Polygamy

[infinitemonkies]

personally, I don't see any problem with polygamy as long as everyone involved is a consenting adult.

I saw a good stand up comic recently, I forget her name, who said: "The problem with polygamy is the ones you always hear about are some crackpot who's married to 4 12-year olds. Find me a man who wants to be married to 4 university educated women in their 40s and sign me up as one of them."

Ultimately, it's the exact same issue as same-sex marriage. The objections are religious in nature. Any country that allows freedom of religion should not allow any religion, even if the majority of the population are members, to dictate what can and cannot be legal for all.

Star Trek: Enterprise had an interesting idea: The doctor's race, forget what they were called, had an incredibly complex yet close-knit social structure based around each male being able to have 3 wives, and each female being able to have 3 husbands.

It's kinda like a love pyramid-scheme.

[jackfaire]

I think that polygamous marriages should be legally recognised so that the wives, other than the "first wife", can have a legal claim to their share of the estate of the deceased husband and not have to live on the public purse.

Take a long time to work out the laws on that. For one does every wife have an equal share? If a wife is deceased do her kids get her share, for example if a person dies and left everything to her kids there is a type of inheritance the term escapes me where the money is split evenly among her offspring if one of her offspring is deceased but they had children then the children divide that offspring's share. If they left no offspring then it is divided among the remaining offspring.


There are a lot of laws that would need to be looked at in polygamous relationships that aren't an issue in same sex marriage due to the fact that current marriage law does not cover multiple partners.

[Lace Neil Singer]

I don't see how anyone could have the patience to deal with more than one husband/wife. I mean, my boyf-soon to be fiance drives me up the wall sometimes; I can't even imagine having to deal with two or three of him. O_o

[suchislife2]

personally, if that's what you want in your life than go for it. If you want to share your partner with another woman/man whatever. As long as you don't screw the system and so on I don't care.

[Ele]

Then you get the homophobic crowd chanting "Why do we need to give "pedophiles" benefits?! What else do they want, they're already recognised for these purposes RABBLE RABBLE RABBLE!"

lol... well, I guess there'll always be the short sighted moral crusaders who will never be happy with whatever changes are made for social justice and tax equity... but fortunately those crowds don't seem to RABBLE so loudly here in Australia, or Australians find them easier to ignore

[fireheart17]

I think that polygamous marriages should be legally recognised so that the wives, other than the "first wife", can have a legal claim to their share of the estate of the deceased husband and not have to live on the public purse. That's the way things are going in Australia - for example, with recent changes to some laws in some ways to recognise same sex relationships for superannuation, inheritence, welfare and tax purposes.

Then you get the homophobic crowd chanting "Why do we need to give "pedophiles" benefits?! What else do they want, they're already recognised for these purposes RABBLE RABBLE RABBLE!"

[Ele]

I think that polygamous marriages should be legally recognised so that the wives, other than the "first wife", can have a legal claim to their share of the estate of the deceased husband and not have to live on the public purse. That's the way things are going in Australia - for example, with recent changes to some laws in some ways to recognise same sex relationships for superannuation, inheritence, welfare and tax purposes.

[fireheart17]

My points on the view.

-If it's made legal, then a set age for the wives/husband needs to be set across the board. In Australia, the minimum age for both partners needs to be 18 unless the judge consents to someone under 18 marrying someone who is over 18. In those cases, the parent and I think the child also needs to consent. Hearing of some polygamous marriages where one of the wives is under 18 is just sick.
-Religion is not used as a point for allowing marriages of people under 18. The main problem is the stigma of having a polygamous marriage in a society that's used to monogamou marriages.

Some African communities I know do allow polygamy, but even then not completely out of the water. Just as long as they're not marrying "anyone to anything" (thinking of that Simpsons episode again...) I don't care.

[AFPheonix]

I was referring to Matthew 19: 4-6 where he quotes the Genesis description of man and woman leaving home and mutating into one person. I've always read it as very specifically gendered and limited to two people.

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/...-6&version=50;


And I only care about this because xtians care about it, not because I think it's important. If you're going to debate people who insist on bringing their religion into everything you have to debate on their terms if you want to have any affect.

I always considered that to be less that Jesus was mandating specific genders for marriage and more that if you're gonna marry somebody, it's going to be a bond that should not be sundered. He says man and woman because, well, there really wasn't sanctioned same sex relationships in that part of the world (with the exception of ancient Greece, but they were pretty much over their heyday by then).
I can see how someone could twist that into saying that Jesus said marriage is only between a man and a woman, but when they do that they've lost sight of what the whole passage is about, which is about a far greater threat to the idea of matrimony than same sex marriage.

[Slytovhand]

That is lowering yourself to their level and trying to win playing their own game. I may laugh at super religious people that know less than casual reader atheist I do. But I don't let myself get caught in their web of self-delusion. I argue my non-religious points.

While that's all well and good for a straight debate with people willing to listen, and perhaps even admit they may be wrong, not going to happen when it comes to religion.

I agree with Anriana - if you want to debate religion (or really anything), best starting point is something the other person can agree with.. then lead them to the conclusion you want. It's not getting caught in their self-delusion, but trying to find the chink in the wall to let the light in on them..

[Flyndaran]

...
And I only care about this because xtians care about it, not because I think it's important. If you're going to debate people who insist on bringing their religion into everything you have to debate on their terms if you want to have any affect.

That is lowering yourself to their level and trying to win playing their own game. I may laugh at super religious people that know less than casual reader atheist I do. But I don't let myself get caught in their web of self-delusion. I argue my non-religious points.

[Sylvia727]

Excessively religious people generally want the USA's laws to be founded on Judeo-Christian traditions. When confronted with "separation of church and state", they claim that they don't want religion in the law, they just want morality in the law. There are people out there who honestly can't tell the difference between outlawing homosexuality or polygamy and outlawing child molestion or rape. As if they're based on the same foundation. With these people, one has to prove that they are not on the same grounds, that they are fundamentally different. One involves consenting adults and the other does not, which I personally would think is glaringly obvious but apparently isn't to some folk.

[anriana]

Care quoting which passage? The only one I recall him mentioning marriage in any depth was in Matthew 19, and that was more of a case against frivolous divorce than gender of the people getting married.

I was referring to Matthew 19: 4-6 where he quotes the Genesis description of man and woman leaving home and mutating into one person. I've always read it as very specifically gendered and limited to two people.

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/...-6&version=50;


And I only care about this because xtians care about it, not because I think it's important. If you're going to debate people who insist on bringing their religion into everything you have to debate on their terms if you want to have any effect.

[Boozy]

I'm pretty sure Anriana was not saying that the Bible should be considered when creating laws. It doesn't sound like something she'd say. I think she just had some information that answered Slyt's question.

So let's not get too side-tracked with this line of debate.

[Flyndaran]

Huh, strangely, as a born atheist, I don't care what some specific hypothetical religion founder may have said.

If one can't defend a governmental limitation of freedom in non-religious terms and has real beneficial effects on the public at large, then it has no business in law.