Strengthening Constitutional Self-Government

No Left Turns

No More "Yuck Factor" for Polygamy?

Almost a decade ago, I wrote a piece for the now defunct Women’s Quarterly (still available on-line through The Claremont Institute) about the attempt of the National Organization for Women to embrace polygamy as an attractive alternative for feminists. I tried to show then that this was but the logical conclusion of many feminist arguments regarding sex and marriage. It was of a piece with the larger cultural war in which we were asked to reconsider all sexual taboos and open up our minds and hearts to things formerly considered perversion or oppression. Still, at the time it was so shocking to most people that NOW quickly tried to disassociate itself from the position it clearly had staked out at a Utah meeting. Emissaries of the group denounced my reporting in the Washington Times but ultimately could not deny that my sources said what they said; namely: "We fight for lesbian families and single parent families. I don’t know why we wouldn’t support this."

What a difference a decade makes! As Peter has noted before, HBO will be airing a new series called Big Love in which the characters involved are part of a polygamous relationship. Maggie Gallagher has written a punchy article about the dawning of this brave new world in entertainment. Most disturbing, she quotes the series’ co-creator Mark Olsen speaking in Newsweek: "Big Love is everything that every family faces, just times three. The yuck factor disappears and you just see human faces." Uh, sorry, but YUCK!

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