Social revolution in the wrong direction

[elfs]

"If we give gays the right to marry, what's next, polygamy?" A common refrain here in the U.S. from those who are opposed to both. Interestingly, the United Nations was recently asked by several member countries such as Belgium and the Netherlands to extend employment benefits to same-sex partners recognized by those countries.

Naturally, this has prompted an explosion. Both Islamic and Vatican-inspired states have objected strenuously. But you'll never hear the polygamy refrain coming from these people.

The U.N. already recognizes polygamy.

[EDIT: It's the Washington Post, not the New York Times.]

Comments

[lazarus834.livejournal.com]

That's a very interesting argument you present. It never occurred to me that it would tip the balance like that, but I guess that women are less likely to marry multiple men (since straight men are less likely to share?).

I can see another argument against polygamous marriage - governments permit one to bring a spouse into the country and grant the spouse permanent residence. With polygamous marriages, this can open the door to a lot of marriages of convenience. Of course, that's a legal loophole that is easy to close...

Having said all that, I still would like to see legally recognized unions of poly-families though. I honestly believe three parents are better than two, and four are better than three. The two-parent family seems just too "fragile" to me.

In other societies and cultures, multigenerational families take care of the pool of children. But for sex-positive poly-folk living in a christian-dominated society, more likely to stay away from our parents, who probably lead very different lifestyles.

I think that legally recognized poly marriages will make it a lot easier for poly families to form communities and to raise children together. And it would also challenge a lot of popular notions of possessiveness and jealousy. Not to mention, lead to a bunch of interesting bleed-over into pop-culture (imagine the TV shows alone!).