{"id":13761,"date":"2011-07-12T15:47:09","date_gmt":"2011-07-12T22:47:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.amptoons.com\/blog\/?p=13761"},"modified":"2011-07-12T15:47:49","modified_gmt":"2011-07-12T22:47:49","slug":"reply-to-george-ix-polygamy-and-incest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/?p=13761","title":{"rendered":"Reply to George: IX. Polygamy and Incest"},"content":{"rendered":"

[This post is part of a series analyzing Robert George’s widely-read article, “What is Marriage<\/a>“, which appeared on pages 245-286 of the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy. You can view all posts in the series\u00a0here<\/a>.]<\/em><\/p>\n

Page 259 (and also 250): In which Robert George doesn’t realize he’s made a case for recognizing incestuous and polygamous (and polygamously incestuous) marriages.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Polygamy and the revisionist\/common view<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Opponents of marriage equality love<\/em> polygamy. They make a scarecrow out of it, wave him from their rooftop, and roll him down that shingled slippery slope to take out anyone on the ground who\u2019s thinking, Perhaps equality under the law is a good thing after all.<\/em><\/p>\n

George seems to think his conjugal\/procreative view is the only thing holding back polygamy. In fact, however, the revisionist\/common view can argue powerfully against it, too. Here\u2019s George\u2019s own description of this view, which he so dislikes:<\/p>\n

Marriage is the union of two people (whether of the same sex or of opposite sexes) who commit to romantically loving and caring for each other and to sharing the burdens and benefits of domestic life. It is essentially a union of hearts and minds, enhanced by whatever forms of sexual intimacy both partners find agreeable.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

How does this relate to polygamy? Scholar Jonathan Rauch offers this<\/a>:<\/p>\n

If marriage has any meaning at all, it is that when you collapse from a stroke, there will be another person whose \u201cjob\u201d is to drop everything and come to your aid. Or that when you come home after being fired, there will be someone to talk you out of committing a massacre or killing yourself. To be married is to know there is someone out there for whom you are always first in line.<\/p>\n

No group could make such a commitment in quite the same way, because of a free-rider problem. If I were to marry three or four people, the pool of potential caregivers would be larger, but the situation would, perversely; make all of them less reliable: each could expect one of the others to take care of me (and each may be reluctant to do more than any of the others are willing to do\u00a0\u2014 a common source of conflict among siblings who need to look after an aging parent). The pair bond, one to one, is the only kind which is inescapably reciprocal, perfectly mutual. Because neither of us has anyone else, we are there for each other.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

A few months ago, crippling abdominal pain sent me to the emergency room late at night. My partner and I live together, so he was there when it hit me so suddenly. He drove me to the hospital, spoke with the doctor, asked and answered questions, and drove me home. Most of all, after they hopped me up on Dilaudid, he sat in a chair next to my bed, reading a book with his hand on my arm. The happiest part was knowing he would be there for whatever I needed, because he puts no one in his life prior to me.<\/p>\n

Polygamy, of course, means you cannot \u201cknow there is someone out there for whom you are always first in line.\u201d Well, that\u2019s not exactly true. In many traditions, polygamy means the husband will have several \u201csomeones\u201d who automatically put him first, but the wives will have none. This imbalance might explain why polygamy so often turns into exploitation.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve seen a few objections<\/a> to Rauch\u2019s view of marriage:<\/p>\n

We can here leave aside how odd this [idea of marriage] will sound to any married couple with young children, partners whose first responsibility is not obviously spousal. The point to note is Mr Rauch\u2019s telling claim that marriage, as he understands it, is primarily directed towards relieving adult anxiety about facing catastrophe alone \u2014 an \u201celemental fear of abandonment\u201d (i.e., that no one will be \u201cthere for me\u201d) that may well express deeply felt human needs and longings, but has little or nothing to do with parenthood as such, the main conjugal concern of historically liberal thinkers like Locke.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

First, of course, let\u2019s remember that not even all opposite-sex couples have children. Thus anyone who acknowledges those marriages as \u201creal\u201d absolutely must some<\/em> non-parental justification for marriage.<\/p>\n

Yet Rauch sounds right even if we accept that once you have children, your chief responsibility is to ensure their safety, health, and development.<\/p>\n

Follow me on this. In its idealized form:<\/p>\n