I am a fairly liberal young woman, living in Canada, a country known for its liberality, freedom, and maple syrup. When same sex marriage was legalized throughout Canada, I celebrated. When I read articles about politicians in the US trying to block the legalization of same sex marriage, I feel outraged, and am frequently tempted to fling things in a southerly direction. I have always identified as a proponent of marriage equality and the freedom to marry whomever you love, so you puzzled me at first.
From the small snippets of your lives that I caught from commercials during Say Yes to the Dress (Or as my father calls it, Say No to the Show), I immediately dismissed you as weird, misogynistic fundies. For that, I am ashamed. I have always prided myself on recognizing that reality television commercials do their best to make everything appear more fraught with drama and dissent than actually exists, but I did not even for a moment consider that a possibility for you. Then you appeared on The Rosie Show, a normal(ish), loving family, and I was forced to rethink things.
I’ve now watched two seasons of your show, and have a vastly different opinion of you, and the issues faced by families engaging in plural marriage, as it is so delicately named. Compounds and cults like those of Bountiful, BC and the community led by Warren Jeffs are appalling. Young girls are sold like livestock to marry men old enough to be their grandfathers and spit out handfuls of children, sometimes before reaching their 16th birthdays. That is where the misogyny and abuse exists. I don’t see that in your family. I don’t see why you should be prosecuted, legally or otherwise, for your choice of lifestyle. You are all consenting adults. You have all chosen this for yourselves. Your children appear loved and well cared-for, and have no less parenting in their lives than most families. You are not defrauding anyone, you are not swindling anyone, you are not even legally married more than once! I have stated my support for polyamourous relationships, and so it would be both dishonest and delusional of me to suggest that your family is any less valid than that of a couple who also have partners outside of their “monogamish” marriage.
Polygamy is a touchy subject. It is associated, in many cases, with child abuse, rape, and subjugation of women, but we don’t really see the other sides of this many-facetted issue. I believe that a person should be able to love whoever they love, and that “whoever” is not necessarily singular. I may not have all that much pull, being a broke Canadian student with a blog on the internet, but for what it’s worth, I think that you should all be free to live as one family, without fear of being charged in court or ridiculed by your peers, and I sincerely hope that the future brings you that freedom.
Yours truly,
No comments:
Post a Comment