Posted on 01/20/2006 7:06:27 AM PST by SirLinksalot
Could Same-Sex Marriage Lead to Legalized Polygamy?
By Debra Saunders
When social conservatives argue that legalizing same-sex marriage could lead to legalized polygamy, same-sex marriage advocates either laugh or sneer. It's a scare tactic, they say. It'll never happen.
Last year, however, as Canada legalized same-sex marriage, Prime Minister Paul Martin commissioned a $150,000 study to debunk the polygamy argument. Big mistake: The study confirmed the scare tactic by recommending that Canada repeal its anti-polygamy law.
It also suggested that a legal challenge to Canada's anti-polygamy laws would succeed. "Why criminalize behavior?" asked Martha Bailey, one of the study's three law-professor authors. "We don't criminalize adultery."
Confession time: I am one of those who, for years, has argued that legalizing same-sex marriage would not open the door for polygamy. The limit for marriages would remain two, I argued. Two doesn't mean three or four.
Wrong. In these politically correct times, do-gooders expand definitions until words -- or institutions -- lose all meaning. Marriage can mean what you want it to mean.
And: If you don't prosecute all crimes in a category, you can't prosecute one.
That's essentially what Bailey argued.
The study recognized the "strong association between polygamy and gender inequality." Then the authors apparently decided that Canadian law should eliminate any legal unfairness -- in inherently unequal marriages.
One Kuwaiti wife can't move to Canada to live with her husband and another wife. That's unfair to the wife and unfair to Muslims. The study noted, "The parties most likely to suffer from this rule are the left-behind wives." To eliminate that inequity, these professors are ready to provide legal cover for all polygamous (and polyandrous) marriages.
"There's a logical extension to it," laughed Rob Stutzman, who worked on the Proposition 22 campaign in 2000, a measure that limited marriage in California to a union between a man and a woman. "If you accept the premise that marriage should be whatever relationships people want to enter into," he said, polygamy is legit.
Brad Luna of the Human Rights Campaign, which supports same-sex marriage, finds any linkage of polygamy to same-sex marriage "offensive." He warned against reading too much into one Canadian study. In America, he said, "two people is the defining element in our system of government on contractual marriage."
Assemblyman Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, who has pushed for same-sex marriage in California, noted "a unique nature of a relationship with two. If you go beyond two, you can't draw a line anywhere else that isn't arbitrary." I agree, but the Canadian study gives me pause. The authors use a very American argument: that adults already are living in de facto polygamous relationships, so why make their arrangements illegal?
The answer is that even if authorities cannot and should not jail adults for group cohabitation, the state should not extend legal protections to those unions.
Extending marital protections to same-sex couples bestows equality. Extending protections to unequal unions protects inequality.
The Washington Times interviewed polygamous Mormons who argued they lead happy, harmonious lives. That may be, but the practice is poison for cultures at large. Rich men marry many wives. Poor men do not. Women have few opportunities and limited rights. It can't be good for the kids. Consider polygamy's most famous son: Osama bin Laden, whose father sired 54 children with 22 wives.
Many elites argue that Canada is 10 years ahead of America when it comes to gay rights. But when legal scholars are so progressive that they are willing to shove marriage back to the Stone Age, they reveal a culture with a death wish.
American advocates for same-sex marriage may want to reconsider supporting civil unions in lieu of same-sex marriage. Or some way to limit marriage to two adults.
This isn't the nanny state. It's the opposite. If you want to keep the government out of family life, don't legalize marriages that, when they dissolve, split property (and kids) between one husband and three wives.
Then comes beastiality.
"Expect Hollywood to make a film similar to Barebuck Mountain that celebrates and is sympathetic the joys of Polygamy at the same time damning middle America for intolerance. The subtle message will be ... DON'T YOU SEE THE HELL YOU ARE PUTTING THESE GOOD AND DECENT PEOPLE TO BY REFUSING TO RECOGNIZE AND LEGALIZE THEIR "normal" RELATIONSHIP(s) ?"
'Polyamory' and open relationships already have much more acceptance than they did only a short time ago. It's certainly not a stretch to envisage something like that happening in the next ten years.
Or incestuous marriages? The logic works the same. I believe this is called the "slippery slope".
"This is bound to cost a fortune in insurance and retirement, and other costs but they are all too eager for those bright, creative, sensitive, well groomed gay people to be on the payroll."
Or else they're terrified not to be seen as such.
Yes, I want to marry my 16 year old dog so I can get $1,000,000 insurance on my 16 year old legal wife.
Yes, that is quite true. If a big corporation is doing business with another big corporation, then when on buckles the other will probably follow suit. GE and Boeing could probably lead half of the Fortune 500 companies all by themselves.
Wow, Somebody else that knows the meaning of polyandry, and uses it correctly, my hat's off to you sir!
One small caveat, Mormon's do not practice polygamy, we have a basic tenant of our church that says we obey the laws of the land (those who violate it are excommunicated).
Religion trolls: No bashing here, I am a Mormon, I know what my church teaches, I have seen people excommunicated for this, if you want to argue what I believe, join the church first, and I'll see you on Sunday.
Good idea, you can also leave your fortune to your spouse when you die and have said spouse remarry one of your kids allowing a tax free transfer of your fortune.
Polygamy is, indeed, the follow-up to gay-marriage in the liberal assault on our values. If Gay marriage is allowed then no court in the land can reasonably stand against polygamy.
but I thought no one cared what people did in their own bedroom?
oh that's right, we only care when it's a man that marries more than one woman.
man sleeping with 100 women... ok.
man sleeping with another man... ok.
man sleeping with 100 men... ok.
man marrying 2 women ... go to jail, don't pass go.
Frankly, I'd much rather have legalized polygamy than legalized homosexual marriage, or even widespread divorce.
Yet ironically, CEO's want to start firing people for smoking.
I guess it's not about logic, it's about trendiness.
On the other hand, they must feel gay employees will add more than they take away which is certainly true with any other motivated worker. Gays are very motivated.
>>I've always wondered how Mormons could get away with polygamy but in any other
>> state if a guy is married to two women he gets arrested.
Mormon's do not practice polygamy, we have a basic tenant of our church that says we obey the laws of the land (those who violate it are excommunicated).
Those who practice polygamy are NOT Mormons (a nick name anyway), they call themselves fundamentalists.
They are fugitives who marry the first “Legally” then the others in their church, Legally they are cohabitating, until common law makes them married legally.
That’s when they become fugitives.
Our society has some pretty strange standards, sometimes. It used to be:
Man sleeping with 100 women = stud
woman sleeping with 100 men = slut
"Extending marital protections to same-sex couples bestows equality. Extending protections to unequal unions protects inequality."
Neither bestows equality! Both protect inequality. Both are causes of the destruction of families and the moral erosion of American culture. Both encourage selfish, erotic, and irresponsible behaviors and lifestyles. Both are a detriment to society at large, both are emotionally and mentally detrimental to children.
This woman is a law-professor???
And people are giving serious attention to her "study"???
Uh...I hate to have to tell you this, Martha, but...uh...murder, rape, torture, enslavement, assault with a deadly weapon, child molestation, blowing up skyscrapers, derailing trains...uh...are forms of behavior.
Uh...behavior is what is criminalized.
What do you think should be criminalized???
You might have to marry an underage dog to make that estate transfer thing work. But marrying underage dogs! Is culture ready for that. Maybe if it isn't a samesex underage dog it'll work. Next year.
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