With the debut of HBO's new polygamy television drama, Big Love, it's getting tougher to laugh off the argument that same-sex marriage will lead to polygamy, polyamory, and ultimately to the replacement of marriage itself by an infinitely flexible partnership system

* With the debut of HBO's new polygamy television drama, Big Love, it's getting tougher to laugh off the argument that same-sex marriage will lead to polygamy, polyamory, and ultimately to the replacement of marriage itself by an infinitely flexible partnership system. Big Love makes a point of comparing polygamy to the drive for gay marriage, arguing that as long as people love each other, family structure doesn't matter.

Even Newsweek is grudgingly acknowledging the connection, reporting that a "new wave of polygamy activists" is "emerging in the wake of the gay-marriage movement." "If Heather can have two mommies," these activists say, "she should also be able to have two mommies and a daddy." Meanwhile, libertarian New York Times columnist John Tierney has endorsed polygamy, welcoming it along with same-sex marriage. The debate over same-sex marriage has never been primarily about society's acceptance of gays. It is about whether marriage will be deconstructed--which is something we seem likely to find out the hard way.

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