"Two Forms Of Polygamy"

The forces of good and evil are amassing on either side of the simmering polygamy war in Canada. You know I'm already cracking up about some aspects of this "reference" case, aspects like:

1. You are guilty of polygamy if merely accused. The law itself is SO POORLY written and so constitutionally defective, it ought to fall - on its face.
2. The polyamorists are saying that their kind of multiple partnerships is more healthy than that of polygamists. They want to be exempt from the law.
3. If the STUPID polygamy law is upheld in the reference's decision, it will inevitably be challenged again and tested very shortly afterwards.
4. There are so few polygamists in Canada, the vast majority of the amici and affiants are from south of the border.
5. Even gays ridicule the law - see this post.

Anyway, in my browsing around on this topic, I discovered the following statement from British Columbia's Attorney General, Craig Jones.

Jones's (unenviable) job is to defend the anti-polygamy law. Defending it is such a fantastical exercise, he clearly had to cook up some very creative reasoning. Let me quote some of Jones's lunatic contortions of logic:

'At one extreme, "polygamous" in the zoological sense describes an organism that will engage in mating behaviour with more than one partner in the course of its reproductive life. By this standard, most Canadians are "polygamous" and most "polygamy" is innocent.'

OKAY, JONES, WE ARE WITH YOU SO FAR! Let's read on as he argues . . .

'. . . the prohibition in s. 293 should be interpreted as follows:
. . . Section 293 prohibits . . . marriage-like relationships involving more than two persons that purport to be sanctioned by an authority having power or influence over the participants . . '

. . . WHAT? "AN AUTHORITY" LIKE GOD ?????????? Are you grasping this tortured hairsplit? Let's hear his punchline . . .

'8. The Criminal Code prohibition was and is addressed to the overwhelmingly dominant form of polygamy, [he's talking about Fundamentalist Mormons and Muslims] and the one most closely associated with demonstrable and apprehended social harms: that is, a patriarchal polygyny that is intergenerationally normalized and enforced through more or less coercive rules and norms of non-state social institutions. Section 293 leaves the balance of multi-partner human sexual behaviour, that which is unrelated to the harms the prohibitions seek to address, unaffected.'

I get it now - promiscuity in the form of casual polygamous behaviour is healthy, innocent and worthy of Canada's full legal protections (like prostitution now is), whereas informal plural marriages inspired by deeply-held religious beliefs and Biblical doctrines are reprehensible and "criminal".

So, here is where I get horribly confused - if "most Canadians are polygamous" (at least approx. 18 million of the 33.5 million Canadians), then how can Winston's and Jimmy's form of polygamy (practiced by scores of people) be the "overwhelmingly dominant form" ??? (Canadian math?)

Moreover, if the bad "form" of the two forms of polygamy is the one that purportedly involves higher "authority" and "patriarchy", shouldn't all religious, monogamous marriages also be outlawed; - AND, shouldn't all monogamous partnerships (legally-solemnized or not) - where the male is thought of as the "head-of-household" - be prohibited, too?

Message to A.G. Craig Jones - - - GO BACK TO ELEMENTARY SCHOOL AND RE-TAKE ALL THOSE CLASSES YOU SLEPT THROUGH !!!! Only then will you be able to competently teach all those year-long classes to the Mounties, where you will try to explain all of the convoluted nuances of figuring out which polygamists are the good, innocent ones, and which ones are the bad, incarcerable ones.

Tar Baby, Eh?

In my short, cynical life, I have seen some public officials get a wild hair about a particular thing and then over-act. I watched a documentary yesterday about ex-Beatle, John Lennon. Richard Nixon and his administration were nervous about John Lennon's ability to marshal sentiment and support for anti-war groups and left-wing activists. They hatched a plan to silence Lennon by revoking his visa and deporting him back to Britain. Needless to say, the plan failed. Lennon had the emotional support of hundreds of millions of fans, and the deportation plan was craven and disingenuous. Lennon eventually became a legal permanent U.S. resident and lived out the rest his (woefully short) life in New York City. Nixon went down in political flames and shame.

I won't say that Canadian polygamists are as popular as the Beatles, but some Canadian politicians are as stupid as Richard Nixon, eh? Perhaps driven by the likes of Wally Oppal, Jancis Andrews, Daphne Bramham and Nancy Mereska, some Canadian observers and officials have taken up the anti-polygamy crusade and are gearing up for the polygamy showdown of their shallow lives. A TV reporter remarked to me recently that he found such crusades too full of "negative energy". What kind of person wallows in "negative energy" 24/7/365 ??? Does negative energy survive into the next life?

People acted shocked when Warren Jeffs was un-convicted. Why? His prosecution was a big set up in the first place. Perhaps the only surprise was that a Court, which not long ago upheld the criminalization of fantasy weddings, now recognized the absurdity of imprisoning a cleric who solemnized a wedding for a couple whose marriage would eventually be unsuccessful.

So, what do we think will ultimately be the result of the "reference" battle before the British Columbia Supreme Court? Which outcome will shock us the most? (See the intelligent discussion and a link to an excerpt of a conference on the subject:)

Canadian Constitution Foundation 2009 Conference

Or watch Martha Bailey on YOUTUBE - [Note also the comments from Nicholas Bala (Queens University Law Professor), who argues that group sex (commercial or non-commercial) should be permitted, while religious plural marriages should not, because the group sex generally does not produce as many children.]

The last thing I would want to see is that the Canadian Charter of Freedoms be muzzled in favor of prosecuting Canadians who enjoy an alternative lifestyle. COME ON, PEOPLE !!! Gay relationships and MARRIAGES in Canada are legal and commonplace. The polygamists are not seeking legal recognition or status for their relationships as did the gays. They want only to be left alone.

The question of prosecuting "polyga-bigamy" is an exquisite migraine. It is a tar-baby for any foolish public official who wants to take it on. I say "BRING IT ON !!!". This debate has awakened a different Canadian faction - a literal army of Canadian "poly-amorists" -- people who share multiple bed-or-life-partners for generally NON-religious reasons. Will they too be marched off to prison?

I can see it now (almost a Joan of Arc or Martin Luther tribunal) - the judge asks the defendant, "Do you believe in Joseph Smith or Mormonism? Did you sleep with this person for religious or erotic reasons. Be careful how you answer, because how you answer the question will determine whether you go free or go to prison for ten years!"

EVEN IF the decision were to go against the polygamists, what then ??? I assume that Canada would prosecute Winston Blackmore and Jimmy Oler - but for WHAT ??? Is it the religion that defines the crime? I know there are a lot of stupid public officials in Utah and Texas, but has Canada lost its mind altogether? Does Canada want to get stuck to this tar baby?

This is like watching a three-ring circus where most of the observers don't realize it is a circus. Murderers often experience regret once they have been incarcerated and are no longer abusing substances or rage. Will our public officials finally have regret and contrition when they realize that brutalizing a generally innocent minority was not the purpose for which they were elected or appointed?

"In the days when the love of men shall wax cold for one another, see that thou be not found with thine hands on a tar baby, lest thou be consigned at the last day to a state of eternal disgrace and shame, eh !!. Renn II, 24:7"

Thought and Deed - Belief vs. Practice

Before I launch into another "polygamy sympathizing" rant, I want to express my appreciation to whomever it was who republished my "vitriolic" anti-David-Leavitt post on the MORMON MATTERS website.

Leavitt Alone, You Idiot!

If nothing else, it stimulated some good dialogue. One commenter reminded us that Utah's state constitution has an anti-plural marriage clause in it. Accordingly, I remind the commenter that this clause has been found unconstitutional (see Coyle v. Smith, 221 U.S. 559 [1911]).

Today's sermon is on the topic of thoughts and deeds. I trust that my readers are all endowed with a sufficiently robust I.Q. and have no difficulty understanding the distinction between thought and deed. The (despicable) Reynolds Court had no difficulty drawing a distinction between thought (belief and opinions) and deed (practices) when it (Justice Morrison Waite) wrote:

"Laws are made for the government of actions, and while they cannot interfere with mere religious belief and opinions, they may with practices."

Americans have had this concept pummeled into their heads for so many years that they can all recite it very capably - government may not punish bad thoughts, yet it may absolutely punish bad acts.

Why, then, do Canada, Utah and Texas punish the thinking of some and not the acting of others?

I have vigorously decried the insane Canadian anti-polygamy law in previous posts. Please indulge me as I attack it again. Canada is investing millions of calories and lawyer-hours in wringing its hands over what to do about the handful of Fundamentalist Mormon polygamists in Creston/Bountiful (B.C).

Gay marriage is legal in Canada. Gay thought is protected; gay copulation is protected. Homosexuality is FIRST an abstract concept, existing only as an urge or inclination in the mind of the gay human. Only SECONDLY is homosexuality a deed or act, manifested when gay partners engage in the physical act of sexual contact and intercourse. When gayness was still a crime on this continent, NOBODY was ever prosecuted for gay thoughts, just gay deeds (just as the Reynolds belief/exercise doctrine decreed).

With polygamy, this all gets turned on its head. No doubt, millions of right-thinking Canadians regularly "sleep around" (fornicate, shack-up, cheat, etc.). Like homosexuality, fornication and adultery are legally protected in Canada (as in the U.S.). Smart Canadians understand that polygamy (or "plural marriage") is a cultural or religious CONCEPT. It is abstract. It is merely a notion in the mind of the observer or practitioner. When I say I "embrace" polygamy, I simply reveal that, in my mind, I don't reject the concept or lifestyle. I don't literally become a polygamist (culturally or religiously) until I do the tangible matrimonial things (ceremony, sexual acts, cohabiting, etc.).

In Texas and Utah, at least a dozen noble citizens sleep around recreationally. It is almost the State sport. These lusty folks commit the physical acts of adultery and fornication (unenforced crimes). They often satisfy the standard of bigamous/polygamous conduct, but they do not cross the dread felony threshold until they have BAD THOUGHTS. I don't mean bad thoughts like the ones involving nudity, erotica, genitalia, sex, disrobing, foreplay, arousal, toys, lingerie, talking dirty, etc. - NO !!!!!!!!! --- I mean bad thoughts like the ones about Mormonism, Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, fundamntalism, D&C 132 and the like.

You see, in Texas, Canada and Utah, the sex acts will get you NO prison time. The palpable deeds will NEVER make you a criminal - it's the thoughts that get ya'!!!!

We all know that incest is a crime, right? I mean, if you have sex with your minor (or even adult) daughter, you go to prison, right? Well, . . . . what if you went to bed with a girl you met at bar, and you tell your friend that, while you were engaged in sexual acts with her you fantasized that she was your daughter? Can your friend then go to the police and accuse you of committing incest (in your mind)? The sex acts were legal, but the thoughts were incestuous, right? Absurd, right? It would never hold up in a court of law, because you cannot be convicted for having bad, abstract fantasies in your head, right? . . . . UNLESS YOU BELIEVE IN POLYGAMY (religious or cultural)!!!!!!!!!!.

You see, pretty soon, Wendell Nielsen will go on trial in Texas for having one legal wife and some other women whom he thinks of as "wives" (not "daughters"). He is not being charged with incest. He is being charged with "bigamy". In Texas' view, his crime is that he has one legal wife, a handful of other (always adult) partners with whom he has allegedly shared a dwelling or a bed but, WORST OF ALL, he believes in the biblical doctrine of plural marriage as restored through Joseph Smith. That's the kicker - that's what makes him a felon - not the women, the sex, the children, the cohabiting (all protected acts throughout Texas, Canada and the U.S.) - NO, it's the thoughts in his head, the abstract notions of theology and religious doctrine shared by at least 13 million Latter-day Saints.

So, as Canada prepares to revisit its ridiculous anti-polygamy law, I remind the honorable court and distinguished Canadian subjects that what the law tries to do is criminalize thought, not deeds, just like Utah's laughable bigamy statute (not to mention that no witnesses or evidence are needed to secure a conviction !!!!!).

A few hundred years back, America (see Salem, Mass.) hanged witches. What is a witch? Is it a lady with a black hat, a broomstick, and a face like Glenn Close? Or is a witch a woman who concocts mysterious potions and puts hexes on her enemies? Eventually, America decided that executing purported witches was unacceptable because their crimes were largely of a religious/ecclesiastical nature, and we no longer wanted to criminalize blasphemy, heresy, and even "witchcraft".

So, recreational copulators go unpunished while the religious ones go to prison. To me, that is punishing the thoughts and not the deeds, which is precisely the opposite of what the Reynolds Court so hypocritically strove to codify.

Have, fun, Canada !!!! - - (and Barbie, too).

Canada is at it again !!!

If last month's shaming of British Columbia's former Attorney General, Wally Oppal, wasn't enough, his successor, Mike de Jong, wants to revisit the illegality of polygamy in Canada. I am confident that, over the decades since polygamists have occupied the Creston/Bountiful area of B.C., there have been several disaffected people who have left the communities and have something to complain about (my sister-wife spanked my kid; my husband didn't spend enough time with me; I had to eat oatmeal; I don't like long dresses; etc., etc. ad nauseam).

I think also that a lot of young women may have been married in their mid teens back in the day when marrying in the mid teens was fashionable and widely acceptable.

None of this has anything to do with the question of whether a man may marry a first wife legally and then add other women to his "family" through an informal religious ceremony and then proceed to conjugate with them.

Mike de Jong wants the Supreme Court to settle the confusion which has been created between Canada's Charter of Rights and Freedoms (which guarantees freedom of religious conduct) and Canada's century-old anti-polygamy law which reads -

Polygamy
293. (1) Every one who

(a) practises or enters into or in any manner agrees or consents to practise or enter into

(i) any form of polygamy, or

(ii) any kind of conjugal union with more than one person at the same time,

whether or not it is by law recognized as a binding form of marriage, or

(b) celebrates, assists or is a party to a rite, ceremony, contract or consent that purports to sanction a relationship mentioned in subparagraph (a)(i) or (ii),

is guilty of an indictable offence and liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding five years.

Evidence in case of polygamy
(2) Where an accused is charged with an offence under this section, no averment or proof of the method by which the alleged relationship was entered into, agreed to or consented to is necessary in the indictment or on the trial of the accused, nor is it necessary on the trial to prove that the persons who are alleged to have entered into the relationship had or intended to have sexual intercourse.

R.S., c. C-34, s. 257.
------------------------------
I admit that I do not know Mike de Jong's motives, but it seems that any layperson can see that the language of the law is reprehensible, and the Court ought to strike it. Paragraph (2) basically says that no WITNESSES ("averment") or PROOF is needed of the commission of the alleged crime, AND it need also not be shown that the accused had or wanted to have sex. In other words - YOU ARE GUILTY BECAUSE I SAID SO !!!

I would rejoice that we do not have so dumb a law here in the U.S., but Utah's anti-bigamy statute runs a close second.

So, what will the Canadian Court do? Canada has tens of thousands of respectable Muslim polygamous families. If the B.C. fundamentalist Mormons are molesting teen girls, then charge them with the pertinent offences under existing rape/molestation/sex-with-a-minor laws. Methinks that B.C. would have done that long ago, had the RCMP found a shred of evidence during its multi-year inquisition.

Bottom line - YOU CANNOT write an anti-polygamy law without impermissibly targeting a specific religious minority. You also CANNOT write one without colliding with existing fornication and adultery statutes which no "right-thinking" western nation has enforced since Wilford Woodruff made his covenant with death and agreement with hell.

So have at it, Supreme Court, twist your brains, bend the phrasing, enlist the brightest legal minds north of Idaho and Montana, and show me how to prosecute a guy for having sex with two adult women (in the same month) to whom he is not legally married, and I will personally move to Canada and test the law.

I feel like these anti-polygamy activists and their suck-up politicians are unwittingly bringing about precisely the opposite outcome from what they really want. Before the U.S. Supreme Court declared homosexual sex a basic Constitutional liberty in 2003, gays in Oklahoma and Texas were legally required to go to the county courthouse and register themselves as SEX-OFFENDERS !!!!!!!!

Perhaps the world needs to come to an end before foolish people will realize their folly.

Today on Fox News I actually heard a financial correspondent say that the Federal Reserve is "an independent part of the U.S. government" !!!

Vote Bernanke !!!