In some cultures, men can take wives and the other wives will not be able to say yea or nay on the matter.
The man will go off, acquire a new bride, bring her home and everyone is expected to adjust accordingly.
This seems, to me, to leaves wives in a position to where they have no say over who they will build a family with.
That type of polygyny makes me sad. We don’t have to be in any way alike, we don’t have to like any of the same things. We can be our own types of people. All I ask for is a team-player mentality, the WANT to build this empire for the betterment of all of us.
There are women who are preaching that NO, the existing wives should have NO SAY. I SUSPECT it’s because they themselves are recently acquired wives and perhaps the existing wives were saying no to her being the one to join the family. And the husband invoked his “you have no say”-ness to it, and married her anyway. These women have no loyalty to the Universal Sisterhood of All Women, which dictates that you don’t allow these kinds of things to happen to your sister. You don’t allow her “choice” to be taken away.
What about existing wives in monogamy that DONT want a polygynous relationship?
YOU SHOULD NEVER EVER FORCE THEM. Even if you feel as if it’s your God-given right! YOU DONT DO IT. You’ve already got a wife. You should love her in the same way that you love yourself! You’d never FORCE yourself in such a situation. No — you value yourself TOO MUCH for that!
You can try convincing her, you can educate her on it, you can insist she read up on it and at least CONSIDER changing her view of it. But if she’s a decent wife, caring for house and home…and loving you…there’s no reason other than selfishness to steamroll past her dislike of polygyny. Don’t hurt that relationship with her for something that MAY NOT WORK OUT ANYWAY, thanks to the brokenness of people’s minds today.
You’ll be like that dog who had a small bone and when he looked in the water he saw a dog with a larger bone. He was unaware that this was his reflection and decided that he wanted THAT dogs bone. But in order to get THAT larger bone, he’d have to drop his own bone. So he let out a fierce bark and dropped his bone. He went after what he saw as the larger bone, and lost his small bone in the process. When he jumped in the water, the dog he saw, and it’s larger bone, disappeared.
…You don’t do that.
Please. Allow your wives to have a say. When they say it, dig into why they feel the way they feel and give it a consideration. You owe it to them, because you’d want people to do that for you in such a MAJOR situation (because taking on wives is NOT child’s play — wives are people with feelings, emotions, personalities, mindsets, etc and they deserve respect and consideration).
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May 11, 2014 at 4:23 am
norfolkfiona
When my husband took on a second wife, which he initially hid from me, he was all about “It’s allowed, it will make you less selfish, the experience will make you grow, the pain is only initial, if you accept it, your acceptance will make me love you more, our relationship will become better, sharing is caring”. Well, I can tell you that tune changed when I told him I had married a second husband!!! No more talk about “sharing is caring” then 😀 No, the pain almost killed him. Well, he had to adjust or loose me, HE was the one who turned our marriage polygamous, not me. But he never thought the shoe would fit on the other foot too…. If men knew that their wives could choose to really live religion and do to their brother what they would have done unto them, I believe men would think differently about polygamy.
May 13, 2014 at 11:59 am
Dr3@MGYRL360
Well I can understand your response considering he hid it from you. So many times I’ve seen relationships that were built on deception like that crash and burn completely.
You should have had a say — what if you didn’t LIKE the woman he chose and y’all couldnt’ work together as a family?? SMH
It’s amazing what people can get with a little bit of honest and open communication.
Anyway, I’m anti-polyandry, I only support it in the sense that people should be able to marry who they love and not be criminalized for it.
Thanks for chiming in!
May 14, 2014 at 10:31 am
norfolkfiona
Well, that’s exactly how I feel about polygyny, so in a way I suppose we’re on the same page 🙂
June 20, 2014 at 6:13 am
Yeye Akilimali Funua Olade
Reblogged this on BLACK IS BEAUTIFUL! and commented:
BEENI O! (YES O!)