If gay marriage lead to multiple marriage ... so what?

[Broede]

Over the last few weeks, I've been having this discussion with my wife and many of my friends, as well as some people on the internet.  I had read an article that was posted on this very forum about a pastor who suggested that accepting gay marriage will lead to two things -- multiple marriage and bestiality.  First of all, like the Bill O'Reilly argument that we'll be marrying children and lamps, the bestiality argument fails to address the issue of consent.  An animal, a child and a lamp cannot give consent, but a grown man or woman can consent to homosexual marriage and we, as human beings, truly have no right to deny them.

But then, I found myself in this position of debating "what about plural marriage?"  What IF gay marriage led to plural marriage?  I don't mean polygamy, as anyone with half a brain knows that the NDLS situation was extreme and technically had nothing to do with plural marriage, it was a religious fundamentalist group abusing children in the name of God for personal satisfaction/gratification/iconification.  But plural marriage between consenting adults?  I... well, I can't find ANY valid reason to deny this.  And outside some pretty flimsy comparisons to fundamentalist religious indoctrination groups, I haven't heard any arguments from anyone else that I could consider valid, either.

So now, here I am in blood and flesh (or, really, digital signals) sincerely posing the question ... what if it does?  So the fuck what?  Consenting adults can live together and fuck and have kids and be happy in nonmonogamous relationships (and, in fact, do, as has been chronicled by several documentaries I've seen in the past).  Current adultery laws are rarely, if ever, applied or even enforced.  Why can't they get married, if all are consenting adults?  Surely, the freethinkers here can give me some insight.

Thanks for your consideration!

[Plu]

There are no rational arguments against a polygamous relationship on an emotional level. The only real issue is having to rewrite a lot of laws and having to figure out how to deal with things like responsbility, finances, wills, child rearing, etc.

I'd be totally in favor of taking time to figure out the pitfalls and updating laws to match, but you'd probably come across some interesting situations.

[Mermaid]

Same sex marriage and plural marriage have absolutely nothing to do with each other, first of all. And I am not even going to dignify the bestiality comment. Same sex and opposite sex marriage, yeah, they are the same thing as far as I am concerned. But plural marriage is a whole nuther can of corn altogether.

I think it should be legal. Why should I have a say in what other consenting ADULTS want? That is the key, though, that everyone is consenting and an adult. Otherwise it's none of my beeswax. The problem is in the religious communities that espouse same sex marriage, way too often, underage girls are brainwashed into that fundie life and married off like cattle to 50 year old men.

Some opposite-sex friends of ours have been married for something like 20 years. They are now engaged to a woman who they plan to marry someday soon. If it makes them all happy, why should anyone care?

[Nonsensei]

"So what?" is the correct response to most social taboos imo.

[Solitary]

If men or women can handle more than one wife or husband more power to them. Solitary

[SGOS]

The person you were debating should be asked what is wrong with polygamy.  What is the assumption he uses to condemn it?  It would solve a lot of problems for the Mormon Church.

[AllPurposeAtheist]

It will lead to god causing more tornadoes, hurricanes, forest fires and airplanes hitting skyscrapers as punishment. Other than that, no objections. Next case. :)

[the_antithesis]

I don't see any real connection between gay marriage and polygamy.

Doesn't matter anyway, since we already have polygamy.

[Jason Harvestdancer]

Same sex marriage and plural marriage have absolutely nothing to do with each other, first of all.

They're both about marriage freedom.

The conservatives like to say "slippery slope, what will gay marriage lead to, multiple marriages?"  The progressive response is to say "no way, that's a slippery slope argument, we're only interested in going so far."  But the libertarians say "yes, sure, why not, I'm in favor of it."

The same three arguments were used in inter-racial marriages, the previous marriage equality battle.

Unfortunately, whenever the progressives catch up to the libertarians, they say "now that we're here someone is finally talking about this instead of nobody talking about this."

[Youssuf Ramadan]

If men or women can handle more than one wife or husband more power to them. Solitary

Yes indeed.  I don't even want one wife....  more seems to me like being a glutton for punishment, but if someone wants to, why not let them get on with it?  It's none of my business what people do in their personal lives.

Out of interest..... does multiple wives mean multiple tax breaks?    :-k

[Eric1958]

As a young man, I read a lot of Robert Heinlein. I'm afraid it warped my mind. He didn't spend much time on homosexual relationships, but he loved the idea of multiple spouses of both genders.

[the_antithesis]

[stromboli]

It isn't about multiple marriage, it is about choice. Look at any current polygamist culture and what you see are women who are being brought into relationships by coercion, by "convincing" by citing religious dogma or any of several reasons. The problem is not polygamy itself but how it is conducted. In religion, it is very patriarchal; women are considered property and are treated as such. Young women in FLDS (Mormon fundie church) have little choice about who they marry, when and why. They are often essentially sold to the highest bidder, which is usually an older man of means. 14 year old girls marrying 40-60 year old men is more common than you realize.

Assuming equal status of man and woman, marriages by choice (of the woman) for economic or other reasons, fine. But the problem is that it is not generally done that way. I could easily be involved in a relationship with two or more women, with the understanding that said women have equal rights and equal choice. Opening the door to polygamy unfortunately justifies (as in fulfillment of prophecy) what is happening now in polygamist religions, which to me is not a good thing.

[SGOS]

If men or women can handle more than one wife or husband more power to them. Solitary

Yes indeed.  I don't even want one wife....  more seems to me like being a glutton for punishment, but if someone wants to, why not let them get on with it?  It's none of my business what people do in their personal lives.

Out of interest..... does multiple wives mean multiple tax breaks?    :-k

A friend of mine worked for the Peace Corps in Africa.  Sometimes the village chief would be very sad when all of his wives would get mad at him.  There are drawbacks to multiple wives.  It's not all that great.

[Youssuf Ramadan]

A friend of mine worked for the Peace Corps in Africa.  Sometimes the village chief would be very sad when all of his wives would get mad at him.  There are drawbacks to multiple wives.  It's not all that great.

Especially when they all find out about each other....  :axe