The Monogamy Thought

Is it natural for human being to be monogamous?

The answer is, it depends. It depends on the definition. There are two definitions of the concept of monogamy itself, at least according to the encyclopedia I read. First, monogamy is the practice or state of being married to one person at a time. Second, it is the practice or state of having a sexual relationship with only one partner at a time.

If the question is applied in the first definition of the monogamy, I guess the answer will be, yes. However, we have to be careful in using the word natural, though. Natural means something that is existed in or caused by nature; not made or caused by humankind. Meanwhile, the concept of marriage itself is actually a society-consensus concept. From the very beginning of humanity, the concept of marriage itself has always been related with the social structure or organization of the society. The marriage, formal union of a man and woman, recognized by the society law, is actually needed in order to accord status to the offspring, so that there will not be any disorderliness in determining inheritance or patrimony. In other cases, marriage is carried out to unite two disputing tribes, or countries, or even clans. Catherine of Valois was betrothed to Henry V in order to cease the dispute between England and France. Marie Antoinette was married to Louis XVI in order to consolidate the relation between France and Austria. Nowadays, in modern society, marriage is needed, again, to accord status, to secure identity. In the society, your identity is something that is crucial, something that is used to define and address you, to delineate clearly your position in the society. Marriage could grant that status, the legalized piece of paper sets clearly who’s the husband of who, who’s the wife of who and who’s the father of who, and so on and so forth. Thereby, that person’s dot is clear enough within the map of the society. From that we can see that the concept of marriage always related with the society, meaning that it is not inherently natural in the characteristic of humankind to have that kind of agreement that recognized the bond between man and woman within the society. To love is a natural characteristic of mankind, but to have a socially recognized relationship is a concept that was made by the society.
If monogamy is defined as the state of being married to one person at a time, it could be said that it is actually natural for human being to apply the concept. If the purpose of marriage is to accord the status of the offspring, to consolidate the disputing parties, or even to make a love-based relationship between man and woman socially recognized, then it could be said that monogamy is the most suitable mode to achieve the purpose. With the concept of monogamy, those purposes could be achieved properly and efficiently. In order to accord status for the offspring to avoid disorderliness in determining heritance or patrimony, a single partner is the most efficient and proper choice than having more than just one partners of marriage. More partners would lead to more complicated position to determine the exact status of the offspring, let alone to determine who has the right to inherit what and so forth. Of course it will be possible to be done, though, however, it is definitely more complicated to achieve the main purpose of marriage by having more partners than just having a single partner, so we can see that monogamy is indeed the concept that is most visible in achieving the purpose of marriage itself. When a concept is created, it is usually created because of some purposes or some targets to be achieved. If the concept of marriage was created to achieve its purpose to accord for the status of the offspring, then we can assume that it is natural to be monogamous, because it is the most proper and efficient way in order to achieve the purposes meant.
The same case as well occurred if the purpose of marriage is to consolidate the relation of two disputing parties, surely we could see that having more partners of marriage would be deficient for that purpose. If Louis XVI married, say, the daughter of Russian’s Catherine the Great while at the same time become the legal husband of Austria’s Marie Antoinette, the consolidation between Austria and France would probably not run as smooth. Therefore, we can see, in this case, it is natural for human being to be monogamous upon the created concept of the marriage itself. Why? Once again, because it is the humanity itself that created the concept of marriage, to achieve certain meant purposes, of course it is natural to find a concept that would be the most proper and effective way to achieve the purposes and logically speaking, it is the concept of monogamy that suits the purposes, therefore; it is natural for human being to be monogamous.

If, however, the question is applied to the second definition of the concept of monogamy, that is; the practice or state of having a sexual relationship with only one partner at a time, the answer is, no. It is not natural for human being to be monogamous. Why does it so? Firstly, again let’s take a look to the meant purpose of the sexual relationship itself. There are two major purposes of a sexual activity; first, as a mean of procreation, and second, as a mean of recreation. In order to avoid confusion about those two purposes, we first have to be able to separate perfectly the different concept of a sexual relationship and the concept of marriage. The concept of marriage is created by the society, society created a sort of agreement that acknowledge and determine a legal basis for a man and a woman to be engaged. Meanwhile, the concept of sexual relationship is a concept that is more naturally instinctual. Long before the concept of marriage was created, human has been able to survive their clans and regenerate by using this concept of sexual relationship.
Therefore, we can see that those two concepts, sexual relationship and marriage, each carry out different purposes. In applying for those two purposes of a sexual relationship, that is; as a mean of procreation and as a mean of recreation, it is actually natural for the human being to be not monogamous. To achieve the mean of procreation, for instance, by applying the concept of monogamy, human would find limitation in reproduction. The capability of producing ovum and sperms is limited by amount and age. Man, as well as woman, for instance would probably not be able to be fertile for the rest of their life. Therefore, to be able to achieve the first purpose of a sexual relationship, that is, to procreate, to create descendants, it is natural for the humankind to find as many partners as they can in order to procreate as many offspring as they can. The same thing also applies in achieving the second purpose of a sexual relationship, which is; as a mean of recreation. The basic characteristic of an activity as a mean of recreation is to find pleasure and enjoyment. By being monogamous, of course this mean would be possible to be achieved. However, by not being monogamous, this mean would be even possible to be achieved in a more effectual way. I could sense that this argument would drag protests or controversies. But, see it this way. First, of course it is natural for human to be bored of the same patterns, if boredom occurred, then the purpose of recreation would no longer be plausible to be achieved. Yes, the boredom could be avoided by applying different patterns. However, having a sexual relationship with different partner could efficiently attain that task, because then the pattern would be inherently different. Now, more partners would of course means more different patterns, therefore, in order to achieve the second purpose, that is; as a mean of recreation, it is natural for human being to be not monogamous. How about the love factor? Well, it is only possible for someone to fall in love with one particular person at a time, but that does not necessarily eliminate the possibility to achieve the purpose of recreation, though. Love is one of the elements that make a sexual relationship pleasurable. But there’s also another element related with the physicals that would still make the mean of recreation could still be possible to be achieved. There we can see that it is natural for human being to be not monogamous in a sexual relationship, because a non-monogamous relationship is more effectual in order to achieve the two major purposes of a sexual relationship.

So, because it is natural for human being to be married with one partner, does it mean that one cannot be married with more than one partner? And because it is not natural for human being to have only one sexual relationship for the rest of their lives, does it mean that the only acceptable type of relationship is the ‘open-relationship’ type? No. One could freely choose whatever suits them. Classifying the natural and the unnatural would only create the boxes of right or wrong or the boxes of should be done and should not be done, and of course we know, there are no such things.

Hmm… I don’t know, at least that’s how I see it.
--sisie--