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Should bigamy be legal

If you are for gay marriage are you pro bigamy too

  • I'm pro gay marriage and pro bigamy too

    Votes: 24 82.8%
  • I'm pro gay marriage anti bigamy

    Votes: 5 17.2%

  • Total voters
    29
Not at all.

My reasoning for supporting same sex marriage is my personal belief that our marriage laws are a violation of the Equal Protection Clause on the basis of gender discrimination.

I've still yet to be presented with an argument for bigamy that convinces me it'd fall under an Equal Protection Clause protection. I see no way it'd fit into a middle or upper tier category, which would make it the lowest tier at best which is a very low threshold to jump through. Considering the SIZABLE structural change...instead of language change...that would have to occur by allowing those who are married to marry other people and the multitude of new legal issues that would cause, I think the state has a legitimate interest in not moving forward with such.

Bigami is consenting adults and it seems to me the disruption to the state is less than same sex marriage. Of course now bigami could mean a bi sexual married to a man in one union and a woman in another union so in that respect you have a point."Marriage" is a word that has lost its original meaning and everything about it is now up for grabs. If anything goes in marriage now why should their be a one marriage rule?
 
WTF does someones views on homosexual "marriage" have to do with Polygamy?

I don't see anything wrong with Polygamy myself, not that I intend to do it, as long as it is between men and women who are mature enough to actually make that choice, it's no business of mine. Hell, the only reason I'm really against the homosexuals on the issue is because the won't STFU and let others live their lives the way they choose but instead, insist on rubbing everyones face in it and calling people names over it.

At least Polygamy is a natural order for sexual behavior.
 
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That's illegal. I wasn't talking about illegal activity.;)

Not completely. Many states still allow those under 18 to marry with their parents' permission. If the parents have raised their children to believe that they should marry young (teenagers) to a man that their parents approve of or picks them, then the parents are likely to also give legal permission for the marriage in that case as well, since they believe it is right.

This is one of several reasons why I believe only those 18 and older should be allowed to legally marry, and parents shouldn't be able to sign off on a lower age.
 
Not completely. Many states still allow those under 18 to marry with their parents' permission. If the parents have raised their children to believe that they should marry young (teenagers) to a man that their parents approve of or picks them, then the parents are likely to also give legal permission for the marriage in that case as well, since they believe it is right.

This is one of several reasons why I believe only those 18 and older should be allowed to legally marry, and parents shouldn't be able to sign off on a lower age.

He mentioned taking young girls as sexual partners and wives. I wasn't talking about 16 year olds getting their parents' permission to marry.
 
>


Philosophically speaking I don't have a problem with multiple-partner marriages on the condition that each individual has to accept the new dynamic. In other words person "A" legally marries person "B". A year later person "A" marries person "C" without the knowledge or consent of person "B". That establishes a legal relationship between "A" and "B" and "A" and "C" but no ties between "B" and "C". Think of community property. "A" owns 50% and "B" owns 50%. If "A" then legally marries "C" does that mean (s)he has 0% and "B" retains 50% and "C" acquires "50%"? (Not likely.) Or does "A", "B", and "C" then have 33.3% with "B" having no say in the matter.

So in the event of multi-partner legal marriaces "A" & "B" & "C" need to be all legally married to each other with all parties agreeing.


From a legal standpoint (government rights, benefits, and responsibilities) there are arguments that such a situation creating a 1:N, instead of a 1:1 relationship, creates a complexity that our family law is not ready to handle.



>>>>
 
Bigami is consenting adults

So? Where in the world in any of my explanation for why I supposed same sex marriage did I bring up "consenting adults"

it seems to me the disruption to the state is less than same sex marriage.

It can "seem" to you like that all you want. It seems to be significantly different.

With same sex marriage it's largely a change of language. From specific spousal terms to simply "spouse" by and large. Every law and issue on the books resolves itself pretty much in a standard fashion. The one exception would be the few times where preference is given to a mother in a situation, but that is rather rare.

Bigamy would require significant rework of multiple laws. Look at just a few. Can a man married to one woman who is herself married to another man claim the other man's income as his own via his wife? If the other man has children, and the wife supports those children, can the first man claim them as dependent as his money is going to supporting them via his wife whose married to those childrens father. Another is the notion of power of attorney. If a man is married to two women, completely seperately, with no official power of attorney designation put forth, it would normally under the law default to his wife...but we have two wives, in no way attached to each other, who would then both have legal say under the current law. It'd need ot be changed to address this. Those are just some of the multitude of issues completely unique to bigamy rather than shared with same sex marriage.

."Marriage" is a word that has lost its original meaning and everything about it is now up for grabs.

That's perfectly fine for you opinion. However that's hardly a strong legal argument against my statement.

If anything goes in marriage now why should their be a one marriage rule?

So basically all your post is doing is "I don't like your answer, so I'll just reask the question again and expect you to say something different"?

If my reasoning as to why same sex marriage should be legal was worthless platitudes like "People should be able to marry who they love" or "It's no ones business what consenting adults do" or "Marriage is a hollow pointless entity" then your post would make sense and have a point. But those aren't my reasons. My reasoning was laid out clearly in the above post and has been laid out repeatedly on this forum. Your restating of the question or bringing up arguments against it that I've never made doesn't actually counter anything I've said.
 
So a marriage between same sex couples is now legal across the land so the logical nest issue is bigamy.If the same sex can be married why not multiple partners? It sees like the term marriage and family are now open ended terms and are being redefined daily so if you are for gay marriage you surly must be for bigamy too I would think. Or are you?

If all the spouses agree to such a polygamous type relationship fine. But for the purposes of the government and benefits(taxes,social security, health insurance, pension, etc) only two people legally married.

But legal? No.
 
So a marriage between same sex couples is now legal across the land so the logical nest issue is bigamy.If the same sex can be married why not multiple partners? It sees like the term marriage and family are now open ended terms and are being redefined daily so if you are for gay marriage you surly must be for bigamy too I would think. Or are you?

Polygamy (I'm assuming that's what you meant, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong) has its own set of pros and cons and can be discussed independently of gay marriage. Otherwise it's no different than saying "...so if you are for gay marriage surely you are for drug legalization too I would think."

As it stands, I've never heard anyone actually clarify an argument against polygamy (that doesn't stem from religion, tradition or any of that other crap).
 
As it stands, I've never heard anyone actually clarify an argument against polygamy (that doesn't stem from religion, tradition or any of that other crap).


Here you go...

There are many arguments against polygamy from a historical perspective that if managed properly would no longer be a large issue.
  1. 1. In the past such societies were almost exclusively polygamous (1 man, multiple women) and structured in such a way as to be abusive to women. Women were viewed almost as property and were expected to be subservient to the man.
  2. 2. It was not uncommon for older men to exercise political (or religious) "power" over community such that very young women were forced into marriages with these older men (often much older) and left with no means of escape from the community. (i.e. statutory rape with no means of escape.)
  3. 3. High concentrations of polygamous marriages tends to skew the natural ratios of the available male/females in a given population. If you have one man marrying multiple women, those women are effectively removed from the - ah - market so to speak. Now you have an increased number of males while at the same time having a shortage of available females. Leading to problems with how to deal with the males who were often excluded from the community.

Now, these reasons may not be as valid today in a modern western civilization society - although many of these problems might still be applicable to African and Middle-Eastern societies. Much larger and more mobile populations also reduces the impact of past wrongs which occurred in isolated enclaves.


However from a modern perspective there are still valid reasons against legalized bigamy.

Legal View: There is no legal framework to deal with partners in a Civil Marriage that exceeds two persons and the issues that are already complex enough dealing with two individuals and possibly children let alone increasing those issues exponentially with each additional spouse.

In each bigamous marriage, there would be at a minimum three legally intertwined status:
A married to B,
A married to C, and
B married to C.

Add a fourth spouse and you get:
A married to B
A married to C
A married to D
B married to C
B married to D
C married to D

Add a fifth spouse and you get:
A married to B
A married to C
A married to D
A married to E
B married to C
B married to D
B married to E
C married to D
C married to E
E married to D

Add another, etc...


So you have issues with property on who owns what, what was brought into the marriage when. If C decides he/she no longer wants to be part of the plural marriage to what extent is he/she awarded property from A, B, D, and E.

You have issues also with children. Who are the parents. The biological parents or are all adults in a plural marriage equally parents. In the event of a divorce who gets child custody? Visitation? Child support? etc...

When the discussion is about marriage between two consenting adults the current legal system will support it because laws, courts, etc... are geared toward dealing with the same situations. Linear increases in the number of spouses causes an exponential increase on the courts in dealing with those issues.


So there is a secular reason to be leery of bigamy as a government recognized entity that has nothing to do with religion or morality.


>>>>
 
Here you go...

There are many arguments against polygamy from a historical perspective that if managed properly would no longer be a large issue.
  1. 1. In the past such societies were almost exclusively polygamous (1 man, multiple women) and structured in such a way as to be abusive to women. Women were viewed almost as property and were expected to be subservient to the man.
  2. 2. It was not uncommon for older men to exercise political (or religious) "power" over community such that very young women were forced into marriages with these older men (often much older) and left with no means of escape from the community. (i.e. statutory rape with no means of escape.)
  3. 3. High concentrations of polygamous marriages tends to skew the natural ratios of the available male/females in a given population. If you have one man marrying multiple women, those women are effectively removed from the - ah - market so to speak. Now you have an increased number of males while at the same time having a shortage of available females. Leading to problems with how to deal with the males who were often excluded from the community.

Now, these reasons may not be as valid today in a modern western civilization society - although many of these problems might still be applicable to African and Middle-Eastern societies. Much larger and more mobile populations also reduces the impact of past wrongs which occurred in isolated enclaves.


However from a modern perspective there are still valid reasons against legalized bigamy.

Legal View: There is no legal framework to deal with partners in a Civil Marriage that exceeds two persons and the issues that are already complex enough dealing with two individuals and possibly children let alone increasing those issues exponentially with each additional spouse.

In each bigamous marriage, there would be at a minimum three legally intertwined status:
A married to B,
A married to C, and
B married to C.

Add a fourth spouse and you get:
A married to B
A married to C
A married to D
B married to C
B married to D
C married to D

Add a fifth spouse and you get:
A married to B
A married to C
A married to D
A married to E
B married to C
B married to D
B married to E
C married to D
C married to E
E married to D

Add another, etc...


So you have issues with property on who owns what, what was brought into the marriage when. If C decides he/she no longer wants to be part of the plural marriage to what extent is he/she awarded property from A, B, D, and E.

You have issues also with children. Who are the parents. The biological parents or are all adults in a plural marriage equally parents. In the event of a divorce who gets child custody? Visitation? Child support? etc...

When the discussion is about marriage between two consenting adults the current legal system will support it because laws, courts, etc... are geared toward dealing with the same situations. Linear increases in the number of spouses causes an exponential increase on the courts in dealing with those issues.


So there is a secular reason to be leery of bigamy as a government recognized entity that has nothing to do with religion or morality.


>>>>

So it would be impractical for the state to address benefits with anything remotely the same efficiency that it handles them for couples. That makes sense.
 
Gender discrimination is your guiding compass so you have to be for bigamy. A bisexual should be allowed to marry someone from each sex or they are being discriminated against right?
 
So? Where in the world in any of my explanation for why I supposed same sex marriage did I bring up "consenting adults"



It can "seem" to you like that all you want. It seems to be significantly different.

With same sex marriage it's largely a change of language. From specific spousal terms to simply "spouse" by and large. Every law and issue on the books resolves itself pretty much in a standard fashion. The one exception would be the few times where preference is given to a mother in a situation, but that is rather rare.

Bigamy would require significant rework of multiple laws. Look at just a few. Can a man married to one woman who is herself married to another man claim the other man's income as his own via his wife? If the other man has children, and the wife supports those children, can the first man claim them as dependent as his money is going to supporting them via his wife whose married to those childrens father. Another is the notion of power of attorney. If a man is married to two women, completely seperately, with no official power of attorney designation put forth, it would normally under the law default to his wife...but we have two wives, in no way attached to each other, who would then both have legal say under the current law. It'd need ot be changed to address this. Those are just some of the multitude of issues completely unique to bigamy rather than shared with same sex marriage.



That's perfectly fine for you opinion. However that's hardly a strong legal argument against my statement.



So basically all your post is doing is "I don't like your answer, so I'll just reask the question again and expect you to say something different"?

If my reasoning as to why same sex marriage should be legal was worthless platitudes like "People should be able to marry who they love" or "It's no ones business what consenting adults do" or "Marriage is a hollow pointless entity" then your post would make sense and have a point. But those aren't my reasons. My reasoning was laid out clearly in the above post and has been laid out repeatedly on this forum. Your restating of the question or bringing up arguments against it that I've never made doesn't actually counter anything I've said.

Post 36 was meant for you
 
Polygamy (I'm assuming that's what you meant, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong) has its own set of pros and cons and can be discussed independently of gay marriage. Otherwise it's no different than saying "...so if you are for gay marriage surely you are for drug legalization too I would think."

As it stands, I've never heard anyone actually clarify an argument against polygamy (that doesn't stem from religion, tradition or any of that other crap).

I meant what I said and don't know why so many seem so confused
 
Not at all.

My reasoning for supporting same sex marriage is my personal belief that our marriage laws are a violation of the Equal Protection Clause on the basis of gender discrimination.

I've still yet to be presented with an argument for bigamy that convinces me it'd fall under an Equal Protection Clause protection. I see no way it'd fit into a middle or upper tier category, which would make it the lowest tier at best which is a very low threshold to jump through. Considering the SIZABLE structural change...instead of language change...that would have to occur by allowing those who are married to marry other people and the multitude of new legal issues that would cause, I think the state has a legitimate interest in not moving forward with such.

If and when the Supreme Court decrees a constitutional right to same-sex marriage, the chances the decision will use any form of heightened scrutiny are slim. Justice Kennedy's reasoning in Romer v. Evans and Lawrence v. Texas both used plain old rational basis review. As far as anyone can understand his garbled opinion in Webster, the same was true there.
 
If anything goes in marriage now why should their be a one marriage rule?

Few if any people hold that position. Instead of building straw men, why not look at what people are actually arguing and argue against that?
 
Gender discrimination is your guiding compass so you have to be for bigamy.

Not at all.

A male marry a woman.

A woman cannot marry a woman.

Therefore a man can do something under the law a woman can not do.

For that discrimination to occur it must serve an important state interest and the discrimination must be substantially related to serving that interest since it would be middle tier scrutiny. I simply don't see an argument that meets that criteria with regards to gender discrimination in our marriage laws.

How exactly does that apply to bigamy at all.

A man is not allowed to marry two men. A woman is not allowed to marry two men.
A man is not allowed to marry two women. A woman is not allowed to marry two women.
A man is not allowed to marry one man and one woman. A woman is not allowed ot marry one man and one woman.

There's no discrimination under the law towards either sex in this case. Please show me where it is.

A bisexual should be allowed to marry someone from each sex

"A bisexual" is not a gender. It's a sexual orientation.
 
Why stop there. How about bestiality or object sexuality.

For the reason that you probably didn't include any quotes, which are all stating consenting adults. Although object sexuality is long since established. Dildos anyone? But no one is seriously considering marry objects on a legal basis. Animals cannot consent. Now if you found an animal with human intelligence then I would argue that beastiality no longer applies.

On a side note I'm against polygamy simply because often 1 wife is too many.

Your bias is showing. Polygamy is multiple spouses. You are referencing specifically polygyny. Polyandry is multiple husbands.
 
So a marriage between same sex couples is now legal across the land so the logical nest issue is bigamy.If the same sex can be married why not multiple partners? It sees like the term marriage and family are now open ended terms and are being redefined daily so if you are for gay marriage you surly must be for bigamy too I would think. Or are you?

How is that logical? What process did you use to determine that? And why is it limited to only 3 partners and not an open number?
 
One can also be in a SSM, albeit not legally recongized, without violating any laws at all. The SSM push back is mainly from the effort to change what is legally recognized as marriage without having to get aprroval by majority vote (or constitutional amendment) but by simply getting a "wise judge" to say what the state (federal?) law "really must be".

When one looks at our nation's constitution they find that amendment #14 was NOT seen as sufficient to give women or black men the right to vote and that caused the addition of amendments #15 and #20 - NOT simply the opinion if a "wise judge" saying that amendment #14 really makes those individual rights become the law of the land.

First what I was noting that while one can be in a Polygamous marriage, an OSM or a SSM, both in the legal sense as well as outside of the legal sense, one cannot be a bigamist outside of the legal sense. One can get married without involvement of the law. One can get multiple marriages (as opposed to a polygamous marriages) outside of the law. But they are not a bigamist u less they get multiple legal marriages.

Secondly, many states are passing SSM in the legislature, so majorities are winning out in those states.
 
So a marriage between same sex couples is now legal across the land so the logical nest issue is bigamy.If the same sex can be married why not multiple partners? It sees like the term marriage and family are now open ended terms and are being redefined daily so if you are for gay marriage you surly must be for bigamy too I would think. Or are you?

Sure, but you can only have one of each. If you want a wife and to marry your best bud, then you should be able to. Just no two of the same sex.
 
I don't care if we legalize polygamy as long as they don't get more financial/tax benefits (or fewer) than couples. To me, equality in marriage means....equality.
 
Do you really mean polygamy? Even in a polygamous relationship each partner is in only one marriage at a time, although they may be not be the only man/woman in that marriage. Polygamy is about removing the limit of two marriage partners while bigamy permits one to be an multiple marriages at the same time. SSM seeks to keep the two partner limit but to (only) remove the opposite gender requirement for the partners, while bigamy seeks to allow marriage partnerships to overlap.

Thanks for the clarification. I botched that one!
 
WTF does someones views on homosexual "marriage" have to do with Polygamy?

.

Apparently, now that 'the geighs' can marry, some people consider marriage...the wild wild West! Anything and anyone will now be considered....the 'slippery slope' at its finest! lol
 
He mentioned taking young girls as sexual partners and wives. I wasn't talking about 16 year olds getting their parents' permission to marry.

First of all, why not? Should a 16 year old be having sex/married to some old guy mainly because her religion says that's right, mainly due to a bunch of old perverts who simply want many young wives.

But also, some states allow the permission for 14 or 15 year olds as well. Some states waive age of consent laws with marriage.
 
Gender discrimination is your guiding compass so you have to be for bigamy. A bisexual should be allowed to marry someone from each sex or they are being discriminated against right?

That is not how bisexuality works. Instead it works similar to someone who is attracted to people of more than one race. Just because a person would be willing to marry someone of any race or either sex doesn't mean those people want to marry multiple people at the same time. Those who want to be in a group marriage are generally polyamorous.
 
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