Federal judge declares Utah polygamy law unconstitutional
Joe Darger, who with his three wives detailed their life in the book "Love Times Three: Our True Story of a Polygamous Marriage," praised the decision and said it would change the future for Utah’s polygamists. He said that he learned of the victory Friday night when Kody Brown called him. The call was unusual — the two men don’t call each other frequently, he said — and when he learned of the ruling he felt "shocked."...
The Browns filed their lawsuit in July 2011, arguing Utah’s law violated their right to privacy. The family’s argument relied primarily on the 2003 U.S. Supreme Court decision that struck down the Texas law banning sodomy, which was celebrated by gay rights advocates...
"It just caught us off guard," he said. "It’s like Christmas came early."It's gonna be a new kind'o Christmas, in our Age of Bacchanal.
We're gonna need more room in the stable for Mary's sister wives and Joseph's husbands. But the empty manger-- little Jesu was a burdensome unplanned pregnancy-- will free up some space.
And since sex and number are increasingly superfluous to matrimony, why obsess over species? The donkeys and sheep may soon play a novel role in family life.
It's just one federal court decision away.
What's the big deal? Should it be illegal for a man to live unmarried with multiple women and have children with each of them?
ReplyDeleteIt's also quite ironic that you talk about a freak-show, taking your religious orders from a cabal of homosexual men dressed like women that engage in orgies, sexual harassment and child rape, while running financial scams and fraud from their giant gay club. Talk about a freak-show.
Egnor's demonstrating his substandard reading skills again. Utah's polygamy law hasn't been affected. The law that has been struck down is the one banning cohabitation, which isn't the same as marriage.
DeleteAnyway. It's not going to affect how a fictional event in a book attributed to a gentile traveling companion of Paul is depicted. Although I wonder how it would be explained how a nonexistent empire wide census had forced a polyandrous polygamous family to travel to the birth place of a distant ancestor of one of the male members of the family.
Yes. Bigamy was illegal on Dec 12, and it is still illegal today. The only change is consenting adults are allowed to be consenting adults in Utah now.
DeleteConsenting adults who were living as consenting adults filed suit to live as consenting adults and can now live as consenting adults. Huge win.
DeleteNo Bachfiend, the problem is not that Egnor has poor reading comprehension. Egnor knows what the judge really ruled-- he's just lying for propaganda purposes.
Delete"Should it be illegal for a man to live unmarried with multiple women and have children with each of them?"
DeleteNo. But why then shouldn't they be allowed to be legally wed? Isn't it a violation of their rights not to recognize their relationship as equal to that of couples?
Do you remember the Texas polygamist sect that was busted up a few years ago? Were you okay with that?
Sounds to me that you really are pro-polygamy, it's only when religious people practice it that it scares you.
Joey
"No Bachfiend, the problem is not that Egnor has poor reading comprehension. Egnor knows what the judge really ruled-- he's just lying for propaganda purposes."
DeleteThere's a contradiction within your own statement. If he has poor reading comprehension then he really doesn't know what the judge said. If he understands what the judge said but is misrepresenting it, then he does not have poor reading comprehension.
But in fact, neither applies. What he's saying is that Lawrence vs. Texas and the so-called "right to privacy" invented out of whole cloth by the Warren Court, paved the way for this. And it's still paving. If we accept the sappy arguments of the homosexual crowd but do not carry them all the way to their logical conclusion--polygamy, polyandry, group marriage, marriage, whatever--we are hypocritical.
Don't worry, we will get there. Polygamy is the next frontier of marriage equality.
Just examine the homosexual's arguments:
1. Equal love, equal rights
2. Everyone should be allowed to get married
3. It's none of the state's business who I love
4. I can't visit my loved one in the hospital!
5. But your marriages fail 50 percent of the time.
6. It makes me happy
7. If Brittney Spears can get get married in Vegas fior 24 hours, why can't three or more people express their enduring love for each other?
8. You're imposing your morals on me.
Joey
Joey:
DeleteNo. But why then shouldn't they be allowed to be legally wed? Isn't it a violation of their rights not to recognize their relationship as equal to that of couples?
Good question. I think it's not in the interest of society to encourage polygamy, because it will make a lot of young men unhappy and do things that disturb the peace. Encouraging gay couples to get married wouldn't have negative societal effects at all, as far as I can see.
@Joey: Just examine the homosexual's arguments:
DeleteFourteenth Amendment to the Constitution and we're done. If you oppose the Constitution, then say so. Just admit that the Constitution is your problem.
1. Equal love, equal rights
Here's an argument that polygamists would never use and which cannot support polygamy. How the hell is it that I get one wife and some other dude gets 10 wives, and that's equality? In practice, polygamists don't use this argument.
2. Everyone should be allowed to get married
Again, not an argument used by polygamists.
3. It's none of the state's business who I love
Maybe used by polygamists, but not used by proponents of marriage equality.
4. I can't visit my loved one in the hospital!
Not used by polygamists.
5. But your marriages fail 50 percent of the time.
Very true; especially fundamentalist Christians have a higher rate of divorce. But this argument is not used by polygamists.
6. It makes me happy
How is this argument better or worse than the argument used by the opponents of marriage equality-- "Gay marriage makes me UNhappny? And therefore, it makes God unhappy."
7. If Brittney Spears can get get married in Vegas fior 24 hours, why can't three or more people express their enduring love for each other?
Not used by proponents of marriage equality.
8. You're imposing your morals on me.
Actually this argument is used by the opponents of marriage equality. "Waah! By saying it's bad to hate and discriminate against gays, you're imposing your morals on me!"
Moreover, the argument used by the opponents of marriage equality, "We should return to the Biblical model of marriage," is again an argument FOR polygamy, because that's the model of marriage in the Bible.
So by your logic, opposing marriage equality will lead to polygamy.
Troy, let's unpack your argument here. "I think it's not in the interest of society to encourage polygamy, because it will make a lot of young men unhappy and do things that disturb the peace."
DeleteThat's kind of a stretch I think. Is that even your real reason? It's kind of thin, and here's why: guys like Joe Darger are going to be taking more than their "fair share" of women whether or not they have a marriage license. Because he has three women (call them wives if you wish; he does) that means that two other fellas are out of luck. They will now roam the land committing random acts of crime, according to you. This scary phenomenon you speak of will happen with or without state sanction of such relationships. But you have already expressed your support for consenting adults who want to live together, regardless of the arrangement, so long as they don't seek a marriage license from the state. "What's the big deal? Should it be illegal for a man to live unmarried with multiple women and have children with each of them?" According to you, it should be.
Oh yeah, and all of those lonely, disaffected men who can't find wives because one guy has too many have another option. They can marry each other, or a woman who has multiple husbands, and perhaps multiple wives as well. Why not? It's an equal rights issue. Love is love.
Joey
Diogenes, why doesn't the fourteenth amendment to the Constitution apply to polygamists as well? Why are they prohibited from marrying?
DeleteYou're full of crap on all fronts. Proponents of "marriage equality" (which apparently doesn't apply to Joe Darger) most certainly do use arguments such as the tired Brittney Spears one, and every other one on the list.
I especially like your response to number eight. Yes, as a matter of fact, the state forcing private citizens to take part in homosexual nuptials is the state forcing its morals down other people's throats. And you're against that, right? Or are you simply opposed to other people legislating their morality?
To say that polygamy is the Biblical model for marriage is inaccurate. If we look only at the Old Testament we find that some people practiced it, but that is not to say that it was the model. But the Bible is more than the Old Testament. The New Testament is arguably more important.
Here's what Jesus said about marriage: "3 The Pharisees also came to Him, testing Him, and saying to Him, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for just any reason?”
4 And He answered and said to them, “Have you not read that He who made them at the beginning ‘made them male and female,’5 and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? 6 So then, they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let not man separate.” (Matthew 19 3-6)
Jesus was, of course, quoting Genesis. So actually both the Old and New Testaments define marriage as between one man and one woman. Polygamy is therefore not the "Biblical standard" as you argue.
A Biblical scholar, you are not.
Joey
>>It's an equal rights issue. Love is love.<<
DeleteAnd that, when you boil it down, is the essence of every argument in favor of same-sex marriage. It just so happens that the people making it don't actually believe what they're saying.
Is it possible for one person to fall in love with more than one person? Yes, it is. So if love is love, then they should have every right to marry any person or persons they love in a civil, state-recognized ceremony.
JQ
It's always interesting to look back a little bit and see whether the predictions of the social theorists were correct. For example, we know that the predictions of Pope Paul VI, as outlined in Humanae Vitae, were correct. Even without simulation models. Or dendromancy.
ReplyDeleteSo let's look at the predictions of a more recent social theorist, Johnathan Rausch. Mr Rausch is a left-wing writer, a scholar at the leftist Brookings Institution, and vice-President of the Independent Gay Forum. The comments quoted below are taken from an interview on NPR May 31, 2012 on the topic "Would Gay Marriage Lead To Legal Polygamy?"...
No. Just the opposite. Same sex marriage leads away from polygamy, not for it.
Hm. Interesting claim. But let's continue...
The problem with polygamy, historically, and there's tons of literature about this, Michel - polygamy is the oldest form of marriage and the most predominant form of marriage in human society - the problem with it is that it almost invariably means one man, multiple wives, and when one man takes two wives, some other man gets no wife.
On this point, Mr Rausch is correct. Polygamist societies have historically had a problem because they lead to an excess of single, unattached young men. In the modern world, these young men often find social affiliation in street gangs (as in American inner cities) or terrorist groups (like the Middle East and some parts of Western Europe and the UK). But the bottom line is violence, as observed and reported in David Courtwright's outstanding historical analysis Violent Land: Single Men and Social Disorder from the Frontier to the Inner City.
But Mr Rausch gives the game away...
So a lot of people lose the opportunity to marry and you get societies where you've got a lot of unmarried young males who are very unhappy, a lot of social disruption, a lot of violence. And there's a whole academic literature on this. Gay marriage changes none of that. In fact, gay marriage leads us away from that to a society where everyone can marry.
So, in Mr Rausch's version of the coming Oceania, gay marriage can be important as an alternative path to socializing disgruntled beta males who have been rejected or abandoned by females for the harems of more attractive alpha males.
Interesting. We must wait and see whether the New Polygamy (harems of unmarried females in a male-headed household) will lead to a flowering of gay marriages (as Mr Rausch would predict and prefer).
Or, perversely, will it result in yet more single mothers on the dole (and single young men in prison) as wealthy alpha males, the New Potentates, rotate through women and release the "gently used" units back on the market?
This much we know, empirically:
The impact of marriage on participation in crime has long been of interest to criminal justice researchers. A large body of empirical research documents a positive relationship between marriage and criminal desistance...
--- The Impact of Marital and Relationship Status on Social Outcomes for Returning Prisoners (ASPE Brief, US Dept HHS
Bets, anyone?
Egnor knows very well that no judge legalized polygamy-- the Biblical model of marriage-- in Utah. Egnor knows very well that the judge merely decided that cohabitation is not polygamy, NOT that polygamy itself is now legal!
ReplyDeleteEgnor knows that. He's lying for propaganda purposes.
And again: one man and several wives is the Biblical model of marriage-- see. e.g., the disgusting story of Jacob, Rachel, Leah and all their pretty handmaids. On what basis can any Bible-believing Christian complain about polygamy, the Bible's model of the family?
You ought to tell Joe Darger that he doesn't have a polygamous marriage. He is, after all, the author of a book called "Love Times Three: Our True Story of a Polygamous Marriage."
DeleteWhat he doesn't have is a state-sanctioned polygamous marriage. But he does have a polygamous marriage.
Mr. Darger is not the only polygamist in Utah. There are others who are offshoots of the LDS Church, living out in the desert with several wives and children. So long as they do not seek a marriage license, should this practice be allowed to continue? And, much more importantly, why shouldn't the state specifically sanction it? It's supposedly a violation of their most basic constitutional rights not to extend to them the full protection of the law. Is it not?
Joey
diogenes missed the book title because he has poor reading comprehension. it's a shame what's happened to our public schools in recent years.
Deletenaidoo
Diogenes:
Delete"On what basis can any Bible-believing Christian complain about polygamy, the Bible's model of the family?"
I'm not a Bible-believing Christian. I'm Catholic. We believe Catholic teaching on faith and morals, which is derived in part from the Bible and in part from the Catholic Magesterium. Our Protestant brothers often assert that they are Bible-believing Christians, and we have taken issue with that theology for five centuries.
And I repeat my point: no judge legalized polygamy-- the Biblical model of marriage-- in Utah. Egnor knows very well that the judge merely decided that cohabitation is not polygamy, NOT that polygamy itself is now legal!
DeleteA point none of you can point to as inaccurate. Instead Anomymous says some fellow wrote a book subtitled, "Our True Story of a Polygamous Marriage." Which he wrote before the judge handed down his decision. And he is not the judge in this case, nor indeed any kind of judge.
The judge was right to assert that cohabitation is not polygamy. I once had two roommates, and it was not polygamy.
Instead we get obfuscation and changing the subject.
Is polygamy legal or is it not? Simple goddamn question.
Is polygamy the Biblical standard of marriage or is it not?
No one has obfuscated or changed the question.
Delete"Is polygamy legal or is it not?" Non state-sanctioned polygamy, yes. And that's not even the question. The question is why the state shouldn't sanction it.
"Is polygamy the Biblical standard of marriage or is it not?" No. See above.
Again, you need to call Joe Darger and tell him that he is not a polygamist because he seems to think that he is. He has three wives, just ask him.
Now that I've answered your question, please answer two of mine. If a man who belongs to some break-away Mormon group wants to live in the desert with a dozen wives, should that be legal, so long as he does not marry them in the eyes of the law? Why shouldn't the law recognize their marriage as legit, if they are consenting adults?
Joey
No, polygamy is not the Biblical standard. Joey's response above sums it up pretty well. You should stop getting your talking points from anti-Christian hate sites and actually read the scripture from time to time.
DeleteJQ
Month after month year after year its more of the same. Conservatives have drilled it in to people's heads that gay marriage will inevitably lead to polygamy. Preaching the inevitability of something they don't want to happen seems perversely counterproductive to me.
ReplyDelete-KW
JFK was a bigamist. See Sy Hersh's book, The Dark Side of Camelot. In 1946 Kennedy secretly married Durie Malcolm in a civil ceremony. Years later he married Jacquie. There's no evidence that the first marriage was ever legally ended.
ReplyDeleteAll of the arguments against polygamy are the same ones used to oppose interracial marriage and same-sex marriage.
JQ