In Legalize Polygamy: Marriage Equality for All, Jillian Keenan argues in favor of striking down laws banning polygamy in this country. She has some solid points, though I’m disappointed at the lack of acknowledgement of multi-partner families with different structures, i.e. polyandry.
If we were to legalize multiple-partner marriages of any kind, I would see it as a step backward rather than forward to isolate such rights to husbands with multiple wives. Despite this (admittedly rather large) oversight, her perspective is worth a quick read. Here’s a sample:
Legalizing consensual adult polygamy wouldn’t legalize rape or child abuse. In fact, it would make those crimes easier to combat.
Right now, all polygamous families, including the healthy, responsible ones, are driven into hiding (notwithstanding the openly polygamous Brown family on TLC’s Sister Wives, that is). In the resulting isolation, crime and abuse can flourish unimpeded. Children in polygamous communities are taught to fear the police and are not likely to report an abusive neighbor if they suspect their own parents might be caught up in a subsequent criminal investigation. In a United States with legalized polygamy, responsible plural families could emerge from the shadows—making it easier for authorities to zero in on the criminals who remain there.
Yes, most of these things have been said before — in many different mediums, by many different people — but there’s something very, VERY personal and powerful about this monologue. There is a palpable passion in these women that demands your attention and dares you to defy them.
Yes, I like this approach.
Women like these are the stuff of nightmares for conservative, white, middle-aged Washington. You know, those men who have obviously never satisfied a woman, but either believe they have or, worse yet, see no value in trying. The ones whose collective verbal diarrhea confirms again and again that they are as ignorant about our bodies and minds as they hope we are about their blatant, panicked attempts to legislate their way to a renewed male dominance.
I want to see them shaking in their boots. I want to scare them. It feels good.
But even more than that, I want to get through to them.
So watch this video. And then join the project and make one of your own. Because we can all act individually, and we can all click “like” or “repost”, but the bigger this gets, the harder it will be to ignore.
This is precisely why the show “To Catch a Predator” is cruel and misguided. Watching it has always made me feel ill, but not in the way that its creators intended.
Like many forms of sexual deviance, pedophilia once was thought to stem from psychological influences early in life. Now, many experts view it as a sexual orientation as immutable as heterosexuality or homosexuality. It is a deep-rooted predisposition — limited almost entirely to men — that becomes clear during puberty and does not change.
In the ritual adultery of Gunung Kemukus, there are many ways to reach your goal. Some people arrive with the blessing of their spouses; others do it secretly. For some, paying for sex invalidates the ritual; for others, it’s just a shortcut. Everyone has a different idea of just how Islamic the whole thing is.
Of course, the ritual isn’t Islam as most would recognise it. Instead, it’s emblematic of Indonesia’s – and especially Java’s – syncretic mix of Islam with earlier Hindu, Buddhist and animist beliefs. But what is truly surprising is that even while Indonesia undergoes a steady shift towards more orthodox Islam, the ritual on Gunung Kemukus is exploding in popularity. It’s a quintessentially Indonesian contradiction.
I can’t help but wonder what the male-to-female ratio is here…
When I find myself in a conversation about sex, and mention that I am a fan of the activity, the men in the room tend to get very nervous, very handsy, or very surly. I think this is due to a common misconception: that women who like sex will “give it up” to anybody.
- Songwriter Carsie Blanton on being a woman who loves sex. From her blog.
If only one of you is in the mood, do it. Even if sex isn’t great every time, it’s a unique form of communication and togetherness that can help you stay together with a good degree of contentment.
According to a new book by evolutionary psychologist David Barash they are
“…like the peacock’s tail, a permanently voluptuous bosom might be a woman’s way of signalling her fitness by showing that she can thrive despite depositing so much valuable fat into cumbersome and mostly decorative…
