In a recent study I conducted on college men, I learned about their feelings on monogamy. I asked five different men if they believed in monogamy, to which they all answered "yes." Monogamy is a term you probably heard in biology courses where your professor explained the mating style of animals. Some animals may be monogamous while others aren’t, meaning they have multiple mating partners.
Today, monogamy is a question most millennials ask one another. In easy terms, monogamy is basically the belief of being married to one person, and having sexual relationships with only one partner. According to Rolling Stone, a study conducted on college students showed that 77.1 percent of them reported not having a regular sexual partner while 84.5 percent of them reported having sex with a friend or random partner.
In his song "Doing it Wrong," rapper Drake says, “We live in a generation of, not being in love, and not being together, But we sure make it feel like we're together, Cause we're scared to see each other with somebody else.”
In our current culture, dating apps have made it easier for non-monogamous relationships. A few years ago, we were excited with online shopping, now dating apps make it easy to find your next partner as easy as just a swipe. Many blame apps like Tinder, Bumble, OkCupid and many others for the increase in non-monogamous relationships. David Buss, a professor of psychology at the University of Texas at Austin who specializes in the evolution of human sexuality says, “Apps like Tinder and OkCupid give people the impression that there are thousands or millions of potential mates out there,” Buss says. “One dimension of this is the impact it has on men’s psychology. When there is a surplus of women, or a perceived surplus of women, the whole mating system tends to shift toward short-term dating. Marriages become unstable. Divorces increase. Men don’t have to commit, so they pursue a short-term mating strategy. Men are making that shift, and women are forced to go along with it in order to mate at all.” Before, people used to meet their partners through the proximity of family and friends but now, online dating has surpassed all other forms. The easier it is the find a partner on the Internet, the lower the possibilities of monogamy.
Others, like rapper Yg, who in his song "Toot It And Boot It" says, “I met her in the club then I said wassup, I took her to the crib, and you know I f**ked, yeah I toot it and boot it, toot it and boot it” have glamorized the short-term dating strategy to “hit it and quit it.” This specific strategy is when you have sex with a person and end the advancement of your relationship.
Not being monogamous is not always a bad or negative thing. Sometimes open relationships work for people. Allowing your partner to seek what they want with your consent is the way many keep the romance alive in their many years of marriage. For some, like those in their early describe not wanting a monogamous relationship in the moment but do seek it in their future.
