I am about to talk about something that was discussed many times. It might be the most controversial topic in our Islamic and Arab worlds. I will do my best to be as objective as I possibly can because this issue in particular hits on my nerves. Polygamy has always perplexed me in its core concept; it always baffled me how a man can take more than one wife and be as sane and stable as any other normal person!

Putting all the religious arguments aside, because I am sure that this is the first thing that men will say; God has given us the right to marry not two, not three but four wives at the same time. I am not going to get into the religious aspect because men who practice this right are not even qualified to practice it from the beginning. It is true that God has privileged the Muslim man with this, but it was not without conditions and prerequisites that a minority of men meets.

What I am talking about here is the human aspect and consequences of such act. I have witnessed some cases of polygamy first hand and more often than not; men do it for their own pleasure and whims, forgetting about the conditions that God has outlined for them in order to practice this right.

The most common scenario is when a man goes through a middle age crisis that turns into a lifetime agony for his first wife and kids and probably for him as well. He marries his first wife and together they start a family; she helps him fulfill his dreams and move up the ladder of success. Her help to him varies from taking care of the household, the kids, helping out from her own career, his personal needs; mental and physical. When he finally becomes the dream; he looks for something to give him back some of his lost youth; and all of a sudden; his wife is no longer suitable for him; he needs a younger, more beautiful and more sophisticated woman who measures up.

The poor wife is in the dark. Yes, she might feel that there is something wrong and she might investigate what is going on with her husband, but what can she do? If she confronts him; she will be making is a reality too soon, so in the hope for this crisis to pass; she keeps quiet until she is surprised with the fact that she has to share the man of her life with another woman, and her kids have to share their father with another family.

In most cases; the woman prefers to accept this humiliation to her femininity for the sake of her children; because she does not want them to lose their mother as they have lost their father. In fear of her husband never coming back to her and her kids, she accepts his presence and does her best to make him feel comfortable. He has forced her into a competition for his love and affection, and she has to pull all her womanly charming tricks to win him over. She has become one of the women in his harem after she had been the only one. Not only she has to compete for his love, but she has to compete with a younger, more beautiful and more sophisticated woman who has become his new love bringing with her all the excitement that comes with anything new.

The minute he decided to marry someone else; he stopped treating his wife as a human; he considers her as property challenging her to even object because if she does; she is risking depriving her kids of their father and might get herself divorced taking the shame and disgrace of that to her own family and maybe losing her kids in the process.

Why does she have to be the one to compromise and sacrifice? Isn’t he a father and has his kids’ best interest in mind? What makes his personal needs more important than hers or her kids’? What makes OK for him to insult her like this and get away with it? It is his selfish nature that drives him to become a cruel person and forget about the woman who shared his life, only to satisfy his manly ego and fall for a woman who does not care whose lives to wreck in her search for her own happiness.

The religious argument here is unacceptable because God is just, God is fair and no way will He accept that the man does this to his wife and family in the name of His teachings; justice and fairness are the most important conditions for the man to be qualified for polygamy.

What a woman is to do when she is put in this situation? Should she accept her husband’s selfishness and stay with him? Should she refuse and leave him risking losing her kids? Who said it is fair that she goes through this while he goes on a honeymoon renewing his youth and love? Who said that she is less human than him to accept sharing him? Who said she does not have needs exactly like his? Why are his needs more important than hers?

It is really sad that some women reach a state where they prefer that their men get themselves thousands of mistresses than a second marriage. I can’t blame them for wishing so and I understand why they would, but do men get it? Do they comprehend the amount of humiliation they force their wives and families to undergo? Does he feel compassion towards them or he does not even care as long as he satisfies his desires?

I am really sad for all the women who have to go through this and I call for fellow women to think twice before wrecking a home and taking a man from his wife and family. Chances are: he did it to her; he will do it to you!

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