The dismissal of polygamy charges against the two leaders of a Mormon fundamentalist sect in Bountiful, B.C., puts the British Columbia government in a quandary.

An appeal could uphold the decision of Madam Justice Sunni Stromberg-Stein that the B.C. Attorney General at the time, Wally Oppal, had improperly interfered in the justice system by “prosecutor shopping” for someone who would go forward with charges against self-admitted polygamists Winston Blackmore and James Oler.

Alternatively, the government could ask the B.C. Court of Appeal to make a ruling on whether Canada’s polygamy law is constitutional. Blackmore argues that it violates the Charter of Rights by denying his religious freedom — in this case, to take multiple wives.

The evils of Bountiful are well described in Daphne Branham’s Secret Lives of the Saints: Child Brides and Lost Boys in Canada’s Polygamous Mormon Sect (Random, House of Canada).

No one has more zealously pursued this story of victimization and religious extremism than Ms. Branham, a long-time Vancouver Sun reporter.

Justice Stromberg-Stein’s decision has sent shock waves through the anti-polygamy movement. Nancy Mereska, the Alberta leader of Stop Polygamy in Canada, says she’s “absolutely devastated.”

It’s important to remember that the decision has nothing to do with the merits of the charge itself. The judge has made no finding in that regard. She dealt with a procedural issue, namely whether or not the Attorney General was within his rights to recruit a third special prosecutor after two previous ones had declined to prosecute. They were of the view that it would be impossible to obtain a conviction because of the Charter of Rights guarantee of religious freedom.

I recall discussing this issue with Mr. Oppal for an article I wrote for The National Post a couple of years ago. He told me at the time he was convinced that polygamy charges could be made to stick. There’s a huge file of academic and legal opinion that the practice of polygamy is discriminatory and oppressive and is a violation of international laws that Canada has vowed to uphold.

It’s been almost half a century since Mormon fundamentalists from Alberta moved into B.C.’s remote Creston Valley and set up a religious colony called Bountiful. It’s a beautiful part of the world — I spent my boyhood there and nature is truly bountiful in its gifts of climate, soil and spectacular scenery.

The fact polygamy has survived largely untouched by outside laws speaks to something in the Canadian character of tolerance and acceptance. It’s also testament to the economic clout of Bountiful, which has fed a constant stream of commerce into what might otherwise be a depressed area.

But facts remain. Polygamy is against Canadian law. Religious-based polygamy (is there any other kind?) involves oppressive brain-washing, usually accompanied by sexual abuse, of young females.

B.C. needs to put an end to the charade of legality that surrounds Bountiful. Is Canada a country to be governed by religion or by reason? Blackmore and Oler must be prosecuted. And our laws must be reformed, if necessary, to put an end to religious abuse of the civil rights of young and defenseless Canadians.

To really get the most out of this, you should probably read Part 1 of the Handy Dandy guide, where I explained the doctrines that set these groups apart from mainstream Mormonism. Yeah, you know what polygamy is, but what’s the Adam-God theory?

Today’s post outlines the groups themselves. This was going to be all one post, but it turned out to be too big, so I split it into more. Possibly three. Look forward to it!

Apostolic United Brethren

Flock: between 5,000 and 8,000

Locale: most in several towns in Utah and Ozumba, Mexico, where they have a temple; Pinesdale, MT; Lovell, WY; Mesa, AZ, Humansville, MO.

Extracurricular beliefs: the Adam-God doctrine, Law of Consecration, and Plural Marriage. The last was the main reason they split from the mainstream LDS church in 1886.

Mannerisms: church leaders do not organize marriages, people under 18 do not marry, and no one marries close relatives. One of the more liberal groups.

Trivia: in 1977 the leader, Rulon C. Allred, was shot by Rena Chynoweth , a follower of another Mormon splinter group.

Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS Church)

Flock: between 6,000 and 8,000

Locale: Hildale, UT and Colorado City, AZ (formerly both known as Short Creek); recently built a temple in Eldorado, TX at the Yearning For Zion ranch. You may have read about it in the news.

Extracurricular Beliefs: Blood Atonement, the Law of Consecration, and Plural Marriage.

Mannerisms: girls are assigned to men based on a revelation by the prophet, Warren Jeffs, when they reach marriageable age. Jeffs’ definition of “marriageable age” has gotten him a ten-to-life jail sentence. Wives are required to be subordinate to their husbands, and everyone is subject to a strict dress code, which apparently derives inspiration from the stylite monks of yore: the higher the hair, the closer to God.

Trivia: Hilade / Colorado City has a gobsmackingly high occurrence of the rare genetic defect fumarase deficiency-about 60% of the world’s cases (about 20 out of 33) have occurred there. Variety in your sexual partners, folks. Don’t date people who look like you.

Latter Day Church of Christ, aka the Kingston Clan

Flock: 2,000

Locale: Salt Lake City and surrounding areas

Extraccurricular Beliefs: Polygamy is the only one I can find for sure (some of the important men have 30+ wives), but the Law of Consecration seems likely.

Mannerisms: Owns at least $70 million worth of gaming equipment throughout the Southwest, selling tp casinos, bars, etc. via the Davis County Cooperative; most members live in abject poverty. Routinely marry off underage girls.

Trivia: They specialize in incest, since the second leader of the group, John Ortell Kingston, believed he had to keep the bloodlines pure. Marrying first cousins, nieces or nephews, or half-siblings is pretty common.

Righteous Branch of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Flock: 100-200

Locale: Modena, UT.

Extracurricular Beliefs: Mainly polygamy, but since they’re an offshoot of the AUB (outline above), I assume they also believe in the Law of Consecration and the Adam-God doctrine. The former leader, Gerald Peterson Sr., claimed that Rulon Allred’s ghost visited him after Allred was murdered and handed leadership to him.

Mannerisms: dress modernly, and claim to not marry off underage women. However, in 2001 there was a big court case in which Tom Green, a member of the church, was convicted of marrying (and having sex with) a 13-year-old, and they had a child. They are still married. Therefore, draw your own conclusions.

Trivia: Finding info on this group is pretty tricky. The best I have for this section is that, surprise, they’re secretive, but have a pyramid-shaped temple in Utah. One webpage claimed that the temple had something to do with the mainstream LDS church allowing black men to take the priesthood, but it didn’t really clarify.

I just watched a TV movie about polygamy that got me thinking… This, added to the fact that I recently went through the first season of Big Love and have read a couple posts about polygamy lately, has made for lots of food for thought or, as one person I know would have it, “blog fodder”.

It does seem that polygamy–OK, polygyny–is the alternate lifestyle du jour for Hollywood (and thus for us the consumers of entertainment). This is a trend that will probably peak and taper off, as has the taste for all things vampire-related (though a new TV show about vampires makes me wonder if that trend will be resurrected–or made undead, as the case may be). And it leads to some interesting questions about marriage, love, relationships, community, soulmates, cultural values, and extended families–things that we’ve been dealing with rather unsuccessfully in secular America for the past century or so.

It does seem that currently we’re preoccupied with the home-grown American variant of polygamy, mostly associated with fundamentalist Mormon sects (though they’re not acknowledged by the Church of Latter-Day Saints). But something else that makes the issue relevant is the fact that polygamy is an allowed practice (though not necessarily the norm) in Islam as well–and our nation as a whole has had to become a lot more versed in the practices and beliefs of Muslims, since 9/11.

I think we’re at a loss about what we think–or what we should think–about a practice like polygamy. On the one hand, there’s something that strikes us as inherently off about one man having many wives. That might be the result of cultural conditioning, though, and two thousand years of Christian monopoly on cultural values. Besides, some argue, there’s plenty of Biblical precedent for polygamous marriages–Rachel and Leah, the wives of Jacob, being the first obvious example that come to mind (then again, what a dysfunctional example of a family!!!). Oh, and Solomon’s 1000 wives… or was it 300 wives and 700 concubines?

The point is that in a society where we feel it’s wrong to make judgments about people’s cultural practices (except when it suits us, and we call it “human rights”), we are starting to realize that we don’t have a leg to stand on to condemn those who live in plural marriages. We can even see that their communities and families are more tight-knit than our own, and that’s something that we admire. After all, if we’re not going to fuss about other alternate lifestyles, why interfere with theirs?

Personally, I’m convinced that a person needs to apply critical thinking to this and other cultural values. Yes, in some ways their lifestyle seems to provide things that we lack in our society, but what is the result when a large community practices polygamy? We’ve heard plenty in the news about that–young girls forced into marriages often with very much older men, boys being forced out of the communities that they grew up in (because they were threats to the elder men), and other things like that. I think that if polygamy easily fell into being a consensual setup where all the adults involved made a true commitment to one another and to their children, we’d see more of that and less of the other.

Then again, living with “serial monogamy” doesn’t seem to produce any better results… For what it’s worth, it’s probably all part of the human condition. Yikes. Sometimes thinking about marriages and relationships (especially in these terms) makes me just want to swear off the whole thing…