AP English Language Arts
Mrs. Hampton
2/19/12
Should Polygamy be a Normal Lifestyle?
“I have a hard time with the other wife Robyn, I’m jealous of her and her relationship with my husband Kody. It’s very hard when you’re jealous of someone as a person and not as an enemy. Secretly, I dread the lunches I have with the other wives, I don’t do well with relationships.”(1) According to Christine Brown who is in a polygamous relationship, and on a popular reality show called “Sister Wives”, she deals with jealousy issues and envy’s the other wives. She feels as if her husband has a favorite wife and only cares about her needs. This causes tension between all four families that share the same father. because Christine soon starts to dislike the other wife Robyn. However, her husband Kody has 4 wives and gets to enjoy having multiple women cater to him. They give him all of their love, while he only gives them half of his affection. In addition, Kody Brown has 17 kids all together with his 4 wives, and according to “Hollywoodlife.com”(2), the kids have mixed feelings about having so many siblings, and about the new baby their father just brought into the world. The children’s mixed feelings are very understandable since Kody only “spends one in four nights with each wife and the kids he has with them.”(3) The polygamous lifestyle doesn’t seem too successful. It seems like the wives have to keep a schedule just to spend time with the husband. Therefore, polygamy should remain illegal due to the fact it creates insecurity for multiple spouses, creates unstable relationships and unstable families, and cause psychological problems for the children involved.
Polygamy relationships tend to cause insecurities for multiple spouses or jealousy between the children, according to the website, “www.blackplanet.com.”(4) Insecurities are sometime unhealthy, often resulting in competition and feelings of being unwanted. With other spouses competing for attention or more time, it creates a stressful situation for the husband, or the multiple families involved. Besides, a rivalry can create arguments that all of the kids may witness causing emotional stress and even missing out on spending time with their siblings because the mothers are too busy hating each other to cooperate. Moreover, to shed light on the fact that if one wife looks better than the rest, the other wives will become insecure, feeling as if they have to change their appearance or improve their sexual relationship to keep their husband around. This is no healthy way to live or feel.
Furthermore, my opponents think that in a polygamous relationship, multiple wives won’t have to compete because the sexual pressure is off of one lover and shared between multiple spouses, avoiding insecurities.(5) The wives also spend an equal amount of time with the husband steering away from favoritism. Although my opponents present firm evidence that the sexual pressure being shared, I disagree that it will avoid competition. In this case, one wife may perform better than the other wives, causing her to be the husband’s favorite. Additionally, in a more negative light, if a person shares a sex partner with multiple people, then STD’s have a higher chance of occurring. But if a person has one intimate partner, then they have a less likely chance to catch an STD. Resulting in a healthier lifestyle.
Equally important to insecurities and competition is the fact that polygamy creates an unstable relationship and unstable family. In some situations, men marry and second wife for financial need not love, allowing the woman to feel used. Notably, some polygamous husbands do not fulfill their needs financially, forcing the wives to pick up the slack where the husband should be successful, showing that providing for multiple spouses is not easy. Unfortunately, polygamous relationships produce a large family of kids that need many clothes, shoes and food etc. Trying to keep up with every child and their expenses will cause one to stress and become unstable. Moreover, according to the cited research “Sister of Islam: Woman’s Right Organization”, the children in a polygamous family always see several mothers causing them to be confused about how to treat the other wife. Should they be treated as a second mother or as a friend. On the other hand, my opponents may argue that in a polygamous relationship with so many children, the father can put them on his taxes to receive a good amount of money for the children’s expenses. Furthermore, with multiple mothers around, the children always have a mother figure to talk to and they will never feel like they lack a mother’s support. However, I disagree with my opponents because even though taxes help financially, taxes only comes once a year. With a large family like 17 children, the money will only help to a certain extent. Additionally, always having a mother figure around is great, but the children may end up liking another mother than their own, resulting in favoritism and jealousy.
Consequently, the biggest downfall of polygamy is the psychological problems for the children involved because of the neglect they receive from their busy fathers. According to the article “stress, quarrels and neglect: the ‘normal’ polygamous family”, the children from the first wife receive the most neglect. The “Sisters of Islam” research shows that some of the children claim their father hardly recognizing them, forming emotional trauma. In contrast to neglect from their farther, the survey also shows that the children resent their mother’s for not being able to keep their father from neglecting them. This creates lack of confidence for the kids and fears that they won’t be able to have their own stable relationship, based on their family experience. It also takes a toll on them mentally not having a good relationship with their mother or father. Without further or do, polygamy is not psychologically good for the children.
Besides psychological problems, polygamy can also cause sociological problems, knowing the fact that society teaches everyone that a child should have one mother and one father from birth. With a child having a polygamous family, students at school may tease the children or ostracize them for not having a normal life like everyone else. The end result of this can be depression or loneliness, in which we all know negatively effects a child throughout their whole life. Needless to say, polygamy has a dramatic consequence.
In conclusion, being in a polygamous relationship does nothing for you but cause unnecessary stress, prevents you from being with your husband/wife whenever you want to and its creates an emotional rollercoaster. With more negative outcomes than positive, there should not be a law allowing people to put themselves through multiple problems, nonetheless putting their children in a compromising situation that can affect their future outcome. The easiest life style is to be in a monogamous relationship where a family can go through the regular problems and be happier without always having a reason to wonder where their spouse is and are they having a better time with the other lover instead of me. If jealousy, insecurity and neglect can be prevented, why make a law that creates them. In the end the world will be better off without polygamy.
Citations
1)."Sister Wives - Season 2B Videos." TLC. Web. 23 Feb. 2012. <http://tlc.discovery.com/videos/sister-wives-season-3-videos/>.
2).Fuller, Bonnie. "‘Sister Wives’ Recap: Robyn Would Give Up Her Own Kids To Stay With Kody Brown & The Sister Wives!" Hollywood Life. 31 Oct. 2011. Web. 23 Feb. 2012. <http://www.hollywoodlife.com/2011/10/31/sister-wives-recap-season-4-episode-7-kody-brown/>.
3).Masjaliza and Othman, Masjaliza and Norami. "Stress, Quarrels and Neglect: The 'normal' Polygamous Family." OpenDemocracy. 14 Jan. 2010. Web. 19 Feb. 2012.
4)."Do Women Find Polygamy Beneficial? – Juggle.com." Debate Topics – The Pros and Cons of Popular Issues – Juggle.com. 2010. Web. 19 Feb. 2012.
5)."POLYGAMY Pros & Cons? Please Comment - Topic - BlackPlanet.com." BlackPlanet.com — Black Women, Men Meet to Chat, Discuss, Engage. Web. 19 Feb. 2012. <http://www.blackplanet.com/forums/thread.html?thread_id=90037>.
