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Well, there's an inherent inequality in that its really only men who can truly enforce the law (sans that threat of eternal damnation from an all-powerful God), so it would be harder to maintain that sort of equality if men didn't want to be bound by it.
We can refactor the question to be basically "how can we convince men to accept strong limits on their sexual freedom (i.e., stop using their physical prowess to secure sex) when their baser instincts would prefer more of a free-for-all? AND convince them to actively police each other?"
For me, it is easy. I believe that the second, third, and beyond order effects of enforced monogamy are self-evidently worth it: we get to have a civilization with internet, running water, and a functioning air travel system. Eventually space travel.
But a guy who finds himself near the top of the hierarchy, he might be well aware that he could vastly increase the variety of his sexual partners if he defects... and he reasonably believes he has sufficient power to get away with it. And a biological imperative to spread his genes to boot.
Guys at the bottom also have reason to defect, but rarely the capacity.
So refactoring it further: "How can we convince elite males who could improve their own position by defecting (whilst destroying the game for everyone else) to accept limits on their sexual freedom and thus their genetic success when other humans have limited ability to even police them?"
I don't have a good answer to this that isn't "Convince these elite males that there's an even higher power that sees all their actions and declares which actions will be punished. And punished VASTLY dis-proportionally, to boot."
We start to slide back towards my classic Skin in the Game screed. Elites need to suffer for misbehavior too.
The story of Henry resonated with a lot of readers of Radicalizing the Romanceless, so I am not certain that this is the case. The top and bottom seem capable of defection for different reasons but the middle of the hierarchy get made into chumps.
Guys at the bottom defect by not making an effort to turn into eligible husband candidates, because it's only marginally rewarded or even feasible. This is not a bit less of a social defection than that of certain elite males but it only has social consequences long-term and invites less attention, so it's easy to assume that it doesn't matter or that it's not happening at all. Indeed it's the men in the middle who have the least reasons to defect.
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I am doubtful that the elite males were ever convinced to a significant degree that God existed, or at least that He would punish them for taking many mistresses, specifically. Certainly all the commandments against not murdering and such were treated as nothing but a polite suggestion, judging by the stories of power struggles around thrones.
What did hold elite males back was that older societies were less atomized, and their escapades were more likely to be known, fueling regular, non-supernatural consequences against them such as their brother getting angry and leading a coup.
Maybe it's the people who should be willing to punish elites, vastly disproportionately. At least for as long as the elites have names and addresses and can't murder us all with drone swarms.
Yes, but that's another doozy of a coordination problem.
I've sometimes thought about actively attempting to rally disaffected young males who are otherwise prone to wasting their lives on video games and porn and helping them acquire training, purpose, and power, to use towards demanding better treatment for males across the board and, ultimately, to punish the worst malefactors who oversaw the current decline.
Which, yes, looks very much like a paramilitary force if you squint, and so I wouldn't be surprised if I got assassinated before it hit any critical mass.
(Gavin McInnes tried this approach with the Proud Boys, and it really got away from him)
I think that is easily disrupted by, e.g. the Andrew Tate grift, where some guy who can convince men that he knows shortcuts to getting wealth and pussy and wrings all the money and enthusiasm out of them by having them chase superficial goals.
I've given up hope that 'the people' will enforce accountability, sans the rise of some Napoleonic (Trumpian? Messianic?) figure who can represent them and guide them strategically to advance a righteous goal on behalf of the whole.
And I won't ever pretend to be that kind of guy.
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