You should start with ancient civilizations (Greek, Turk, Roman, and even Biblical Israel.) I have quite a bit of info on the subject, but it's on another computer at home – I'm not there now.

http://themoderatevoice.com/54968/divorce-ban-i…

I liked your approach to this one stockboy, until that last sentence. You are absolutely correct that you can't change behavior by “beating them over the head with the Bible”. I know that.
My main goal is to attempt to make people see (both Christians and non-Christians) that the “worldly” view of sex and relationships has a negative effect on our culture. It is true that adherance to Christian principles does decrease the likelihood of falling into that worldly view, and I'm sure several other non-Christian philosophies can acheive the same effect. But it it the humanist approach that says that the worldly view of sex and relationships is a good thing. The humanist approach is what I fight against and is the single most detrimental factor in our society.
As far as the condoms go, if you don't “trust” the person you want to be with sexually (or do not know their past without a doubt) then you should not be with them. I'm sure you'll ask, “can ANYONE know someone's past without a doubt?” In today's worldly view of sex, no you cannot. When virginity was a “given”, you absolutely could. This goes for both hetero and homsexual sexual relationships.

You know what I get to do, as a person, Sil? Decide what I am passionate about, and what areas, if any, I want to spend my time fighting for. There are lots of problems in the world, and I have time to do a limited amount of work for a limited number of them — so I choose what I care most about and put my time there. How dare you tell me how I should be spending my time?

Of course I'm being rhetorical, not 'intellectually dishonest”. [...] YOU are being intellectually dishonest in evading it and then battering me for attempting to get you to expose yourself, ironically, by calling me what you are being…

How's that summation for “a two year old”?

Well, “I know you are but what am I” is closer to a 5 year old world view, so I do have to apologize by underestimating you by 3 years. So: sorry.

I know the question is mostly directed to roro, but I'll provide my answer as well….

I do not support polygamy. It's not part of my religion. However I also believe that people have the right to practice their religion, so I would not deny polygamists their right to marry.

That's the short answer. However I'm not aware of any polygamist marriage movement and I do not know what they would want in a group marriage. Since you insist on talking about the the right for polygamists to marry and appear to know these details perhaps you can fill me in on these details. This will allow me to talk more intelligently about what it is polygamists do expect out of their marriage.

Sometimes bad things happen to good people. Certainly if you use bad judgement and sleep with someone who you know has an STD, you deserve what you get. But I don't think most people would knowingly sleep with someone who would pass an STD to them.

Your comments tend to be, “This is how people should act” and then you look at the resulting problems. I tend to believe that less preaching (after all 99.999999999% of Americans don't come to me for advice) and more understanding of how people act is better. People will always do stupid things. You can howl all you want about their immoral behavior, but it doesn't change anything.

Most people, especially non-Christians, won't change their behavior if you throw the Bible at them. However if you teach (without judgement) people the importance of using condoms, of not sleeping around and how it benefits them, then they'll respond more positively.

I agree.

I think we all agree that abusive relationships or those with infidelity should not be tolerated by women (or men). Most other marriages can, indeed, be salvaged but it takes a lot of work on both parties. The problem is that too many people begin a marriage with “me, me, me” – and that goes for both men and women. That translates into a selfish marriage. If both parties can actually humble themselves and admit their part in the selfishness; it can be salvaged. Love can actually phoenix into a greater love than was there before (that's actually the norm for those who go through it). This goes for friendships and just about every other relationship out there.

As far as “sexism and homophobia being kissing cousins”. I do not agree for the most part (I know you're shocked). Anything based upon hate is wrong, be it sexism, racism, or hatred of homosexuals. As I've said many times, I have not one ounce of hate toward any of my human brothers and sisters – none. When I meet homosexuals, I treat them as equals and with resepect. I make no apologies for my standing against the behaviors they embrace, as they are not to be “accepted” within my faith. At that point, many end the acquaintance there, and that's fine. But some, respect my opinion, and we simply do not bring it up. My homosexual friends know this about me, as I know about their feelings toward the issue. It's really no different than my being acquainted with atheists. I respect them as human beings, but we differ on faith and beliefs.

The “rules” you alludes to provide for well-defined roles within a society. It has been my experience that liberals typically don't like “roles”, where anyone can serve as anything they wish. That's an option, of course, but it breaks down a society because of the lack of a common moral model.
I agree that marriage should not be for the “benefit of men”. It should benefit men and women as a equal partnership (as the book I follow lays out – the Bible). My wife and I are equals. She acknowleges me as the head of the family, as do our children. I did not demand that, it was given; as she also is a faithful Christian woman. But truth be told, she runs the entire household. I guide the family, but she runs it. Sometimes she does my job(s) and sometimes I do hers. That's the way it should be.

But the bottom line for gay couples is that I cannot “accept” that behavior as the norm. I consider it likened to a fetish. It's your right to engage in whatever fetish you wish – this is America. But to demand that the rest of society embrace it is too much to ask. Yes, heteros have fetishes as well, but to the best of my knowledge, they are not out in the street asking for America to accept and/or celebrate their fetishes.

This may make me seem “backwards” in your view. That's fine. Just know that I have never shown hate toward homosexuals. I treat them with respect, as long as they respect me by not shoving their activities in my face, or worse, the faces of my children.

You haven't answered it without prejudice and I'm challenging you to do so because in courts it will also be challenged. I would like to see in advance what the arguments will be to suppress polygamy once “anything but heterosexual” is allowed between just two people..

Of course I'm being rhetorical, not 'intellectually dishonest”. I'm playing devil's advocate to force readers into a position of seeing the slippery slope. That's obvious. And that position of exposing the slippery slope is how YOU are being intellectually dishonest in evading it and then battering me for attempting to get you to expose yourself, ironically, by calling me what you are being…

How's that summation for “a two year old”?

Please stop playing games and answer why you aren't behind polygamy. Saying “it doesn't work” is not a viable answer. Many lesbian and gay arrangements “don't work” either and end up splitting apart. By your “logic” should we lose enthusiasm for them too?

Also: it's a stupid gotcha. It's not going to make anyone suddenly realize “OMG dude! She's right! Homos ARE like bovine mounting for sperm collection!”

How would you propose to find out? Do you think this is a question you could ever answer accurately — which divorcing couples in America needed to do so and which didn't? And how do you define “needed”? How do you know that your definition of “need” would be the same as someone else's? I have no idea whether any other divorce other than mine “needed” to happen. There's no way I *could* know that unless I were a little elf flitting invisibly in their house from room to room, following them wherever they go.

Of course, there *are,* objectively, behaviors one can see from the outside that relate to the way a couple handles a divorce: for example, if children are involved, how you tell them, how you explain the divorce to them, how you handle custody arrangements, how you talk to each other in front of your children, how you respond to your child's emotional needs in the midst of and after a divorce. It's well-known by now which behaviors will help children and which will stand a good chance of harming them. Don't put your kids in the middle, don't ask your kids (directly or indirectly) to choose between parents (“If you love me, you'll tell me what he's doing”), reassure your children as often as needed that the divorce is not their fault, accept your children's feelings, whatever they are.

But these things have nothing to do with why a couple divorces — with the reasons for the divorce, why they decided they needed to divorce. That's something no one can know but them.

I am as certain as I am of anything in my life that my daughter is happier and healthier, emotionally and psychologically, because her father and I ended the marriage — because I know what the marriage was like, what the dynamics of it were, what the problems were, and how it affected her before we made the decision to divorce. These are things no one else can possibly know. I know how hard we tried to make it work and how impossible I had to finally acknowledge that it was to make it work anymore, and I knew why it was that way. No one else does, except those I have chosen to tell (exceedingly few), and no one else can ever know.

But at the same time that I know the divorce was ultimately the best decision for Maggie as well as for her father and me, I also know that it would NOT have turned out so well in the long run if her father and I had not committed ourselves to being responsible in the way we managed the divorce in relation to her. And I can tell you I was intensely aware of how important that was at almost every moment of my life.

Who suffers most? The children of those broken relationships. For every one who is happy their parents broke up, how many more wish they would have stayed together?

Maggie certainly wished for us to have stayed together for a significant time after the divorce. How could she not have? But my belief is that you have to take the long view and decide, using the adult knowledge that a child doesn't have, of whether this is likely to be the best decision for the child. Redbus, one of the reasons for the divorce (at least for me; I can't speak for my ex-husband) is what I could see the problems within the marriage were doing to Maggie. I am not going to be more detailed right now — maybe I will at some point in the future — but Maggie and her dad are the only ones who can rightfully agree or disagree with me, because they are the only other ones who know what was going on.

So, yes, Maggie did wish for us to get back together, for a long time. But those painful feelings evolved and changed over time. She eventually came to see (and told me, in conversations, with no hesitation) that it was better for all three of us this way. It took time, it was very gradual, but she did come to appreciate the after and look back at the before with recognition of how unworkable it was. Of course, that probably would not have happened if I (and her dad, too, but I just don't want to speak for him) had not made a conscious decision to do certain things and not do certain other things in very specific ways in regard to her. A bad marriage can be just as harmful for a child as divorce — and divorce can be disastrous for a child even if the marriage was also disastrous. It all depends on how it's handled.

And if you won't fight for polygamy, why not if the underlying qualifyer for your “passionate” fight is “people in love with each other seeking a formal union”? Please explain in great and intricate detail your position on multiple-partner matrimony.