What about polygamy
 

Should polygamy be legal?

How it hell could you afford more than maybe one? While in Sumatra, you could have 4, if the others agreed! WTF!

In all honestly, I have no moral qualms with it. I don't personally understand the concept of three-way love (no pun meant at all), but if someone else does, far be it from me to deny them that.

HBO's Big Love shows the kind that should be legal (the main characters) and the type that shouldn't (the prophet).

An enclave community has a large danger of veering into child abuse for structural reasons. With a 50/50 gender ratio, and assuming a multiple women/one man structure, there will be intense competition for brides. Without constant vigilance, prospective brides will be picked up earlier and earlier, and prospective competition will be expelled.

it should be legal. the government shouldn't litigate family structure. where it gets messy is inheritance, custody of children, and divorces. the courts can handle that, though.

Don't care. Nothing morally wrong with it, IMO, but it seems incredibly stupid in today's culture. Seems kind of a throwback. People can hardly make relationships work with one other person, why add more to the mix? Plus, the Mormon version has pedo and human trafficking overtones (kind of wish I had put "against" now).

If you look back in history you can find all the pedophilia and arranged marriage stuff in normal marriage as well, we instituted laws to control it. The same thing will happen with polygamy, we'll just apply current laws to the new situation. I think most, if not all, of the legal problems can avoided by slashing government perks to married couples. It's not really in the governments juristiction anyway to say that some people deserve tax breaks just because they signed a form together.
We have the infastructure and laws in place to prevent couples from being driven into bankrupcy by a large family already, you just wont be able to have a lot of kids.
Again, I don't really feel the need to prove one side or the other on grounds other than legality and precident, which clearly says 'go ahead'.

I know many women that would need several husbands to support them.:D
What, you weren't thinking of multiple husbands? Why not? Why always multiple wives?

Who the hell would want more than one mother-in-law, anyway?

My problem with it is that it is too rife with "issues". Mainly in the US is it's possible misuse in business.

We are talking MARRIAGE or other legal union, right, not just keeping yourself a haram?

Sure, people can say there is nothing MORALLY wrong with it but what they really mean is there is nothing wrong with a MAN having multiple partners. Or brood mares, or handmaidens, or whatever use a man has for several/many women under his control. Nobody ever considers it in the light of giving women the same privilege, that would cause the collapse of civilization, bet on it. (One of my favorite quips is "If men could get pregnant, abortion would be a sacrament.") WHY doesn't any race, religion, or civilization want to deal with the idea of women being in a union with multiple males? THAT is the issue I have with "plural marriage". It is just another scam which victimizes women.

I don't see that there should be legal sanction against people who choose that way of life. That said, most of what I've seen on tv, or read, about polygamy seems to be very much orientated around the male and his desires / needs. I get the impression of a very sexist system, where the man decides to take another wife and wife n01 better get used to the idea. I also get the impression from some of the more prominent proponents of polygamy, that it seems to promote intensely patriarchal systems, and the marrriage of young women to older men is common.

Of course, I may be totally wrong. The documentaries I've seen may have had a very narrow perspective on a much wider issue. But it does mean I have a negative gut feeling about polygamy. Shouldn't be illegal though.

Hey, I sure didn't say anything about the genders and ratios... As far as I'm concerned a lady can have as just as many spouses as a man can.

Actually I always understood that polygamy referred to a man having more than one wife, and polyandry was a woman having more than one husband.

The online dictionaries do not seem to back this up though.

(edited to add - polygyny was the specific term for more than one wife - I assume that's where I got confused)

It's happened before, and if plural marriage were allowed in the US, there would be no restrictions on gender ratios. But many of the people in the US who would want to take advantage are from an extremely patriarchal and strict religion where the purpose of marriage is to generate children. Polygyny is much more efficient for that purpose than polyandry.