Why should polygamy be illegal?

tyr_13 said:
If you're married to your wife, and you marry a husband, is that husband married to your wife too? Which one makes the medical decisions? Is your wife your 'main spouse' or a 'secondary spouse'?
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Why should any of them be anything other than equal?
 
AWPrime said:
In a equal heterosexual relationship the female and male sides have equal value. Split one of these sides into two so you can have three people into a relationship also splits the value. This can lead to competition between the two for the other side. Or the competition can end when one is dumped, when the two others find their bond to be on a higher level.
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Love is not a zero-sum game.

That's very important to remember.
 
Sorry about the multiple posts, but it's taken me a while to get up to speed with this thread. As I said, I wish I'd seen it earlier. Now, I'm sure that some of you have things you'd like to shout at me, so please feel free to do so now. :D
 
AWPrime said:
In a equal heterosexual relationship the female and male sides have equal value. Split one of these sides into two so you can have three people into a relationship also splits the value. This can lead to competition between the two for the other side. Or the competition can end when one is dumped, when the two others find their bond to be on a higher level.
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This sounds like double talk though. What is a male side and what is a female side? Does this mean that only homosexual polygamous relationships can work?

No one is claiming that they are not very much more complex, a couple has 1 relationship, tripple has 3 and a quadruple as 6 individual relationships. And if any one of them goes wrong it can wreck the whole thing.

This makes it seem likely that poly relationship might be more violatile than binary relationships, but the issue here is about laws not if such relationships are stable.
 
politas said:
That's almost worth opening a new thread.
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Sure we can have a good long thread on that, but most people are confortable with the idea. The problems I am aware of is with people who do not neatly fit into gender and sex catagories of male and female.

The point is that it is sex or gender based discrimination, you say men can go here and women can go here, and neither can go in the other. That is discriminating on the basis of sex, but most people think it is fair and not unjust discrimination.

People throw the word discrimination around too much assuming that it is always negative, when it just means makeing a descernment based on that quality.
 
arthwollipot said:
I wish I'd noticed this thread earlier.

I am a part of a family that consists of four adults (two male, two female, if you must know, only one of whom is bisexual) and our three collective children (one of whom is now also an adult, the other two early teenage). We all have equal status under the law. We are all covered equally in all of our wills. We have a joint bank account, we are co-signatories on our mortgage, and we have all the legal rights (as far as I know) that a married couple has. We're just a married foursome. We're extremely stable, and our kids are growing up smart and well-adjusted.

Each of us also maintains at least one relationship outside the family, which does not involve the same legal rights.

I am happy to elaborate on request. :)
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I suspect that if legal push came to legal shove you would find out that they are not all equal(well maybe if you are all common law marriage and no individuals have signed specific binary liciences).

Looking at an earlier question of how to rewrite laws and regulations, how would your family be viewed for financial college aid compared to a married pair?

Z had said much the same thing, but now that his marriage(s) broke down, I can not tell if he has the same view or not.
 
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arthwollipot said:
Why should any of them be anything other than equal?
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To prevent legal ambiguity and tug-of-war. It happens all the time with just two equal partners. It's easy to say, 'it works' based off of ideal situations, but then any law, form of government, relationship, form of marriage, or stool soften works in ideal or perfect situations.
 
politas said:
This is a simplistic view of human emotion that does not bear true under experiment. People are not interchangeable in this way. People are more than their gender.
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That is just a statement.

arthwollipot said:
Love is not a zero-sum game.
That's very important to remember.
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I think you say that from the fact that there are many kinds of love. However that doesn't prevent one bond from being stronger then the other.

Also my example is valid under the stated conditions of 'heterosexual' polygamy. A bisexual or homosexual polygamy relationship might actually work as the bonds between each member can be more equal.
 
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In response to the OP, so long as everyone marrying up is a grown up, it's non of my business. Just so I'm clear no kids, no mentally ill, no VICTIMS. Otherwise, just don't do it in the streets and upset the horses.
 
Smiledriver said:
In response to the OP, so long as everyone marrying up is a grown up, it's non of my business. Just so I'm clear no kids, no mentally ill, no VICTIMS. Otherwise, just don't do it in the streets and upset the horses.
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The thing is that this works for sexual relations, but marriages effect many things that can effect you.
 
Z said:
Someone wake me up when I'm allowed to marry myself. Nothing else compares.
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So on your honeymoon, you'll go off and f___ yourself, with nobody first suggesting it?

You are a good sport! :D

You'll also save quite a bit of dough on airline tickets and dining at that fancy resort!

I tip my cap, sir Z, to your out of the box thinking. Most people can't pull that off ... which sorta describes the above mentioned honeymoon realistically.

(Yes, horrid pun, sue me.)

DR
 
ponderingturtle said:
I suspect that if legal push came to legal shove you would find out that they are not all equal(well maybe if you are all common law marriage and no individuals have signed specific binary liciences).
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No, we have set up everything specifically such that we all have legal rights. We got our solicitor to make sure of that.

ponderingturtle said:
Looking at an earlier question of how to rewrite laws and regulations, how would your family be viewed for financial college aid compared to a married pair?
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I don't know - what's financial college aid when it's at home?
 
ponderingturtle said:
So they need to make a decision for you and do not agree, who's decision wins? Enter the lawyers to fight it out.
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That is unthinkable. We discuss things like rational human beings. Of course we have occasional arguments - we are human beings after all, but for any one of us to call lawyers in against any other is so ridiculous as to be absurd. It's an utterly ludicrous suggestion and I doubt any of us would ever consider it. I certainly wouldn't.

ponderingturtle said:
It is easy to say that when things work, but when they break down does it still hold?
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They haven't broken down in twenty years, and while I don't presume to predict the future, I can't see them breaking down ever.
 
tyr_13 said:
To prevent legal ambiguity and tug-of-war. It happens all the time with just two equal partners. It's easy to say, 'it works' based off of ideal situations, but then any law, form of government, relationship, form of marriage, or stool soften works in ideal or perfect situations.
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I don't understand. No situation is "ideal" or "perfect". I'm a realist, not a Platonist. It works in the real world.

I'm not suggesting that my situation is representative of anyone else's situation. It is, as far as I know, unique. However, it does outright falsify the hypothesis of "it can't possibly work that way".
 
AWPrime said:
I think you say that from the fact that there are many kinds of love. However that doesn't prevent one bond from being stronger then the other.

Also my example is valid under the stated conditions of 'heterosexual' polygamy. A bisexual or homosexual polygamy relationship might actually work as the bonds between each member can be more equal.
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I'm sorry, you've completely lost me on this. Are you saying that homosexual relationships are more equal than heterosexual relationships? 'Cause if not, then I'm completely missing your point.
 
arthwollipot said:
That is unthinkable. We discuss things like rational human beings. Of course we have occasional arguments - we are human beings after all, but for any one of us to call lawyers in against any other is so ridiculous as to be absurd. It's an utterly ludicrous suggestion and I doubt any of us would ever consider it. I certainly wouldn't.
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There are thousands of cases in the courts right now involving people who believed the same thing. We aren't interested in the 'perfect' cases or your group of completely 'rational human beings' (is that an oxymoronic statement?). Taken to the large scale there will be legal disputes. Fine, not in your specific case, but I'm sure you can think of three people that you know that if married could easily come to that.

They haven't broken down in twenty years, and while I don't presume to predict the future, I can't see them breaking down ever.
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Anecdotal evidence from your perfect world. Yeah, I'm just jealous.
 
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