Polygamy

[Julia Thompson]

On Mon, 4 Feb 2008, William T Goodall wrote:

>
> On 4 Feb 2008, at 05:10, Julia Thompson wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> On Mon, 4 Feb 2008, William T Goodall wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> On 4 Feb 2008, at 03:24, Alberto Vieira Ferreira Monteiro wrote:
>>>
>>>> Keith Henson wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> Considering that polygamy is the norm for the vast majority of the
>>>>> cultures in the world, it's an interesting question how the western
>>>>> countries, and a few others, became monogamous.  It seems to be
>>>>> associated with settled agriculture but I don't know if there is a
>>>>> connection or why.
>>>>>
>>>> I would guess that it's peace that doomed polygamy. There can't
>>>> be polygamy unless there's more women than men, otherwise
>>>> the men without women will revolt.
>>>>
>>>
>>> If gay men don't marry women then there are more available women than
>>> straight men.
>>
>> You're failing to take into account lesbians who have absolutely no
>> interest in men.  (Like several people in one of my social
>> circles....)
>> That might balance things out somewhat there, putting you back to
>> square
>> one.
>
>
> The consensus is that the  proportion of women who are lesbians is
> much lower than the proportion of men who are gay. If we remove all
> gay and lesbian people from the equation there is still a surplus of
> straight women to straight men. How big a surplus depends on whose
> numbers for the proportions are correct.

I think the concensus is off, then.  I think it's close to equal, or very 
slightly biased towards more lesbians.

Do you have sources to cite?  I'd be interested in seeing them if you do.

 	Julia