Is Polygamy Next?

[AgnosticBoy]

You just gave the grounds: moral and theological.

Polygamy is neither Christian nor sane.

A man has three wives and fifteen children by them. What happens if he is jobless? What burden does that put on society?

The same burden that some men put on society today when they have children by several different women but do nothing to support either the women or the children.

How is that not a crime against the women, the children, and civilization itself?

Not so. Polygamy is not always practiced in the way you described because there are plenty of modern-day families where all of the spouses have a job. One polygamous family that comes to mind is Joe Darger’s family. Here’s a good interview: here. I personally don’t support every agenda of the LGBT community, but one smart thing they’ve accomplished was to show that they can function and raise kids without abuse which also required coming out in the open for all to see their relationships. Perhaps it might help that you can see how NON-FLDS polyamory and polygamous relationships (e.g. Joe Darger’s family) can work and do some research. I can email you other videos of adult consensual polygamous relationships if you’d like.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Not so. Polygamy is not always practiced in the way you described because there are plenty of modern-day families where all of the spouses have a job. One polygamous family that comes to mind is Joe Darger’s family. Here’s a good interview: here. I personally don’t support every agenda of the LGBT community, but one smart thing they’ve accomplished was to show that they can function and raise kids without abuse which also required coming out in the open for all to see their relationships. Perhaps it might help that you can see how NON-FLDS polyamory and polygamous relationships (e.g. Joe Darger’s family) can work and do some research. I can email you other videos of adult consensual polygamous relationships if you’d like.

It is always possible to find instances of exceptions to the rule.

However, if polygamy became popular the exceptions would be eclipsed by the profound effects of a massive number of children and women becoming playgrounds for oversexed hedonist men.

We are seeing some of this already in serial monogamy, where men lose interest in their wife and children and go on to start up new families, the effects of which we are seeing today in the moral and financial confusion and chaos of our times. A family without a father is a crippled family. A family with too many women and children and one father will be morally crippled even when the finances are healthy enough.

This is so common sense that even the Mormons gave up on polygamy when they were challenged for it, though there is some hidden polygamy still among them.

The common sense of mankind is that polygamy doesn’t work. People should go with common sense rather than seek to break old taboos to prove they are compassionate to every perverse hedonist’s demands.

 

[AgnosticBoy]

It is always possible to find instances of exceptions to the rule.

True, but it is also possible for the exceptions to increase and eventually replace the old norms. History shows that this has happened even with monogamy where it was the norm for women to be suppressed and completely dominated by patriarchal men, but that’s becoming less and less common in the West. So if we can give monogamy a chance to evolve, why not polygamy? Unless you are saying that polygamy is inherently abusive and the abusive norms are there to stay, in which case I’d ask you for evidence.

The truth is we don’t have a fair picture or number of adult consensual poly families because they are reduced to hiding but that is changing as these families are popping up on documentaries, tv shows, and hopefully soon to come movies. This is a start! The next step is using science and theology to make the case for why monogamy is not for everyone.

However, if polygamy became popular the exceptions would be eclipsed by the profound effects of a massive number of children and women becoming playgrounds for oversexed hedonist men.

To be honest, we mostly find men abusing polygamy when it’s done under a religious paradigm, like the FLDS Mormons. However, I see no evidence of your point being a problem with independent Mormons, Protestants, and non-religious people who practice polygamy/polyamory. Keep in mind, that polygamy can be practiced as having any combination of genders (MFF, FMM, FMMF, FFF) and with any combination of sexual orientation.

We are seeing some of this already in serial monogamy, where men lose interest in their wife and children and go on to start up new families, the effects of which we are seeing today in the moral and financial confusion and chaos of our times. A family without a father is a crippled family. A family with too many women and children and one father will be morally crippled even when the finances are healthy enough.

Banning polygamy will not keep a man from having many women and kids with these women outside marriage. Lets address the real problem rather than punishing consenting adults who are otherwise responsible.

The common sense of mankind is that polygamy doesn’t work. People should go with common sense rather than seek to break old taboos to prove they are compassionate to every perverse hedonist’s demands.

It seems like you are trying to speak for everybody. It seems that you are obligated to accept monogamy only because of your faith. But to me, I listened to both sides of the argument first, then did my research, and realized that many Christians have no strong case against polygamy, not even from a religious standpoint.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

It seems like you are trying to speak for everybody. It seems that you are obligated to accept monogamy only because of your faith. But to me, I listened to both sides of the argument first, then did my research, and realized that many Christians have no strong case against polygamy, not even from a religious standpoint.

I’m not trying to speak for everybody, but for common sense, a rare commodity in today’s world.

The collapse of social morality today is fed by the demands of perverse hedonists.

There is no law that says society must give in to those demands when those demands are aimed as social dissolution both for women and children. Polygamy is characteristic of primitive societies in which women vastly outnumbered men because of tribal warfare.

We are not primitives, though sometimes I wonder if we are not getting there.

 

[AgnosticBoy]

Polygamy is characteristic of primitive societies in which women vastly outnumbered men because of tribal warfare.

We are not primitives, though sometimes I wonder if we are not getting there.

Both polygamy and monogamy are primitive practices that had primitive purposes so your argument doesn’t go well with your own position. The characteristics of a relationship largely depends on the characteristics of the culture at large, which is why Middle Eastern style monogamy is not all the same as monogamous marriages in the West. If polygamy were given a chance to evolve with Democratic values, as opposed to be oppressed by religion and our laws, then it would also take on those values as it is already beginning to now. There are plenty of polygamous and polyamorous couples who practice CONSENT, EGALITARIANISM, everyone works instead of just the husband, etc. A lot of your views are showing a lack of familiarity with these examples, which will inevitably lead to stereotypical conclusions.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

A lot of your views are showing a lack of familiarity with these examples, which will inevitably lead to stereotypical conclusions.

A lot of your views are showing a lack of knowledge of the historical difference between cultures that adopted monogamy and those that adopted polygamy. Your view that future polygamy on a large scale could be beneficial is based only on a hopeful assumption rather than the facts of history.

On a practical level, I daresay you’ve never been married.

If you think you could handle five wives as well as one, good luck!!!

 

[AgnosticBoy]

A lot of your views are showing a lack of knowledge of the historical difference between cultures that adopted monogamy and those that adopted polygamy.

Your point here is very vague. I’m not here to defend every form of polygamy, just as you wouldn’t defend how monogamy is practiced in the Middle East today. I’m only here to make a case for adult ‘consensual’ polygamy as practiced by a subset of polygamists and polyamorists in the US. My future hope is only for all of them to come out of hiding, perhaps lend themselves to scientific inquiry just as the gay community has done which revealed no abuse of kids, etc, and we can go from there.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Your point here is very vague. I’m not here to defend every form of polygamy, just as you wouldn’t defend how monogamy is practiced in the Middle East today. I’m only here to make a case for adult ‘consensual’ polygamy as practiced by a subset of polygamists and polyamorists in the US. My future hope is only for all of them to come out of hiding, perhaps lend themselves to scientific inquiry just as the gay community has done which revealed no abuse of kids, etc, and we can go from there.

The abuse of children by gays would of course be very difficult to prove, so difficult that documentation would be worthless.

But common sense comes to the rescue. It’s only common sense that children are best served in their psychological development by the presence of two parents of the opposite sex. You evidently don’t agree.

 

[Bradski]

The abuse of children by gays would of course be very difficult to prove, so difficult that documentation would be worthless.

I would say that it is your comment that is worthless.

 

[Lion_IRC]

I would say that it is your comment that is worthless.

I don’t think we should disparage people’s posts (their opinions) as “worthless”.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

I would say that it is your comment that is worthless.

Still praying for you.

 

[Yeoman]

In Italy a Muslim leader is pushing to legalize polygamy since same-sex unions are now legal. Is that a logical deduction? Is that next on the American marital agenda? Stay tuned.

catholicherald.co.uk/news/2016/08/18/islamic-leader-wants-to-legalise-polygamy-in-italy/

I’m to this thread really late, and I haven’t plowed through all the responses, but frankly I think that the Obergefell decision makes the legalization of polygamy in the US inevitable.

Indeed, I thought that before Obergefell.

The reason is that marriage laws in most places, prior to mid 20th Century, made divorce difficult and for cause. At least in the early 20th Century it was still the case that cohabitation without being married was illegal in many US states or would end up resulting in common law marriage irrespective of the affirmative public actions of the couple. Now, all that has passed away. If its legal for a man to have one wife, and mess around with a dozen more, we have to ask if prohibiting plural marriage makes legal sense? In the current legal atmosphere, probably not.

Which doesn’t mean I support legalizing it. Rather than elect for The Benedictine Option and just wall up ourselves, I think we might want to opt for the St. Nicholas Option and beginning slapping this silliness around (granted, he didn’t really do it). In other words, stopping the redefinition of marriage means recreating the original one we were operating on, which meant divorce was difficult, cohabitation frowned upon, etc.

 

[Yeoman]

I’m to this thread really late, and I haven’t plowed through all the responses, but frankly I think that the Obergefell decision makes the legalization of polygamy in the US inevitable.

Indeed, I thought that before Obergefell.

The reason is that marriage laws in most places, prior to mid 20th Century, made divorce difficult and for cause. At least in the early 20th Century it was still the case that cohabitation without being married was illegal in many US states or would end up resulting in common law marriage irrespective of the affirmative public actions of the couple. Now, all that has passed away. If its legal for a man to have one wife, and mess around with a dozen more, we have to ask if prohibiting plural marriage makes legal sense? In the current legal atmosphere, probably not.

Which doesn’t mean I support legalizing it. Rather than elect for The Benedictine Option and just wall up ourselves, I think we might want to opt for the St. Nicholas Option and beginning slapping this silliness around (granted, he didn’t really do it). In other words, stopping the redefinition of marriage means recreating the original one we were operating on, which meant divorce was difficult, cohabitation frowned upon, etc.

This all assumes, of course, that the makeup of the Supreme Court doesn’t change with the addition of one more Supreme Court justice, which would potentially alter things, including on the recent decision I referenced.

 

[HerCrazierHalf]

In other words, stopping the redefinition of marriage means recreating the original one we were operating on, which meant divorce was difficult, cohabitation frowned upon, etc.

That’s a tough sell. Why would the public go along with this.

Not being argumentative, but I just don’t see it on the horizon (within 15 years).

 

[AgnosticBoy]

That’s a tough sell. Why would the public go along with this.

Not being argumentative, but I just don’t see it on the horizon (within 15 years).

There are two ways to make this issue a hot topic. You either have a polygamist arrested and have him or her (or them) challenge the laws… or you can force it on the American people by using the Hollywood effect, that is, flashing it on tv shows, movies, music, etc. Isn’t this why the LGBT were so successful at getting people to see their lifestyle and eventually accept it? Then you can throw in a few studies showing that polygamy can be practiced without harm to children, and then you have yourself a hot topic issue within 1 or 2 years tops from the time that these two points are implemented.

 

[HerCrazierHalf]

There are two ways to make this issue a hot topic. You either have a polygamist arrested and have him or her (or them) challenge the laws… or you can force it on the American people by using the Hollywood effect, that is, flashing it on tv shows, movies, music, etc. Isn’t this why the LGBT were so successful at getting people to see their lifestyle and eventually accept it? Then you can throw in a few studies showing that polygamy can be practiced without harm to children, and then you have yourself a hot topic issue within 1 or 2 years tops from the time that these two points are implemented.

I meant why would the public go along with returning to the previous definition of marriage that is difficult to dissolve in addition to reviving anti cohabitation laws?

 

[Yeoman]

That’s a tough sell. Why would the public go along with this.

Not being argumentative, but I just don’t see it on the horizon (within 15 years).

It is a tough sell.

But its something at in a way, sells itself. Thousands of people, maybe millions, who were sold on sex as entertainment and have now sustained permanent psychological, social, and even physical injury is the advertisement. Broken land damages lives, children with no knowledge of their fathers and sometimes badly damaged mothers.

But change does come. It came first with abortion, which is still a curse, but which is much less popular with younger generations than with the Boomer generation that brought it in. And according to statisticians sexual activity in younger generations has been declining. Younger generations themselves are more socially conservative than their parents, but they also have a harder time sorting out what that means as the Boomer generation has left such a mess.

 

[Yeoman]

To add, however, in “tough sell”, nothing succeeds like success.

Are people content with the victory of the libertine in the sexual revolution? It doesn’t appear to be the case. People keep flailing away who are on the edge of that movement. In the end, the further we get from a grounding in the truth the less happy we are, and demanding that everyone accommodate a situation and acknowledge it in the end brings no real satisfaction. To those on the edge of the “progressive” movement in these regards, those who have stayed close to the traditional form of marriage are irritating, not because they are unhappy and need liberation, but because they do better and don’t need the liberating. That’s part of the sale.

 

[HerCrazierHalf]

Regarding the fact that sexual activity is down with this generation vs boomers and such …

That’s something of a double edged sword. Awareness of the risks (including physiological for women) is part of it. But I think more millennials are single, not only as a martial status but as in no romantic partner. The level of distrust and sometimes hostility towards the opposite sex by a number of my peers is amazing.

I often wonder if the future filled with women unable to find suitable men interested in dating and hordes of men giving up deciding it is not worth it.

 

[AgnosticBoy]

To add, however, in “tough sell”, nothing succeeds like success.

Are people content with the victory of the libertine in the sexual revolution? It doesn’t appear to be the case. People keep flailing away who are on the edge of that movement. In the end, the further we get from a grounding in the truth the less happy we are, and demanding that everyone accommodate a situation and acknowledge it in the end brings no real satisfaction. To those on the edge of the “progressive” movement in these regards, those who have stayed close to the traditional form of marriage are irritating, not because they are unhappy and need liberation, but because they do better and don’t need the liberating. That’s part of the sale.

I agree with a lot of your points except for when you bring up polygamy in the context of cultural degradation stemming from the ‘sexual revolution’. If the sexual revolution opened the door to polygamy then I actually think that’s a good thing. Polygamy is about marriage, and it was clearly accepted by God. Monogamous marriages were not always the norm, nor is it necessarily the gold standard for everyone to abide by.