Our society is one of contradictions and double standards. We have long dared to put into laws those things governing consenting adult to adult sexual practices and personal relationships. We have laws against sodomy, adultery, fornication and bigamy. There are no laws using the words “polygamy is against the law”.
The item on this list that should be against the law is bigamy. There is a legal public document establishing a marriage between man and woman. With that marriage you have all the rights of inheritance. It is a contract.
Now it is very hard for me to understand how any prosecutor can bring charges against anyone for adultery, sodomy or fornication when they themselves or their friends and co-workers participate in these behaviors.
How could any judge sit over a case of this nature for the same reason? It is difficult to have laws on the books when we have the affairs of our Law Makers being publically tossed around in the press or they “out” themselves to the world. These laws are ridiculous.
The laws regarding these behaviors should be strictly limited to the sexual acts which are forced upon someone or involve a child. As far as Polygamy is concerned, it is the act of adultery or fornication between a man or woman with multiple sexual partners when all parties have agreed to the arrangement.
Being raised in a household with one father and three mothers seems no stranger to me than being raised in a household with two fathers or two mothers.
The demise of the family isn’t worth debating. It is a battle for the churches. A platform of education, discussion and lecture that should be owned by the churches and not our government. We have laws to secure child support for children born outside of wedlock or of broken marriages. These laws are good. They protect the innocent and promote their continued security and support. So when polygamist Jane leaves polygamist Bob, Carol and Sue and takes her children, nothing different should be done than we would do in any other case. Determine custody using the same standards and hand down child support. If ex-polygamist Jane turns into cocaine addict and is living off the street with her kids than they should go back to Polygamist Bob.
Now if Polygamist Bob wants to farm out daughter Zoe at age 15 to younger to Polygamist Jed who is 65 year old man – then we have a law being broken. However if daughter Zoe decides at 18 or 19 years old that Jed is one hot 65 year old man and she wants to live the life of polygamy and become one of the woman in the house than that is her business. And when Zoe decides that it is an awful life and she can’t stand it and wants to leave old Jed and he tries to stop her then this is against the law and he should be prosecuted for unlawful imprisonment or whatever would be appropriate in this case.
Now let us take this one step further. Let’s say that Polygamist Bobs legal wife Carol wants to leave him. Then she should file for divorce. But in this case she could not use Adultery as cause since she entered into this relationship of her own free will. Maybe there should be a pre-polygamy agreement like a pre-nuptial to cover this point when bring on other woman into the home. Once they are divorced then Bob can marry one of the other women if he wants.
Now I am not a polygamist nor do I think this is a life style that I could be comfortable with for my children to enter into; but at the same time I wouldn’t be overly comfortable if my son told me he was gay. I would deal with it however.
Adults need to make their own choices in life. My problem with the entire subject is the amount of power that government has over an individual. I believe that if we let people live and worry about just the abuses put upon children then society would be a lot less over-burdened with unnecessary conflict.
I also believe that if we take the practice out of the closet that the children raised in these families will be more balanced and able to better make decisions for themselves going forward as to what they want to do knowing that this choice of life style is theirs and only theirs. It is not something that is dictated by a Bishop or Father.