Turkey wants to bring back polygamy

[Mediocrates]

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2011/05/24/another-step-backwards-for-turkey%E2%80%99s-women/

In Hurriyet today (http://www.hurriyet.com.tr/gundem/17863104.asp?gid=381) (alas, only the Turkish version) comes words that a senior AKP official in Istanbul has called for legalizing polygamy again. It is increasingly silly to talk about Turkey reforming and putting itself on a trajectory to join Europe; Turkey is on a trajectory for something else entirely.

[Achihud]

When Hurriyet office goes up in flames I suppose that's one more AKP problem solved.

[NewsGuy]

I know it sounds bizarre, but of all the things that people want to do, why not let people have more than one spouse? Is it really more weird than same sex marriages? I don't think so, to be honest. And, oddly enough, a man can legally live with several women simultaneously and father as many children as he wants with them all, but suddenly it's a crime if he wants to be married to them? IMO, I would let everyone do as they please, so long as they're all consenting adults. See how liberal and progressive I am? :)

[farmboy]

I know it sounds bizarre, but of all the things that people want to do, why not let people have more than one spouse? Is it really more weird than same sex marriages? I don't think so, to be honest. And, oddly enough, a man can legally live with several women simultaneously and father as many children as he wants with them all, but suddenly it's a crime if he wants to be married to them? IMO, I would let everyone do as they please, so long as they're all consenting adults. See how liberal and progressive I am? :)
The western model is that wives are equal partners and share in the responsibility and decisions making, of running a family and providing for it. Two wives would be one too many and in some cases two too many. The Islamic model is that wives are posessions, speak when they are spoken to and are there purely for the benefit of the man. When he grows tired of one he can accuse her of adultery, then have her stoned to death.
There has to be some sort of middle ground that respects womens rights without emasculating the male. Some women you would do anything to keep quiet, point in case, Tzipy Livny, who responds to every action by the government in the negative without thought or hesitation.
One irritating woman.

[Achihud]

We all know that every muslim has the (moral) obligation to spread the faith.
One (cultural) way of doing that is the islamic virtue to arrange marriage while they are young and to push for grandchildren. So far nothing wrong with that, every religion can act the same. Catholicism did too. To take four wifes multiplies the faith spreading appr four times as well but the husband needs to provide for them all equally. A religion or country that wants to go to war needs young soldiers on the battlefield and young women in weapon factories, a lot! So far nothing wrong with that if you want your religion or country to triumph. But at some point your advantage will turn against you when it's becomming clear that you will never be in a position of winning that war. Young people want prospects, among them jobs. That's why they rise up and start protesting to the point that the regime collapses. Once you go that way you have to go to war or time will catch up on you, economically. If A-jad says that he wants more Iranian children being born time will catch up on him or his successor. If AKP wants more children being born, time will catch up on them when the economy collapses. It just speeds up uprisings in the near future for a different regime for better or for worse. But since it has gone out of control it will be for the worse because desperate people take desperate measures and so a religion inspired cultural habit can be the Achilles heel of that peculiar faith. As we all know God punished king David because He didn't want him to rely on such grievous miscalculations. Should Allah think different, hey no problem.

[Cellis]

Hi, no panic. It's not a senior AKP official but a family advisor who works for islamist families. People bashed that particular person very well. 11 days left for the elections. I'll vote at the airport without stepping outside the airport. Wish us luck people.

[farmboy]

GL to you and all your wives Cellis,;) Fly safe. Literally

[Chris Keller]

It will not work much in Turkey, even if legal, because social and economic factors are against it. Polygamy worked well in ancient societies where there was a large male, but lesser female, mortality. So you saw it in old Islamic empires that fronted on, and were sometimes at war with, non-Muslim states, and before that, in Middle Eastern cultures in general. The surplus of young men became frontiersmen and warriors. But Turkey is not an ancient or frontier society any more. These days no country has an expanding or war frontier and war frontiers are not part of modernism or a centralized, modern State.

It worked well in primitive herding societies, where the man were mostly out working with their animals and the women did other tasks needed for the nomadic economy. The men were subjected to greater hazards than women were, so there were fewer men than women. You see this reflected in many parts of the Old Testement. But Anatolia is no longer an agrarian semi-nomadic society, and large parts of it were urban even in ancient times. Polygamy does not fit with urbanized life. In fact, the Turks became city dwellers about as soon as they entered the urbanized areas of Europe and Asia during their medieval migrations. City people have things in common all over the world, and one of those is that the male does a very large share of the ardouous and/or dangerous, but higher paid (per hour) work in most families. Such a man cannot afford polygamous relationships for long even if he wants to.

In Turkey women in white-collar, highly paid or professional jobs will also not settle for polygamous relationships, as they will be just a small corner of a man's attentions.

If polygamy is legalized in Turkey, there will be very few Turks who will find it suits them personally. That said, if unconventional things like Gay marriage are legal in European and American culture, and they seem to be moving in that direction (or have moved already), who are we to complain about polygamy for the few who will practice it?

I do not know if the Turks have issues in divorce like spousal support, alimony, and the like. But I am sure that the average man there would not find divorce in a polygamous marriage less troubling than over here in a regular one.

In Turkey, women have a lot of social power, contrary to the way they are seen in the West. The Turks for instance, legalized female suffrage on a national level back in the 1930's.

[SpaceCowboy]

I know it sounds bizarre, but of all the things that people want to do, why not let people have more than one spouse? Is it really more weird than same sex marriages? I don't think so, to be honest. And, oddly enough, a man can legally live with several women simultaneously and father as many children as he wants with them all, but suddenly it's a crime if he wants to be married to them? IMO, I would let everyone do as they please, so long as they're all consenting adults. See how liberal and progressive I am? :)

I can agree with most of what you say, but I also see some problems here in the USA related to things like health insurance and social security benefits. Would an employer be required to cover 5 wives?

In addition, as actually practiced by some of the "rogue" Mormon sects here in the US, plural marriages occur in very isolated communities where all organs of the local governments are controlled by sect members. These communities drive out most of the young boys from the communities in order to provide additional young wives to the preferred men of the sect. In these communities, the coercion of the young and old alike is considerable.

Perhaps other communities would be able to integrate plural marriages in a healthier way.

[Chris Keller]

I can agree with most of what you say, but I also see some problems here in the USA related to things like health insurance and social security benefits. Would an employer be required to cover 5 wives?

In addition, as actually practiced by some of the "rogue" Mormon sects here in the US, plural marriages occur in very isolated communities where all organs of the local governments are controlled by sect members. These communities drive out most of the young boys from the communities in order to provide additional young wives to the preferred men of the sect. In these communities, the coercion of the young and old alike is considerable.

Perhaps other communities would be able to integrate plural marriages in a healthier way.

Polygamy will work only where some males have a monopoly of social/financial power. It still operates in modern times in the breakaway FLDS church. But in that case polygamy is not really economically self sufficient, as most of those families rely financially on welfare. A modern State and economy that does not give out welfare grants is poor soil for a polyganous culture to grow in.

Polygamy will never work well for the average male in ordinary modern civil society. In Christian Europe, one time in recent centuries it was legal was in parts of Germany after the Thirty Year's War, where there was a shortage of males in general and great depopulation. This was limited in time and scope.

I read on the Internet just now that Turkish courts do order spousal support in divorce cases. If the Turks ever legalize polygamy, this will cause males to limit the number of wives more than any other factor.

Another factor limiting polygamy is the fact that large numbers of unattached young males are socially unstable, and this creates opposition to polygamy. This was one reason the old Mormon church faced opposition in the American Old West, where there was already a shortage of marriageable women.

There was a recent incident in Nigeria where a local man had over eighty wives, and was told by a Sharia court to divorce most of them. He also faced hordes of protesters who did not like this conduct.

The elephant in the room regarding polygamy is what women say, or do not say, about it. Some may disagree, but human females are the ones who drive sexual selection in our species, and a culture will not have polygamy if its women do not find it to their liking.

[Madeline]

I know it sounds bizarre, but of all the things that people want to do, why not let people have more than one spouse? Is it really more weird than same sex marriages? I don't think so, to be honest. And, oddly enough, a man can legally live with several women simultaneously and father as many children as he wants with them all, but suddenly it's a crime if he wants to be married to them? IMO, I would let everyone do as they please, so long as they're all consenting adults. See how liberal and progressive I am? :)

If they make it legal, its entirely their business. And you are right, its just as weird or absurd and same sex marriage. But hey, as long as they are all consenting adults, right?
Wrong.
From what I gather, these practices suit one person, and one person only, and that's the man of the house. Looking at Islam overall, with few exceptions of course, it seems that women aren't asked much about their preferences. Regardless whether they consent or not, they serve their master...oops, husband.

[Chris Keller]

If they make it legal, its entirely their business. And you are right, its just as weird or absurd and same sex marriage. But hey, as long as they are all consenting adults, right?
Wrong.
From what I gather, these practices suit one person, and one person only, and that's the man of the house. Looking at Islam overall, with few exceptions of course, it seems that women aren't asked much about their preferences. Regardless whether they consent or not, they serve their master...oops, husband.


I do not think that is correct. IF the man has resources, the woman does benefit in a polygamous relationship, especially as she becomes part of a large, extended family. And the polygamous man I reckon will always be one with a lot of resources. She will not get as much of the man's company though as in a monogamous relationship. This notion some folks have that women are childlike slaves, either world-wide or in Islam, is wrong. Women run societies as much as men do---they just work more behind the scenes than do men. Human beings behave in a certain way because there is a payoff of some sort, and humans have been like that since our species existed.

At any rate, for the ordinary man, polygamy is not an issue in his world.

[Madeline]

I do not think that is correct. IF the man has resources, the woman does benefit in a polygamous relationship, especially as she becomes part of a large, extended family. And the polygamous man I reckon will always be one with a lot of resources. She will not get as much of the man's company though as in a monogamous relationship. This notion some folks have that women are childlike slaves, either world-wide or in Islam, is wrong. Women run societies as much as men do---they just work more behind the scenes than do men. Human beings behave in a certain way because there is a payoff of some sort, and humans have been like that since our species existed.

At any rate, for the ordinary man, polygamy is not an issue in his world.

Some women run societies, others not so much.
Perhaps its different in Turkey than it is in Afghanistan, under Taliban rule, but it leaves the door wide open for abuse, esp in countries with less than desirable human rights records.
Of course many women are liberated, but just as many half to walk behind their beau, do what he says, obey by the rules.
So why make it easier for the guys?
Of course, if its only a marriage of convenience and not love, I'd appreciate other women to be the subject of his daily desires.
Just another woman's point of view.

[Aliyah1995]

One wife, two kids, two jobs....Who has the strength for more?!?! Just my 2 cents:)

[Madeline]

One wife, two kids, two jobs....Who has the strength for more?!?! Just my 2 cents:)

Oh, just taking the easy way out, are you?:cool:

[Chris Keller]

Some women run societies, others not so much.
Perhaps its different in Turkey than it is in Afghanistan, under Taliban rule, but it leaves the door wide open for abuse, esp in countries with less than desirable human rights records.
Of course many women are liberated, but just as many half to walk behind their beau, do what he says, obey by the rules.
So why make it easier for the guys?
Of course, if its only a marriage of convenience and not love, I'd appreciate other women to be the subject of his daily desires.
Just another woman's point of view.

I don't think the Turks will ever get like the Taliban. They front on the Mediterranean, and Mediterranean countries do have a lot of cultural influence over each other. Even in the 14th Century, Turkish women had a lot of power and status. Ibn Battuta remarked on this when he traveled in Asia Minor back then. As for bad human rights records, almost every country has skeletons in the closet, or active human rights violations that are ongoing, or both.

Israel and Jewish folks need to remember that the Turks, whatever their present differences, helped them in the past. Bayezid II gave them refuge from the enmity of Ferdinand II, Isabella, and the Inquisition in 1492, when the Jews were expelled from Spain.

[Cellis]

You guys are kidding right? taliban, turks... madeline... I'd compare the states to uzbekistan but taliban and turks? Impressive logic.

[SpaceCowboy]

It's not just the Turks!


New Jewish group wants to restore polygamy
By JONAH MANDEL
07/11/2011 01:18

Practice promoted as solution for the abundance of single women, Arab demographic threat and the predicament of seeking extramarital relations.
Talkbacks (50)

A new organization is trying to reinstate polygamy into mainstream Orthodox Judaism, despite it being against the contemporary norm of Jewish law, and prohibited by the state.

The idea is the brainchild of Habayit Hayehudi Hashalem (The Complete Jewish Household).

RELATED:
Jordanian launches campaign to advance polygamy

It is being promoted as the Jewish solution for the abundance of single women, the Arab demographic threat and the male predicament of seeking extramarital relations.

A small advertisement over the weekend in the broadly circulated Shabbat Beshabato, a hand-out distributed in synagogues nationwide dealing with the weekly Torah portion and contemporary issues, quoted a paragraph from senior Sephardi adjudicator Rabbi Ovadia Yosef’s Yabi’a Omer treatise, in which he wrote that it is a mistake for non-Ashkenazim to follow Rabbeinu Gershom’s “stringency,” according to which it is prohibited for a man to marry more than one wife. Approximately 1,000 years ago, Rabbeinu Gershom of Mainz, Germany, issued resonating reforms on a variety of subjects pertaining to Jewish life, and those who transgressed them were liable to be socially excommunicated. Perhaps the most well-known of these prohibitions is to not to be married to more than one woman at a time, despite the fact that this was common in biblical times.

The man behind the ad, Rabbi Yehezkel Sopher, saw no legal problem in his initiative.

“This is not about secular people who abide by the rules of the state, rather religious people. Whoever wants to take another wife – the Torah does not object to it,” Sopher told The Jerusalem Post. “We work according to the Shulhan Aruch, there are rules here.”

As for Rabbeinu Gershom’s excommunication ban, even for those who would as Ashkenazim have followed it – “that has been over for hundreds of years by now,” as its end date was the end of the fifth millennium according to the Jewish year count, i.e. some 700 years ago, he said.

As for the fact that the rabbinate is against bigamy and polygamy, Sopher, who identified himself as a resident of the Central region, explained that “the rabbis at the Chief Rabbinate receive their salaries from the state,” so publicly they have to object to polygamy. “But if you ask them behind closed doors, they will say it’s allowed.”

Sopher himself is married to only one woman, “but there is already consent to a second.”

Asked why they made this issue public now, and in a mainstream national-religious publication, he said that “we really wanted it to resonate.

We’ve been working on it for two years now, through our publications.

But we want it to get out to the larger public.

“This is a cry out to all God-fearing Jews. Instead of Arabs marrying Jewish women, Jews should,” he said.

“This is also a solution for women who never married, for widows, divorcees.”

The whole notion of monogamy is not an essentially Jewish one, Sopher stressed. “This [polygamy] is very acceptable in our religion, it’s religious coercion from the establishment under the influence of Catholicism that prevents about 15 percent of women in their fertile age from marrying,” he said.

“It’s cruel. And the Jewish nation is harmed by it. We think national fertility could rise by at least 10%. This is national discrimination, where the state turns a blind eye to Beduin, who freely take more wives. If Jews do, they are thrown into prison. And if a law is implemented in a discriminatory manner, it doesn’t have to be heeded,” he said.
(more) http://www.jpost.com/JewishWorld/JewishNews/Article.aspx?id=228736

[Chris Keller]

Space Cowboy, I think that polygamy will always be around on the periphery, but most people in any religion or region will not practice it due to economic and social factors. I see you have a point, though.

But not being Jewish, and being somewhat familiar with their fascinating history, I think the main danger to them was and is absorption more than anything else. Often this absorption will be peaceful rather than coerced. Some places, such as China, absorbed them as to make them no longer distinguishable, in most cases, from the larger population. Their identity was lost in such places. Huge populations in the world number Jews amongst their ancestors. I am certain I have some via Spain. Likely most people in the Middle East and Eastern Europe have some too.