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North Carolina’s Despicable Amendment

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I understand that there would be a lack of efficiency, but that's not an ethical reason. Ostensibly, a polygamist(or polyandry for that matter)could craft their own marriage licenses for wives number 2, 3, and 4. Perhaps a line of succession, like inheritance, for decision making with regard to health issues and all that. Currently, like gay gay marriage, it is not even allowed regardless of how much work they wish to put into it. If ones sexual preference is to have more than one person to love, than they and their sexual preferences are being discriminated against. Their preference isn't just having a woman. They want the woman, her best friend, and her sister, too be happy in the relationship. If they're all game, why should other people tell them that they can't?

They shouldn't.

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The only argument I can think of involves the greater ease with which polygamists could abuse marriage to "sell" citizenship. This may be a problem with how we grant citizenship, though, instead of a problem with polygamy.

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So no arguments against polygamy?

Politically? No.

The practical? One spouse is enough. Two sounds like way to much work.

To be more serious I've always considered it a leftover of a different era when larger families = survival combined with the tribal view that sex was only for procreation and not romance. There is still religious opposition but I'd bet most of it is cultural simply because of tradition. More importantly there is no will to change such laws since there is no practical need or desire for it. We don't need larger families and we have sex for romantic reasons. As a culture we are trending away from group relationships and individual relationships.

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Politically? No.

The practical? One spouse is enough. Two sounds like way to much work.

To be more serious I've always considered it a leftover of a different era when larger families = survival combined with the tribal view that sex was only for procreation and not romance. There is still religious opposition but I'd bet most of it is cultural simply because of tradition. .

Wouldn't that then, also apply to marriage in general? Without needing to reproduce and secure inheritance, what purpose does it serve?

More importantly there is no will to change such laws since there is no practical need or desire for it.

Sure there is, desire at least. Just fewer people asking for it. As far as practical need for it, that same argument could likely be applied against gay marriage.

We don't need larger families and we have sex for romantic reasons. As a culture we are trending away from group relationships and individual relationships

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Rand Paul had some comments on Obama's recent declaration of support for gay marriage. Some quotes from this CNN article:

“Call me cynical, but I wasn’t sure that his views on marriage could get any gayer.”

... ...

“It did bother me though that he used the justification for it in a biblical reference,” Paul said. “He said the biblical Golden Rule caused him to be for gay marriage. And I’m like, what version of the Bible is he reading?

... ...

“We understand sin and if we believe it’s a sin, we still are (sinners) and people sin,” he said. “We’re not out there preaching some sort of hateful dogma against people. But that doesn’t mean that we have to go ahead and give up our traditions.”

... ...

“Six thousand years of tradition” combined with “anthropological” evidence shows “there’s stability in the family unit,” he said

Edited by softwareNerd
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Sorry, some malfunction in the quoting there. Meant to add that I don't understand what you mean in this sentence.

I meant to say we have been trending away from group relationships to individual relationships.

The power one word has to change a sentince! Anyway, I was simply saying we are becoming more private. We don't need "the tribe" we need ourselves and only the people we desire in our lives.

As for marriage, their is a desire for it still. It's the same thing - Based on individual desires. Instead of running out and getting maried to the first person they meet at 19 because they are "supposed to", many people I've met are willing to live together ot wait to later in life. Obviously that doesn't apply to everyone but overall people seem less concerned with what society says they have to do with marriage and more likey to pick their own path. Sort of like how being divorced was a stigma at one time and now many people don't think twice about it.

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  • 8 months later...

Rand Paul:

Six thousand years of tradition” combined with “anthropological” evidence shows “there’s stability in the family unit,” he said

He should've really picked a different number there. Perhaps 6500. Or 7000. Anything but what the Bible claims to be the age of the Universe.

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Polygamy shoudl be legal. In a free society, most people would avoid such relationships anyways.

I believe that polygamy has contribute to many of the Arab world's problems. I suspect that many of the people who become suicide bombers do so because they are disenfranchised. A major stage in most people's life is mariage and raising children. If someone can't achieve that, they can feel alienated and have low self esteem. Institutional polygamy like we see in the Arab world allows rich men to take multiple wives, while some poor men can be left with nothing because of this. When this happens, you have poor, alienated, fundementalists, virgins who have no where to gono future in their society.

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2010/12/05/the_truth_about_suicide_bombers/?page=full

Men who are raised in polygamist sects, but who are not given an oppurtunity to get married often suffer in the same ways.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_boys_(Mormon_fundamentalism)

The following is a paper written about a southeast asian immigrant community in the United States who practiced polygamy. It lists many disadvantages in polygamy. One could easily see how, on a macro scale, polygamy would cause political problems.

http://www2.uwstout.edu/content/lib/thesis/2003/2003yangm.pdf

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