Polygamy (Split from Anti-Muslim Terrorist Attack)

[Ziggurat]

I thought that the same mechanisms would apply if the polygamous marriage was a gay one.

No, they don't, because gay marriages, polygamous or not, don't change the balance of the sexual marketplace. Balance isn't relevant in the gay sexual marketplace where everyone involved is the same sex.

I'm opposed to polygamous gay marriage because I think it may encourage the acceptance of polygamous heterosexual marriage, but that's an indirect second-order effect.

 

[PhantomWolf]

That's not an assumption, it's an observation. That's overwhelmingly the direction it goes, for reasons which should be obvious to anyone actually familiar with humans.

It's an observation based on a limited dataset. Of the two polyamorous relations I know of personally, one is that of three woman and one is one woman and two men. Should I base my assumptions entirely on that limited dataset?

The fact is that outside of certain religious situations where women are pretty much treated as goods, polygamy is illegal, and so we have very little data on how polyamorous relations would occur in a free society when it is up to those involved to determine the ratios of people in the relationship. Your assumption that it has to be one male with many women is totally unfounded.

 

[PhantomWolf]

Question: how do you distinguish a "forced" marriage from an "arranged" marriage? Arranged marriages are still common in some parts of the world, particularly Islamic countries, but I know people from Japan and India who were or have been in an arranged marriage. They were not uncommon in the Western world not too long ago.

If the participants in the marriage are forced into an arranged marriage against their wishes, then yes. If the participants want to be a part of an arranged marriage then no.

Some people do find an arranged marriage better as they don't have to worry about going through the whole dating business to find a partner, and for them arranged is fine. Arranging a marriage for your 4 year old and then demanding that they honour that arrangement regardless of their wishes, is not so good.

As far as polygamy, it will become legal in the near future because of the growing Muslim populations in the west.

I think that this is an vast over estimation of how much Muslim populations are actually growing compared to the rest of the population in western Countries. For instance, France has one of the fastest growing Muslim communities in Western Europe, but the rest of France's population is outstripping them fast enough that France's overall percentage of Muslims is actually decreasing.

 

[Segnosaur]

- immigration... if someone moves to another country, most destination countries will allow them to bring in family. What if the person is part of a polygamous relationship... can they bring in ALL members (spouses of spouses)?

- Taxes and benefits... these can be impacted by marital status. This will get a lot more complex if you have more than 2 people in the relationship.

*Shrugs* We don't panic over the complication in the laws of someone bringing 4 kids over instead of 1, why is this different?

See above. The tax code doesn't explode when someone has 2 kids instead of 1. I'm sure we can manage.

First of all, the status of an extended polygamous family is more complex because of the different variety in the relationships... in a monogamous society, its pretty simple... a child has 1 or 2 parents. A person can have at most one spouse. In a polygamous relationship, the fact that you can have extended family groups makes things more complex... you can have (in theory) an infinite number of spouses, and claim 'parenthood' for children that you may not be genetically related and for whom you have not assisted in the parenting (and don't plan to either.)

Secondly, nobody is 'panicing'. But they are questions that have to be dealt with.

The problem with the the people who say "yeah, people should engage in polygamy if they want" is that they tend to just sweep all these issues under the rug, claiming "its easy to deal with". Maybe it is, but I haven't seen anyone actually TRY to deal with it. I'd be open to allowing polygamous relationships, if only someone would actually think some of this stuff through, rather than just shrugging and saying "no big deal", which is what you seem to be doing here.

 

[qayak]

That is naive.

Look around the world. Where is polygamy legal? What is the legal status of women where it is legal? It's not good. That correlation isn't a coincidence.

Legalizing polygamy may not directly impact women's rights, but it will do so indirectly, and severely. It always does. Monogamy is a fundamental component of western civilization, you can't remove it and expect everything else that it helps prop up to remain just as it was before. Humans don't work that way.

The countries you mention do not offer women the same rights as men. That is what causes issues for women not polygamy. If you can show that polygamy in Western society where women have equal rights would somehow strip women of their rights I would change my mind but I just can't see how that could possibly happen.

Marriage is just a contract which means nothing until people get divorced. What would be different if three people were signatories to the contract instead of two? What about if it were four people?

 

[Arcade22]

In practical terms there seems to be no good reason to allow polygamy when marriage has lost much of its legal and social importance, although I realize that this hasn't happened everywhere in the western world.

Besides a few small and usually inconsequential religious and cultural groups that maintain highly questionable social customs, there seems to be no source of support for polygamy in the west.

If you want to have sex with multiple people there should be no legal or cultural reason why you'd need to marry them.

 

[BobTheCoward]

In practical terms there seems to be no good reason to allow polygamy when marriage has lost much of its legal and social importance, although I realize that this hasn't happened everywhere in the western world.

Besides a few small and usually inconsequential religious and cultural groups that maintain highly questionable social customs, there seems to be no source of support for polygamy in the west.

If you want to have sex with multiple people there should be no legal or cultural reason why you'd need to marry them.

Why adopt a "no good reason" framework? There are multiple frameworks to use, why that one?

 

[Ziggurat]

It's an observation based on a limited dataset. Of the two polyamorous relations I know of personally, one is that of three woman and one is one woman and two men. Should I base my assumptions entirely on that limited dataset?

The fact is that outside of certain religious situations where women are pretty much treated as goods, polygamy is illegal, and so we have very little data on how polyamorous relations would occur in a free society when it is up to those involved to determine the ratios of people in the relationship. Your assumption that it has to be one male with many women is totally unfounded.

The truth is right under your nose, and you don’t even notice it. Why do you think the hilighted portion is how things turned out? Do you think it’s just a coincidence? Random chance? Why aren’t there any large polygamous societies where women are treated well? Why are there lots of polygynous societies but no polyandrous societies?

Because men and women are different, and sexual relationships are asymmetric.

You think we can become the one exception in human history? You really think that’s how it would play out?

 

[Ziggurat]

The countries you mention do not offer women the same rights as men. That is what causes issues for women not polygamy.

You say that like there’s no connection between the two. But the perfect correlation between polygamy and oppression of women (that is, all polygamous societies oppress women) should give you pause to consider that maybe there is a reason for that.

If you can show that polygamy in Western society where women have equal rights would somehow strip women of their rights I would change my mind but I just can't see how that could possibly happen.

Politics is downstream from culture. Change the culture, and politics will inevitably change as well. A polygamous culture will always be one where women are valued less than men. Legal protections won’t last in that environment.

Marriage is just a contract which means nothing until people get divorced.

That is remarkably naive. The cultural significance of marriage extends far beyond the legal contractual basis. One wonders if you’ve ever been married, or even interacted with married couples.

 

[Ziggurat]

Why adopt a "no good reason" framework? There are multiple frameworks to use, why that one?

Chesterton’s fence, that’s why.

 

[BobTheCoward]

The truth is right under your nose, and you don’t even notice it. Why do you think the hilighted portion is how things turned out? Do you think it’s just a coincidence? Random chance? Why aren’t there any large polygamous societies where women are treated well? Why are there lots of polygynous societies but no polyandrous societies?

Because men and women are different, and sexual relationships are asymmetric.

You think we can become the one exception in human history? You really think that’s how it would play out?

Order may matter. All the societies that adopted polygamy may have adopted unequal policies previously. Do we have a case where an equal society adopted it and things became unequal?

 

[Ziggurat]

Order may matter. All the societies that adopted polygamy may have adopted unequal policies previously. Do we have a case where an equal society adopted it and things became unequal?

Suppose you’re right about the order, that polygamy came second: why then would societies which treat women well NEVER adopt polygamy but societies which treat women badly frequent adopt it? Doesn’t that still suggest that maybe polygamy is compatible with the latter but incompatible with the former?

How certain are you that we can be the first exception is human history?

 

[qayak]

In practical terms there seems to be no good reason to allow polygamy when marriage has lost much of its legal and social importance, although I realize that this hasn't happened everywhere in the western world.

Not true at all. In British Columbia the laws were recently changed so that even unmarried couples have the same rights as married couples in the event of a split. From this perspective, marriage is so important that they have extended the benefits to those not married and even those who didn't want to be married.

Besides a few small and usually inconsequential religious and cultural groups that maintain highly questionable social customs, there seems to be no source of support for polygamy in the west.

Really? There are a lot of polyamourous people who wish to live together, do, and make it work well. Making sure that all parties are equal seems to me to be in society's best interest. Even if the proportions are small, ie.- 100,000 people in a nation the size of the U.S., what is the issue of protecting their rights. It's exactly the sane as with a married couple.

If you want to have sex with multiple people there should be no legal or cultural reason why you'd need to marry them.

Is marriage just about sex then? If a couple can fall in love then why not three people? Or four? Or more?

 

[The Great Zaganza]

Who is the center of polygamous relationship has always been determined by status and wealth.
Gender is secondary.

 

[qayak]

You say that like there’s no connection between the two. But the perfect correlation between polygamy and oppression of women (that is, all polygamous societies oppress women) should give you pause to consider that maybe there is a reason for that.

Post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy.

Politics is downstream from culture. Change the culture, and politics will inevitably change as well. A polygamous culture will always be one where women are valued less than men. Legal protections won’t last in that environment.

B.S.! Those countries also don't allow gay marriage and we do. The sky hasn't fallen, Chicken Little.

That is remarkably naive. The cultural significance of marriage extends far beyond the legal contractual basis. One wonders if you’ve ever been married, or even interacted with married couples.

No, it doesn't and never has, Marriage is nothing but a property contract between two people which doesn't come into play until the marriage is over. That can be extended to multi-person agreements with little problem.

I am, in fact, married and my wife agrees with me although she is not okay with me having a relationship with other women while I am perfectly fine with her having relationships with other men, or women, if she so chooses. She feels that people should be allowed to live life the way they choose.

 

[qayak]

Who is the center of polygamous relationship has always been determined by status and wealth.
Gender is secondary.

[SARCASM]I thought status and wealth didn't matter. No woman would ever care about that, they only care about love and the alignment of souls.[/SARCASM]

Status and wealth play a huge role in marriage, why shouldn't it in polygamous marriage?

 

[BobTheCoward]

Suppose you’re right about the order, that polygamy came second: why then would societies which treat women well NEVER adopt polygamy but societies which treat women badly frequent adopt it? Doesn’t that still suggest that maybe polygamy is compatible with the latter but incompatible with the former?

How certain are you that we can be the first exception is human history?

A) if you know me, you know I'm indifferent to the consequences.

B) I don't think it would be an exception, but a novel case.

 

[PhantomWolf]

The truth is right under your nose, and you don’t even notice it. Why do you think the hilighted portion is how things turned out? Do you think it’s just a coincidence? Random chance? Why aren’t there any large polygamous societies where women are treated well? Why are there lots of polygynous societies but no polyandrous societies?

All of this can be answered pretty easily if you take a moment to think about it. Because most societies have been Patriarchal, and Patriarchal societies treat women as their property to do with as they want. There have been very few Matriarchal or truly equal societies that give women the power to chose their own paths. It's quite interesting that in a number of the actual Matriarchals that do exist, there is often no marriage and sexual partners are often chosen on a rather fluid system, for instance in the Mosuo, a woman may have children to many different men.

Because men and women are different, and sexual relationships are asymmetric.

This however is for a variety of reasons, one of which is social conditioning and culture. As long as we keep telling women that they should not be interested in sex or they are slut, unclean, deviant, and so forth, they will continue to associate their sexual drives with being bad, and repress them. Sure that won't make them as horny as a lot of men, but the differences between how society views women's sexual drives and men's sexual drives does account for some of that difference. Other things being that women and men simply view sex differently.

You think we can become the one exception in human history? You really think that’s how it would play out?

I think that using human history is a poor way to try and develop the future of society, since most of our history has been based on oppressing certain people groups.

 

[PhantomWolf]

In practical terms there seems to be no good reason to allow polygamy when marriage has lost much of its legal and social importance, although I realize that this hasn't happened everywhere in the western world.

Besides a few small and usually inconsequential religious and cultural groups that maintain highly questionable social customs, there seems to be no source of support for polygamy in the west.

If you want to have sex with multiple people there should be no legal or cultural reason why you'd need to marry them.

Laws should not be made based on good reasons for allowing things to occur, they should be made for good reasons to disallow behaviours to occur. It's not a case of having a good reason for allowing polyamorous marriage, that there are people that engage in this behaviour outside of the religious ones, is good enough reason to see if there is enough logical and secular based reasons to keep it illegal. As to saying that there isn't a lot of support in the west, this is because it's illegal and so those that are interested have to find other ways to do it and most of them don't advertise it because of the social stigmas attached to it. Removing the illegality also helps to remove the stigma and allows those that are interested in it to be able to make their relationships official and recognised.

 

[PhantomWolf]

Suppose you’re right about the order, that polygamy came second: why then would societies which treat women well NEVER adopt polygamy but societies which treat women badly frequent adopt it? Doesn’t that still suggest that maybe polygamy is compatible with the latter but incompatible with the former?

How certain are you that we can be the first exception is human history?

Because societies that treat women well have only existed, and even then they aren't the whole way there, for about 30-40 years.

Societies that treat women as goods had it because they treated women as goods, it was exactly like having many cows or pigs.

There has never been a time in human history where women had the freedom of choice in where they wanted to form legal polyamorous marriages in the way that they were able to chose and design them in a free and equal manner.

And as to be the "first exception is human history," we already are. All past history has been built on the oppression of other people be that by gender, skin colour, or just nationality. We have been trying something really new since the 1960's and we still have a long way to go, but we're trying to build a society where there is no oppression of people different to those with power.