Have you ever wondered what exactly the deal is with Fundamentalist Mormon hair and the Little House On The Prairie-esque dresses?
Because I have.
And I've searched long and hard, far and wide to try and find something that would explain it to me. There were lots of articles on the rules for the women, like how they had to dress and how they had to wear their hair, but nothing on why. And, considering that the news of late was starting to feel like a 24/7 Big Love marathon, my interest was getting increasingly piqued.
And then I found this.
And so, I bring to you, the only (and therefore most comprehensive) article on what is up with Fundamentalist Mormon Style.
In elaborate polygamy fantasyland, the idea of a haircut can keep a sheltered wife in line.Read the rest of the Salt Late Tribune article here.When the elders of YFZ Ranch in Texas tried to quash a 16-year-old bride's rebellion, they warned that the outside world would force her to have sex with "lots of men." Apparently equally important, she would have to cut her hair and wear makeup.
As threats go for a young woman in polygamy, a bob or a bit of blush seems minor. But the girl's terror about changing her appearance is heartbreakingly naive and very real.
The compound fence isn't the only cage for the women of polygamy. There is also a prison uniform - yards of pink and blue fabric, inches and inches of hair and ugly orthopedic shoes.
Utah and Arizona television stations and newspapers have been photographing the polygamy costume worn by Warren Jeffs' followers for years. But for the rest of the country, the billowing dresses and poofy French braids must look like a cotton-candy variation on 19th-century fashion or the voluminous folds of a burka.
Clothing and hairstyle distinctions between individual polygamous families and sects could fill an anthropology notebook.
"You can modify people's behavior just by putting them in a certain kind of dress," says Carolyn Jessop, a former spiritual wife of Merrill Jessop, the bishop of the Texas FLDS enclave. "It is a uniform. You have nothing about you that's individual. You're just a part of a whole."
The homespun prairie styles - most can be traced to modest Mormon pioneer fashions - are intended to make polygamists stick out from the rest of us and band together.
"By dressing the same, you have this solidarity," says Janet Bennion, an anthropology professor at Lyndon State College in Vermont who has studied fundamentalist Mormon polygamists.
Oh, and if you think my concern with their hair is, well, inappropriate considering the rampant sexual abuse rumors running around, I'm not sure what to tell you. Other than: at least it's less inappropriate than this!
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What's next: a follow-up on those freaky Amish? or howzabout those Mennonites? And let's not forget Hasidic Jewish women who shave their hair and wear wigs because it is immoral to be vain about your hair. Oh yeah, and while we are at it, let's make fun of the way Moslem women dress.
Who is the model for American Womanhood? Housewives of Orange County? of New York City? Girls Behaving Badly?
I think many of us older people don't really understand what is in style the last couple years among young people, but that is probably the point. They wear their pants that way because they are conforming to a style that they know many people won't like. In a similar way the cult dresses in a way that you and I might not understand. They want to conform to themselves and be as different from us as possible so that they can feel cut off from us for various purposes dealing with aspects of group psychology. I guess the message is style must be incomprehensible, and when you have different groups hating each other you need multiple different versions of contradicting styles so that you can keep the various groups happy.
If you don't like it local fashion, move to a cooler climate.
Isn't it strange that this sort of behavior is condoned while on the other side of the state they're swooping in and seizing hundreds of kids without one shred of evidence that they ever have been or ever will be abused?
Surely you jest.
*alleged* Big difference between alleged and proven.
Also one cannot take it as proof that all FLDS marriages are like that from the fact that their leader Jeffs was convicted of rape as an accomplice in Arizona ( for marrying a girl over the local age of consent to her 19 year old cousin (not close enough cousin to make it incest by the local laws), in that the girl (years later) alleged threats were made and her saying no was ignored.
My take is that this was a load of BS legally as too much time had elapsed and the people whom the girl was now staying with, and was dependent on for economic support, had an ax to grind with the FLDS in general and Jeffs in particular. But the jury did convict.
Being in favor of prosecutes being required to actually prove accusations beyond reasonable doubt is not the same as being in favor of the crime, or being against the (alleged) victim.
God forbid, that a woman be allowed to think and make her own decisions! What's next, women voting, serving on juries, flying space stations, and running for public office? It's the Devil's work!
Now I'm not saying I agree with any religious control over hair and dress habits, and I certainly don't care for the FLDS' beliefs (Among a thousand other religions...), but when you go looking for the reason why, don't stop with only the opposing viewpoint and claim you've looked "far and wide," please.
Who or what is this "god" who makes up rules to cover hair and clothing?