Traditional marriage advocates have long argued that once you establish that marriage is simply a contract between consenting adults, polygamy is a necessary logical outgrowth. And every time we attempted to raise this point, others explained to us to shutup.
Well, it seems that shutup time is done as polygamists are celebrating The Supreme Court’s decision as well.
Buzzfeed reports:
The Supreme Court’s rulings in favor of same-sex marriage Wednesday were greeted with excitement by polygamists across the country, who viewed the gay rights victory as a crucial step toward the country’s inevitable acceptance of plural marriage.
Anne Wilde, a vocal advocate for polygamist rights who practiced the lifestyle herself until her husband died in 2003, praised the court’s decision as a sign that society’s stringent attachment to traditional “family values” is evolving.
“I was very glad… The nuclear family, with a dad and a mom and two or three kids, is not the majority anymore,” said Wilde. “Now it’s grandparents taking care of kids, single parents, gay parents. I think people are more and more understanding that as consenting adults, we should be able to raise a family however we choose.”
“We’re very happy with it,” said Joe Darger, a Utah-based polygamist who has three wives. “I think [the court] has taken a step in correcting some inequality, and that’s certainly something that’s going to trickle down and impact us.”
Noting that the court found the Defense of Marriage Act unconstitutional because the law denied marriage rights to a specific class of people, Darger said, “Our very existence has been classified as criminal… and I think the government needs to now recognize that we have a right to live free as much as anyone else.”…
But polygamists in the United States, where bigamy is a crime, have taken cues from the marriage equality movement, and the few public champions of the lifestyle have deliberately positioned themselves as libertarian-minded gay rights advocates as well. Following gay rights activists’ lead, polygamist families — like the Browns, with their TLC reality show Sister Wives, and the Dargers, who came out with a book last year — have come forward to convince the American public that their lifestyle can be wholesome and normal…
“I’m not a fortune-teller, but it seems like if more people are accepting of gay marriage, it would follow that polygamist marriage wouldn’t be criticized quite so much.”
Anita Wagner Illig, a leading polygamy activist, told U.S. News & World Report that gay-rights campaigners had set a welcome precedent. “We polyamorists are grateful to our brothers and sisters for blazing the marriage equality trail,” she said.
So when we talk about gay marriage meaning the destruction of marriage, we kinda’ mean it.
June 28, 2013 at 2:29 pm
Anita is a polyamorist, not an advocate for polygamy. The polygamists can claim some semblance of tradition. Polyamorists are the 'open relationships' crowd who take progressivism into the bedroom. Actual polygamy is unlikely to ever be legal because, you know, stable families might result, and multiple partners mean multiple claims on the breadwinner, thus less money for the lawyers.
June 28, 2013 at 2:51 pm
The connection is so bloody obvious, I'm not sure why so many liberals are so blind to it–or just obtuse. Liberals aren't known for thinking much, anyway.
June 28, 2013 at 3:31 pm
Ugh. If anything skeeves me out, it's polygamy. How in the world could any self respecting woman put up with it.
June 28, 2013 at 4:02 pm
Well, I bet all those Fundamentalist Mormons are tickled pink by now!
June 28, 2013 at 4:11 pm
Liberals aren't blind to it at all. It's just that all the havoc they have wreaked in the last 150 years or so has come through incremental change accompanied by protestations of innocence. The formula has worked well for them and they are unlikely to change it.
June 29, 2013 at 12:34 am
Agreed, Ellen. CREEPY. I was wondering the same thing; what kind of deranged woman would agree to such an arrangement?
I can just see them now, like… was it Leah and Rachel? Their handmaids?… arguing about the last melon, and deciding that the woman who didn't get to sleep with the hubby that night got the melon. Nice.
June 29, 2013 at 12:46 pm
I read somewhere that Mormons don't do that anymore. Who really benefits from legalized polygamy are – you guessed it – Islamists.
June 29, 2013 at 1:27 pm
Rick, the mainstream Mormons don't do polygamy anymore, but the fundie spinoffs do. BTW, you're probably right about the Muslims.