Reblogged:Conservatives vs. Right to Contract. Again.

[Gus Van Horn blog]

I know I am not the only pro-freedom voter who -- concerned that Biden might pack the Supreme Court -- voted for Trump. Nor am I the only such voter to have gone for a long time thinking that conservative justices generally understood individual rights and the Constitution better than leftist ones -- until the twisted reasoning of Dobbs showed me that was far from the case.

But, for anyone who might be inclined to think something along the lines of Yeah, but they see the fetus as having rights or hope that conservatives might be weirdly compartmentalized about abortion, take a gander at how upset conservatives are getting about the prospect of legalized polygamy, which a court case in New York has raised.

Take the following excerpt from a prominent conservative blog:

Image by State Library of Queensland, Australia, via Wikimedia Commons, no known copyright restrictions.

If you take biology out of the mix, "two" is an arbitrary and irrational number. And in the short time that has gone by since Obergefell [sic] [which legalized gay marriage --ed], the concept of biology itself has come under widespread attack. If things continue on their present course -- and they will, absent a vastly invigorated conservative movement -- the "right" to polygamy will soon be established. Which is to say that the rest of us will have polygamy jammed down our throats.

God forbid two or more adults enter a contractual agreement by mutual consent!

Yes, because leftists feel the need to rub the noses of most Americans in anything they might disapprove of or just not be all that wild about, we can expect a 24-7 surround-sound media blitz extolling all manner of group marriages as an unchallengeable virtue, especially directed towards children.

I don't look forward to this, either, but that is a separate issue from whether contractual arrangements among consenting adults deserve legal protection. On that score, polygamy should certainly be legal for the same reason that men and women can get married: They are adults and want to enter a long-term contract with each other.

The likes of John Hinderaker might be surprised to learn that -- yes -- even men and women often get married because they are in love. Sit down, Hindy, but many of these same people marry without any intention of producing offspring.

Grab the smelling salts!

As with "heartbeat" arguments against legalized abortion, this "biological" argument is a pathetic attempt -- akin to nature-worshipping totalitarians invoking The Science as reason enough to criminalize fossil fuels -- to make it look like theirs is a reasonable position.

But the fact that a man and a woman are necessary to reproduce implies that the government should criminalize all marriage contracts except those sanctioned by Christianity no more than the existence of global warming means we should all be forced to quit using the fossil fuels we need, much less absent a competitive, viable replacement.

I personally think group marriage is a Bad Idea for many reasons I don't care to discuss, but I think it should be legal, and this is America: Your living arrangements and sex lives neither pick my pocket nor break my leg.

Have at them, but don't expect me to spend an inordinate amount of time thinking about them. I, too, have a life of my own.

-- CAV

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