Plural Marriage

The content that I have chosen is a film documentary. I’ve watched and became quite a
fan of some of Kara David’s film documentaries and I’ve felt poignant and connected to some of
the stories she had. It inspired me to make a documentary the content I’d respond to. This film
documentary, however, is not written by Kara. This film was produced in 1999 but it still reflects
the modern situations of polygamy in fundamentalist mormons.

Documentary Synopsis:

“My Six Wives and 29 Children,” directed by Jane Treays (the youtube link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vqORJHyNWJc), is a fifty-minute documentary about the
isolated life of a fundamentalist Mormon family of Tom Green, the 51-year-old patriarch, his
five wives, and one former, and their 26 children. The Greenhaven, a collection of old and
tarnished mobile houses, lying at a desert two hundred miles away from Salt Lake City, Utah, is
home to this polygynous family. Three of the originally 30 children already left Greenhaven as
they have already reached the proper age, one died from a fire, and the remaining 26 are all aged
12 and under. Tom believes that it’s his calling [by a God] that he engages in plural marriage
(some acolytes would argue it be called “celestial marriage”) and that the more wives he has, the
more his seat in heaven is secured. Linda, the first wife, married Tom at age 14, Tom was 35 at
that time. His second, Shirley, was 15 years old when she got married. Tom then married June,
Shirley’s mother, who’s still living at Greenhaven at that time but is now his ex-wife. Tom
pursued LeeAnn, his step-daughter to another ex-wife, making her the third wife. Cari, the
fourth, became one of the sister-wives after marrying Tom two days after meeting him. Cari’s
sister, Hannah, then married Tom two, three weeks after Tom’s marriage with Cari. Candace,
Tom’s granddaughter to one of his adopted sons, will be Tom’s sixth wife when she turns 17.
However, at that time, Candace is having a romantic relationship with Tom’s eldest son at
Greenhaven, Mel. Despite the complexity of their situation, the wives have been very expressive
of their love for Tom and they firmly believe that it’s rightful to share their husband.
The film’s narrative unfolds through the introduction of Tom and his wives, followed by
a series of their perspectives, the subsequent and casual dialogues of the family, and Tom’s
statement of the future possibilities of the family. The documentary concluded with the lawful
pursuits of the anti-polygamist group in Utah against Tom and his family.

Points and Responses:

I have watched several heart-wrenching and perturbing documentaries regarding polygamy in

Mormon that discloses the extreme secrecy of domestic abuses, sexual exploitation, recurrent
incest, wicked manipulation, human trafficking, child trafficking, and fearful indoctrination. It
has been inevitable to shed some tears watching the horrendous heinousness and despicability of
such immoral maniacs. I felt discomfort and anger whilst watching such documentaries; I can’t
imagine how much more these people have suffered. I have chosen this documentary because it
feels less traumatic to respond to. I believe that it’s not polygamy that makes victims suffer; it’s
the overwhelming greed of a man lacking moral enlightenment and virtues. I came across
polygamous families with less immoral acts; with more care, love, and respect. I also
remembered cultural anthropologist, Kimber McKay, in her TED talk regarding the different
templates of marriages in Humla, Nepal, which I have shared in my reflection on module 8.
Also, the ABC News short report I’ve shared on module 9 about a former Mormon polygynous
family of Brady Williams. These films are proof that morality can flourish despite being in a
polygamous family. As such, I would like to address these three specific points in the film:

1. According to Tom Green, she married the wives that he has because they are the wives
that God brought to him and that He informed him that those wives are the girls that
Tom should marry (around 7 min and 14 sec of the film). He believes that he’s entered
into solemn covenants with his wives and that each has been bound to him by a very
special and sacred religious ceremony. But is it truly “God, the omnibenevolent,” who
has placed such tribulation on him and his family? Or is religion being exploited to
justify his pedophilia?
From the documentary, it is evident that Tom has had several wives before his current wives. He
left his former wives to build a new family. According to the wives, Tom has been very kind and
caring to them, however, overt actions are not a good indicator of what his true motives are. If
marriage to him is sacrilegious, then why did he leave his former wives (i.e. June, June’s sister,
LeeAnn’s mother)? Doesn’t that entail that he prefers younger women to have coitus with? I
posit that religion is just a petty excuse to dignify his pedophilia and that when his wives age and
wrinkle, he’ll leave them and remarry younger women. He’s providing them their necessities
because they’re submissive, young, and able to satisfy his sensual needs; submissive because,
despite jealousy, the women were able to be ”happy” for him and suppressed their emotions for
the greater benefit of the family. Not that I am cynical of his words but the fact that he’s left his
former wives to settle for younger wives shows that he places his interest before the interest of
these women. His actions indicate that he’s an ethical egotist. When youth fades and Tom’s
interests are no longer fed, would he continue to support the family, the family that “God wants
him to have”? Near the end of the film, Tom said that: “obviously, uh, the time may come when I
have a wife that’s younger than the children we have over here.” In such words, I see not the
virtue of love rather the lust masked by his religion.

1. To freely practice and preserve their fundamentalist Mormon beliefs, the family is living
in isolation, distant from the city. The children have little to no contact with the outside
world and education is catered by their mothers. The Green family have barely thirty
thousand pounds a year to feed, clothe, and house all thirty-three of them. Tom was in
the dry cleaning business but now relies on erratic magazine subscriptions he and his
wives offer to the people in the City several hours away from Greenhaven. Despite
experiencing financial instability, Tom would still pursue another girl to include in the
budget.

I am particularly concerned with the children. First, about their rights. The children are denied
their right to education, to the standard living of adequate health and well-being, to liberty and
freedom of thought and expression, to the services offered by their country, to participate in a
community, to freedom around the world, among others. Second, about their maturation.
Without sufficient nutrition and a healthy environment, these children would grow up with
physiological or psychosocial impairment in one way or another. They’re only viewed and being
raised as future polygamists and nothing more. As told, children are home-schooled by their
mothers, however, their mothers have limited knowledge about the world as well. They are being
fed with the knowledge that is only relevant to their religion. The potentials of these children are
not nurtured because they are confined within the limits of their parents’ beliefs, trapped within
the boundaries of secrecy and isolation. When the girls are of proper age, they are married to
another polygamous man. The knowledge they have is too little for critical thinking which
suggests that this familial system is built to manipulate people as young as possible such that the
continuance of the practice of fundamentalist Mormonism is secured. Tom had confessed that he
was not able to attend to his children sufficiently. It is the children’s right to receive patriarchal
care because they came from his cells. He has to provide attention to his offspring, not only to
his wives because they are a family. 
In the film, I witness children are allowed to play outside their house, on the arid and barren
land. They’re strong and capable of hanging upside down on a metal bar elevated from the
ground. They’re kind to their siblings and loving to their parents. The kid and perpetuate funny
ruses, sometimes. They have great potential. It’s heart-wrenching to see such potentials be
wasted on just the confines of the family. If I may say so, I feel that the parents are selfish for not
providing appropriate rights to these young individuals, for not seeing the possible consequences
of their lustful actions. Tom can barely attend to his children, in need and attention, and they
wanted to add more members of the family, another sister-wife, another group of children which
would suffer the lack of appropriate parenting.
Shirley’s fourth son, Gerry, died in the fire caused by a wiring problem. At that time Shirley was
in Salt Lake City a month before boring her twins. She is unsure if the babies would come early
so she went to Salt Lake just in case. That night in the city, Linda called Tom through their
neighbor’s phone and told him that their house is on fire. Linda and Cari managed to safely get
all of the children out of the house, except for Gerry. There were too many children at that time
and in panic, the wives' first instinct was to save their children first. No one wanted it, but I see it
as one of the consequences of their actions, their selfish “love”. That child could’ve had a great
future ahead of him. At that time, it was winter and the family had no shelter to warm
themselves. They’ve struggled to survive and thankfully they’ve managed to. Tom knows he’s
financially unstable, yet he still wants to add another wife in the family to “elevate his status in
heaven” without carefully thinking of the offspring he has and he will probably soon have;
thinking of the life the children will be experiencing and the struggles that require patriarchal
attention. Care is genuine only to the wives and Tom; to the children, I feel no genuine care.
They’ll either be in another polygamous family as a parent when they grow up, or they won’t
have the opportunity to grow up at all.

1. All the wives of Tom have been very vocal about their love for him throughout the
documentary. They believe that how they live is how life ought to be lived and they see
nothing wrong with it.

This point somehow provides support for feminist care ethics. As Carol Gilligan has
stated, women’s morality centers on the notion of caring and responsibility. The wives are busy
catering to the needs of their children and of Tom's. They do the chores and school their children.
They have nothing else to do in their life but to be suitable and effective wives and mothers.
Linda told the interviewer that she loves Tom very much and she’ll feel very guilty and selfish
not to share his husband that’s very capable of loving other women. The level of generosity and
selflessness is quite to a high degree that most normal people would’ve not dared to have. They
have forgotten themselves and their individual need for sufficient attention to supporting a
family Tom is creating. But it kept me thinking about how they were indoctrinated when they
were still young. These women were once children of polygamous parents. They were taught
values and beliefs that are only anchored to their religion. From the moment of their birth, they
have been exposed to plural marriage, that’s why it feels natural and right to them; one of the
reasons why I posit that feelings must often be disregarded when deciding what’s right and
wrong. Such a setting is only rightful to them because they feel it is, not because it morally is.
Also, these women view their right only in the freedom to decide whether they want to marry the
man or not, or be intimate with him or not.
“I think that most people when they see plural marriage, they see this horny old man that wants
to have sex with young women; and that’s not Tom, that’s not him at all. It’s a woman's choice,
it’s a woman’s issue… It’s more about our rights and our freedom than it is about his. I mean, we
get to decide when we’re gonna have sex with him. He doesn’t ask; it’s not his place; It’s a girl’s
place to choose her husband, and we chase Tom. I chose him.” These are the words that Cari,
Tom’s fourth wife, said during an interview. She views her right only as it is inclined with
marriage but not as an individual in a society, not as a human in humanity. I posit that women in
fundamentalist Mormon families were robbed of their independent thinking, being manipulated
to serve a man-centered system, and sexually exploited because they lack the means to resist or
to think of resistance.