[SOC] Bigamy, anyone?

[Heaton, Timothy H.]

I don't have any real problem with bigamy as described by Chris (or with
homosexual couples and other oddities) as long as everything is in the open
and there is no victim. However, polygamy rarely works that way. It is
nearly always practiced in closed patriarchal societies where the women have
very little power or control over their own lives. This is certainly true in
many Muslim countries. It was true of the LDS Church back when polygamy was
practiced. And it is true of the Mormon fundamentalists today. John
Krakauer's new book Under the Banner of Heaven describes this well.

I am a descendent of Mormon polygamists and have examples of both good and
bad polygamists in my ancestry. My paternal grandfather was a child in one
of the last LDS polygamist families. His father had two wives, and they
managed reasonably well. Usually the two families lived in different towns
in a rural area in southern Utah and didn't interact much, so the half
siblings seemed more like cousins than siblings. His father planned to marry
his two wives on the same day, but when my great grandmother learned that he
wanted to marry her second, she backed out for a while and ended up marrying
him a few months later than the other wife! (The wedding night would have
been tricky if he'd married them the same day!)

The paternal grandfather of my maternal grandmother was a terrible
polygamist. He was a high ranking Mormon official and had many wives. In his
later years he took a liking to a young girl and was frustrated because she
was in love with a young man. He tried to send the young man on a mission to
get rid of him, but he refused. When none of his threats worked, he had his
men abduct and brutally castrate the young man! By doing this he eventually
got what he wanted. This story is well documented in books of the day and
known within my own family. Brigham Young (the LDS president at the time)
demoted this man for his crime, and according to one account he (Young) took
the castrated boy's mother as a plural wife (mainly to smooth things over).

Krakauer describes many events equal and worse than this one among existing
polygamy cults. So while I'm an open-minded person, I'm pretty skeptical
when it comes to polygamy. It generally creates a lot of victims, some of
whom are prevented from ever realizing what victims they are.

-Tim (N7VU)

-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Redding [mailto:chris.redding@g4pdj.freeserve.co.uk] 
Sent: Sunday, October 26, 2003 5:35 PM
To: soc@mailman.qth.net
Subject: Re: [SOC] Bigamy, anyone?

That's the problem, apparently.
Like I said, the UK recognises all marriages that were legal when they
occurred, so some moslems see their spouses admitted automatically.
According to their website, The church of JC&LDS no longer permits polygamy,
and excommunicates anyone who is found to practice it, but the UK is not
normally in the practice of 'booting' US citizens.

Just to play 'devil's advocate' for a bit: what (apart from the curse of two
mothers-in-law) is wrong with having two wives?.  As long as both are aware
of everything, and are happy with it: who is the victim?

To my mind, if a crime does not generate a victim, then it is not a crime.

Also: if a woman has two husbands: one who is a rich 'something in the city'
and another who knows how to unblock drains, fix cars, and isn't afraid of
spiders in the bath, where is the victim?.

Especially in the UK, which has nowadays largely 'dumped' Christianity in
general, and the Old Testament in particular.

Sorry, we are in ineffable twaddle territory again ;-)

Chris G4PDJ