Women or Wine? Monogamy and Alcohol
What’s not to like? The headline is the title of an intriguing new working paper [PDF] by two University of Leuven economists Mara Squicciarini and Jo Swinnen. The two note an interesting correlation between societies that practice monogamy and those that drink alcohol. As the abstract explains:
Intriguingly, across the world the main social groups which practice polygyny do not consume alcohol. We investigate whether there is a correlation between alcohol consumption and polygynous/monogamous arrangements, both over time and across cultures. Historically, we find a correlation between the shift from polygyny to monogamy and the growth of alcohol consumption. Cross-culturally we also find that monogamous societies consume more alcohol than polygynous societies in the preindustrial world. We provide a series of possible explanations to explain the positive correlation between monogamy and alcohol consumption over time and across societies.
So, as you can see, monogamy leads to more alcohol consumption and therefore poses a serious threat to society.
I say let us ban this unnatural abomination and let us return to the traditional polygamous marriages of our forefathers.
Children deserve to grow up in a stable drug free environment so this social construct that is basically the result of heathen mores needs to end.
Remember, no man is an island so if you choose to endanger society with your sexual preferences we have every right to legislate it out of existence.