Polyamoury and marriage

Degenerate

New member
I don't know how much this varies elsewhere, but here in the UK I may not marry more than one person, in the eyes of the law.

In terms of traditions previous to this law, there are other types of wedding which exist but which are not legally recognised (or recognised by 'the church').

I would like to be able to get married and got engaged to one of my partners (Phoebe) at the weekend. But we do not know yet what kind of wedding we will have. We expect it will be a non-typical wedding and have plenty of time to decide.

I don;t like the idea that I can only marry one of my partners legally, and I wondered how others have got around this, adapted old traditional weddings, created their own, being married to one partner and another partner having less legal rights, etc. Do any Poly aware types of weddings exist (non religious ones I mean)

Would love to hear anything anyone has to say on this matter.

De
 
Here in the US, no form of multiple marriage is legal. That, however, in no fashion precludes religious or non-religious binding ceremonies with multiple people. There's just no legal recognition of those ties.

Thus while Pagans can have handfastings with more than one person, only the legal spouse has the legal rights associated with marriage. Any other spouse, though handfasted, is not recognized by the law. It's not a matter of one partner having more spousal rights than another--one has all spousal rights and the other has none.
 
I am unaware of any countries in the world which allow multiple partner legal marriage. But that doesn't mean there aren't any.

As for having a non-legally binding poly- marriage cerimony, I'm sure there are lots of ways of going about it, and that the polyamory community should have plenty of resouces to draw on for inspiration.

Does anyone here know where to direct Degenerate for ideas or the experience of others?
 
Thanks for your replies about this and I look forward to hearing anything else anyone has to offer on this subject.:)

De
 
I heard once of a legal poly group working to help draft legal documents that approximate a legal marriage. (You can't get all the legal rights of marriage or even of domestic partnership yet, but I think it is pretty close.) However, it is a huge amount of legal work and I imagine the cost is pretty high for it.

I figure that once gay marriage is legal, then it is time for polygamy.
 
I think people look to the state too much for solutions. Personally I'm finding myself more and more distant from any form of government - it's not working for me. I also don't plan to vow my pledge towards a representative of the state, just as I'm not going to do it to a representative of a Church. The only person I would vow my pledge to would be my wife, in front of her whole family. If I vow my pledge to another potential wife, so be it. And I would probably do a sort of spiritual (really spiritual) wedding (something like a commitment together with the universe). I don't owe the state anything in my opinion, so I would just draw up contracts that would guarantee the necessary things for everyone involved.
 
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I figure that once gay marriage is legal, then it is time for polygamy.

I hate to sound like that asshole Jay Severin, but what then? People marrying their pets?

ALL legal marriage should be ABOLISHED and anyone who wants to can just make up their own independent contracts. That should level the playing field.
 
I think that legal marriages should exist, but between same species only...at this point. But contracts would definitly be the way to go. Then the individuals involved can choose whether they want some kind of ceremony as well. A legal marriage is basically just that anyway, a contract. If you get married by a judge, no religion (should) has it's say in your union unless you allow it.
 
Yeah, legal marriage is a contract. I think we'd all be better served if that were made explicit and folks decided on all of the components involved in the contract at the time of marriage, instead of automatically getting stuck with all of the rights and obligations that have been added to the marriage contract that might not fit with individual arrangements.

The trickiest part of dealing with a poly marriage contract involves how to settle up when one ends in whole or part. I don't think it's as difficult as many would have us believe, though, as the business world deals with multi-party contracts with regularity.
 
I hate to sound like that asshole Jay Severin, but what then? People marrying their pets?
Just limit marriage to consentind adult humans and i think we have covered all the bases. :)

ALL legal marriage should be ABOLISHED and anyone who wants to can just make up their own independent contracts. That should level the playing field.
I am not against this idea. What would be nice is a collection of legal frameworks that you can pick from that are common in concept. You can create your own unique legal arrangement if you want to customize it. So one framework could be "monogamous marriage." Another could be "7 year monogous marriage." Yet another could be "2 couple Quad Marriage" and so on...

But for now, we are stuck with the concept of marriage. The governemt and companies use it for so many benefits and categories, that we will have to work within that concept for the time being.
 
I hate to sound like that asshole Jay Severin, but what then? People marrying their pets?

ALL legal marriage should be ABOLISHED and anyone who wants to can just make up their own independent contracts. That should level the playing field.
I think that legal marriages should exist, but between same species only...at this point. But contracts would definitly be the way to go.

Fortunately I'm pretty sure contracts, and marriages require some kind of consent between the parties, so we needn't worry about pets since they'd probably be found incapable of giving informed consent. But there's no reason to be speciest about it, since if marriages were setup as contracts, it should be open to anyone with enough sentience to understand what it says...which will save a lot of time, tears, and blood when the alien invasion comes and the whole species thing comes up again...

Seriously though, the idea of flexible term contracts based on individual group needs (tell me that doesn't sound paradoxical already) would probably save society a lot of tears, heartache and bloodshed upfront since divorce would simply become a non-renewal clause, and people stuck in bad situations would also know there's an end in sight, and decide if they need to break now, or wait until the end of contract, which would probably be a shorter time than what some unfortunates wait for under the current system.

Although I'm not sure if the Lawyers would go for a smaller flat rate up front in lieu of the big $ they make in the current cycle of divorce & alimony.
 
I actually didn't mean what I said, I was just playing devil's advocate.

However, I have to say that something in me believes that legal marriage should only involve two people. I can't really find the words to describe why this is.. Maybe it's mono-conditioning, but I can talk myself around that. Perhaps as this discussion continues, things will become more clear and I'll be able to figure it out.
 
I think that legal marriages should exist, but between same species only...at this point.
But I so wanted my dog to marry my cat!

YGirl said:
However, I have to say that something in me believes that legal marriage should only involve two people. I can't really find the words to describe why this is.. Maybe it's mono-conditioning, but I can talk myself around that. Perhaps as this discussion continues, things will become more clear and I'll be able to figure it out.
When I studied older societies, I quickly learned that marriage was a way to pass a daughter from her father to a new man. It was a way to make sure that lineage could be followed (which is why adultery and sex rules focused on the woman, not the man).

It was not until recently that marriage has changed to be about happiness and love and an environment to raise children. I think a polyamorous idea of marriage is just continuation of this idea.
 
This is actually a very good discussion to have. The reason I say this is because it brings up a question I have had for some time...has anyone else ever had the problem where because you are married that the "new" partner, reguardless of equality, seems to bring up the "because you're married" thing whenever things don't go a certain way or when things seem to be going a different way then expected? Or uses the "you are married" line regularly? also, I found a site where you can get ceremonies for triad or poly unions (tho I must confess that I would have to search for it again :eek:) but alas, those unions aren't recognized by governmental bodies which is not right because in my opinion people should be able to marry whomever they want without fear of retribution from the government who is supposed to protect us not punish us.
 
...has anyone else ever had the problem where because you are married that the "new" partner, reguardless of equality, seems to bring up the "because you're married" thing whenever things don't go a certain way or when things seem to be going a different way then expected? Or uses the "you are married" line regularly?

I've not been in that situation... but honestly, that is why I am leery of being someone's elusive "unicorn"
 
has anyone else ever had the problem where because you are married that the "new" partner, reguardless of equality, seems to bring up the "because you're married" thing whenever things don't go a certain way or when things seem to be going a different way then expected? Or uses the "you are married" line regularly?

Being a "new" partner I can't even imagine saying that. I hold Redpepper's marriage sacred and above everything else in this. of course that is also the source of my compersion for their relationship as well.
 
P used to use this line all the time. "You are married" "He is your husband". I reminded her all the time that we were together a little over 5 years before marriage and the marriage came about for practical (health insurance, life insurance, security for our child) and not emotional reasons. In our hearts, we were married long before. And to us, that "in our hearts" union was what mattered and could be achieved with another just as strongly emotionally, if not legally. I may as well have been talking to a wall.
 
...has anyone else ever had the problem where because you are married that the "new" partner, reguardless of equality, seems to bring up the "because you're married" thing whenever things don't go a certain way or when things seem to be going a different way then expected? Or uses the "you are married" line regularly?

Unfortunately, as the law currently stands, with marriage comes all sorts of legal rights and privileges. Regardless of how people may "feel in their heart", it still stands that two members of the triad have more legal rights and security than the third. This includes rights to hospital visitation, child custody, health insurance, power of attorney, etc. If a third does join a poly couple in some form of marriage, that third is doing so with a great deal more risk than the couple is, regardless of how committed everybody is emotionally. I find it amazing that lots of couples can't understand why this inherent practical inequity can be an issue for a third. I often wonder of married couples wanting a third to join them- would they be willing to divorce each other and one of them marry the third instead?

This (among other reasons I have laid out in other posts) is why I never desire to be a third that joins a couple in a polyfi triad. If being in a closed triad was my relationship style, I might be more willing to consider three people if we all three came together at the same time and none of us were married, but honestly, that's not what I'm looking for.
 
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