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Is polygamy sexist?
Is polygamy sexist?
Introduction to Question
Some worry that the historical practice of polygamy as well as contemporary theology about polygamy is sexist.
At least a few fear that Church doctrine implies or teaches that a spouse might have to practice plural marriage in the eternities without the approval or desire of their first spouse. This stance has been most passionately argued by Latter-day Saint poet Carol Lynn Pearson in her book The Ghost of Eternal Polygamy: Haunting the Hearts and Heaven of Mormon Women and Men.[1]
The observation that grounds this assertion is that polygamy fragments women's emotional and sexual opportunities as a wife. As Brian C. Hales has argued:
In the case of a new plural wife who would have remained unmarried if monogamy was exclusively practiced, her "emotional and sexual opportunities as a wife" are increased from zero to some fraction depending on how many other wives the man has. However, the other wives’ opportunities are diminished as a result of the new plural matrimony.[2]
- ↑ Carol Lynn Pearson, The Ghost of Eternal Polygamy: Haunting the Hearts and Heaven of Mormon Women and Men (Walnut Creek, CA: Pivot Point Books, 2016). For reviews that expose the weaknesses of Pearson’s position and approach, see Allen Wyatt, "Scary Ghost Stories in the Light of Day," Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 23 (2017): 137–160; Brian C. Hales, "Opportunity Lost," Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 23 (2017): 91–109. Pearson's work is sadly dated in many issues of history—she has not kept up on this field, and in some matters it seems her education in them stopped in the 1970s. Her work is useful because it diagnoses a problem that some women do struggle with. The difficulty is that Pearson's proposed remedy—the repudiation of plural marriage as a doctrine—is unwise and would be unhelpful. Instead, worries about doctrine can be alleviated by learning true doctrine and more accurate history coupled with revelation, rather than insisting that doctrine must be changed because we don't like the conclusions that some people have mistakenly drawn.
- ↑ Hales, "Opportunity Lost," 97n4. Hales has repeatedly made this assertion in his publications. See another instance in Brian C. Hales and Laura H. Hales, "Lending Clarity to Confusion: A Response to Kirk Van Allen’s 'D&C 132: A Revelation of Men, Not God'," FairMormon Papers and Reviews 1 (2015): 4