NOM

I’ve started watching the HBO series Big Love. I am finding it rather funny. Many things are really spot on as far as the church and polygamy are concerned.
I know it’s a few years old, but it has been numerous to watch the over zealous Mormon neighbors, the Viagra to keep up with his wives, the dictator-like polygamy leaders, and all the gymnastics to navigate a world of polygamy. I really feel for people stuck in polygamy today.
One thought that comes to mind is that if it were not for the government pressure to end polygamy, me and many of us in NOM would also be polygamists or come from polygamous families. I can’t even imagine life in the church today if polygamy had not been eliminated…

2bizE wrote: ↑

Fri Jan 07, 2022 4:31 pm

....... the dictator-like polygamy leaders, and all the gymnastics to navigate a world of polygamy.

Early on I used to think Mormon culture during polygamy would have been fairly normal, just one or two more wives added in.

How naive....

The more one reads the history, the more you realize that Mormonism under Brigham would have been almost exactly as it is/was under Warren Jeffs. Brigham was just as heavy handed and corrupt as Jeff's except for taking the child brides.

Current LDS members who actually think about polygamy (not many do) mentally paint it with a patina of virtue that it never had. Anytime you have someone dictating who you're going to marry you've got a big problem. At least in India you have your parents making your arranged marriage. In early Utah it was your church leader. No conflict of interest there, eh???

It's bizarre that you can look around you in Sacrament Meeting and realize that these people don't blink an eye at the idea that the founders of their religion were harems owners, and that most of these men (and their wives) accept that they also will be in the next life. Equally yoked my a$$.

2bizE wrote: ↑

Fri Jan 07, 2022 4:31 pm

I really feel for people stuck in polygamy today.

If you spend some time listening to the "Year of Polygamy" podcast, or watch some documentaries about current polygamists, or do some reading of books written by polygamists: There are a LOT of polygamists who don't feel "stuck" in polygamy at all. They believe in the "Polygamist LDS Lifestyle" the same way the vast majority of us NOMs believed in mormonism. They truly believe that polygamy is the only way to find eternal bliss with their family and Elohim. They just want to be "left alone" to "live their religion" just like every other religious person on the planet.

I don't get it, just like you 2bizE; But there are lots of True Believing Polygamist Mormons (TBPM's?) who are perfectly happy with their religion/lot in life.

wtfluff wrote: ↑

Sat Jan 08, 2022 4:50 pm

There are a LOT of polygamists who don't feel "stuck" in polygamy at all...... there are lots of True Believing Polygamist Mormons (TBPM's?) who are perfectly happy with their religion/lot in life.

Which only manifests the problem of being raised in a severely isolated culture. How can one know there's anything better if they've never had an opportunity to experience it?

Even the Amish allow they're teenagers to go out and experience the world through Rumspringa before making a final commitment to their religion and way of life.

Palerider wrote: ↑

Sat Jan 08, 2022 5:25 pm

Even the Amish allow they're teenagers to go out and experience the world through Rumspringa before making a final commitment to their religion and way of life.

I have always thought Mormon Rumspringa would be a great idea, but I have a feeling most kids wouldn't come come back, assuming that Mormspringa also gave them license to listen to podcasts and read things like the CES letter.

Hagoth wrote: ↑

Sat Jan 08, 2022 2:44 pm

It's bizarre that you can look around you in Sacrament Meeting and realize that these people don't blink an eye at the idea that the founders of their religion were harems owners, ...

These are the people giving America marriage advice with the Proclamation on the Family.

moksha wrote: ↑

Sat Jan 08, 2022 10:28 pm

Hagoth wrote: ↑

Sat Jan 08, 2022 2:44 pm

It's bizarre that you can look around you in Sacrament Meeting and realize that these people don't blink an eye at the idea that the founders of their religion were harems owners, ...

These are the people giving America marriage advice with the Proclamation on the Family.

I know! Blows my mind!

wtfluff wrote: ↑

Sat Jan 08, 2022 4:50 pm

I don't get it, just like you 2bizE; But there are lots of True Believing Polygamist Mormons (TBPM's?) who are perfectly happy with their religion/lot in life.

I'll bet not that many are perfectly happy. They are obedient, but I would guess few are happy. Just like a select few LDS are happy; there will always be those square pegs that fit through square hole. Statistically speaking, how many baptized LDS are in? Of those in, how many pretend to be happy? Even my very TBM mom had issues, but kept publicly silent. She was often angry about church stuff. She did enjoy her church friends.

I really liked watching Big Love. I remember being shocked when they showed the temple scene. It felt like a betrayal, even though I was freshly out. I'm watching Versailles now. It doesn't have polygamy, but watching how royals were, and are treated, regarding marriage, is so sad. They are no more than bargaining chips, requiring complete obedience. That's how I think of early mormonism, but less about money and power, more about horny and power.

Has not some form of polygamy been around forever across many cultures? It is not remotely unique to mormonism. Maybe the eternal salvation part, but not the lifestyle in general.

Biologically men want to have sex with more than one women. Its the best way to spread your genes. It promotes the survival of the species. All the trappings of religious polygamy are put in place to justify that biology in a culture that frowns on said behavior.


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1smartdodog wrote: ↑

Fri Jan 28, 2022 7:01 am

Has not some form of polygamy been around forever across many cultures? It is not remotely unique to mormonism. Maybe the eternal salvation part, but not the lifestyle in general.

Biologically men want to have sex with more than one women. Its the best way to spread your genes. It promotes the survival of the species. All the trappings of religious polygamy are put in place to justify that biology in a culture that frowns on said behavior.

I agree.

I think most cultures that promote polygamy don't do as well as those that promote pairing, which creates selection pressure against polygamy. Most successful cultures that evolve in the presence of that pressure don't allow it. That leaves men with the biology on one hand saying "spread the seed and out-compete!" and the culture saying "hell no." Cultures put selection pressure on individuals to adapt to them. If cultures make human males evolve into something less inherently polygamous, that seems like a win to me.

The only survival advantages polygamy has ever conferred is via making men expendable. I don't want that, and I don't want women to be treated like cattle.

Also, I'm amazed at how many terrible things are a result of humans giving in to very old programming, at all levels of organization in society.

1smartdodog wrote: ↑

Fri Jan 28, 2022 7:01 am

Has not some form of polygamy been around forever across many cultures?

Yes. Ironically, Mormons find it universally abhorrent. Except, of course, in the case their own founders. Oh, and Old Testament prophets, because they can use that to prooftext their own special case. What do you want to bet if we found out that Joseph Smith had also married a man, Mormon apologists would defend that as godly, but only in that specific case?

Hagoth wrote: ↑

Sun Jan 30, 2022 8:01 am

1smartdodog wrote: ↑

Fri Jan 28, 2022 7:01 am

Has not some form of polygamy been around forever across many cultures?

Yes. Ironically, Mormons find it universally abhorrent. Except, of course, in the case their own founders. Oh, and Old Testament prophets, because they can use that to prooftext their own special case. What do you want to bet if we found out that Joseph Smith had also married a man, Mormon apologists would defend that as godly, but only in that specific case?

You mean like the Law of Adoption?

2bizE wrote: ↑

Sun Jan 30, 2022 9:47 am

You mean like the Law of Adoption?

No, I mean the kind of marriages that were done secretly behind Emma's back with children and other men's wives, for which letters to arrange secret meetings on nights when Emma wouldn't come which the recipient was supposed to burn.

The Law of Adoption totally destroys the apologists' defenses for polygamy, as far as I'm concerned. They use it as evidence that polygamy was purely about linking families together and had nothing to do with sex. But then, if we take that claim just ONE baby step further, we must ask why Joseph and Brigham didn't just adopt a male from each family instead of robbing teenage girls of the right to their own families (which would have produced sons that could be sealed to Joseph via the Law of Adoption with total visibility and no brows furrowed), and wives from his friends. He could have also avoided a lot lying, sneaking around behind Emma's back, tall tales about angels with swords, nonsensical D&C revelations, layers and layers of contradiction, and possibly his own mob execution.