Comments on: Polygamy Showdown http://deanesmay.com/2008/04/26/polygamy-showdown/ Defending the liberal tradition in history, science, and philosophy. Mon, 21 May 2012 11:55:01 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.2 By: ann_in_arizona http://deanesmay.com/2008/04/26/polygamy-showdown/#comment-155154 ann_in_arizona Wed, 30 Apr 2008 02:45:32 +0000 http://deanesmay.com/2008/04/26/polygamy-showdown/#comment-155154 Oops, forgot the link: <http://www.alternet.org/blogs/peek/83517/> Oops, forgot the link:

<http://www.alternet.org/blogs/peek/83517/&gt;

]]> By: ann_in_arizona http://deanesmay.com/2008/04/26/polygamy-showdown/#comment-155153 ann_in_arizona Wed, 30 Apr 2008 02:44:39 +0000 http://deanesmay.com/2008/04/26/polygamy-showdown/#comment-155153 Dean & Scott -- The FLDS have co-opted law enforcement and the courts in  the remote Arizona  Strip  north of the  Grand Canyon, and adjacent  Southern Utah, for over 100 years,  in service of their corrupt and exploitative dogma.  Hurray for Texas because they are not allowing this abusive and domineering group to gain a toehold/refuge in yet another state. Read this piece, look at the pic of the former prophet and his "last two wives" and tell me this isn't seriously weird. And please provide evidence for your allegation that 'fundamentalist Christians" practice polygamy. Web ravings don't count; "Anyone can post on the internet." Dean & Scott —
The FLDS have co-opted law enforcement and the courts in  the remote Arizona  Strip  north of the  Grand Canyon, and adjacent  Southern Utah, for over 100 years,  in service of their corrupt and exploitative dogma.  Hurray for Texas because they are not allowing this abusive and domineering group to gain a toehold/refuge in yet another state. Read this piece, look at the pic of the former prophet and his "last two wives" and tell me this isn’t seriously weird.

And please provide evidence for your allegation that ‘fundamentalist Christians" practice polygamy. Web ravings don’t count; "Anyone can post on the internet."

]]> By: willem http://deanesmay.com/2008/04/26/polygamy-showdown/#comment-155010 willem Sun, 27 Apr 2008 05:42:04 +0000 http://deanesmay.com/2008/04/26/polygamy-showdown/#comment-155010 Still, I look at that podium photo of the Sheriff and wonder about his religion, and his religious bias and the projection of his own vainglorious religiosity into the matter. Was it a publicly aggressive Uberbapti who plotted and seethed for "four years" preparing to storm this temple? Was this "Mother Superior Jump The Gun" to a Baptist backbeat? Was this a battle of "born one too many times" vs. "borne one too many?"With the exception of the tragic impact on the children (and some may rightly argue they were tragically impacted from the get-go) it seems Divine providence has dispensed a considerable amount of poetic justice here amidst the greater questions to be faced.Clearly, there's no morality to be found in this affair. No clean hands. Much irony. A remarkable ethical puzzle. An orgy of double-binds. Fools rushed in.And what a government lesson re separation of church and state. And what a revisiting of an old problem with government being involved (wrongly) in the religious practice of marriage.This travesty has occurred in large part because we conflate the law's recognition of joint property rights with religious practice, and allow our government to license, tax and police elements of religious practice commonly referred to as Marriage. From this Texas disaster to the battles over same-sex unions, our failure to separate church and state regarding the religious practice of marriage lies at the root of these issues. The government should have no role, and, I think, gravely transgresses in the role it now enjoys. There are other ways government can record paternity and preserve/dissolve joint property declarations.Freedom. Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness are not abstract concepts. As adult children we know the failings of our parents had profound consequences; as parents, we know and fear our impacts on our own children. Should we be criminalized because the state has produced a formal moral tyranny by which a particular utopian minimum may be forced upon us under a doctrine of administrative secularism?These are difficult questions of balance and boundaries. As Thomas Jefferson said, "Let my boundaries end where your's begin and vice versa."Our government has every right to investigate human slavery, unlawful incarceration and "welfare" racketeering -- something that can occur with one wife or 50, one husband or twenty, or none at all. Under RICO they can march the racketeers off to jail.But, that has nothing to do with the religious practice of marriage. That which seems most wrong with this situation has its roots in the wrongful intrusion of government into the religious practice of marriage as a failure of the separation of church and state. In a very real sense, the problems here have nothing to do with formally practiced poligamy as a societal threat separate from informal, ad hoc poligamy readily practiced throughout our society. Still, I look at that podium photo of the Sheriff and wonder about his religion, and his religious bias and the projection of his own vainglorious religiosity into the matter. Was it a publicly aggressive Uberbapti who plotted and seethed for "four years" preparing to storm this temple? Was this "Mother Superior Jump The Gun" to a Baptist backbeat? Was this a battle of "born one too many times" vs. "borne one too many?"With the exception of the tragic impact on the children (and some may rightly argue they were tragically impacted from the get-go) it seems Divine providence has dispensed a considerable amount of poetic justice here amidst the greater questions to be faced.Clearly, there’s no morality to be found in this affair. No clean hands. Much irony. A remarkable ethical puzzle. An orgy of double-binds. Fools rushed in.And what a government lesson re separation of church and state. And what a revisiting of an old problem with government being involved (wrongly) in the religious practice of marriage.This travesty has occurred in large part because we conflate the law’s recognition of joint property rights with religious practice, and allow our government to license, tax and police elements of religious practice commonly referred to as Marriage. From this Texas disaster to the battles over same-sex unions, our failure to separate church and state regarding the religious practice of marriage lies at the root of these issues. The government should have no role, and, I think, gravely transgresses in the role it now enjoys. There are other ways government can record paternity and preserve/dissolve joint property declarations.Freedom. Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness are not abstract concepts. As adult children we know the failings of our parents had profound consequences; as parents, we know and fear our impacts on our own children. Should we be criminalized because the state has produced a formal moral tyranny by which a particular utopian minimum may be forced upon us under a doctrine of administrative secularism?These are difficult questions of balance and boundaries. As Thomas Jefferson said, "Let my boundaries end where your’s begin and vice versa."Our government has every right to investigate human slavery, unlawful incarceration and "welfare" racketeering — something that can occur with one wife or 50, one husband or twenty, or none at all. Under RICO they can march the racketeers off to jail.But, that has nothing to do with the religious practice of marriage. That which seems most wrong with this situation has its roots in the wrongful intrusion of government into the religious practice of marriage as a failure of the separation of church and state. In a very real sense, the problems here have nothing to do with formally practiced poligamy as a societal threat separate from informal, ad hoc poligamy readily practiced throughout our society.

]]> By: Kevin D. http://deanesmay.com/2008/04/26/polygamy-showdown/#comment-155004 Kevin D. Sun, 27 Apr 2008 02:16:40 +0000 http://deanesmay.com/2008/04/26/polygamy-showdown/#comment-155004 <blockquote>Maybe it’s because I don’t trust state governments to mess around with people’s lives (one of the reasons why I reluctantly support Roe v. Wade even though I believe abortion is murder).</blockquote> So you support state sanctioned murder because you don't trust the state to mess around with people's lives? Like how, exactly? By saving them? The government is involved either way you slice it. I don't understand how siding with the side you admit is murder somehow lessens government intervention.

Maybe it’s because I don’t trust state governments to mess around with people’s lives (one of the reasons why I reluctantly support Roe v. Wade even though I believe abortion is murder).

So you support state sanctioned murder because you don’t trust the state to mess around with people’s lives? Like how, exactly? By saving them? The government is involved either way you slice it. I don’t understand how siding with the side you admit is murder somehow lessens government intervention.

]]> By: Scott Kirwin http://deanesmay.com/2008/04/26/polygamy-showdown/#comment-154994 Scott Kirwin Sat, 26 Apr 2008 18:39:02 +0000 http://deanesmay.com/2008/04/26/polygamy-showdown/#comment-154994 Seeing the pictures of the crying women and screaming kids hasn't sat very well with me. Maybe it's because I don't trust state governments to mess around with people's lives (one of the reasons why I reluctantly support Roe v. Wade even though I believe abortion is murder). I haven't followed the case very closely so I can't speak intelligently about it. But I have seen polygamy up close in Tanzania, and it has its advantages/disadvantages in that society that I don't think would translate one-one in ours. It just seems to me that as long as there isn't obvious abuse going on (and yes, geezers "marrying' prepubescent girls is a form of abuse in my opinion), then government has no place telling people whom to sleep with. Seeing the pictures of the crying women and screaming kids hasn’t sat very well with me. Maybe it’s because I don’t trust state governments to mess around with people’s lives (one of the reasons why I reluctantly support Roe v. Wade even though I believe abortion is murder).

I haven’t followed the case very closely so I can’t speak intelligently about it. But I have seen polygamy up close in Tanzania, and it has its advantages/disadvantages in that society that I don’t think would translate one-one in ours. It just seems to me that as long as there isn’t obvious abuse going on (and yes, geezers "marrying’ prepubescent girls is a form of abuse in my opinion), then government has no place telling people whom to sleep with.

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