I've been watching the polygamist camp women on tv today, hair piled high, prairie dresses pressed with crisp little collars, while they cry for the return of their children in soft voices.
I have no doubt that they are anguished. They are hurt and afraid. They were taken from the only home most of them have ever known at gunpoint, and then had their children taken away while they were sent back to the ranch.
I also know that they were raised to this, have no idea what the outside world is like, except that it's sinful and evil. So it isn't as if I have no sympathy for these women.
But it's just so hard for me to understand how a woman could watch her son be used as little more than slave labor, and then cheerfully give her daughter to an older man in marriage, knowing that immediately after the ceremony he's going to take her to a bed behind the altar and 'consummate.' But then again, I'm not the one who's been brutalized and brainwashed.
The trial over custody of these poor kids starts today, and it's a madhouse. Putting these children in foster care, especially a system that's already strained, will be a nightmare. These children will have to have counseling, or even deprogamming, for years. They have been taught that being with us will not just lead to punishment, but eternal damnation. As a Christian, this horrifies me.
As a human being, I say that the police removed the wrong ones from the compound. The women and children should have been able to stay- and the MEN should have been taken into custody. I noticed that none of them are featured on the news; granting interviews and being filmed. If the church- and I say that sarcastically- elders think that parading their Prairie Stepford Wives is going to make this go easier for them, they're mistaken. The men who make the rules and enforce them are the ones who need punishment. And as far as I'm concerned, hell is too good for them.
5 comments:
Yes, poor kids.
It breaks my heart, Bernita, it truly does.
My feelings exactly.
Have you checked out any of the news blogs? I was aghast at how many people are outraged by how Texas handled this, but NOT outraged by the dirty old men raping these little girls and their mothers being okay with it. I know I shouldn't be. Sane people with strong moral centers are less likely to spout off in a public forum. I know that.
I hope and pray for justice and for the safety of these little girls, whatever the truth is. I hope they all grow up to be blackbelts in karate commanding the first shuttles to build space stations on the Moon, falling in love and enjoying every aspect of the partners of their own choice.
;)
Thanks, Missie.
Kimber, it burns me up. I think these little boys are being ruined, too- growing up to become rapists or kicked out of the clan if there are too many men. I hope foster families from all over the country can be called upon to help these kids.
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