Extra-marital sex and violent crime
Interesting post, which begins:
Extramarital sex is the principal factor in high violent crime rates in the Americas (North, South, and Central). This surprising conclusion calls for some explanation. As promised, here it is.
The first point to make is that most violent crime involves young male perpetrators on male victims. The violence is thus between potential competitors over women (1). Such violence can prove deadly. In their study of homicides in Detroit, Canadian researchers found that the leading cause of homicides was seemingly unmotivated aggression that police classify as "trivial altercations." For instance, two men accidentally jostle each other in a bar, there is a scuffle, and someone gets fatally stabbed. Men who lose face in such encounters fall in the pecking order and become less desirable as dates. In trivial altercations, men are indirectly fighting over women.
In contrast, men who are married and out of the dating arena have remarkably low rates of violence. Divorce is of interest here because formerly-married men find themselves dating again. When that happens, their involvement in violent crime rises also. This is not too surprising because dating takes place in singles bars and night clubs where alcohol is consumed and inhibition is lowered. A substantial proportion of violent crime occurs close to such venues.
Researchers have also looked at the physiological implications of divorce. Divorced men have unusually high levels of the male hormone testosterone coursing through their veins…
