On Feb 2, 4:17 pm, Josh Hill  wrote:

> That being said, a careful reading will note that I did not assert
> that polygamy is socially harmful, but rather that it /appears/ to be
> socially harmful. I based that on a number of news accounts I've read
> of the unfortunate social and economic consequences of present-day
> Mormon polygamy (and, IIRC, at least one Usenet post). Apparently,
> many of the brides end up living in poverty, off the state.

This may be at least partly a reflection of conservative organised
religions typically discouraging women from pursuing professional
careers to the same degree as men. I've heard some women who are in
plural marriages/relationships argue that having more than one person
to look after their children when they're doing other things makes it
easier to pursue a career and balance this with raising a family.

I don't dispute that there are some plural marriage arrangements that
are mutually beneficial to the parties involved, and where consenting
adults are making a rational choice with no coercion to something
which they believe is consistent with their own interests and doesn't
harm them. However, I still think that plural marriage has some
difficulties of a logistic nature. Firstly, in cases where there is a
gender imbalance (particularly one person of one sex and more than one
of the other sex), an unequal number of women and men are being
removed from being single and available. If the practice were
generalised, and there was a pattern of wealthy heterosexual men
marrying multiple wives more than any other arrangement, then there'd
be all sorts of social consequences relating to an inflated number of
underprivileged single men.

Now, limiting plural marriage to the same number of persons of each
sex would help somewhat, but there'd need to be a system to cover the
logistic difficulties involved when one or more persons wanted to
terminate the relationship contract. For example, if two women and two
men were married, and one of the four wanted to leave, if the result
was one person going back into the single population and three
remaining in an unequal two-to-one marriage, this would still
potentially risk the problems outlined in the above paragraph.

On a related note, I can't say I have much time for hypocrites who
aren't really poly but are quite happy to have multiple partners for
themselves as long as the arrangement is one-sided. IMO the main
defining characteristic (though not a sufficient condition, as there
are people who meet this but who themselves want to only have one
partner) of being poly is that one is emotionally capable of a close
relationship with a primary partner who is intimate with others as
well. If you want to have multiple partners yourself but yet you'd
spit chips if your spouse or primary partner did the same thing, then
you're not poly, just a hypocrite. And that goes doubly for anyone who
promotes sexist double standards as a way to indulge their own
personal preferences and insecurities.

So my concern is that, whilst some genuine and well-meaning poly folks
would benefit from the 1-to-1 requirement on marriage being lifted, it
could also be exploited by opportunists (particularly some wealthy
heterosexual men) who want an unequal arrangement. Osama bin Laden is
a prime example of such -- on the one hand having multiple wives for
himself, and on the other hand supporting a government that executed
women who had premarital sex or left their homes without wearing a
veil or being accompanied by a man.

Matthew
--- SBBSecho 2.12-Win32