Polygamy - 1 United States - 0

[gran guerrero]

lulz

only in texas

[Desire]

I have nothing to say about the article but that picture freaks me out.

[gran guerrero]

I have nothing to say about the article but that picture freaks me out.

the same can be said for your avatar

[Aquatiq]

[Stormwick]

mine shows the true full picture

link here

[gran guerrero]

so the difference being that there's someone (whose face is cut off, and has no boobies whatsoever) standing in front of the person crying (which is the true emotion of the picture)...

huge difference.

[Jerome Scuggs]

the rights of polygamists supercede any federal claims

[Kolar]

The state took action in removing the children not the feds. They're going to have a hell of a time working this shit out but fundamentally they were in the right. The rights and safety of the children (not FLDS children, not "THEIR" children) override the rights of the parents.

The state has to prove their case person by person but if they can prove an immediate threat could have befallen a single child in the care of their parents and their "community" then they went far enough and I think they can.

[Nickname]

thread delivers

[DankNuggets]

Muahahahaa

[Jerome Scuggs]

The state took action in removing the children not the feds. And it is an obscene and disgusting "lifestyle", they're going to have a hell of a time working this shit out but fundamentally they were in the right. The rights and safety of the children (not FLDS children, not "THEIR" children) override the rights of the parents.

The state has to prove their case person by person but if they can prove an immediate threat could have befallen a single child in the care of their parents and their "community" then they went far enough and I think they can.

Homosexuality is "obscene and disgusting" to some people as well, but the State has no right to intervene on behalf of the children of homosexuals. Once you justify totalitarian state measures because of your personal subjective preferences, you seem to forget that even if the polygamists do dissapear, the newfound interventionist powers of the State, don't. Eliot Spitzer will give you a good 101 on that lesson.

The entire ordeal was justified by authorities who acted upon a second-hand report of a desperate 16-year-old girl claiming to have been abused by a man who wasn't even in the state of Texas and hasn't been for over a year.

And then of course I have to wonder how much of an "immediate" threat these people were considering the State has been funding them through welfare and legal loopholes. Surely the State wouldn't support something so terrible. Not "ignore", but "support". But I could use "ignore", since the "immediate" threat of this particular compound was first reported something like 5 years ago, in 2003.

I think that the whole ordeal is twisted, but instead of demanding an illegal government raid, I'd start with perhaps the government stopping its funding that allows these sort of polygamist cults to exist in the first place. Don't treat symptoms, shoot for the source of the problem. Hell, it would be so legal and non-fascist that Bush's head would explode.

edit: oh, and those children will of course be saved from their families to be put in foster homes, which are far safer. (I urge you to read that report if you really want to touch on the matters of "obscene and disgusting")

[Kahlan]

I just think it's nuts. At least they aren't calling these people LDS or mormon. Freakin "Fundamentalist" or "Reformed" church claiming polygamy is retarded.

[Kolar]

It's not comparable to Homosexuality and I didn't mean that the state should intervene base entirely on moral grounds, if ever. If two people of the same gender decide to enter into a relationship that is their right and decision as adults and for now it's illegal in most places for those couples to adopt or jointly to be a parent so it's a moot issue. Those couples who have had the ability to do not have a history of abusing their children nor do they have the condemnation of metal health groups, Governments and other NGOs stacked against them. Forcing underage teenagers into sexual relationships with 40 and 50 year old men just barely skirting the law (and breaking it) is wrong.

They have to provide justification for their actions, they acted on some bad information which we know now after the fact. But the fact remains that these children are being subjected to inappropriate things while those abusing them are using the guise of religion to keep what could be described as a pedophile ring up and running.

You can't justify the police actions based on what we know now but I can believe at the time it was. Put yourself in their place. They were told an underage person was being sexually and physically abused within a community that either promotes such acts or turns a blind eye too. I don't doubt there truly are kids there who are in that situation but again it doesn't justify the actions of the police. It does mean I don't think these people deserve any kind of defense or understanding because of that fact.

I agree with you on the welfare issue. A majority of these children are being born into "families" that can not support them much less the 6 or 7 prior. But I think they would continue regardless of that life line being cut off, it would impoverish them even more and the welfare and safety of the children have to be looked after even if the freaks don't care. It might help but the root of it is steeped in their religion and there's no easy way to deal with that in rehabilitating those seeking a way out or being abused.

[Jerome Scuggs]

If it justifies the abolition of due process, then explain what exactly the State does to preserve "order" and "society"? The more these knee-jerk instances of coercion occur, the less I see of the government's supposed necessity for peace and harmony. Is this situation not the definition of "chaos"? On a more general point, what these days isn't chaotic in respects to the State?

Now that the State has tipped its hand, future polygamist sects will be allowed to continue under the shield of "freedom from persecution", while still continuing to lap up welfare. If anything, a situation has been created in which a few years down the road, a scandal will break out that will make this one seem like child's play, no pun intended.

Imagine if the disgruntled local citizens, aware of the things going on at the compound, had taken it upon themselves to run the FLDS members out of their city years ago. What would the public think? And more importantly, how would the issue have been handled?

[Kolar]

I think they had reasonable cause to remove the children based on the call they received. After it was found that it was a prank you can't really and it shows why the police need better tools and procedures to investigate these issues not only to ensure the rights of the people are protected but also that those under a curtain age are protected as well. I think that complicates this issue, dealing with youth and their rights. That has always been a contentious issues especially when the parents are removed from the decision making process.

The problem with these sects is that they completely control the town or city they inhabit. It's not so easy to "run people out of town" when they've integrated themselves so much into the operations of the municipalities or in other cases cloistered themselves completely away from outside interference. I think if it were to occur people would view it in the same light they do with sexual predators being released into the community... not in mine. They're no different then any other group or individual on the fridges of society, minus the dogma.

Edit: Btw congrats http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7417311.stm