Columnist Still Clings to Bigotry

Mindelle Jacobs at the Edmonton Sun looks at a polyamorous “V.”

Marilyn, a stay-at-home mother and polygamist has a dilemma. Who to sleep with on Valentine’s Day? Her husband or her boyfriend?

If she was in a triangle that engaged in threesomes instead of a V, the question wouldn’t be there.

Marilyn e-mailed me after reading a recent column I wrote in which I criticized a law professor for urging that polygamy be decriminalized.

Good for her.

“As a mother and wife, I firmly believe in the protection of women and children,” she wrote. “As an individual who identifies as polyamorous … and is involved in a consensual relationship with not only my spouse but also with another man, I strongly disagree with (the ban on polygamy).”

Thank you.

She wondered if I’d like to chat. Well, sure. After all, you don’t (knowingly) meet polygamists every day.

Don’t be so sure. Poly people are your neighbors, your coworkers, and people you pass by every day.

She compares her awakening polyamorous sensibility to someone realizing he or she is gay. “It was a very interesting process coming out to myself,” she says. “I realized something very deep about myself — that this kind of relationship makes sense to me. This is who I am.”

She should have that freedom.

All in their mid-40s, they’d be unremarkable in a crowd. No Playboy Mansion looks. Just middle-aged people with a bizarre lifestyle.

Love is not bizarre. It is strange that some people will call this relationship bizarre, but they wouldn't say the same thing if this woman was cheating on her husband, having a secret affair.

Inexplicably, Jacobs wraps up the column this way…

Sorry, Marilyn. While I can’t imagine the police busting up your polygamous party, I don’t want Canada to be a beacon for the cause. Overall, polygamy causes immense harm to women. Why encourage it?

No proof is given, because there isn’t any that will back up such prejudice. What harm is Marilyn suffering? Why deny freedom and equality to consenting adults?

Barbara Anne Smith is confused as shown in this comment…

IMO Marilyn is lucky, but it isn't a true polygamous relationship. If it was, she may be the main wife, but she would also have several sister wives and be at the beck and call of her so-called husband.

Polygamy is any marriage with more than two spouses. Smith is thinking of a certain form of polygyny, which is a subset of polygamy. If Marilyn considers both men her husbands, then she is in a polyandrous form of polygamy. Either way, it is a polyamorous relationship.