Because “No man can serve two masters.”
(Twain, I think.)
And I’d have to take issue with the statement above that children should always go with thier mothers.
What if Bob is married to Jill. Jill can’t have children so he also marries Jane so they can reproduce. Jill is happy to have a child even if it isn’t biologically hers. Jill is the child’s primary care-giver and does all of the things a mother would do for a child. Jane is the bio mother who doesn’t really raise the child.
If Jill decides to leave the relationship and wants to take the children how would that happen? Could it happen? She is their emotional mother but shares no DNA with them. Could Jill adopt Jane’s child without Jane relenquishing custody? Could a child have two legal mothers?
(edit) mine
I think that perhaps you and WhyNot are oversimplifying a bit. By only allowing a single beneficiary you are in effect creating a second-class spouse. While a good pre-nup and divorce lawyer might settle out many potential issues, I can see a lot od convuluted issues here.
Let’s say that Bob marries Jane, Lisa, and Sue. Bob names Jane as his primary spouse. Everyone lives happily for 20 or so years. Bob dies. Now, are Lisa and Sue entitled to a share of the estate, or does it all fall to Jane’s generosity? add kids to this mess etc…
Which is why I said “or take the same benefit and split it however many ways.” That way, each spouse gets an equal share. I’m not oversimplifying; I think you’re overcomplicating. 
Polyamory requires a lot of thought and planning. It’s ridiculous to think that those involved in a polyamorous relationship wouldn’t put the same thought and planning into something like a life insurance policy. It may be more difficult, but certainly doable.
“Our stay in Salt Lake City amounted to only two days, and therefore we had no time to make the customary inquisition into the workings of polygamy and get up the usual statistics and deductions preparatory to calling the attention of the nation at large once more to the matter. I had the will to do it. With the gushing self-sufficiency of youth I was feverish to plunge in headlong and achieve a great reform here - until I saw the Mormon women. Then I was touched. My heart was wiser than my head. It warmed toward these poor, ungainly and pathetically ‘homely’ creatures, and as I turned to hide the generous moisture in my eyes, I said, ‘No - the man that marries one of them has done an act of Christian charity which entitles him to the kindly applause of mankind, not their harsh censure - and the man that marries sixty of them has done a deed of open-handed generosity so sublime that the nations should stand uncovered in his presence and worship in silence.’”
Mark Twain, Roughing It, 1872.
I would say that Bob & Charlie are each married to Alice, but not each other. They simply don’t have any inter-Bob-Charlie relationship. So if Alice dies, their connection, such as it was, is severed.
I’m sure other provisions could be made by law or private contract. Certainly there are a myriad of legal and practical matters that need to be worked out, but I don’t see any reason why those difficulties should prohibit a legal polyamorous arrangement.
And the allowance of polyamory should have no effect on the vast majority of people who desire traditional marriage. Live and let live, I say.
Someone once said to me, “Let two (or more) people who love each other get married, and it’ll be the biggest non-event in history.”
Well, that’s just it…I’m not against polygamy from a moral standpoint, but I think it could get VERY complicated in terms of these practical issues. A very strong case could be made that Lisa and Sue ARE entitled, no matter what the law of survivorship says, and even no matter what Bob’s will says. Lisa and Sue could certainly sue for part of the estate, and eventually, I wouldn’t be surprised if so many of these lawsuits happened, that the law itself would be declared obsolete.
No, IF he has declared a primary spouse and his other wives have accepted it, then that’s it. Just like a will leaving all assets to one child. Sure, they could stamp their feet and whine to a judge and they might even convince him to force Jane to share, but so what? People whine and sue over inheritance rights all the time as it is and it hasn’t overwhelmed our legal system.
Basically, anything that can apply to multiple children can apply to multiple spouses.
In reality, I wouldn’t enter a marriage like that, and I prefer the “split it X number of ways” idea. But I’m certainly supportive of other couples, triads or groups working out whatever arrangements work for them. Frankly, I don’t like default marriage laws and benefits, period. I’ve known way too many young idiots who get married in our current system and are then shocked that they are now responsible for their spouse’s credit card debt. Uh…yeah, that’s the way it works. Force everyone to write, read and sign a paper, and then they’re not (socially) allowed to bitch about it. Intentionally create a contract that works for you, and you’ve changed marriage into a responsible, adult, informed situation. I like that, two partners or twenty.
That sounds nasty…and fits my vision of ‘voilent’. Maybe violent is the wrong word. Less stable? Outcasting young men seems pretty unstable…what if you couldn’t outcast them?
If multiple wives roughly equals multiple husbands then I don’t think this would be an issue.
However, could this happen? One issue I have that we all have an urge to reproduce. A man with multiple wives reproduces as do the women and (baring cheating) he knows they are his kids as do the women of course.
One wife with multiple husbands…well…she gets to reproduce, but do all the guys? A woman can only have so many kids and even if she gives each husband one, baring genetic testing how is he to know for sure? Even if he gets one, he might want more.
Wiping culture out completely and just for the above reason I see multiple wives being much more common than multiple husbands…therefore an imbalance…therefore more unstable.
Men married to a woman with many husbands will also probably (overall) be less content…also contributing.
/brainstorming
But why are you barring genetic testing? It’s here, it’s a reality, and it’s part of our current culture, so it SHOULD be considered. To bar it in the conversation is akin to saying, “Well, barring antibiotics, we’re all going to die of typhoid.” Maybe 100 years ago, uncertain paternity would be a sticking point and valid criticism of polyandry. Today it’s a cotton swab and $99 moot point.
People aren’t hypotheticals. People are people, and they communicate with one another. I know several married monogamous couples who are still sorting out the “should we have kids and when” debate. People need to work these out for themselves (ideally before they get married, but I’m old fashioned like that.) If a man really, really wants biological children, then why on earth would he marry a woman who knows she doesn’t (at least with him) - regardless of whether or not she has another husband? It doesn’t make any more sense in a monogamous context than a polygamous one.
Actually, I see monogamous couples being much more common than multiple couples of either gender, much the same as it is now. Allowing polyamory =/= requiring polyamory. Monogamy wouldn’t suddenly be a thing of the past.
Hence the whole “if a polyamorous relationship isn’t for you, don’t enter into one.” No one’s arm is being twisted into joining a group marriage, here. Just an allowance of multiple spouses.
So if husband #2 isn’t certain that the baby his wife says is his is in fact his and not husband #1’s, he should be legally able, within this loving polyandrous marriage, to force the child to submit to genetic testing if the wife doesn’t want to?
But how would his wife know who it belonged to, if she was sleeping with both of them? Unless she was sleeping with each in really long shifts, then no one would know…and it would be in everyone’s best interests to get tested.
I don’t think anything is ever as simple as arranging it all beforehand. Let’s assume the model of the primary spouse and secondary spouses, wherein the secondary spouses are not recognized in the legal sense. (taxes, estate etc)
So while Bob is alive he holds 1/2 the estate. The other is held legally by Jane.
Lisa and sue however, contribute to the estate monetarily, in assets and in children. Upon Bob’s death, if other arrangements are not made, Jane now profits off of Lisa and Sue’s contributions and is legally within her rights to toss them out on their ears. :eek: The children of the secondary spouses may also have a hard time establishing credit, or a claim to the estate even though they have Bob as a recognized father.
I agree that marraige law is archaic and draconian, but it would almost require that a poly marraige be chartered, and re-chartered each time a new spouse is added or a child born.
That’s why I wouldn’t be in favor of legalized polygamy without the consent of all parties already in the marriage- I wouldn’t want my husband to suddenly decide he does want another wife after all, and not be able to say no to that.
Not everybody does- there are lots of people out there who are childless by choice. There are also adoptive parents who are satisfied with raising children who are not genetically related to them.
The primary difference being you don’t have sex with and bear children by your brother. What you described as the romantic relationship is the heart of a marriage. You don’t have that with your brother. It seems to me (and this is pure opinion unsupported by any survey of poly wives) that a husband who has numerous wives is enjoying a fully romantic relationship, but each wife enjoys only a fraction of the romantic relationship.
Yes, feelings of jealousy for siblings are normal (I was thinking more of when Mom and Dad bring home another sibling with whom I have to share their attentions.) But as we grow up, we are supposed to grow apart from our parents. New siblings do drive a wedge between older siblings and the parents – that’s part of the leaving-the-nest process. It’s actually healthy because it’s supposed to begin teaching us to stand on our own. But adding spouses to a marriage surely must drive that same wedge, with each wife having to learn to make do with less and less of her husband’s attention, time and affection.
I’m basing this on a couple of books Razorette and I have read during our marriage therapy years, primarily Harville and Helen Hendrix’ “Getting the Love You Want,” which is a terriffic guide to all-family relationships, and “Marriage, a History: From Obedience to Intimacy” by Stephanie Coontz.
Few American authors have mastered irony and satire quite like Twain.
They’ll be sued for religious discrimination. And the fact that many employers would terminate health coverage rather than deal with the whole multiple spouse thing is an excellent reason not to legalize polygamy. The rights of the individual do not automatically override the interests of the community as whole; and polygamy would introduce so many new complications and burdens into our system of law and social services that the community is justified in saying, “Sorry, one to a customer.”
Best interest doesn’t enter into it. This thread is about the legal ramifications of recognition of polygamy.
If the marriage contract stipulated that the single wife of two husbands was to endeavor to bear each of them at least one child, then each husband would have the legal right to force a genetic test of any children, even if that’s not wanted by all parties.
Could such a contract be used to recoup losses against a wife who failed to birth myself a child? Say I divorce her or vice versa, can I keep all my assets or collect damages due to unfulfillment of the contract? Does that contract superscede a woman’s right to choice?