go to polygamy itself as a form that relationships among human beings can take.
It could perhaps also put a crimp in the gene pool, particularly in smaller, more isolated communities. Again, that is a practical matter associated with polygamy, not the thing in itself. In today’s world that concern is mitigated by the fact that anyone anywhere on the planet can potentially marry anyone living anywhere else on it.
The question remains: what, specifically, is the problem with polygamy? What is wrong about it?
It can’t violate any oath or ‘sacred vows’. Presumably, the structure of the family would be taken into account in any ceremony formally bringing another person into the family.
Even without that, anyone entering into such a relationship would know what one would be getting into — in terms of the general form of the thing, at least. No doubt, there would be a steep learning curve regarding the group dynamics, but that is true of marriages limited to two people. The more people involved, the more complex those dynamics would be, but that definitely has nothing to do with making polygamy illegal.
Practical benefits are easily imagined.
For one, child-rearing would be way easier. There would be in place, as Hilary Clinton would say, a kind of village of people (sharing the same values) to look after the children and help them grow into decent human beings. With multiple adults around, it would be more likely that there would be an adult in the family with whom any child in the family might happen to form an especially good bond.
The chances of a breech of sexual faithfulness would be reduced. That benefit would be furthered if sexual relations of all kinds involving any interested spouses were permitted.
Finally, all of the myriad chores, responsibilities, and roles associated with the existence of a family would have more people to share them. Different spouses would by the nature of things revolve towards the chores, etc. that were most in line with their innate character.
In short, I cannot find a good reason why polygamy — in itself, as a form relationships among human beings can take — should be illegal. There might be practical problems for a society associated with it, but on the other hand practical benefits are not hard to discern. Polygamy in itself is, to my mind, an arbitrarily persecuted form of human relationship.