Polygamist Sects: A Further Lesson In Style

The Today Show did a piece this morning on the reasoning behind Fundamentalist Mormon clothing. They invited two former Fundamentalist Saints on to the show to discuss the whys and hows of Fundamentalist style. As some of HuffPost-ers are admittedly obsessed, we thought it only fair to share.

The hair, apparently, is a status symbol. They never cut it - it's their crown and glory. And the dresses? Each color corresponds to a family. Clever! Here's the video, check it out.

Comments

[alwaysthere]

thank you for your response

a poem

My Child

Some say that it is in the dream
And not in life that we find what is true
But I say this, what does it matter
When in both, I have loved you
And yes, perhaps it would have been easier
To have never have been a star
Than to fall from the sky
And yet !! are not both a wonder to the eye
So whether we twinkle, or someday fall
Consider this MY Child
Is there not a beauty
To it all

s.2008

I wish you well
answer this please

Do you hate the natural !!

I had a very negetive experience when i let the mormons into my house

they seemed to want to place authority over me !!

it felt insane !!

[alwaysthere]

want some poetry
tired of things just not ringing true
then today try listening to your Heart
instead of having your head tell you the things you should do !!

I'm curious do Mormons break "The Will" of their children !!

is that a term they use ?

religion is not God

and try as you might, neither are you

but i suppose delusion allows anything !!

huh !!

[drewmarden]

actually Mormons are ASSOCIATED with FLDS, hence the one letter difference for fundamentalism. They were both founded by Joseph Smith, both regard him as a prophet. both Joseph Smith and Brigham Young supported polygamy.
The reason polygamy was renounced is because it threatened Utah's statehood.
Not to mention current mormons believe that plural marriages will come in the afterlife when the male becomes a god over his own "eternal kingdom," and planet.
If someone actually does the history reading and avoids mormon apologists, they will find this to not only be true, but that FLDS actually adheres to the very principles that Joseph Smith taught.
And one does not have to be a "lifetime" mormon or talk to a mormon leader to know about this as many will tell you.
Ask those that LEFT. Ask a historian.

[dawacu]

As a lifetime Mormon I can assure that Mormons (LDS, not FLDS) do not break the will of their children. My parents always urged me to find out for myself if the Church was true. That being said, I have no idea about the FLDS Church. They are not connected to the Mormon Church and haven't been for over a hundred years. What they have done to those children is truly horrible.

[Trueheart]

As of yesterday 4/21/08, Child Protective Services has 437 children. 77 are aged 2 or younger. Ninety-five mothers have been allowed to stay with younger children, but this week, the state will send those mothers home. Attorneys representing the mothers asked Judge Walther to allow nursing mothers to remain with their children.

The state plans to separate adult mothers from their children later this week, after it finishes collecting DNA samples that will be used to determine parentage. Attorneys for the women asked the judge to consider letting nursing mothers remain with their children after negotiations with CPS on the issue stalled. They asked the judge to let the mothers stay until DNA results are in, likely to take up to 40 days.

" Walther acknowledged the nutritional and bonding benefits of breast-feeding. 'But every day in this country, we have mothers who go back to work after six weeks of maternity leave,' she said." http://www.sltrib.com/polygamy/ci_9002940

[iluvsam]

We,as a society, rightfully remove children when their parents abuse them. These people have abused their children, allowed others to abuse their children, or refuse to act to stop others from abusing their children. We don't accept children suffering needlessly, especially under the guise of religion. The State of Texas hasn't abused the First Amendment or the 14th Amendment. It was the religious fanatics who did so. They have attempted to fool the rest of society into believing that their sexual exploits are acceptable religious practice and have attempted to use the First Amendment as a shield. It is sick and disturbing. The best interest of the CHILDREN is what matters. If these children are permitted to return to these people, we are leaving them to be abused and brainwashed. This is unacceptable and absolutely unAmerican. These people created their own problems. They have put their children in a perilous situation due to their own inability to protect them from sexual predators and more disturbingly they actually willingly GIVE them to the predators for exploitation. How you find that acceptable is beyond me. In this country, we need to protect those weaker than us. How dare anyone deny these kids a chance to grow up free from a life of abuse. Shame on you. As hard as it may for some to admit, sometimes the best place for a child is NOT with it's parents.

[Trueheart]

I don't know how you get from my post that I support giving these children to abusers. I have a lot of questions about how this whole operation is being handled, and my concerns go directly to the welfare of these children. That includes their physical, psychological well-being in addition to their civil rights. So go point your "Shame" finger at someone else.

And if you can't understand the cruelty involved in taking a nursing infant from its mother, rather than assigning social workers to supervise both mother and child, then you ought to look in the mirror and point that finger at your cold-hearted self.

TEXAS: THE SHOW NO MERCY STATE

[truthyguy]

Another law of the sect is none of the women are permitted to have breasts.

[TooLooze]

Sacramental undergarments?

[ming099]

...........at the very BOTTOM of this .........is a cult established BY men.....for MEN........so they can subjugate YOUNG women for sex, procreation and eventual world/religious domination.......if you keep 'em ugly, stupid and knocked up......no one else will want them and they are easliy controlled........the state of Texas may well have been somewhat late in looking into this..........but I think they have taken the right track..........not wanting to set off another Waco debacle..........

.......SAVE THE CHILDREN...........SCREW the adults..THEY knew better...........

[Theda]

With all those women collecting welfare, why didn't the Texas welfare system investigate those 13 and 14 year old girls having babies? That in itself is a crime. Getting young girls pregnant is a crime. It's called rape.
And with home schooling, there are supposed to be "standards" adhered to.
The state should have shut down this "religion" a long time ago.
And in Utah, many Mormons are actually finding excuses to defend what went on.
The women were beaten and starved into "submission."
Way to go, Mormons. So nice of you to defend this. I don't hear Mitt Romney complaining or Orrin Hatch showing any outrage.
Hatch once defended polygamy by referring to them as "little families minding their own business."

[Trueheart]

Along the way in reading about this situation, I found out that legal age of parental consent in the State of Texas is 14, and sometimes, with a judge's permission, that is lowered to 13 for girls only . Wow, I sez to myself! I guess that's their way of handling underaged pregnancies.

You can look it up: http://family-law.freeadvice.com/family-law/tx_parental_consent.htm

[dawacu]

As a Mormon, I can say that there is a lot of Mormon outrage at this situation, much like the rest of the nation. It's just a little more complicated for Mormons because they still remember the history of their ancestors and being driven from the homes and massacred. Consequently, religious freedom is a sensitive issue for Mormons. That said, the FLDS are not Mormon (as in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) and what they have been doing is evil. I do wish that more Mormon politicians would speak out on this.

[sumanne]

I am from europe and i am having a hard time understanding what is going on here.
Dont have kids go to school there? And even if they are homeschooled - dont they have to take compulsitory tests? And about the girls...where did they give birth? Even if most of them are healthy and able to give birth at home - some of them must have needed c-section. So why did people at the local hospital not do something??
If a 14 year old pregnant girl shows up here the father is in big trouble. Esp if he is 40 !

Can anyone explain to me why authorities have not acted earlier?
Even if the compound is isolated and all...people must have noticed that there are a lot of very young, very pregnant girls. And why is it ok to kick out young boys without the authorities investigating?
I am getting the impression that nowadays as long as you call yourself "christian" everything is possible in the US.

And other thing - Dont you care about this girls who get raped and abused at the age of 14?
Last few days the headlines were more about the dresses and hair - not about the systemetic sexuell abuse of minors.

greets sumana

[Theda]

I agree. Some of the girls must have needed c-sections. Why did the doctors not report this to the police and the welfare department?

[Village]

The authorities need to start looking for graveyards. In the western FLDS, they call the graveyard Babyland. All babies who are not perfect are killed at birth. I've read that in Texas they found a 'small graveyard' on the property. They need to start digging that up. And where are the boys? 416 kids taken, and 27 boys????

[NoSillyName]

I didn't catch the whole story, but one of the news guys on the scene said the children have changed dramatically in the short time they've been out of the compound. Instead of being surly and pissed off, they've started laughing and playing and are interested to know about everything. News guy said something like "they have discovered that there's a whole world out here that they hadn't known about."

Remember, as the women said, they are trained not to feel any emotions. They're not supposed to laugh or cry or question anything the men say or do. This is why they don't object when their daughters are raped or their sons are cast out of the community.

If the children have truly changed so much so quickly, I'm wondering what will happen to them if they go back to that place.

As for the women's looks, someone here thinks they look like little girls. I think they look years older than they probably are.

[CubanGirl]

I'm so glad the kids are out of that horrific place. As for the women, I'm less horrified by their hideous dresses and extraterrestrial hair than I am by their inability to put two words together. The interviews I've seen terrify me. They all seem to either be mentally ill or to have mild retardation. Perhaps someone could discuss why these women come across as if they have serious emotional and intellectual problems. Is it the abuse? Is it the inbreeding? If not, then what?

[iluvsam]

Lack of education.

[recless]

Hmm.... they do all look AWFULLY closely related, now that you mention it. But is that really a surprise? This is a pretty small group, that doesn't exactly take in outsiders very often. Considering the numbers and how long this group has operated, they might not be actively trying to commit inbreeding but it is likely that such a small, closed group is going to end up with everyone pretty closely related (genetically speaking).

As for "emotional and intellectual problems", please don't confuse natural disorders with what these women are displaying. What you are seeing here is called brainwashing.

[Roman777]

Man, where do they force these women to choose their hideous clothing, Polygamist Dress Barn?

[alwaysthere]

And so what if they lied
The self-righteous are always justified

[JerseyBob]

HAVE SOME OF THE LOST BOYS BEEN MURDERED?
My gut feeling is that some of the lost boys may have been murdered. I would urge authorities to search that compound thoroughly using cadaver dogs and whatever else they can muster to do the job.
Could one not reasonably question that of all the boys who are not there anymore, one of them fought hard to get back to his mother -and put himself in mortal danger? The mother might be brainwashed and the child might not be her birthchild which would compound the futility of the poor boy's quest.
To put it another way: If no one cares for the boys, no one looks for them!
Who then looks for the "lost boys." I think the state is obligated to account for them.

[Theda]

Many lost boys from polygamy "colonies" are dumped onto the streets of Salt Lake City when they become 15 years old.
What shocks me is...those so-called religious people throwing the boys out have gotten away with it for so long.
I'm still waiting to hear Mormon "outrage" about this.
Hell, their church was FOUNDED on the very idea of old geezers having sex with 13 year old girls and calling them "multiple wives."

[dawacu]

Being a Mormon living in Utah, I can tell you that most every Mormon is outraged about this situation. The FLDS church is not the mainstream Mormon church and is viewed by most Mormons as horrible. As a matter of clarifaction, the Mormon church (meaning the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, not the FLDS church) was definitely not founded on the idea of polygamy and was several years old when certain members of the Church started practising polygamy.

[JerseyBob]

I looked around and found the following from a July 6, 2006 story by Kimberly Seveith in Salon.com:
"In order to keep tabs on his followers, Jeffs relied on the local police, who acted more like the Taliban's morality squad than keepers of the peace. The cops were essentially informants, loyal first to Jeffs and second to the state laws that they were sworn to uphold. They patrolled the community for violations of the prophet's moral code, reporting infractions to their supreme leader. They would pull kids over for alleged traffic violations, then take photographs if they found CDs or other worldly possessions, which they turned over to the Jeffs. Until last year, when government officials in Utah and Arizona began investigating charges of underage marriage and tax fraud, Colorado City was essentially allowed to thrive outside the law."
This relates to a different FLDS compound but it is easy to infer the same kind of cooperation from local police in Texas. An independent investigation should be considered. Comparing local police to the Taliban hints at a troubling situation for the "lost boys." Not trying to be cute here but this is starting to sound like a John Grisham novel. And of course apologies as warranted to all the good police who have a dangerous job. It will only take one to open this up if indeed something is amiss.
Something may be terribly wrong. It will only take one.

[ballerinagirl]

I have thought a great deal about this horrendous situation and have come to the conclusion that perhaps the state should have rounded up the men from this compound and held them, leaving the women with the children on the compound until some conclusion and plan of action were laid out. I know that this action would not have given free access to the children [without intimidating parents nearby], but as a first step in dealing with this, I do think that logistically it would have been easier for everyone involved. While I understand the reason behind removing the children, it seems harsh in my mind to rip these children from their homes and their mothers when the adults [mothers and fathers] are the perpetrators of this heinous and heartbreaking mess!

[TN]

I was thinking they should have taken the men and the women off and let the children be watched and cared for there as they sort this out.

[Trueheart]

I am so upset over this that I started reading comments on the Salt Lake Tribune website.

Today there is a story headlined:
Texas FLDS case: Was massive raid based on bogus call from Colorado woman?
http://www.sltrib.com/news/ci_8969094

It concerns a disturbed woman who has a record of making phony abuse calls, and possible links to the calls from "Sarah" at the Yearning for Zion Ranch. What a hobby.

[GeoLee]

Frankly, I am glad that the judge has demanded DNA tests to figure out who is the parent of each...and hopefully who is the father of each child. Why is paternity important? Well many of these families receive governmental monies for their chidren according to studies in Colorado City and other polygamy settings and so the state needs to get paternity established, too. Obviously if you cannot determine who is the mother, they how could you return the child to the parents. It is a sad case altogether and I predict they will move their headquarters out of the country if the children are sent back home. I do have problems with children being raised in this kind of environment knowing how very secretive and isolated they are required to be and how set up they are to be brainwashed into the same lifestyle o ftheir mothers. The children need freedom from religion, not freedom of religion.

[Trueheart]

And the children wait in the San Angelo Coliseum until the test results come back? 400 children get parcelled out to foster homes? And that's preferable to returning them to the ranch and providing supervision onsite? The judge in this case is said to be "making up the rules as she goes along," because this is such an unprecedented situation. Have mercy on these poor little ones, and bend some of the protocol so that they can at least see their mothers....I'll bet they don't care if they share DNA with the woman who has mothered them.