Apocalypse alert! The New York Post ran a bizarre story this weekend headlined, “NYC Judge Rules Polyamorous Unions Entitled to Same Legal Protections as 2-Person Relationships.”
Hahahaha! That HAS to be a mistake! We were PROMISED when Obergefell made gay marriage the law of the land that this would NEVER HAPPEN. It was just a lunatic conspiracy theory to predict that the extra-constitutional decision would be quickly extended to polygamy and all sorts of other deviant sexual behavior.
But the headline was NOT a mistake. The lawsuit was about tenants’ rights; the lease provided that only family members could use the unit. The judge found that the third gay polygamist — it was three men — was just as much a part of the “family” as the two original guys in the apartment and was entitled to renew the lease too. It seems there was a breakup and the original guy on the lease left to go touring European festivals or something.
Finding that the third “partner” could renew the lease, even though he wasn’t on it, the judge described the bizarre arrangement using the unwieldy euphemism “significant multi-person relationships”:
The instant case presents the distinct and complex issue of significant multi-person relationships.
Uh huh. It’s complex all right. She continued, raising the awful specter of hateful INTOLERANCE: “Why then, except for the very real possibility of implicit majoritarian animus, is the limitation of two persons inserted into the definition of a family-like relationship for the purposes of receiving the same protections from eviction accorded to legally formalized or blood relationships?”
Um, maybe it’s not hateful animus. Maybe it’s just because landlords want to have SOME control over who lives in their units.
Then the judge asked the $64,000 question: “Do all nontraditional relationships have to comprise or include only two primary persons?”
Um, yes. It should’ve ended there.
But, amazingly, the judge cited Justice Robert’s DISSENT in the Obergefell decision, where he ruefully predicted this very thing would happen: “If not having the opportunity to marry serves to disrespect and subordinate gay and lesbian couples, why wouldn’t the same imposition of this disability … serve to disrespect and subordinate people who find fulfillment in polyamorous relationships?” Roberts opined sadly.
Indeed. I can’t wait to see the next kind of “nontraditional relationships” New York judges find deserve the full and fair protection of the law. Maybe puppies? Cat people?