Lolek Ltd, Trading as 'The Iona Institute'

oldrnwisr wrote: »

To paraphrase Ben Goldacre, interestingly you're wrong. Actually it's not interesting that you're wrong, when you're wrong it's a case of dog bites man.

Anyway, one man one woman marriage is not the most common family form throughout the western world in history. In fact, only about 20% of societies have been based on monogamy. The most common family form has been polygyny as this graph demonstrates:



Source data: Ethnographic Atlas Codebook

The human male tendency is towards as many mates as possible and so, heavily patriarchal societies as has been the norm for most of human history has tended to swing towards polygyny. (As far as Ireland in particular is concerned, I'm sure Bannasidhe is much better positioned to destroy this misconception).

Also, even if your point about one man one woman marriage had been valid, I'm sure at some point that someone has pointed out to you that an appeal to tradition and an appeal to common practice are both poor foundations on which to build an argument.

Now, you've already been asked to justify your position without reference to religion. Can you please do so?

Indeed. Prior to the Conquest (completed in the mid 17th century) Gaelic Ireland was a highly secular society where marriage was seen as a one of several options to ensure allies. It was political.

The concept of the family was vastly different to the current nuclear model which arrived with the Normans and never really caught on until the Tudors killed anyone who tried to live by the Gaelic model.
In fact most of the Normans adopted Gaelic concepts of the family within 2 generations of their arrival.

The family was extended not nuclear- the Clann - and sought to increase it's status/protect itself by seeking alliances with other clanns.
Marriage was an important tactic, but not the only one.

The other two were fosterage and gossiprid.

Fosterage - where a child aged around 7 left their biological family and were raised by a family who usually had no blood connection was the norm. As part of the fosterage agreement this child always inherited a portion from their foster parents but not necessarily from their biological parents. On leaving fosterage aged approx 14 these children were considered fully fledged adults and were usually married off to political advantage.

Gossiprid - where unrelated adults made a blood bond and became 'legally' related - it was considered more heinous for the bond of gossiprid to be broken then for biologically related people to kill each other.

There was no concept of illegitimacy and female virginity was not considered particularly important (it was a sexually permissive society). As marriage was about politics not romantic love or sexual attraction it was understood that both partners were free to seek sexual satisfaction outside that marriage should they wish.

It was the norm for men to have many children with a variety of women - all of these children were equal under the law with absolutely no distinction being made between legitimate and illegitimate.

Women 'named' the father of their child - this did not have to be their husband and quite often wasn't.
There is no extant record of any man denying fatherhood having been thus 'named' nor any record of a divorce due to a woman baring the child of a man who wasn't her husband.
The child was considered a member named father's clann not the mother's husband's. The named father would arrange fosterage and on reaching 14 years the child would be a considered fully fledged member of their biological father's clann. (Hugh O Neill was the son of Ferdoragh who was named Con Bacach O'Neill's son at the age of 12.)

Multiple sexual partners was the norm and it was so rare for husband and wife to be 'faithful' that when it did occur it was remarked upon - I have only found two entries in the Irish Annals (which cover a 1000 year period) praising a man for being faithful to his wife- the most recent dating to the 12th century (An Uí Conchobhair king was faithful to his Ní Bhrian wife - she wasn't to him )

Divorce was widespread (Hugh O'Neill had 6 wives). Men did not need any grounds, the law allowed 11 legal grounds for women - these 11 grounds pretty much covered everything and were primarily concerned with ensuring that women were sexually satisfied and not abused in anyway plus whether she got to hang onto some of his property - her property always remained hers and hers alone.

Homosexuality was accepted although it was grounds for a woman to divorce her husband if it meant he couldn't sexually satisfy her.

So Silvio - if you want us to embrace genuine 'traditional' Irish values, as opposed to the ones violently imposed on us by a foreign power, I'm all for a secular society where women have a great deal of personal power, where sex is guilt free, where homosexuality is considered a fact of life and all born children up to the age of 7 are considered not only equal but in value equivalent to a cleric and abortion was available- oh, by the way tansy was the most common way of aborting fetus' but I don't know if that was what (St.) Bridget used as there were other methods available and the sources do not tell us what specific method she used - just that she aborted a pregnancy.

But then you do believe foreign powers have the right to tell us how to live so I guess you don't think much of genuinely traditional Irish values.

Silvio.Dante wrote: »

Marriage in our society is between a man and a woman. Relationships outside of marriage are of course made up of many varying styles...:)

Not for much longer.

Nothing to say about 'Traditional' Irish values Silvio now that it has been shown that those values were very, very liberal?

Forgot to mention - all those Gaelic laws I referred to can be read in Fergus Kelly's Guide to Early Irish Law.