what are your thoughts on poligamy, folks?

With the whole FLDS raid in texas going down rignt now, poligamy has been on my mind quite a bit lately. especially since that whole situation has direct repercussions in my day to day life.

my question? how do y'all feel about poligamy in general? for, against, neutral, simply interested, etc?

my feelings: i am kind of in the middle. i do not think poligamy itself is nessacarily wrong, or heinous, and i have no real issues with groups that practice it as long as they keep it between consenting adults, although i would not practice it myself if it were truly legal and socially acceptable. generally, i agree to disagree if discussing the topic with one of them and we are at odds. imho, it's no worse than many of our elected officals who have multiple mistresses, are involved in prostitution rings, etc. for me it's more of how you go about it, thus my next comment:

a number of poligamist groups that i am aware of have had problems with inbreeding ( the marriage of first cousins and/or half brothers and sisters, generally,) which is inevitable if you practicice poligamy in a closed group, especially just within one family. it's not a good thing, and is actually starting to have genetic consequences in some cases, but is an unfortunate fact of life for these folks. but that's not what really pisses me off. The group (or subgroup) of people who have made the news by dragging innocent (women and) children into things without thier consent, and using them as a means of self gratification and to generate revenue via tax and welfare fraud, is, in my opinion WAAAY over the line .:mad: IMHO the folks in texas deserve exactly what they are getting, and it's about friggin time. someone needs to stop the the cycle of abuse, or at least put a kink in it, now that thier activities have escalated to the point of , in my prsonal opinion, organised crime under the cover of religion. that said, please keep in mind that the particular group of folks in the texas comopound who are so prominantly featured on the news do NOT represent the typical way most of the other local poligamist groups do things, nor is it nessacarily represenative of the FLDS religeous practics except for the group that recently came under the leadership of Warren Jefffs . also keep in mind that in the state of Utah, where Warren Jeffs was tried and convicted for rape as an acccomplice for arranging underage marraiges, basically said to the rest of the local area poligimast groups in the local news right after he was sentcnced, that (and this is loosely quoted),
Quote:
Warren Jeffs got the verdict he needed, and it is a great victory for the state of Utah in it's fight against sexual predators.. that said, the state does not currently feel the need to, nor does it curently have the nessacary statuates and/or other legal tools to, prosecute a person or group based on their practice of poligamy alone. as long as you are not engaging in child abuse, rackateering, and tax fraud, we won't come after you. as least not in the forseeable future"

for some some history on how i gained my current perspective:

I live near a large FLDS poligamist community in southen Utah/Arizona. For the past 15 years or so both my wife and i have, on a regular basis, done business with, worked with and in the case of my wife, worked for, a number of said FLDS poligamists. They are an established part of my community, and it's not possible for me to NOT interact with them. the majority of my ancestors came to utah with the mormon pioneers, and were poligamists themselvs in the early days of the mormon church before Wilford woodruff, who was the mormon prophet at the time, ended the practice of poligamy by the momon church untill further notice. this caused the original members of the FLDS religion, as well as 50+ different splinter groups, to go thier seperate ways and start poligimast colonies on thier own as they did not agree with the mormon prophet ending it. (poligamy)

my wifes ancestors were scottish methodists, and also settled in much of the same areas of Idaho and Utah as the mormons. on more than one ocassion, the poligs, as we call them, have asked my wife if she was so and so's daughter, thinking she was one of them!!! while working wih them at the local hospital, she cut her hair rather short one day( it was getting very hard to take care of) and about 20 co workers who would have nothng to do with the poligs unless it was directly work related suddenly started talking to her on breaks and in general office chit chat, realising she wasnt one of them in scrubs. a few of the poligs also mistook me for one of them at a company party for a polig owned business my wife was working for, and about 5 of the women tried to hook themselves up with me needless to say, based on the way we look and talk like them, and thier geographic and religous proximity to our ancestors, my wife and I have both come to the conclusion that there is a VERY high probablility that one or both of us are distantly related ( circa 1890 or so.) to at least several of FLDS famlies we have interactd with .

these folks are decent folks, not the perverted twisted monsters the media types them out to be. (well, at least the women, children,. and and a fair portion of the guys) they are nice to talk to, fair to work for, and easy to get along with if you can overlook ther extremely conservative clothing fasions that make them stand out even in a sundy crowd. these are normal, evreyday folks with normal everyday problems, wants, needs, and dreams. and a very sick religous and commmunity leader. I kind of feel sorry for the whole lot in a way.....

*sighs* and what WERE they thinking moving to texas and holing up in a compound??? first mistake: moving to texas. EVERYTHING goes down big in texas. even the child welfare operations. second mistake: intentionally holing up in a compound branch davidian style and purposly being wierd. kind of asking for the texas rangers to come knocking on your front door, if you ask me.

one way or the other, i'm right in the middle of this. and it will have direct repercussions on my life. just curious to see what everyone else thinks.