POLYGAMY TOO

TODAY'S FAMILY NEWS - February 17, 2003
GAY MARRIAGE COULD OPEN DOOR TO POLYGAMY, MPS WARN

"Tinkering" with marriage by allowing homosexuals to legally marry could lead to the legalization of polygamy in Canada, Liberal MP Pat O'Brien warned last week. In an interview reported Friday in the Globe and Mail, O'Brien said that any departure from the traditional definition of marriage as being between one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others could open a Pandora's box of legal and social problems. "Once you decide that a marriage between two men or a marriage between two women is lawful, what's to say it can't be a man and two women or a woman and five men?" he asked. O'Brien is a member of the Commons Justice Committee which is holding public hearings in Ottawa on whether or not to redefine marriage.

And O'Brien is not alone in voicing these concerns. As the Ottawa Citizen reported, Canadian Alliance MP and fellow committee member Vic Toews said that he too is "very troubled" what could happen to the institution of marriage if it was forced to conform strictly to the equality guarantees in the Charter of Rights. "How could you deny a multiple partnership marriage?" he asked. In testimony before the committee, Bruce Clemenger with the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada predicted that others with a non-traditional view of marriage will demand the same rights for themselves, if the law is changed to allow homosexuals to marry. "Inevitably," he said, according to the Citizen, "polygamists are going to ask: 'What about our orientation?'"

Bloc Québécois MP Réal Ménard, who also sits on the committee as an acting member, denounces this attempt by some MPs to "link" polygamy and gay marriage. "It's vicious, it is not logical," he told the Toronto Star. "Polygamy is not a Canadian value. It is obstruction." NDP MP Svend Robinson agrees. "The hearings have too often been steeped in an atmosphere that is abusive, hateful and full of, in a number instances, really disturbing allegations about gay and lesbian people," he said in the Globe and Mail. (On Thursday, Robinson introduced a private members bill - C-392 - that calls for the legalization of gay marriage.)

But it was not MPs who first suggested a connection between legalizing same-sex marriage and legalizing polygamy. Under questioning by Liberal MP John McKay on January 30, Law Commission of Canada president Nathalie Des Rosiers testified that she saw nothing wrong in denying people the option of living in a polygamous relationship. "...when you are in a society that says it has equality of its citizens in front of the law, you must be able to justify why you exclude some of them [from marrying]. That's where the debate is," she said. Des Rosiers added: "In our view, what's interesting is that there is no reason for why [polygamy] should be excluded."

Similar concerns were also raised last week by the Alliance for Marriage and Family. It is seeking permission to intervene in the case of a two-year-old boy in London, Ontario. His parents, who do not live together, have asked a judge to grant his mother's lesbian partner equal status as a parent. If approved, it would mark the first time in Canada that a child had three legal parents.

"When we say parents, we think of the mother and father who gave birth to a child, unless you adopt and then a non-biological person assumes the obligations," Alliance lawyer Michael Menear told the London Free Press. "But if it's not two [parents] and pushed by biology, where do you define the term? And if we allow three parents, why not four. If four, why not 10?"

Focus on the Family Canada is expected to testify before the Justice Committee sometime in March.