Against polygamy

[Trilby]

Sister Wives makes me wanna puke.

I can't believe wolf watches it without some serious - uh, mood enhancers.

[Perry Winkle]

Originally Posted by freshnesschronic

I didn't mean cheat, but the union of marriage universally has always been 1:1 and evolved that way for humans because of the postpartum feeding problem.

You need to define what you mean by "post-partum feeding problem."

[Shawnee123]

Originally Posted by Shawnee123

The what?

Originally Posted by Perry Winkle

You need to define what you mean by "post-partum feeding problem."

Yeah.

[Perry Winkle]

Maybe by "union of marriage" fresh means it in the very limited modern sense. Marriage between common people has only been an institution for about 2,000 years, and doing so with any formality is an even more recent invention. Even then, that's only sufficient in the Christian west.

That's a pretty small damn universe.

[Perry Winkle]

I assume that the post-partum feeding problem can be defined thus:
How does a group of humans ensure that all members are fed, including newborns, which can only ingest liquids?

This is pretty unsatisfactory to me. It doesn't seem to have any cultural implications (marriage and monogamy are most definitely cultural).

(I had a whole rant listing reasons why it's not a problem, but I'll hold onto that...)

[monster]

Originally Posted by Perry Winkle

You need to define what you mean by "post-partum feeding problem."

Who gets to eat the baby. If there's more than one wife, there will be competition over the devouring of the young.

[Sundae]

Who gets to eat the afterbirth?
And how is it cooked?
Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall recommends cooking with garlic.

Although I thought that was supposed to be avoided by breast feeding mothers?

Channel 4 rapped for serving placenta

Britain's Channel 4 has been severely reprimanded for a programme in which a woman's afterbirth was served up as paté.
The Broadcasting Standards Commission said the episode of TV Dinners, shown in February, breached a taboo and "would have been disagreeable to many".

The presenter, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, devised the recipe with mother Rosie Clear for a party to celebrate the birth of her daughter Indi-Mo Krebbs. The placenta was fried with shallots and garlic, flambéed, puréed and served to 20 relatives and friends as a pate on focaccia bread.

Mrs Clear's husband Lee had 17 helpings but the other guests were less enthusiastic.

Labour MP Kevin McNamara was one of nine viewers who complained to the Independent Television Commission about the show. The ITC passed the comments on to the BSC, which upheld the complaints on the grounds of taste.

The commission accepted it was not illegal to cook or consume afterbirth - in fact it is considered highly nutritious and mothers in many countries are encouraged to eat their own. The programme makers had also sought to treat the subject sensitively and fairly, said the commission. But in its report the commission said the content of the show would have taken many viewers by surprise - despite a vague announcement before it was aired.

Mr McNamara, MP for Hull North, said the programme was "offensive to the public".

Channel 4 said the programme was not a conventional cookery show and was designed to challenge conventional wisdom.

I admit this is from 1998, but many people here still remember it.

[Spexxvet]

Originally Posted by Perry Winkle

It creates an excess of young men without prospect of marriage.

And young men with blue balls can be a terror!


Women want security to "breed and feed", and long ago they got this security by having children with the alpha male. But the alpha male was making babies with as many partners as he wanted to.

[Shawnee123]

Oh, I see. Women want...

Thanks for tellin' me, I forgot what I wanted.

And to paraphrase Paula Cole: Where Have All the Alpha Males Gone?

I must be an anthropological oddity.

[freshnesschronic]

What I was meaning to say was the origins concept of "marriage" or mutual agreement between a man and a woman and their offspring.

All forms of marriages came about because of the postpartum feeding problem. I took a cultural anthropology class; this is fact. And then culture took over and and variances/differences happened.

BUT marriage and everything related to it happened because of this: as the species homo sapiens produce offspring with very long childhoods and usually only one at a time, the human mother did not collect food/hunt while taking care of this offspring. The father takes the responsibility for being the food provider for his mate and offspring. We are not a mate-and-leave-your-offspring type of species, and because of that marriage has developed universally.

[Sundae]

Originally Posted by freshnesschronic

I took a cultural anthropology class; this is fact.

[Shawnee123]

See what you started, Zen, with your smarty-pants maths?

[Sundae]

Pants again!

[Shawnee123]

Laughing way too hard today. You peeps kills me!

[monster]

Originally Posted by freshnesschronic

I took a cultural anthropology class; this is fact.

transcript or it never happened.