Follow-up on "Guilt by Association"
Based on a comment on a previous post by a regular and respected reader I decided that I need to clarify my position on the whole Texas FLDS thing.
I believe that Mormonism as practiced by the FLDS is all about male domination, power and sex, just like I believe that Islam as practiced by its radical elements is all about male domination, power and sex. I believe that clear instances of abuse should be punished, but when we ditch the constitution in order to right what some in government feel is wrong we are stepping out on a very dangerous slippery slope. I fear the unbound power of government more than I fear fringe religious elements.
If there is one family caught in the wide net cast by the Texas officials that can show they were in no way involved in illegal practices and that there was no probable cause for search and seizure, I hope they sue to the full extent of the law. If there are a hundred such families I hope they all sue.
What Texas should have done when they received the telephone complaint from the young woman was to get a warrant from a judge and go out to the compound and conduct an investigation. If the sect leaders refused to cooperate the authorities should have taken the steps provided by law to force them to cooperate or go to jail. If this process produced clear evidence of abuse, those instances of abuse should have been prosecuted. All other parents and children should have been left to continue their lives as they see fit, as long as it is within the law.
Some have said that if one child was saved from abuse the actions of the Texas officials are justified. This is an absurd argument. Absolutes in a complex social system are unattainable. The FLDS children are being placed in foster-care. Texas cannot guarantee that none of them will be abused. We sacrifice children in accidents because we won't give up our freedom to travel. We may have to sacrifice children to retain our constitutional rights.
The reader says to ask those who have escaped or been cast out of the FLDS. That is a very good suggestion. Why has their testimony not been used to investigate and prosecute the offenders in the sect? Perhaps it has in some cases. I seem to remember that this might have been a factor in the Warren Jeffs case. But why have we not heard of a lot more of these cases. Could it be that no clear evidence of abuse is found in many of the cases? Or that the escapees or cast-offs won't cooperate?
This affair smells to me like a bunch of self-righteous do-gooders getting a bit overwrought over some beliefs and practices that are not like theirs. Neither do I have any clear evidence of that, but I'm not going to go out with armored vehicles and force them into my custody.
I believe that any religion that seeks to force its will on people is despicable. I also believe that a government that unlawfully seeks to force its will on people is despicable and more dangerous (at this time).
Having said all this, I'm willing to admit that I'm wrong about this particular case if Texas proves, beyond a reasonable doubt, that all the affected parents are guilty of placing their children in imminent danger of physical abuse.
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Let me say first that I wish you had been handling this case because I totally agree with your suggestions as to how is should have been handled. I also agree that the state I am most familiar with, Florida, has a child protection program that is sorely lacking. However, in Florida most every case I read where a child is removed because of abuse, many times sexual, many times by the mother’s live-in boyfriend, all the children are removed from the household—not every time, but almost, if news reports are accurate. In the situation in Texas a case could be made that under aged girls had been abused by men as much as thirty or forty years older. Their pregnancy or children are proof enough. I also think members of the Texas compound should be considered a family—one family. I don’t know how else you would sort it out. There doesn’t seem to be separate living quarters for a mother, father and children, but fathers’ quarters and women and children’s quarters. This may not be according to Texas or Federal law, but realistically that is how it is. Following that thinking, if any child is being abused children’s services would be bound to remove them all for protection. At least that has been the practice.
I have seen interviews with two women who escaped from the Jeff’s religious compound. I have not followed it closely, but know at least one of them did testify against him.
Just wanted you to know my thinking on a complex matter. Like you, I honor the rule of law first and foremost. I just hope it doesn’t result in ruining children’s lives in this case. America was founded on religious freedom and we should protect that at all costs. Too often the unscrupulous and perverted have used this to their advantage. I do believe an eleven or twelve year old girl in that living situation is in “imminent danger of physical abuse” in the not too distant future. I am glad Texas has brought this to light. Perhaps something good will come from it.
I too hope something good will come from it. But in this case I believe that the CPS far overreached their authority, and the Texas apellate court agrees with me. We'll see what the state Supreme Court says.
I don't think that five pregnant teenagers out of 460 children is clear evidence that the girls were abused by adult men. There are pregnant teenage girls in every town in this nation.
I do appreciate your thoughts on this case and on my viewpoint; I just disagree with some of them.