Open Arms, Open Heart

                     Something I’ve always found intriguing is different lifestyles in our world.  I find it important to think about how the choices of others, especially before I pass any judgment.  One of the newest things I’ve started to think about is polygamy and the different sides to it.  I started out only hearing the cult version of this practiced lifestyle, and like so many others I automatically found it perverse and disgusting.  After reading about different aspects and watching sister wives, I have grown to understand it more.  While I will never truly understand it and have no intention of ever practicing this religion, I also find the immense amount of judgment on this life alarming.

                In the world today sex, marriage, and love are all something that has lost its value to much of our society.  In many instances sex is practiced before marriage and having children out of wedlock is nothing new. A woman may also have children with different men as well.  Love isn’t just shared between a man and a woman, and same sex relationships are the norm.  I have grown to accept all of these things, and realize everyone has their own path.  The main question now is why is polygamy against the law in the land of opportunities, freedom of religion, and the background of new beginnings.

                In polygamy among families (not cults, or compounds), it is the belief that the larger the family, the more opportunity the family has to serve God in the afterlife.  It is the choice of the individual, and a practice of a faith.  If a person is allowed to have children with multiple men without the promise of marriage, why should people who choose to have children with a man with multiples wives be condemned.  In cases of polygamy as well, it takes away the single mother, disputes of child support, and allows children to grow up with both parents.  What is wrong with allowing others to practice a belief, if all parties are engaged?         

                Polygamy to me is something I could never imagine living.  I feel as if I would not want to share my husband, isolate my children, and constantly live in fear for my family.  If the families, whom practice this fundamentalist society, were not castigated for this behavior, two of my three concerns would no longer exist.  America was established to free itself from the anarchy of the British rule, and to live a life without fear of choices leading to punishment.  Let the world live as promised, separation of God and state.