Dr Dean Edell
I just got off the phone with Dr Dean Edell. Last night I watched the most recent episode of Big Love. One of the main characters owns a hardware in Utah and is obsessed with being outed as a polygamist. The non-polygamists are portrayed, unilaterally as being opposed to the beliefs of these fundamentalist Mormons. I couldn't help wondering, as I watched the show, if his lifestyle would be as much of a concern if he lived in San Francisco or California for that matter. Edell brought up the issue of Polygamy on his noon talk show on KGO 810 and so I thought I'd call him up and get his opinion on the matter. I told him that I was calling from San Francisco and that, out here, we have a pretty strong sex positive culture. We have authors like Dossie Easton who wrote The Ethical Slut, a book on polyamory. I personally know people who are in polyamorous relationships and their relationships seem to be working successfully. I don't know anyone who's a polygamist though so I asked him if he thought polygamy would be as much of an issue with someone who lived in San Francisco?
He explained that California was founded by people during the gold rush and that this contributed to our acceptant attitude. Furthermore, our acceptance of people, as with people who are homosexual for example, is influenced by whether we know someone with that lifestyle. We are more likely to accept a lifestyle if we know someone who practices it. He said it was more likely for polygamists to be accepted in blue states than in red states.