The Michael Medved Show - Polygamy in the Media

The Michael Medved Show Radio
November 23, 2007
4:00 pm East Coast Time (U.S.)
Syndicated, The Michael Medved Show

On November 23, 2007, Mark Henkel, the Founder of the TruthBearer.org organization, appeared as a guest on the syndicated conservative-talk radio program, The Michael Medved Show. The interview was a hard-fought "battle" for Mr. Henkel, but, in the end, he was victorious. The conservative host - although disagreeing and battling Mr. Henkel along the way - concluded the show (and made a blog post, archived herebelow) agreeing that consenting-adult polygamy should be de-criminalized. (The entire interview is now freely available in the TruthBearer.org Members Area. For anyone who is not yet a member, simply JOIN TODAY!, and then you may hear it right after you log in!)

Mr. Medved opened the show, saying, "There is a new pro-polygamy movement that asks a provocative question - and i think it's a brilliant question, frankly. The question is, 'If it's ok for Heather to have two mommies, what's wrong if Heather has two mommies and a daddy?'" After then inviting listeners to call in, Mr Medved continued, "Let me welcome to this show, a gentleman named Mark Henkel who is the leading spokesperson for the pro-polygamy movement in the United States." Michael Medved then also made it very clear that Mark Henkel and this national pro-polygamy movement are not, in any way, connected to the rogue Mormon polygamy isolated sects in Utah/Arizona or the convicted criminal and FLDS leader, Warren Jeffs.

Mr. Medved agreed with Mr. Henkel that the 10th Amendment does prohibit federal involvement in marriage. But he otherwise disgreed with Mr. Henkel as Mr. Medved still thinks that the States have the supposedly legitimate authority for big government marriage control. Mr. Medved also agreed with Mr. Henkel that the government should not be involved in criminalizing what consenting-adults choose to contract for relationships. But he otherwise disagreed with Mr. Henkel as Mr. Medved still embraces the socialism of big government social engineering to promote and give/grant liberal "special rights" to those who choose "one man, one woman" marriage.

The first caller was an unrealized anti-competition socialist yet self-admitted atheist who repeatedly insisted the obvious absurdity that, if polygamy was de-criminalized, all Americans would supposedly act like the communism of the rogue FLDS sect where young men were kicked out of the communistic/cult-type compound. The caller refused to grasp that an entire American population would never respond to de-criminalized polygamy in anything similiar to that of such a rogue, isolated cult-type of community. As such, the caller refused to understand that his socialist anti-competition notion that all the marriagable women would somehow be "hoarded" by a few elite men was utterly absurd. No matter how many times that Mr. Henkel explained how laissez faire marital economics would ultimately motivate currently-jerk-men to grow up to excellence (in husband-qualities) that it would then still eventually create equillibrium in the ratio of marriageable men to women anyway, neither the caller nor the host seemed willing to understand the well-known economics principle of "laissez faire" and its impact on motivating the increase in excellence.

The second caller raised the "one flesh" issue, questioning how Mr. Henkel could be an evangelical Christian. As Mr. Henkel showed how that Genesis 2:24 verse was written by polygamist Moses, both the caller and Mr. Medved were so surprisingly unable to address what the Bible actually says about Moses that Mr. Medved eventually made the human mistake of last resort in actually name-calling Mr. Henkel as a "fool." Of course, regardless of whether or not one believes that Mr. Henkel is a "fool" does not change the fact that anti-polygamists absolutely cannot Biblically disprove that Moses had two wives, according to the Bible.

The third caller tried to allege that Mr. Henkel's advocacy was supposedly similiar to that of advocating prostitution. Namely, the caller asserted the notion of "victimless crimes" as supposedly being Mr. Henkel's argument for polygamy too. Mr. Henkel adamantly refuted that assertion, stating that he does not promote polygamy on the basis of any "victimless crime" argument. Mr. Medved jumped in saying he, himself, easily differentiates between government criminalizing the financial transaction of prostituion in comparison to government not criminalizing the mere contracted relationship of consenting adults in polygamy.

One other point of note in the interview occurred when Mr. Henkel was explaining the overall motivation for why people first fled to America: fleeing the tyranny of governments controlled by the catholic institution and its manmade doctrines. Mr. Medved very vehemently disagreed. Instead, he then referred to the Puritans at Plymouth after 1620 debating and allowing government to have marriage control. What he was not realizing, of course, was that he was actually referring to the Plymouth Plantation's failed experiment with pre-Marx communism. No anti-communist, true political contemporary-conservative would ever want to rely on past experiments with communism as supposed "justification" for embracing big socialist government control of anything, of course - much less something so important as God's exclusive doctrine of marriage.

Overall, the interview revealed that Mr. Henkel's very intellectual arguments were so irrefutable that the others seemed like they could only succumb to their choice of trying to prevent the intelligent argument from actually being heard. The specific arguments that generated the most opposition and fear in the interview were in regard to

the history of the Christian Reformation,
the historic reason why people came to the "new world" called America,
laissez faire marriage economics,
the actual Hebrew text of the Bible, and, of course,
the Biblical issue regarding "one flesh" and polygamist Moses.

Of course, the more that opponents try to silence intellectual arguments, history demonstrates how much louder and more successfully effective such arguments actually become! Undoubtedly, these are very effective arguments indeed. So, it was very much a "good thing" - in what it revealed.

Indeed, the interview is very much viewed as a "success." After all, in the end, Mr. Medved completely embraced and declared his support for de-criminalization for un-coerced consenting-adult polygamy. Although the interview was a hard-fought "battle" for Mr. Henkel, Mr. Medved's acceptance of polygamy's de-criminalization was a serious "win."

Moreover, in his subsequent December 1, 2007 blog-post at the conservative web-site, Townhall.com, Michael Medved re-iterated his support for the de-criminalization of consenting-adult polygamy while not supporting polygamy itself. His blog-post is archived here, as follows:

No perscution, no promotion
Polygamy advocate Mark Henkel asks a powerful question: “If it’s all right for Heather to have two mommies, then why can’t she have two mommies and one daddy?” His challenge provides perspective on current demands that government endorse same-sex marriage. Why should society support the novelty of gay relationships ahead of polygamy, which was practiced nearly everywhere for thousands of years and would probably appeal to far more people than homosexuality?

The right answer to polygamists should be government neutrality: if private relationships involve consenting adults, then it makes no more sense to prosecute a male who claims he has two wives than to go after a guy who boasts of two girlfriends. But that doesn’t mean government should license polygamous relationships, any more than it should sponsor homosexual coupling.

In both cases, those who choose unconventional alternatives to one-man/one-woman marriage—still the best situation for child-rearing—shouldn’t be punished, but they shouldn’t be promoted either.

Mr. Henkel agrees with most of Mr. Medved's blog-post there - except to add one thing. Mr. Medved is correct that there should not be "special rights" for polygamists. And he is also correct that there certainly should not be "special rights" for those who choose homosaexual behavior either. But, Mr. Henkel takes the true conservatism one step further and says that also should be "No Special Rights" for those who Choose "One Man, One Woman" either.

Again, though, the interview and resulting blog-post were a real "win" for polygamy rights. Another political consevrative in the media has at least acknowldged the true conservative position of de-criminalization for consenting-adult polygamy. For that, Mark Henkel and the entire TruthBearer.org organization are thankful to Michael Medved for the interview.

So that polygamy rights supporters may hear this entire interview with all its quotes, an audio-recording of this interview is freely available in the TruthBearer.org Members Area. (For anyone who is not yet a member, simply JOIN TODAY!, and then you may hear it right after you log in!)

Both Mr. Henkel and the entire TruthBearer.org organization are grateful to Michael Medved and his show for providing the opportunity to let the real issues about polygamy to be presented. The entire TruthBearer.org organization is grateful indeed.

TruthBearer.org

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