[mattmcc]

Well, you're a man.

Thanks for writing out what probably a lot of men think. I would bet that almost all the negative replies are coming from women. Some women will just not make an attempt to understand this and will resort to trying to make you feel guilty and shamed because it's such a shock to their upbringing.

I think you've probably done a lot of reading on the topic so you have more knowledge than me. But from learning about different cultures and societies, polygamy is the most common form of marriage across cultures, not monogamy.

Steve, you concluded your post:

If I had it to do all over again, knowing what I know now, would I still get married? No, I doubt it. The monogamous marriage model doesn’t feel right to me. I love the idea of long-term committed relationships though, but you don’t need marriage for that. I don’t see a compelling reason to get a formal divorce just on principle, but it’s fair to say that my commitment to being in a single monogamous relationship has ended.

This is something I have thought a lot about recently. Monogamy doesn't seem right to me either.

I look at marriages today and what do I see?

I see divorce rates of 60%+ plus a good number of unhappy marriages that stay together because of the children or they think it's the right thing to do. That means probably around 70-80% of marriages are not happy.

Marriages in the past were mainly held together because of the economic dependence of women on her husband. Now that the tie has been removed (at least in North America), we see that most marriages do not last based on "love" alone.

I know you can't reply to much on the forums but what advice would you give to an unmarried, 20-something man like myself? Or perhaps a better question, is what advice would you give your 20-year old self regarding this?