How science f*cked me on my path towards non-monogamy
Most people out there assume that men are more likely to want non-monogamy than women.*
The science behind that assumption goes something like this:
Men invest very little in reproduction and women do. All men have to do to reproduce is ejaculate into a fertile woman during sex. Done. No “effort” is made. Just fun really.
Whereas women — well, let me tell you — women, yeah they may start out doing that fun part with the man, but afterwards they get all hormonal and their bodies start to grow to impossible sizes until they pop out a tiny human and risk their lives in the process.
And that’s not where it ends.
When that’s all over, they have to stay up all night feeding this child with their bodies while that same body (and mind) try to recover. This whole process lasts over a year to 2+ years for most women.
Also for many of us, our bodies will never look the same :(.
This is a very different investment.
Men want as much sex as possible, and woman want to save it for the right guy.
As such, the theory suggests that since men invest very little in having children, to them, sex is like, whatever. If you get someone pregnant, she’ll have to deal with it. Not your problem.
A good evolutionary strategy for a man is to go around banging as many women as possible and spreading his seed onto the world as much as he can in this way.
Whereas for women, a good strategy is to be very selective about the men you sleep with. Make sure he has as good of genes as possible so your baby is as healthy and “fit” as possible, and make sure that he’s like generally a good guy — someone who might stick around and be part of the process of raising that kid — so that you don’t have to do it all on your own.
Because there’s a hell of a lot more at stake for you as a woman, going around banging whomever, whenever is not a good strategy. If that “wrong guy” knocks you up, you’re kind of f*cked. You may end up having a deadbeat loser’s baby who doesn’t contribute at all.
Because of all of the above, during my late teens/young adult life, I thought that women should naturally want to hook up less than guys do.
I thought, we were supposed to care about saving ourselves for the right guy. And that this “saving ourselves” is something that will just come naturally to us ladies.
And everything around me reinforced this idea. The way the protagonists of the movies I saw interacted with men (see almost any rom com in the early 2000’s). The way other girls I knew were slut shamed in high school (having sex for fun - not cool). The way I was slut shamed in my twenties.
Wanting to sleep around as a woman was shameful. Not normal. Not natural. Evolutionarily unsound.
I felt I was unnatural.
And because I’m a nerd who’s into this kind of evolutionary science, part of the reason it was so hard for me when I was in my late teens and twenties and struggling in monogamous relationships was not just that it was hard limiting myself, it was that I thought I was f*cking broken for wanting anything different.
I wanted other men, I didn’t just want this one.
And I thought no one would accept this about myself because what I wanted wasn’t normal. It wasn’t natural that I didn’t want to be with my boyfriend and my boyfriend alone.
I didn’t have any examples of people doing anything differently. I was just wrong. My desires were wrong.
The only problem was, as you may have suspected, what I discussed above isn’t entirely true.
It is true that men must invest less in reproduction and women more. That all said, when you look at the world around us, we see women stray from their so-called monogamous pairs just as much as men do.
According to the wikipedia page on extra-pair copulation in humans, “females do seek out extra-pair copulation, with some research finding that women's levels of infidelity are equal to that of men's, although this evidence is mixed.”
And according to a recent study from BMJ Open, women are much more likely to lose interest in sex with their partner in longer-term relationships than are men.
When it comes to consensual non-monogamy, in my experience as a coach and from talking to others, women are just as, if not more, interested in it than men.
Knowing all this now has made me feel a hell of a lot more normal.
Men are also hurt by this story.
The science has fucked men over too when it comes to exploring alternative relationship styles. I was also taught in high school, whereas women actually give birth to children and thus have parental certainty (they know their child is their own), men are more concerned with making sure the woman they date is exclusively with them and them alone so that they too can have parental certainly.
If they are providing resources, they want to know that their woman is exclusively having sex with them and thus giving birth to their child, so that they don’t end up giving stuff to a baby that they didn’t genetically contribute to.
Accordingly, many men believe that keeping “their” woman to themselves is of the utmost importance. Indeed, in our culture, it is a direct threat to your masculinity if your partner sleeps with another person.
As a man, there’s nothing “wrong” with you for wanting to be non-monogamous, but there would be something wrong with you for “letting” your female partner be.
In Adam Darrow’s memoir Seek the Risk, he talks a lot about this direct threat to his masculinity when opening up his relationship.
After his partner requests that they put on Facebook that they are in an “open relationship,” he says,
“I knew that after I clicked that confirm button for all the world to see, there would be people who would view me as weak… I do not believe that a man whose wife or girlfriend sleeps with other men with the consent of all parties is weak. And yet emotionally, I was plugged into precisely those values.”
As a woman, if my partner hooks up with other women, sure it could reflect poorly on me, especially in certain circles. It could make me look like a fool.
But for men, growing up in a heteronormative world, when their partner hooks up with other men, there is much more at stake.
If another guy “fucks your girl” and everyone knows about it, you might be called a cuck, a loser. People might think you’re not good enough, and that’s why she’s off with other men. (“Haha maybe your d*ck is too small!”)
But this is, of course, also bullshit on many levels.
From an evolutionary standpoint, it’s actually not as important as we’ve been led to believe that a man knows whether or not his child is his own biologically.
There are many reasons that a man might care for a child that is not his own. This obsession with exclusivity has a scientific basis, but it’s not telling the full story and makes sense more in the context of the capitalist world we live in, not in the context of how we evolved in tribes, where the kids were all part of one big tribal family unit.
Whether that kid was directly your own or not wasn’t going to stop you from showing affection and loving them.
Indeed, we see adoptive parents easily growing to love their kid as easily as if it were their own. This is also quite natural.
The stories we were told weren’t true.
The science I learned in high school wasn’t total bullshit, but the widespread conclusions drawn from them were. It was hard to not internalize these ideas growing up. I just wish I’d understood more of the nuance to these stories.
In just one week, I’m bringing on the above-mentioned author Adam Darrow to talk about his memoir Seek the Risk, in which he vulnerably describes the insecurities he feels as a heterosexual man in non-monogamy.
Pick up the book, start reading it, and became a paid subscriber to join us live next week or get the replay/podcast recording.
*I wrote the above article in very binary (male vs. female) heterosexual terms. I did this because this is how the science talks about gender. However, this does NOT reflect the more fluid reality when it comes to gender.
WHAT ELSE?
I Had a S*xual Experience I Never Desired Because I Wanted to Be Pleasant
Last week’s special post was a longer-form story about a difficult time I had while solo-traveling in Sicily. In case you missed it…
Yes, You Could Be Polyamorous (Even If You Don’t Want To Be)
Colleague Thomas Brand’s article about ppl saying, “I could never be polyamorous.” Thought-provoking take.
Next Community Hour - Wed, July 16!
The above-mentioned CH on the difficulties of being both “masculine” and non-monogamous at once is happening in one week at 11am Eastern / 5pm CET
Become a paid subscriber to join us live on Zoom and/or get the podcast recording.
