for Latter-day Saints
-- Site to be completed in Winter 2025 --​
Basic principles of healthy partnership for Latter-day Saints, including the psychosocial argument against polygamy
Sections 1-10
Sections 11-20
Sections 21-30
Sections 31-40
Sections 41-50
Sections 51-60
Sections 61-70
Sections 71-80
Sections 81-90
Sections 91-104
1 ~ God established the proper order of marriage & partnership with Adam & Eve ~
2 ~ The proper order of marriage is intended to establish proper equality between a man & woman ~
3 ~ "Isn't God the Father a polygamist, and married to multiple Heavenly Mothers?"
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The idea that Heavenly Father is a polygamist began with Brigham Young, not Joseph Smith. The Doctrine and Covenants reads,
15 And again, verily I say unto you, that whoso forbiddeth to marry is not ordained of God, for marriage is ordained of God unto man.
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16 Wherefore, it is lawful that he should have one wife, and they twain shall be one flesh, and all this that the earth might answer the end of its creation;
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17 And that it might be filled with the measure of man, according to his creation before the world was made.
This clearly states that the earth answers "the end of its creation" by a man and woman being married together monogamously. This also states that monogamous marriage allows for the earth to be filled with the full measure of man "according to his creation before the world was made." This suggests that the monogamous pattern of humanity's creation on earth is "according to his creation before the world was made." This could also perhaps suggest that it is even only through monogamy that the earth is filled according to our creation in heaven.
4. "Wouldn't being a polygamist mean that God the Father can have more spirit children more quickly?"
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Many Latter-day Saints have assumed that if we teach of resurrected bodies, eternal marriage, and eternal progeny, then there must be eternal procreative sex too. This assertion has been used to argue for the validity (and even desirability) of eternal polygamy as well. While a woman living infinitely could be consecutively pregnant with an infinite number of children even if produced one-by-one, it is pointed out that a God-man with more than one immortal partner can produce an infinite number of children at an even faster rate than if He has only one partner. This has been an argument for eternal polygamy for at least a hundred years. It has contributed to Latter-day Saint men fantasizing about what women they might have above, and caused Latter-day Saint women to dread what afterlife is in store for themselves. It has caused outside critics to point out that such an idea means a heaven of men potentially having eternal harems of women who are eternally pregnant and burdened with child-bearing. This "women as eternal incubators" idea has sometimes been given as reason when asked why we do not hear more of Heavenly Mother, asserting that She is too busy spiritually birthing more spirit children, and so being more involved in our lives is therefore not part of Her role. But it would be worthy to consider why the mechanics of human reproduction are as they are, and consider if they are perhaps mechanics that only apply to humans --
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Males emit about 200 to 500 million sperm with each ejaculation. Even when conception succeeds, only one (or in rare cases, two or three) sperm ever successfully fertilize an egg. This "less than 100,000,000 to 1 odds" is an evolutionary feature to help ensure that only one of the highest caliber of sperm succeed in fertilizing the egg, but the inefficiency of having literally hundreds of millions of sperm be wasted with every emission in order to weed out any defective or weak sperm would not likely be a feature of reproduction in a heavenly realm with no risk of genetic imperfections.​
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Having mothers carry developing babies in their body is protective to the survival and the development of the child. It serves as a safety feature by which the developing baby cannot be separated from the mother; the placenta acts as a mechanism for all needed nutrients to reach the developing baby from the mother; and the placenta also acts as a barrier to protect the baby from environmental toxins. That women are usually only pregnant with one developing baby at a time is also a survival mechanism, as it helps ensure the survival of one baby by not having that baby be competing for nutrients with another.
All of these evolutionary protective mechanisms are potentially features that are only existent on earth.​ If we know that human fertilization is an act of evolutionary "one winner to many losers" feature, and that female child-bearing is to protect a developing human fetus from the threats of a brutally-naturalistic earth, it could be reasoned that our fertilization and child-bearing mechanism for creating human life is solely a telestial-based model. The creation of spirit bodies in a higher realm would not necessitate any "survival of the fittest" competition between genetic material, there would be no mortality-based threats against any "infant" spirit children being created, and no limitation of nutrient, space, attention, or anything else to hinder one Father and Mother God from forming an unlimited number of spirit children simultaneously.
5 ~ Perhaps born of the mind of God, not of Their bodies ~​​​​
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​We have not been explicitly given any doctrinal answer as to by what mechanism God the Father and Mother formed our spirit bodies, but if we believe that God created the earth, and everything on it, through the organization of existed matter and the guided development of biological organisms, and that this was achieved solely through the intended will of the mind of God, could our spirit bodies have also been formed by solely the intention of God? Could we suppose that our spirit bodies were perhaps formed by the united mind of a Man & Woman God, rather than by some kind of resurrection-fluid passing between resurrected bodies? The idea that we were created by the will of God (as opposed to thinking that our spirit bodies exited out of a god-vagina) is a belief held by all the rest of Christendom, and it fits more closely with the language of Abraham 3:22 where we read,​ "Now the Lord had shown unto me, Abraham, the intelligences that were organized before the world was;"
6 ~ God does not change the order of marriage to better suit culture ~
7 ~ The culture of the United States in the 1800s was not more tolerant towards polygamy anyway ~
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8 ~ "Why can't we have any polygamy exceptions? Why not even in really extreme cases?" ~
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9 ~ Polygamy reversal ~
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10 ~ "Who says there isn't equality in polygamy?" ~
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11 ~ "Why can't there be equality in at least some cases of polygamy?" ~
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12 ~ "Ye have broken the hearts of your tender wives" ~
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Jacob states that the reason for the Lord to be commanding the men so strongly and explicitly to be monogamous is to protect the women from pain,
For behold, I, the Lord, have seen the sorrow, and heard the the mourning of the daughters of my people in the land of Jerusalem, yea, and in all the lands of my people, because of the wickedness and abominations of their husbands.
And I will not suffer, saith the Lord of Hosts, that the cries of the fair daughters of this people, which I have led out of the land of Jerusalem, shall come unto me against the men of my people, saith the Lord of Hosts.
Jacob 2:31-32
For they shall not lead away captive the daughters of my people because of their tenderness, save I shall visit them with a sore curse, even unto destruction;...
...Behold, ye have done greater iniquities that the Lamanites, our brethren. Ye have broken the hearts of your tender wives,... Jacob 2:33,35
The LDS church argues that Jacob is only here condemning unauthorized polygamy, but as Steve Reeds of Oneclimbs.com asked,
Does it seem reasonable that the Nephite women and children were so profoundly heartbroken over the men's practice of taking multiple wives and concubines simply because they lacked "authorization"?...Would there have been no “sorrow,” “mourning,” “cries,” “sobbing,” “captiv[ity],” or “hearts [dying], pierced with deep wounds” if only there were “authorization”?
https://oneclimbs.com/2017/01/05/a-proposed-reinterpretation-of-jacob-230/
When Ann Eliza Young was asked by a visitor to Utah where polygamy hurt the most, she responded, “It hurts all over, body and soul, mind and heart … I can’t tell a spot that it does not hurt.”
13 ~ "Ye have lost the confidence of your children" ~
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14 ~ Polygamy demographically shown to be harmful to women's health & well-being ~
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15 ~ Polygamy clinically shown to be harmful to children's health & well-being ~
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16 ~ Polygamy demographically seen to be harmful to women's relationships ~
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17 ~ Polygamy demographically seen to be harmful to marital relationships ~
18 ~ "Who says polygamy necessarily ruins emotional intimacy in marriage?" ~
Kody Brown, the polygamist husband of the reality TV show, "Sister Wives", is a member of the Mormon polygamist offshoot group called the Apostolic United Brethren, and has been practicing polygamy since 1993. Together with his four wives, their family was portrayed in the series as an ethical model of modern-day polygamy, in which they prioritized the values of transparency, equal treatment, and mutual consent. But now, after twenty years of practicing polygamy, three of the wives, including his first legal wife, have all divorced Kody, leaving only the youngest wife who has not left. Kody now disavows polygamy as a healthy system of marriage, stating, "Polygamy kills emotional intimacy. It makes everybody defensive, and I really want an emotionally vulnerable, intimate relationship with a woman, and you're not going to get that in polygamy."
19 ~ Polygamous communities experience higher rates of physical spousal abuse ~
20 ~ Polygamous communities experience higher rates of physical child abuse ~
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21 ~ Polygamous communities experience higher rates of spouse & child neglect ~
22 ~ Brigham Young taught that "the bull is not responsible for the calf" — polygamist husbands were not required to provide for their wives, even those who had children ~
This directly contradicts 1 Timothy 5:8, which states, "But if any provide not for his own, and specially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel."
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23 ~ Brigham Young had, according to himself, a "too high to count" number of wives (that he did not provide for) ~
24 ~ Most of Brigham Young's wives and children were left without inheritance or provision after his death ~
25 ~ Polygamous communities experience higher rates of child sexual abuse ~
26 ~ The higher rates of crime in polygamy is not only correlative, but also causative ~
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27 ~ A parent's 'jealous' tendencies to not wish children to bond with non-related adults is evolutionarily protective for children ~​
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28 ~ Acceptance of polygamy causes personal harm, even when no polygamy is being practiced ~
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29 ~ Acceptance of polygamy causes societal harm, even when no polygamy is being practiced ~
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30 ~ Women competing against invisible women, Salt Lake City voted "The Most Vain City in America" ~
31 ~ "So long as we are monogamous and reject any idea of polygamy, we have equal partnership, right?" ~
32 ~ Equality as equal access ~
34 ~ Equality as equal agency ~
35 ~ Equality as equal authority ~
36 ~ The LDS church for many years (even recently) did not teach equal authority between husband and wife ~
37. Priesthood ordination falsely equated to higher authority
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38-39 ~ Gwendolyn Wyne's sacraments ~
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40. Church leadership position falsely equated to higher authority
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41 ~ Higher academic education falsely equated to higher authority ~
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42 ~ Higher income and greater career advancement falsely equated to higher authority ~​
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43 ~ Equal contributions ~
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44 ~ True signs of strengths, false signs of strengths ~​
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45 ~ Couples who practice equal access, equal agency, and equal authority have higher relationship success rates ~
46 ~ The Israelites were commanded to have their oxen be "equally yoked" ~
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47 ~ "Whoredoms" in Jacob chapter 2 does not mean 'whores' ~ ​​​
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Jacob referring to polygamy as a "whoredom" in the English translation of the Book of Mormon is a point of pain for some LDS women due to its root word being 'whore', which has the derogatory meaning towards women of being debased prostitutes. Such a label has suggested to women in the past that women wrongfully involved in polygamy are no better than prostitutes in the eyes of the Lord, and has suggested to men that whenever polygamy is wrong, the women are equally to blame. It is unfortunate then, that the word "whoredom" is related to such a derogatory term, as other language translations of the Book of Mormon use words more akin to 'fornication' or 'licentiousness' that have no derogatory double-meaning against women. But the fact that the Lord is not calling the women involved in polygamy 'whores', and is placing the blame of polygamy squarely on the men, is evident in all the other text involved in that same sermon: ​​
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Jacob apologizes to the women and children present for having to hear such a harsh message delivered to the men
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the Lord is quoted as stating that the sorrow and mourning of the daughters of Jerusalem are because of the abominations of their husbands
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the Lord refers to the women of the Nephites as "fair daughters", who have "tender hearts"
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the Lord says the prayers of the women will be heard by Him, even when they are against the men
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the Lord refers to the men as leading the women away, and the women being "captive" to the men
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the Lord emphasizes that if polygamy spreads, the men will be destroyed
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Jacob condemns the men for having broken the hearts of their wives
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Jacob promises the broken-hearted that they will be healed by the Lord
All of this language shows that the Lord views women involved in polygamy as being victims, not as complicit instigators, and that the Lord hears the prayers of women who have been deceived by the men, and will punish the men for it, even going so far as to destroy them outright.
48 ~ Inequality of past sealing practices ~
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49. The negative psychosocial effects on children growing up in unequal monogamous homes
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50 ~ Partnership roles ~
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51 ~ Navigating flexibility in partnership roles ~
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52 ~ Respecting roles while respecting individual choice ~
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53 ~ Respective roles means respective work, not respective dictatorship ~
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54 ~ Respective roles requires respective knowledge within those roles ~
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55 ~ "How can a woman fulfill her priestesshood without bearing children?" ~
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56 ~ Viewing gender & hetero non-conformity as a neurodivergent trait ~
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57 ~ Viewing gender & hetero non-conformity as a non-impediment to being a good partner or parent ~
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58 ~ The "curse" of Eve? ~
In Genesis 3 of the Bible, after Adam and Eve are found to have eaten the fruit of the tree of knowledge, we read these verses,
And the Lord God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life:
Genesis 3:14
Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.
Genesis 3:16
This second verse has been referred to as "the curse of Eve", and has been used as justification for husbands to domineer and control their wives, arguing that such is how God intended things to be for women outside of the garden of Eden. It has been applied outside of marriage as well, historically justifying men's dominance and authority over women ecclesiastically and in every other governing sector of life. But a proper reading of this chapter shows that the only cursing enacted by name was the cursing on Satan and the later cursing on the ground, not on either Adam or Eve. It is not even said to be God that is sending a curse onto Satan, as it states that it is Satan's own doings that have unavoidably brought the curse to him: "Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed..." indicating that it is by our own actions that we bring cursing upon ourselves, rather than it being the will of God.
Rather than a husband ruling over his wife being a mortality-bound curse from God according to His intended will, it is a permissible interpretation to suggest that God's words to women here are a warning and explanation of what negative consequences have befallen women on account of the world's fallen state and the telestial nature of man. As we are intended to conduct ourselves in a manner that is worthily in accordance with the principles of a terrestrial garden of Eden (and even that is worthy of Celestial glory,) we are therefore not justified in intentionally perpetuating a telestial natural-man desire of husbands ruling over wives, or of men ruling over women at all.
59 ~ The false equality of equal military burden ~
Some have argued that gender equality ought to lead to equal responsibility of military service, reasoning that so long as men are the only ones risking their lives in war and national defense that women are being given too great privilege and entitlement. This is not the case, as women already bear the outsized life-threatening burden of childbearing. As there are more women in the history of the world to have died from pregnancy, labor, and postpartum complications than the number of men to have ever died in war, (including the 300,000 women a year dying still to this day,) mandating military service for women would only be further adding to the current gender inequality of life-risk and body-burden that is already inherent in nature.​
60 ~ The harm of economic oppression on families: dual income as a financial necessity ~
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61 ~ The harm of economic oppression on families: institutionalized & out-sourced childcare as a financial necessity ~
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62 ~ The harm of economic oppression on families: limiting number of children & delaying having children as a financial necessity ~
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67 ~ Scriptural evidence of a Heavenly Mother ~
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Bible historians state that, "There is wide consensus among scholars that Aramaic was the primary language spoken by the Jews of first century Palestine" ("Aramaic language | Description, History, & Facts". Encyclopedia Britannica.) and, "Jesus and the Apostles are believed to have spoken Aramaic." ( "What Language Did Jesus Speak?". Zondervan Academic.) Our King James Version of the Bible records the Lord's Prayer, offered by Christ during the Sermon on the Mount, as beginning, "Our Father who art in heaven..." (Joseph Smith translating the Book of Mormon also used King James Version language for those Bible passages which he had memorized.) The Aramaic text of the Lord's Prayer however, is addressed to "Abwoon" of heaven, which is actually an amalgamation of two words: "Ab" being from the word "Abba", meaning father, and "woon" meaning "womb" for mother. The fact that Christ's combining of the two words into one whole is a traditionally unique use of the terms in Aramaic language customs makes it likely that it was a term very intentionally chosen.
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In the Book of Mormon, after Nephi is shown Mother Mary the Spirit then says, "Behold, the virgin whom thou seest is the mother of the Son of God, after the manner of the flesh" — suggesting Jesus to have another mother who is not of His flesh, but of His spirit. The Hebrew name "Elohim" of the Bible is in a grammatical form that allows it to be applied to more than one singular being. Even more scriptural references to a Mother in Heaven can be seen in this video by another LDS sister.
68 ~ 'We have a Heavenly Mother — but don't worship Her; or speak to Her; or try anything else to grow closer to Her.' ~
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The LDS church's "Mother in Heaven" gospel topics essay states,
Latter-day Saints direct their worship to Heavenly Father, in the name of Christ, and do not pray to Heavenly Mother. In this, they follow the pattern set by Jesus Christ, who taught His disciples to “always pray unto the Father in my name." Gospel Topics Essay, Mother in Heaven
However, the Aramaic text of the Lord's Prayer quoting Jesus as addressing the prayer to "Father-Mother in heaven" gives argument that Jesus practiced no such restriction himself. What virtue-based reasoning could there be to argue that men and women should not ever seek to speak their hearts to their Mother in Heaven?
Contained in our LDS hymnbook is a song, "O My Father", which was originally published with the title "Invocation, or The Eternal Father and Mother". The original title and the third verse of the song directly acknowledges the existence of a Heavenly Mother, and the last verse of the song then reads,
When I leave this frail existence,
When I lay this mortal by,
Father, Mother, may I meet you
In your royal courts on high?
Then, at length, when I’ve completed
All you sent me forth to do,
With your mutual approbation
Let me come and dwell with you.
"O My Father", LDS Hymnbook, #292
"Invocation" is a word of Latin orgin meaning "prayer", the text of the fourth verse directly addresses both Heavenly Father and Mother in prayer verbiage, and as we are told in D&C 25, "the song of the righteous is a prayer unto me" — meaning that we have, however unwittingly, been addressing the "prayer" of this song to Heavenly Mother in our church meetings since the 1800s.
70 ~ "Isn't Heavenly Mother too sacred for us to be speaking of Her?" ~
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The idea that Heavenly Mother is too sacred to be spoken of or spoken to does not originate with any church president or apostle but with a seminary teacher in the 1960s. There is no record of Joseph Smith or of any other high-ranking church leader as ever teaching this. There is no scripture, revelation, or doctrine in the history of the church in existence that states Heavenly Mother is beyond an additional veil of sacredness to us, meaning our silence towards and about Heavenly Mother has arguably been nothing more than the cultural convention of a past and current society that is patriarchy-centred.
69 ~ "In whose image was woman created?" ~
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69 ~ The fruits of believing in a Heavenly Mother, contrasted with the fruits of believing in doctrinal polygamy ~
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71 ~ "How do we know what a Celestial partnership actually looks like, if we know nothing of Heavenly Mother?" ~
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Who says that we know nothing about Heavenly Mother? We know that she is the Mother Creator of our spirits and that She with Heavenly Father together hold all power existent in the world. What details do we know about Heavenly Father that we don't know about Heavenly Mother? If we feel like we know less of Her, it is perhaps only because she is so seldom spoken of, and because the words of Elohim traditionally have never been equally attributed to Her, even in those cases when the contextual grammar of scripture indicates or allows for such an expansion of the narrative source.
72 ~ Not giving credit where credit is due ~
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73 ~ Those who have applied the instruction of "Ask ye shall receive, seek and ye shall find" to the doctrine of Heavenly Mother ~
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74 ~ Multiple eternal companions was not a feature in patriarchal blessings contemporaneous to Joseph Smith's life ~
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75 ~ Disparity between men vs women regarding the acceptability of polygamy — negative psychosocial effects on LDS girls ~
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Many LDS women report learning of polygamy as young girls, and remember feeling immediately uncomfortable with the thought. (Mere children intuiting the wrongfulness of it! Imagine that!) Other LDS women who did not learn of Mormon polygamy doctrine until adulthood have expressed feelings of traumatic betrayal once they have learned of it. Many women have reported it to be the greatest challenge to their faith, and many have reported to have left the church entirely over it, even as young as during their teenage years. What kind of different experiences in the LDS church would girls and women have if they never go through the self-reported fracturing experience of "learning" of polygamy being commanded by God? — "I wish I could get back all the years that I ever believed in 'divine' polygamy."
76 ~ Polygamy having a much more serious fracturing effect on women's and girls' identities than any other past false doctrine ~
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77 ~ "The history of Joseph Smith" listed as the highest contributing factor to members leaving the LDS church ~
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Survey results from thousands of former LDS church members were released in 2024, showing that the most common listed reason for leaving the church by former members was, "History related to Joseph Smith". Of those who have left, 92% reported that it was at least "unlikely" that they would ever return to the church, with 82% reporting it to be "very unlikely". It would appear from this that at least certain parts of the current LDS narrative of Joseph Smith's history has a very strong repelling effect. In the 2013 Personal Faith Crisis Report commissioned by Elder Dieter F. Uctdorf, church history was the largest reported factor leading to loss of belief, with polygamy being one of the highest (if not the highest) of all the contributing historical factors. In a 2019 survey asking for contributing reasons why respondents left the LDS church, 31% of the respondents selected, “I did not trust the Church leadership to tell the truth surrounding controversial or historical issues.”
78 ~ For perhaps the first time ever in history, a generation of women are now leaving religion at a higher rate than men ~
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A 2023 study showed that, among those categorized as Gen Z (born mid-to-late 1990s to early 2010s), 54% of those who have left religion are women, marking perhaps the first time ever that a subset of women are leaving their faith at a higher rate than the same subset of men. The ratio of women-to-men leaving religion has been marked to have risen for both Millennials and Gen X as well, when compared to their Baby Boomer counterparts. This could suggest that the traditional patriarchy-centered models of religion are becoming increasingly more distasteful to women with every passing generation, and that the future women of Generation Alpha may experience this effect in an even more compounded way.
79 ~ The gender disparity of polygamy belief — negative social implications for married members ~
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Many women find that the anti-polygamy evidence immediately rings true and confirms the workings of the Spirit inside their hearts and minds. The gender disparity in which men on average tend to feel much more okay with the idea of polygamy doctrine than women do does in some cases produce significant negative effects for married members of the church when the wife begins to question the validity of polygamy as a doctrine. I have personally heard multiple private reports of LDS women facing severe mistreatment from their husbands for studying this topic of polygamy and harboring feelings against it as a principle. If the church does not denounce doctrinal polygamy, it is not unreasonable to expect that certain temple marriages will be lost (not to mention the other male-female family relationships that can be fractured and broken off by polygamy arguments as well.)
80 ~ The gender disparity of polygamy belief — negative social implications for priesthood leaders ~
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As one of the principle requirements of becoming a bishop, stake president, or any higher ecclesiastical leader is to be married, church leaders will inevitably have a difficult time disciplining members speaking out against doctrinal polygamy if ever their own wives learn of the evidence supporting the LDS anti-polygamy movement. A bishop who is receiving pressure from higher-ups to discipline members publicly sharing anti-polygamy evidence is in a very difficult marital position if his own wife has any sympathetic beliefs towards the anti-polygamy narrative herself. If the church were to ever seek to circumnavigate this by changing policy to allow a higher number of church leadership positions be offered to unmarried priesthood holders, then that would directly lead to a lower number of children in the church being born to church leaders — which would have other undesired repercussions. The current church narrative of polygamy cannot continue if the wives of our church leaders ever cease believing it.
81 ~ The gender disparity of polygamy beliefs — negative social implications for single men ~
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​One very common and immediate psychosocial effect for an LDS woman, once she has discarded belief in doctrinal polygamy, is that polygamy-believing LDS men suddenly become significantly less attractive as a potential partner to herself. This could be considered as having just as strong of an effect, if not more, for very young women who are not many years far removed from having watched princess movies and imagining their own "one true love". As the anti-polygamy message reaches ever-younger women in the church, this will have the effect that single men who believe in the church's pro-polygamy historical narrative will find themselves having less single LDS women who are wishing to date them — and if they never marry, then under current church policy they can never serve as a bishop, yet alone any higher church leadership position. An LDS man can of course still serve as a bishop if he has a wife who is not a member of the church — but women outside the church tend to be repulsed by men who believe in early Mormon polygamy too. If single LDS women collectively cease to believe in the pro-polygamy historical narrative, then single LDS men who do still believe it will likely have a much more difficult time finding anyone who wants to marry them.
82 ~ The negative future social consequences for the LDS church if we continue with the current narrative ~
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Ultimately, it is already too late for the anti-polygamy message to be stopped. It has been immortalized on the internet and attempts to sequester it have led to so-called "Barbara Streisand" effects (in which attempts to either remove information or silence individuals have ultimately only brought more attention to the topic.) The online anti-polygamy community now consists of tens of thousands of individuals — LDS member Michelle Stone had some 120,000 subscribers on her pro-monogamy YouTube channel before it was taken down. Directly after her channel was removed in 2025, an influx of new podcasts and channels was created to fill the void, meaning that there was near-immediately a much higher number of LDS public commentators broadcasting anti-polygamy content, some with academic historical certifications and some targeting very young demographics of church members. Many of us researching and analyzing the anti-polygamy evidence have experienced divine help and guidance in finding previously-unknown sources and received heaven-given knowledge and insight, all signifying this to be information that the Lord wishes to be brought forth now. I know the Spirit has inspired my mind to write many of the words I've written, such that I don't venture to take credit for them all myself. I know that the Lord will continue to aid those of us who are striving to bring this message to more children of God, and that should the church continue clinging to the pro-historical-polygamy narrative more miracles will be performed to further our success. The longer the church adheres to the current narrative, the more negative consequences they will incur for themselves.
83 ~ The Lord in D&C confirms that members in Joseph Smith's time were under condemnation ~​​​​
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Section 84 of the Doctrine & Covenants reads,
And they shall remain under this condemnation until they repent and remember the new covenant, even the Book of Mormon and the former commandments which I have given them, not only to say, but to do according to that which I have written—
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That they may bring forth fruit meet for their Father’s kingdom; otherwise there remaineth a scourge and judgment to be poured out upon the children of Zion.
The Lord here states explicitly that church members will be under condemnation for not following the "former commandments", and that this condemnation will follow us until we both do and say according to that which the Lord has written. The Book of Mormon was written for Joseph Smith's day, for our day, and for the day of our future generations. We have never had any valid doctrinal excuse to dismiss the Lord's commandments to the Nephites through Jacob as only being for the Nephites.
83 ~ A release from condemnation — for church leaders ~
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Jacob began his sermon in chapter 2 by stating,
Now, my beloved brethren, I, Jacob, accord-ing to the responsibility which I am under to God, to magnify mine office with soberness, and that I might rid my garments of your sins, I come up into the temple this day that I might declare unto you the word of God. Jacob 2:2
Jacob stated here that if he were to neglect speaking against the Nephite's sins (specifically of pride and what he calls the "grosser sin" of polygamy justification) then he would have his garments stained with their sins at the last day. Other Book of Mormon passages repeat the idea that leaders and parents who teach false doctrine, or even who merely refrain from proactively teaching truth, will be held jointly responsible for the sins of their people and children that would have otherwise been avoided. Modern church leaders who have either been rationalizing historical polygamy or staying silent on it should consider what implications of this there might be for themselves.
84 ~ We are promised that once we are properly following the principles of the Book of Mormon, we will receive the revelations contained on the sealed plates ~
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Speaking of the sealed scriptures of the gold plates, the Lord has said,​
They shall not go forth unto the Gentiles until the day that they shall repent of their iniquity, and become clean before the Lord. Ether 4:6
The Lord went on to state that those who do not follow the lesser knowledge (of the Book of Mormon) will not be given the greater knowledge (of the sealed plates),
And he that will contend against the word of the Lord, let him be accursed; and he that shall deny these things, let him be accursed; for unto them will I show no greater things, saith Jesus Christ; for I am he who speaketh. Ether 4:8
So long as we as a church are teaching that God may sometimes command husbands to violate the law of monogamy, we are not fully following the principles of the Book of Mormon.
85 ~ Further study, and introducing the neurological argument against polygamy ~
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Many of the psychosocial arguments against polygamy are directly related to and supported by the harmful neurological effects of multi-partner sexuality, which are introduced in the following website linked below titled, "Principles of Sexuality for Latter-day Saints." Further information of the documented psychosocial harm of polygamy, as well as informational resources designed to help individuals heal from the harmful effects of internalized polygamy beliefs, can be found on the Further Study page.
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Also seek confirmation of the truth from the Lord in prayer, as "by the voice of the Spirit ye may know the truth of all things," and as Joseph Smith read, "If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not, and it shall be given him."