news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7353304.stm

The kids in the polygamist compound are subjects of custody hearings now. I can't help but wonder if going into foster care wouldn't be worse for some of these children. They have mothers who love them for better or worse. Still growing up in that compound has subjected them to brainwashing and subjected the females to abuse as they enter their teen years. Something had to be done to help those girls but now that the compound has been raided is it really beneficial to keep the young children away from the mothers? Considering how isolated from the world they have been many of them are probably very frightened right now. In many ways their mothers are just victims themselves.

This raises a lot of questions about how laws about morals and families are defined in this country. Personally I don't have any problem with polygamy if it were to occur between consenting adults. Unfortunately that isn't what was happening in this cult.

I am just wondering given the huge issues with foster care in this country if placing these kids in that system isn't going to fuck them up more?
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  • Josh
    Josh
    offline 17

    Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

    Thu, April 17, 2008 - 2:49 PM
    That's a toughie. And while I don't exactly have faith in the foster system, I do know that there are some good foster parents out there. As I see it, you're definitely choosing between the lesser of two evils:

    Do you roll the dice and put the kids in a foster system in which they may be abused further or may get a shot at a decent life?

    Or

    Do you leave kids with mothers that are clearly unfit and imbalanced and more or less guarantee that the kids will be abused further.
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    • Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

      Thu, April 17, 2008 - 2:53 PM
      are they "clearly unfit" though?

      i don't think we have enough information to determine that right now.
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      • Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

        Thu, April 17, 2008 - 3:30 PM
        I agree that the life in that compound is clearly unfit for teenage girls, that is for sure! Whether or not their mothers themselves are clearly unfit I do think is yet to be determined. Most of those mothers were forced into their marriages as teenage girls themselves and up until now may never have known any other kind of life than the one they lead. Does this make them unfit? Are these mothers neglecting or beating or starving their children? Does just being ignorant of their choices make them clearly unfit?

        I really don't know. I think this one is a toughie. I have no reason to believe that these mothers don't love their children. Yes, there definitely are some great foster parents out there but there are also some stinkers. Any time you put a child into foster care it is a crap shoot as to what they will end up with.
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        • JSin
          JSin
          offline 97

          Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

          Thu, April 17, 2008 - 3:40 PM
          hmm sounds like yet another Age of consent argument.

          Our social system says these are teenage girls and incapable of consent therefore being abused. In the 1800s they would be happy and respectable wives at 15. This groups has held the same beliefs they are practicing since their schism with the Morman church.

          Not making a case of right or wrong here just saying the culture of these folks is radically different than mainstream.

          JSin
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          • Nicole♫
            Nicole♫
            offline 194

            Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

            Thu, April 17, 2008 - 3:43 PM
            In the 1800s they would be happy and respectable wives at 15

            in the 1800s, that was the best that many women could
            hope to aspire to. This is not the case today.
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            • Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

              Thu, April 17, 2008 - 4:27 PM
              In the 1800s for the most part only women of the lower classes married at such an early age and that was usually because they didn't have any other choices. Even upper class women didn't have many choices outside of marriage.

              In the 1800s we had no child labor laws
              in the early 1800s slavery was still legal.
              In the 1800s it was still legal to shoot Indians on sight in some states.
              In the 1800s it was illegal to be a homosexual in most states.
              In the 1800s women were unable to vote.

              Not so sure the 1800s are a time to live by.
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              • JSin
                JSin
                offline 97

                Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

                Thu, April 17, 2008 - 5:08 PM
                Seems in a hell of a lot of states that under 18 you can fuck legally, 30 actually and in many with parental consent you can marry
                Marriage laws:
                www.coolnurse.com/marriage_laws.htm

                The ref to the 1800 was in reference to the cultural relevance of the religion. It is pertinant. Otherwise we should force the Amish to abide by 21st century social order and standards.

                If a woman is being abused certainly help should be available, but to paint an entire community as wrong and or criminal requires a bit of a deeper look at the sociological/ cultural aspects.

                As ya cited Yuni in many states it was legal to shoot indians.
                Modern Americans shoot other stuff with the legal system, like alternative religious philosophies.

                Are they right? Hell if I know, that is not what I am arguing.

                Do I think it is right to take their children from them for alternate or non consistent religious beliefs? Absolutely not

                Remember back when ya could shoot ya some redskins on sight, their children were taken from them and placed in White schools cause the indians were not responsible enough to properly raise their kids.

                Actual concepts of right and wrong seldom follow your gut or emotional reaction.

                JSin
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                • Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

                  Thu, April 17, 2008 - 5:41 PM
                  But this isn't just a matter of alternative religious belief. If it were then the Amish probably would be raided as well, but they aren't. Though the Amish are strict they actually do allow their children to chose the lifestyle or not when they reach a certain age. No one is forced to stay Amish. The children of this particular cult are not afforded this choice. Runaway girls are captured returned and forced into unwanted marriages to men that are often 3 times their age. This sect was reported for child abuse by two teen aged girls who themselves complained that the sex and marriages were not consenting.
                  Still I don't know if taking all the children away is any form of justice that I would want to support. It seems rather extreme to separate them from their parents without further investigation into how unsafe each of them actually is.
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                • Josh
                  Josh
                  offline 17

                  Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

                  Fri, April 18, 2008 - 8:21 AM
                  "Do I think it is right to take their children from them for alternate or non consistent religious beliefs? Absolutely not"

                  They are not being removed from their parents because of religious beliefs. It's the tangible, real world manifestation of those beliefs and the laws they break that have caused this scenario.
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  • Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

    Thu, April 17, 2008 - 6:00 PM
    This is a cult and should be treated as such.
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    • Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

      Thu, April 17, 2008 - 6:24 PM
      I tend to agree that they are a cult. Then again I think the Scientologist are a cult. That doesn't mean I believe each and every child should be separated from their mother because she is a member (and probably a forced member) of said cult.
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      • Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

        Thu, April 17, 2008 - 6:28 PM
        I think you and I will disagree on this one.

        But that's okay!
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        • Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

          Thu, April 17, 2008 - 6:46 PM
          To be truthful I am actually not sure I have a firm position on this one. All I know is I feel for a whole bunch of children who have been yanked away from the only home they know.
          I agree that place needed to be raided. The kinds of things that were happening to young women are not acceptable. But part of me feels that since women and children are both kind of victims in this particular situation and not really the perpetrators then what good does it serve separating the women from their little ones? Why not place them all in a shelter together or something?
          I just don't know.

          Part of me pictures a young girl getting forced into marriage at 15, raped and then having a baby, then later having that baby taken away from her because she is a member of a cult that she was actually the victim of. It just seems so unfair.
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          • Fifi
            Fifi
            offline 51

            Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

            Fri, April 18, 2008 - 5:52 AM
            It is a hard question but one thing to consider is that these mother's aren't protecting their girl children, they're raising their boy children to believe that they have rights over females they don't legally, and in some cases may even be in cahoots with their husbands in forcing their daughters into rape situations to comply.

            I'd think that at the beginning they'd want to separate the children while they're figuring out what's going on and there may be other contributing reasons. For instance, perhaps the mother's are covering up for the fathers or believe that there was nothing wrong done so can't be trusted not to just return to the situation with the children. Or it will be harder for the father's to fight the state for custody than it would be an impoverished wife. Or maybe the mothers really are unfit in that they're so invested in their faith that they don't see the abuse as abuse (since they may well have had the same experience and blame themselves or make excuses, etc) and are trying to coerce their kids into not revealing what was going on.

            It's a hard call, either way these kids are likely going to have a tough time of it.
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  • Josh
    Josh
    offline 17

    Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

    Fri, April 18, 2008 - 8:20 AM
    I would wager that the psychological state of the mothers varies greatly from brainwashed to never seeing an alternative to truly believing in their way of life. I can't think of a single scenario in which it doesn't make sense to at least temporarily separate the kids from the mothers. Especially since we don't know the state of the mothers.

    However, the fact that the mothers are instructing their children to lie about their names and who their parents are seems indicitive to me that they're kind of banding together around their lifestyle.
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    • Fifi
      Fifi
      offline 51

      Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

      Fri, April 18, 2008 - 8:51 AM
      Josh - I didn't realize the mothers were telling their children to lie, if that's the case then it's obvious why the children and mothers needed to be separated. While certainly some of the mothers may be brainwashed, that may also be true of some or many of the men and boys who were raised in this community as well. In a family abuse situation, both adults participate in the abusive dynamic - inaction is essentially the same as condoning, and it sounds like the adult women in this community are more than passive and powerless victims since they're actually taking action to support an abusive paradigm.

      Considering just how accepted polygamy is becoming (c'mon, once there's a sitcom/family drama about it, it IS mainstream!) and that this case centres around a claim of abuse by an underage girl (or at least that's my understanding, please correct me if I'm misinformed), this seems to be less about polygamy and more about forcing young girls into sex and marriage with older men.
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    • Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

      Fri, April 18, 2008 - 10:28 AM
      I agree the mothers probably are brainwashed and abused and possibly very consumed by the lifestyle that they have been forced into. Their fathers and husbands have coached them into how to lie and teach their children to lie in case of a raid since they were tiny children and they have done what they were taught to do. Many of them are so brainwashed they wouldn't know how to think for themselves and so they will cling to what they know. It is all disturbing. I still don't know one way of the other how I feel about it all. The kids are going to suffer no matter what I guess and that sucks.

      I don't think the women are so much active participants as they are victims who follow orders because they don't know any better and face harsh punishments. The women are completely subserviant to their husbands in this cult. They are taught that not following their husband's every wish means eternal damnation.
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      • Nicole♫
        Nicole♫
        offline 194

        Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

        Fri, April 18, 2008 - 10:39 AM
        wow...

        i'm in the same mindset that you seem to be, Why....
        i can't decide where i stand on this as far as the mental and emotional
        health (or lack thereof) of these young people, let alone that of their parents.

        i think that already damaged individuals from such a separate upbringing
        than ours will be shocked enough by everything, let alone if they're expected
        to face it without even a single familiar face (ie, in this case, their mothers).

        my feeling is to look deeper, see where these women stand - do they really
        deeply believe in this system they've lived in, or are they willing to change?

        i think that should be a determining factor in whether or not they're separated
        from their children - i believe it IS possible (purely because i can't conceive of
        the circumstances they were living in) that they weren't in a position to safely
        defend their children. Now's their chance, if they deserve it, maybe?
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  • Re: Is foster care a step up or a step down for these kids?

    Fri, May 23, 2008 - 12:06 PM
    Latest turn in this strange case apparently will return the children to their parents. Maybe.

    A Texas state appeals court Thursday said authorities had no right to seize more than 440 children in a raid last month on the compound.

    The 3rd Court of Appeals in Austin said the state failed to show the youngsters were in "immediate or urgent" danger, the only grounds in Texas law for taking children from their parents without direct action by a court of law. The appeals court said the state acted hastily in sweeping up all the children on an "emergency" basis without going to court first.

    The ruling gave a lower-court judge 10 days to release the youngsters from custody, but the state could appeal to the Texas Supreme Court and until further hearing, stop that order. So the children are still in foster care.
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