Polygamy Story Illustrates "Women as Scarce Resources/Property" Concept

[DoveTurnedHawk]

In addition to so many more vile and repulsive things. American Taliban. The next time someone says it can't happen here, refer them to this story and tell them it already is happening here.

:puke:

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<...>

Gideon is one of the "Lost Boys," a group of more than 400 teenagers — some as young as 13 — who authorities in Utah and Arizona say have fled or been driven out of the polygamous enclaves of Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City over the last four years.

His stated offenses: wearing short-sleeved shirts, listening to CDs and having a girlfriend. Other boys say they were booted out for going to movies, watching television and staying out past curfew.

Some say they were sometimes given as little as two hours' notice before being driven to St. George or nearby Hurricane, Utah, and left like unwanted pets along the road.

Authorities say the teens aren't really being expelled for what they watch or wear, but rather to reduce competition for women in places where men can have dozens of wives.

<...>

http://news.yahoo.com/s/latimests/20050613/ts_latimes/losttotheonlylifetheyknew

DTH

[MuseRider]

1. I can't even begin

to speak about this. I sickens me and these folks frighten me. I am a Jack Mormon and I can say that officially the church does not recognize these people but you never know what they really think deep down in the hierarchy. It is such a patriarchal society.

[VelmaD]

2. I wish they wouldn't call this polygamy...

since that means having more than one spouse...gender neutral. They don't believe in that. What they practice is polygyny...having more than one wife.

[geniph]

6. Velma, thank you

one of my biggest pet peeves of this issue is the co-opting of a gender neutral term to assume polygyny as the default.

These people are pedophiles and child abusers. They're not representative of those in the poly community that *I* know.

This sect, by the way, is the one Jon Krakauer wrote about in Under the Banner of Heaven. Horrifyingly disgusting people, really stone-age.

[all.of.me]

8. i didn't know that. thanks.

that will keep my thoughts rolling today!

[Warpy]

10. It's always a cruel system for women and children

as new wives get added, old wives get shoved aside, children get neglected, and young males get banished.

The serial polygyny as practiced by so many men, especially wealthier men and most especially by wealthy sanctimonious men, is only slightly less cruel, as young males at least keep their homes with their mothers. The men blithely trade in women as though they were cars, the wife made shabby by a decade of childbearing and domestic servitude being traded in for the fresh faced new model.

This is the reason for the religious proscription against divorce.

I'd like to see a different way tried, perhaps a biblical sounding 7 year wait for men before they can remarry. It might put the loss of a cook and homemaker into perspective if these galoots had to clean up after themselves for 7 years between wives.

As a survivor of divorce, I like to think about such things, anyway.

[Finder]

11. Religious "polygamy" is abusive...

in so many cases. Religion has a way of making every institution it gets involved in abusive and bigotted may it be personal relationships, governments, charity etc...

[geniph]

12. A lot of people ARE trying a different way

albeit not with legal sanctions. I know a number of poly families, in all manner of arrangements - polyandry, polygyny, group marriages, triads, quads...many very very happy and none living this kind of abusive pedophilic bullshit. These people are NOT representative of most polyamorous/polygamous people in the U.S. today - these people (the FLDS) are freaks and criminals.

You know poly people too. You just don't know it. You might be surprised to find out how many of your friends and neighbors are quietly living in non-standard marital arrangements.

[Finder]

13. I have known a few...

and wouldn't have a problem being part of a similar arrangement myself. It makes sense economically if not anything else.

[Warpy]

14. I knew one polygamous family a long time ago

The women kicked the Patriarch out and went on living with each other, sharing work and childcare.

[DoveTurnedHawk]

15. Wasn't Aware of That, Thanks

Although when you think about the word roots, it makes total sense.

DTH

[Solly Mack]

3. That story angered me greatly.

On so many levels...

So many emotions all going at once

[DoveTurnedHawk]

16. Totally

I was shaking, I was so outraged after I read this.

DTH

[Finder]

4. I wonder if they are tax exempt...

I still believe these types of religions are dangerous to humanity. Sad that this stuff happens in the US.

[politicat]

7. Tax exempt in that they evade, lie, steal and cheat....

The AZ Dept of Ed (or whatever they call it) has had to go in recently because that community has stolen something on the order of a couple million from the public school budget. They went in with a criminal warrant a couple weeks ago looking for evidence, and the school district is now under state control, not local control. (Hooray.)

AFDC needs to audit them, but has not yet, because they sign up their "spiritual" wives for welfare benefits for the not-first wife (who is the legal one). Thus the subsequent wives are effectively single, uneducated mothers without a means of support or a way to make a living.

Utah froze the FLDS trust assets a few weeks ago while investigating malfeasance and a possible property swindle.

The FLDS call this behavior "bleeding the beast."

The AZ Republic (www.azcentral.com) is following this closely, and has an exensive series of articles.

I hated growing up a non-Mormon in a 95% Mormon community, but Hilldale/Colorado City remind me that as bad as the community I lived in was, it could have been much, much worse.

[atommom]

5. I wonder how well these boys will be able to function in the outside

world, after having been brought up in that environment. The whole scenario sounds like something out of the animal kingdom, where some species drive the young males out when they become potential competitors for the dominant male's harem.

Sometimes I really question how far we've come as a species...

[all.of.me]

9. anybody that suffers a trauma ...

...and that's what this is, will have scars and problems in the future. i know a guy whose mother, when he was 9, discovered she was a lesbian, and just GAVE HIM AWAY! she didn't want any males in her life, so she put him into the foster system. he is a mess - he can function in society ok, but when he goes off, there are guns and fights.

i feel sorry for these boys. that is not even a strong enough statement.