Interesting Gallup Poll on Morality

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If all consent, I don't see a problem with that.

And let all those men leave the competition for the women who only want one husband.

And no, Polygamy is not for everyone, but for those that want that, that's none of my business...


Drew: I still see your stance as hypocritical. First, you tell me that my stance against Homosexuality is a crock because of religious influence, then you don't accept a stance that allows a different definition of marriage because of what they do in other countries or in a small subculture.

Bottom line, when you start playing with cultural rules on who can have sex with who, you open a pandora's box. Why couldn't it stay closed?

 

Because what happens in other peoples' bedrooms is an inherently interesting topic, I'd wager, and we just can't get enough of it. Oh, and you can get a lot of people interested that way, which is good for organizations that thrive on public interest.

I wonder when it started... I mean, was it rooted deep in our subconscious (finding any mention of sex inherently tittilating, sort of like pornography lite) or was it a social construct that came by in an earlier civilization, and spread?

 

So would I. However, it doesn't actually happen that way and never has, so you're point is moot.

Gnarff, the way it is customarily done is highly valid. Further, from a government standpoint, marriage is just a tax benefit. There isn't a single law on the books (at least none that are actually enforced) banning having multiple "wives". Remember, from a government standpoint, marriage is just collection of tax benefits. The government is well within its rights to set limits on how many people can receive these tax benefits at the same time. If, however, the government starts regulating what Gender you have to be, then that's discrimination.

Last I checked, you didn't need to be legally married in order to have sex. Heck, even adultery is legal. Legal marriage is nothing more than a collection of tax benefits. Spiritual marriage is a different matter entirely (my wife's Christian parents don't consider us married because our marriage was never blessed by a church), and I can think of lots of ways to abuse the ability to take more than one spouse. Think about it Gnarff....if polygamy were legal, I would be able to pass my entire estate on to more than one person while avoiding gift or inheritance taxes by simply marrying anyone to whom I'd like to leave my estate! I could even have my sons temporarily divorce their wives, marry them legally, divorce them (or die) and pass on all or part of my estate to them in the divorce (or my will), and have my sons re-marry them afterwards just to avoid inheritance tax when passing my estate.

I'm fine with polygamy. I'm not fine, however, with extending extra tax benefits to polygamists above and beyond what a typical married couple gets.

[ June 18, 2007, 12:29: Message edited by: Drew ]

 

According to Catholic doctrine, yes, you're absolutely correct. But keep in mind that in the US, unlike Poland, Catholics do not constitute a majority. I just googled some information, and as of 2006 (the latest year information was available) there were just under 65 (64.8) million Catholics in the US. In a country with a total population of a little over 300 million, Catholics represent about 22% of the U.S. population.

Now, the rules are different in the different Protestant denominations, but generally speaking, most Christians are against abortions and premarital sex, while not nearly as many are against contraception. Furthermore, from what I see of Catholics, there are a great many more that are willing to bend the rules regarding contraception and premarital sex than are willing to do so with abortion.

I'm not even disagreeing with what you are saying in principle - I'm just saying that how it happens in practice is different. You call it hypocritical (which in a way it is), while I see the results as pretty much what I expected. If you don't see anything immoral with contraception or premarital sex, then generally speaking, yes, you find sex without the woman getting pregnant better than the woman getting pregnant, unless the actual goal was to get pregnant.

Well that's where my statement of "perception trumps reality" comes in.

 

In a modern society, where women are encouraged to seek education, and concent is required, that would occur. In situations where it does not, then the Government should be stepping in. This is not immoral, but a case of the government being lazy.

Actually, when Utah applied for Statehood, the Church was required to abandon polygamy, not only legally but Spiritually as well. Men with multiple wives were either fugitives or imprisoned. John Taylor, the third president of the Church, had to spend several years in hiding because of this. How can they do this without such laws?

No, it's not. The Church was forced to eliminate even spiritual unions involving multiple spuoses as part of the deal to gain admission to the union and to avoid prosecution of the priesthood leaders and confiscation of Church lands and property (which included most of Utah at the time under Church doctrine).

Then could the government refrain from sticking their nose into Spiritual marriage? They don't, therefore, they must uphold the traditional definition.

Sorry, I call bulls*** on that one. When the Government demanded the early Mormons to abandon the practice of polygamy, they discriminated against them based on religion. By whatever constitutional authority they did that, they are then obligated to deny homosexuals the privelege of legal and lawful marriage.

First off, then the Government then has to close those loopholes. For starters, how about a flat rate tax on all estates at point of death? Secondly, some restrictions on the legal marriage rules to close off more of those loopholes. Mind you you are trampling on something sacred to cheat the government. It is offensive to the faithful. While you don't believe in God, I assure you that He is real, and won't look favourably upon your sins.

That is an example of part of the loopholes. Perhaps in a divorce, the marital assets would be taxed at time of divorce as well to get around that...

But that's not the issue. You would piss and moan about one group's choice on economic reasons, while accusing me of bigotry and hatred for opposing another group's choice on moral grounds. Discrimination is discrimination.

 

The problems with polygamic marriages are mulitple while problems with homosexual marriages (compared to regular heterosexual) are nonexistant.

First of all there is the unequality and possible abuse which almost by definition follows polygamy. There has probably been quite a few cases of happier polygamic communities and relations but I dare say they are an minority. I'm not convinced that three people can love each other equally. Someone will allways be first and another one second. I don't think such a relationship lies on a very healthy basis.

Also there is a whole new legal jungle that needs to be cleared if polygamy is accepted. What will happen with the children if one of the wives die? How will inheritance be organized? Etc. If there was a wide enough acceptance this would of course not be such a problem, which of course leads us to the third reason.

Polygamic marriages lack public support. 91% against 9%. I would not even advocate homosexual marriages in countries that have such low ratings of acceptance, It would simply be way too undemocratic.

 

Drew, all 50 states have statutes against bigamy and polygamy. In most it is a felony.

Utah was required to adopt a bigamy/polygamy statute when applying for statehood.

 

The question of prosecuting polygamy in Utah is similar to the case of incest (adult brother and sister wanted to have kids) we had in Germany. The government keeps out of the bedrooms, and rightly so, and usually such stuff isn't prosecuted because it is off the radar. That of course changes when folks start to be very overt about it. Only then it is prosecuted.

Which leaves me somewhat uneasy - what use is a prohibition by law when it is enforced half-hearted or selectively? Well, it might make sense with 'common sense' laws - like the prohibition of incest in Germany, or polygamy - that are generally accepted. Still, the bad feeling remains.

 

Not what I'm talking about. There isn't a single law on the books banning the lifestyle or banning a church from blessing a polygamous union. Obviously, having more than one civil marriage is illegal.

 

It sounds like you're going to rather absurd extremes attempting to make a point. It's against the law. Period.

You're right, there is no law that doesn't allow multiple people from living together and claiming they have been married in the eyes of God. But then, that wasn't the basis of your beef against polygamy (such a group would have no claim to exemptions from the government).

You're just going in circles with your argument -- every time someone offers evidence counter to your argument, you waffle. Perhaps you should pursue a career in politics.

 

T2 is correct, where bigamy is a felony, all that is required is that the perpetrator fulfills the elements of the offence, and guilt is then indicated becase the act of marriage is a cognitive one. Wether a civil marriage has church blessing or not is irrelevant, and carries no legal weight. But it can be the other way around when a state accepts a church marriage as legally binding, as iirc some US states do. In that case it of course is legally relevant.

The cognitive exercise to split a civil marriage from a church marriage sort of misses the point. It isn't about the lifestyle. If they want that they can make a Mormon variant of a hippie community and just sleep with each other, 'live the lifestyle' - but that's pretty much what polygamous Mormons are not about.

Consider for a second what a bloody mess in terms of inheritance problems an enterprising man with three wives may cause just by reproducing....

 

No. Polygamy, as a civil institution is illegal. The practice most assuredly is not. There are many rather large communities in Colorado, parts of Utah, Canada, and Mexico that have followed a polygamous lifestyle for years without fear of legal recourse. The only time members of these communities (at least in the US or Canada...I don't know as much about Mexico) get brought in and charged are times when it has been proven that a "marriage" was forced or that the wife was underage (unfortunately, both of these things happen far too often)....or when some moron tries to defraud the government by legally marrying more than one woman.

I really don't give a flying **** if a guy decides to take 27 "wives". He just can't reasonably expect to be able to pass his estate tax-free on to 27 people or to be allowed to make 27 times as much money before moving up a tax bracket.

How about attacking my ideas instead of me? Just a thought. You are constantly putting words in my mouth and I really don't like it.

EDIT: For the record, I have no idea how you got it in your head that I thought polygamy was legal. It was never my argument.

 

I didn't write these words:

And yes, they ARE enforced. Utah ACTIVELY hunts down polygamists -- several were jailed while I lived in Salt Lake City every year. And, no, none of those cases I remember had forced marriages or marriages to minors.

The real problem with finding these people isn't a lax legal network -- it is years (generations) of training to be secretive about the lifestyle. In some cases the local law enforcement is a part of the lifestyle, but that does not mean the state is willing to close their eyes to the problem.

I really do respect your knowledge and your arguments. This is one of those rare cases where you're just off base.

 

Nothing that government couldn't handle if the desire was there. I would even go so far as to say that if the Government is so keen to redefine Marriage, then they should extend it to all minorities, not just one...

Again, that's the Government's problem. There has to be means to close any loopholes that the change of marriage laws would create.

But nobody has satisfactorily answered my question: Why are fornication (sex outside covenent or marriage contract), Adultery (sex with someone other than your spouse) or homosexuality morally acceptable to the majority but plural marriage is not?

 

Gnarff, most people don't consider adultery morally acceptable....and more than you would think consider fornication unacceptable as well. They just don't think that the government should have any say in what happens in the bedroom. The law doesn't exist to establish or protect what is and is not morally acceptable. It exists to provide order.

Not from what I've seen. The only cases I've seen have involved either a person trying to legally marry more than one person. You should take a look at communities like Colorado City and bountiful before asserting that polygamists are so rabidly hunted. Here's a little excerpt that may explain my point

Bountiful and Colorado City have been around for a long time. Colorado city has been left alone and allowed to follow their chosen lifestyle (except when violating minimum age laws or coercing marriage) since the 1950's. While Bountiful is coming under fire due to scandals involved coercive underage marriage, no one in Bountiful is actually being charged with Polygamy. You may also want to take a look that the FLDS as well.

Colorado City and Bountiful are not secrets. They've been public, for all to see, for well over 50 years.

 

I don't know anyone who thinks adultery is morally acceptable, so we can scratch that one off the list. However, I have to agree that the number of people who find fornication and homosexuality morally acceptable is quite a large number. I think the main reason that the law stays away from fornication is that it involves no legal issues. Marriage is a legal contract, having a one night stand isn't.

Which brings us to homosexuality. The first thing that should be pointed out is according to the poll, more people find it unacceptable than acceptable. Voters also bear this result out, as in states where there have been votes to either define marriage as a union between a man and a woman or to allow for homosexual unions, the traditional definition of marriage has consistently won. To my knowledge, Massachusettes is the only state that allows for homosexual marriage, although I believe New Jersey has allowed for homosexual civil unions earlier this year.

But I digress from the issue at hand. Since marriage amounts to a legal contract, and one that is intended to be between two people, I can see it being extended to homosexuals. However, I don't think it should be extended to homosexuals if they wanted to marry multiple partners.

I also think it's a little dishonest to just call homosexuals and polygamists the same kind of minority. To be sure, both are minorities, but the number of homosexuals has to be far, far greater than the number of polygamists in the US. I don't have figures for polygamy rates in the US, but the numbers I have seen for homosexuals indicate that they represent 3%-5% of the population. So that's somewhere between 9 million and 15 million people in the US. I'd have a hard time believing that polygamists amount to more than a few hundred thousand.

Here's the thing about polygamy that I just don't get from a very practical standpoint. If you are married, you know how much time you devote to your spouse. It's an enormous amount of time. I do not think that you can have more than one spouse and still be able to devote as much time to each one individually without taking time away from the other one(s). Which means if you are a man married to more than one woman, you're not being the best husband you can potentially be to both/all of them.

 

I never saw a polygamist showing off his family in Utah or Arizona (in the 20 years I lived in both states). And I even come from a family with a polygamy history.

You don't even mention the part about Colorado City that got the states involved. And it wasn't underage marriages. The police have been going after Colorado City for a while. But as I said before, these people are quite adept at hiding what they do. The police need PROOF to arrest, if officiating at the forced wedding of a minor is all they have then they need to use it.

Have you ever been to Bountiful? I have -- the VAST majority of people there are monogamous. As I've said before polygamists tend to keep their habits very quiet and hide from everyone else.

Just because there are very few national stories about law enforcement going after polygamist is no reason to assume there is no active enforcement of the law. Most of these stories never make the national news (except the most spectacular).

Aldeth: Your exactly right. My great-grandfather hated his father. His parents rarely saw each other, she was his youngest (and last) wife. The only time his father came around was when he wanted sex -- his mother did everything to maintain the house (they lived in a small house on the outskirts of town while the 'first wife' and her family lived in a mansion).

 

Are you referring to the events of 1953 or 2004? Both are covered in the wiki article to which I linked, so I felt no need to go into it.

From Wikipedia:

*Note that there were no police actions between 1953 and 2004. I am well aware of the events of 1953, but feel they have no bearing on a discussion of current policy, just as I feel that (discriminatory) decisions made by the US government in 1896 have no bearing on a discussion about legal decisions that the government makes now (this statement is for Gnarff's benefit). A mistake made by our government in 1896 (refusing to legally recognize polygamy is not religious discrimination since no specific legal benefit is actually being denied to polygamists**.....but refusing to allow polygamous couples to follow their lifestyle even when not gaining any legal benefits for the union most assuredly does constitute religious discrimination) is not acceptable grounds for making an even bigger mistake in 2007 (our government is not allowed to deny anyone a right based on his/her gender or sexual orientation).

** No one in the United States has the right to tie themselves legally and financially (mechanically, this is all marriage actually does) to more than one other person, so polygamists, who still have the right to gain the legal benefits of a single government marriage just like everyone else of legal age, are not being denied any legal benefits to which other groups of people are entitled. This is the fundamental difference between polygamy and homosexual marriage. Heterosexuals are entitled to government marriage, but homosexuals are currently denied that right based on their gender and sexual orientation. Polygamists, on the other hand, are not being denied a right that is given to another group. No one in the United States has been given the right to tie themselves financially and legally to more than one person. Hence, no discrimination.

[ June 20, 2007, 17:51: Message edited by: Drew ]

 

So what happens if the government does not redefine marriage to what one person or another wants? Wouldn't that be maintaining order? Further, wouldn't maintaining order mean setting one definition of marriage and sticking with it?

The Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints split from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints over the issue of polygamy after Official Declaration 1, signed in 1890, removed polygamy from church practice. Removed from the regulating influence of the parent Church, the practice, that once was ordained of God, into the practice you describe. The main branch of the church does not condone incest or underage marriage. Such concerns that Drew has brought up would have been addressed had the Government not stuck their nose in a faith's religious beliefs.

And also between a man and a woman, therefore, that shouldn't be changed either. But if one part is subject to challenge and change, the rest of ut should be subject to the same scrutiny.

But if you want to redefine marriage for one minority, then you have to redefine it for all others...

 

About as much as setting one set of laws and staying with it. Meaning that no, that would not be maintaining order. Laws adapt to social changes, and with it the legal definition of marriage.

When you are able to show us enough evidence that polygamous relationships can and do exist on equal basis there might be some ground to this. I won't be holding my breath though. There are plenty of countries that allow polygamy, in none of those are all parties equal. Equality is a very fundamental principle of the western civilization and polygamy breaches that principle, homosexual marriage does not.