[Excelsior]

(09-02-2012 04:22 AM)RealityX Wrote:  

I know this is an old thread, but it came up in my search engine while writing my thesis. I regret to inform the participants that you all pretty much have no idea what you're talking about.

Coming in with an aggressive opening salvo, I see.

Alright, then. Let's talk.

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Both male and female are polygamous by nature. It hurts men's souls to admit that women aren't some form of monogamous (either hypergamous or purely monogamous) but they aren't.

You are not speaking to a bunch of naive betas. We're all red-pill takers here. We don't bother with pretty lies designed to protect our feelings.

Hypergamy is not some form of imaginary special relationship designed to make us feel better.

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The only reason they even appear this way is entirely societal influence. As a poster who was on the right track mentioned, if it weren't natural you wouldn't need heavy societal norms and practices to reinforce it.
m.

The amount of shaming of women's sexual behavior and shaping of their relationship ideals from birth throughout their entire life, is a clear indication that forces are at work to counteract what we know are their natural inclinations.

Society works to counter female hypergamy as it does male polygamy.

With regards to the source of this shaming, however, I question the notion that females themselves are not providing the impetus for much of this social engineering.
As most here already know, men do not do most of the slut-shaming in this society. A slut's peers are her own worst enemies in that regard, and women are absolutely not opposed to labeling females who do not deserve such shaming if it serves their social interests.

In previous generations, women used their influence as mothers and grandmothers/matriarchs to instill in their daughters the importance of avoiding impropriety, thus playing the crucial role in upholding the monogamous, patriarchal system.

I question the notion that there was no benefit in the maintenance of this system for these women, and I question the claim that they weren't aware of said benefit.

(09-02-2012 04:30 AM)RealityX Wrote:  

However, female mammal species cannot even know if they are pregnant until well into their pregnancy (for humans, at least a month if not more because of irregular menstrual cycles). This proposes a conundrum. If we agree that man is by nature polygamous, and will mate and leave to find another to mate with, it makes little logical sense to assume that the first female mate for instance, will focus all her attention on the one, now absent male, without any real assurance whether she was successfully impregnated by him or not.

I do not think this is an irreconcilable issue.

Man may be polygamous, but this does not mean he lacks the ability to impregnate multiple females within good time-the expression of male polygamy does not require the maintenance of harems beyond his own reproductive capacity to satisfy on a timely basis. A virile male in good health could regularly mate with 2, 3 or 4 females at any given time and have enough in him to impregnate all of them (assuming their fertility).

Your scenario seems to assume that said male is likely to engage in intercourse a couple of times and then disappear for large spans of time, creating wide intervals of time between instances of intercourse that force her to find other mates to guarantee impregnation.

While this is very possible, it is not a certainty. Even with 2-4 females in a small harem, it would not be necessary for a male to go many days or weeks between intercourse with each one while still maintaining enough in the way of sexual stamina to offer a reliable chance of impregnation to each one.

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Even in hypergamy situations, the idea that females only mated with the alpha male is proven false repeatedly. They engaged in outside sex rather frequently.

Fair enough, but my definition of hypergamy has already left open this possibility. I state that hypergamous females are looking out for the best deal, and if said deal appears tomorrow (and said deal is clearly superior and/or her chosen male is simply not getting it done), they'll take it and engage in outside sex.

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This produces another conundrum. If the females are looking to be impregnated one way or the other, being the 200th in line on day 30 when alpha male can get it back up and give adequate sperm isn't going to cut it, is it?

No, that would be untenable.

The problem is that the expression of male polygamy does not require such a large harem, and in practice does not usually consist of such large harems. A healthy alpha male would have problems servicing 200 mates, but he'd have a better time servicing 2-5 well with a good chance of maintaining stamina and offering a good shot at impregnation to each one.

In such a small-harem scenario (which I would contend was much more common than the big, three digit harem scenario you outline as a template here), much of the impetus for your argument (which hinges on natural male refractory periods) is taken away. With a smaller number of females, this is less of an issue.

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So, females will receive the extra resources and status that come with being one of the alpha male's harem, but also continue searching outside to increase her chances of being impregnated by other attractive males.

...assuming said harem is too large for her to mate with her chosen alpha male regularly without waiting too long.
On this we can agree.

That doesn't prove innate female polygamy, however. You've merely established an upper limit to the expression of male polygamy (read: the size of a harem), whereby female hypergamy (the desire to become impregnated by an attractive male) will act to undermine it.

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Secondly, females not only want to ensure impregnation, but ensure being pregnant by the best possible sperm. As many pointed out, the BEST genetic partner is not so easily defined as property or resources. When you are talking about genetics, none of us truly has any idea of our genetic fitness or propensities, let alone those of our partners. You can get hints from physical traits (i.e. why I keep hinting at attractive males) but this is far from absolute. Its why the physical specimen and "Iron Horse" Lou Gehrig has a debilitating disease named after him, and none of us saw it coming. So for this reason, females enact some version of 'internal competition' amongst the sperm of their many different partners. The logic behind this being that whichever sperm makes it to officially impregnate her, chances are high its the BEST of the bunch because it beat out several other competitors for the spot.

My statements before implied that a hypergamous female will remain on the lookout for more appealing mates. She cannot be precise as to how superior another male is, but her attraction will give her an idea and, if it is strong enough (and/or her current partner dissatisfying enough, i.e. maintains too large a harem and is unable to satisfy her regularly), she will stray. Sperm competition will ensue between her partners, confirming or denying the superiority of her chosen outside mates.

This is merely another expression of female hypergamy, not a refutation of it. Other partners are sought only as another means for her to attract the best seed possible when a better deal (as signalled by her attraction) comes by or her own chosen mate is not getting it done, and sperm competition follows.

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Actually, the idea that females are more monogamous period than men is actually pretty laughable when you really do your research and/or just examine biology.

Nah, I don't think so.

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In fact, from an sociological standpoint, the very creation of monogamy was not for women, but for men.

While monogamy is no doubt a boon to average (read: most) men, I do not think it lacks benefits for females as well, nor am I convinced that they have not played the most crucial role in upholding monogamy for much of this time (as I mentioned earlier).

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In the first place, if you consider the time a male would have to spend hanging around the pregnant female to ensure the safety of his own seed (that another male would not run in after him, kill his seed and impregnate the woman with his own), he could not dedicate as much time to finding extra partners. So monogamy would be a natural progression for him anyway.

...assuming a large harem scenario.

An alpha male with a smaller harem of 2-5 women at a time could have less trouble. The expression of male polygamy doesn't require the neverending chase for mates and the subsequent three-digit harem. A strong alpha male could viably maintain and guard a smaller harem, especially if not all of the women are pregnant at once.

The limiting factor you describe here (time needed to guard male offspring) is not necessarily a factor that would force monogamy. What it actually does is limit the expression of male polygamy and force smaller harems, lest a male be unable to guard all of his mates and end up losing them to other men.

Combine this with the other limiting factor you mentioned (male refractory period/sexual stamina limits encouraging scarcely satisfied women in large harems to stray) and you have two very reliable natural checks on the erosion of human genetic diversity. Even the most alpha of males can only service and impregnate so many women without getting cuckolded or having them taken by force. This, in turn, prevents a scenario where too small a number of alphas make nearly ALL the genetic contributions to a pool, and thus weaken it down the road due to a lack of diversity/inbreeding.