Right. This is not a new theory. It's well known that evolution tends to favor polygamy where females are more selective and males are more promiscuous.

What's interesting is that this apparently started after agriculture rather than before. I had previously thought that maybe hunter gatherers practiced polygamy but it faded away as we become more agricultural.

Also 17 females to 1 male is pretty absurd. Even if you look at cultures that practiced polygamy in recent history it wasn't to that extent. And even when it was practiced, it wasn't necessarily common except in the very upper class, so the average female to male ratio would have been more reasonable.

We can only speculate to what degree this might have shaped our (recent) evolution. That's a huge selective pressure on males to have traits that would lead to them being the local king or whatever they were. And everyone alive today would be descended from those people.