Utah Just Got One Step Closer to Making Polygamy Great Again

Source -  Lawmakers in Utah supported a bill that decriminalizes polygamy in the state, The Salt Lake Tribune reported Monday. ...

“The people that I have spoken with long to feel part of society,” [Sen. Diane] Henderson argued. “They are tired of being treated like second-class citizens. They feel like Utah has legalized prejudice against them. They want to be honest people, but feel like they have to lie or teach their children to lie about their families in order to stay safe.” 

The newspaper noted that the new penalty for polygamy would not include jail time, only fines up to $750 and community service. 

I'm not one to dive into politics. Particularly the politics of exotic, far off lands with strange customs I'll never live in, such as Utah. I'm pretty much a small "l" libertarian who tries to live it and let live. And frankly, I always thought that it was weird the U.S. forced Utah to drop polygamy in order to become a state from the first time I heard about it in History class. I seem to recall it went to the Supreme Court and they ruled it was constitutional for the other states to make that a requirement. Even while half of them were practicing objectively horrible things like slavery, denying women the vote, and allowing the Irish to move in (shudder). 

So good for Utah if they get this through. You guys do you. Ever since Joseph Smith made up a religion was chosen by God to dig up the Book of Mormon that was written on golden plates under a tree on his farm, copy them down onto paper and then re-bury them without ever showing them to anyone, having several wives has been part of Utahan's cultural tradition. If their women are happy being 1/6th or 27.5% of a happy marriage or whatever, what business is it of anybody else's? 

I'll just add this though. At the risk of sounding like I'm judging the cultural norms of some foreign land, these Utah husbands can have all the polygamy. As Trump said of Mitt Romney, keep it. It's all yours. Do. Not. Want. I think I watched "Sister Wives" once. And there was no part of me that envied whatshisname. This guy:

Having the right wife is THE major part of what makes life worth living. Emphasis on the "the." As in singular. Because even the very best of them don't come right out of the box ready to plug and play. Under the best of circumstances, a wife is a complex piece of machinery that require months of training to operate. Think not of a laptop, but a Lockheed-Martin F-35 Lightning II all-weather stealth multirole combat aircraft. They require expert handling and high levels of precision maintenance from the very best engineers. The more complex wives to maintain are probably more like the carrier you try to land the F-35 on. I wouldn't know. I've had it easy. 

I've often told the Irish Rose I'd never cheat on her. One, because I'm not attractive or desirable and it's a miracle she's interested. Two, because one wife is more than enough. Ideally, marriage would be like the work week for a firefighter: Four days on, two days off. Then I'd spend a third of my time hanging out with my friends and she can go off to her rehearsals for that "Guys and Dolls" she's doing in the spring. As opposed to coming home finding me on the couch watching "Road House" for the 100th time because we're on the job full time.

But that's just me. If these guys in Utah want all that heavy lifting of having one wife, only multiplied by 10 or 12, more power to them. And if their wives are happy to be a fraction of a full wife, who are any of us to judge? All I'm saying is I don't know anyone who'd be interested in that arrangement. Not even for the price of $750 and some community service. Hard pass.