doubt it? the age of consent in texas is 17...

Do you see why lowering the marriage age doesn't make sense as a legal issue then as a means of furthering their polygamous ends? I guess it means that they can have a younger first and legal wife, but since none of the other marriages are legal anyway, what would it matter?

Not that the whole thing makes much real sense to me.

Is it normal to have a lower legal age for marriage than it does for sexual consent? I've never paid that much attention to this issue before. It seems weird though.

FLDS mothers appeal to Texas governor to help children

By JENNIFER DOBNER,
AP
Posted: 2008-04-13 17:25:46
SAN ANGELO, Texas (AP) - The mothers of children removed from a West Texas polygamist sect's ranch after an abuse allegation are appealing to Gov. Rick Perry for help.

In a letter sect members say was mailed to Perry on Saturday, the mothers from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints claim some of their children have become sick and even required hospitalization.

They also say children have been questioned about things they know nothing about since they were placed in the legal custody of the state.
http://news.aol.com/story/_a/flds-mo...13172509990026
Mothers from polygamous sect write letter to Texas governor seeking help for children

AP
Posted: 2008-04-13 20:03:35
SAN ANGELO, Texas (AP) - The mothers of children removed from a polygamous sect's ranch in West Texas after an abuse allegation are appealing to Gov. Rick Perry for help, saying some of their children have become sick and even required hospitalization.
http://news.aol.com/story/_a/mothers...13200309990004
In the letter, a copy of which was obtained by The Associated Press, the mothers from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints also say children are "horrified" by physical examinations they have undergone while in state custody.

LDS Church critical of media reports on FLDS

Some news outlets fail to distinguish 2 faiths
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is criticizing international news media outlets for failing to distinguish between the mainstream LDS Church and the Fundamentalist LDS Church.
"The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints discontinued polygamy officially in 1890. More than a century later, some news reports, especially those outside the U.S., still fail to draw clear distinctions whenever stories arise about polygamy in the Intermountain West," the LDS Church said in a statement posted on its Web site.
http://www.deseretnews.com/article/1...269713,00.html
First look inside YFZ Ranch

First look: Quiet is unnerving as FLDS members seek answers
YFZ RANCH, Texas — The children's shoes still sit neatly, side by side where they last left them. Child-sizedshovels and miniature wheelbarrows sit on the porch of their three-story, log cabin-like home.

The only noise now emanating from this 1,700-acre compound is the rustle of the wind, birds chirping, the occasional scurry of a roadrunner or a truck traveling along the dirt roads. "It's miserable. It's too quiet," says Nancy, struggling to keep her emotional voice loud enough to be heard.
http://www.deseretnews.com/article/1...270108,00.html
FLDS parents hit with court papers for pending custody battle

Legal notices are being published in the Eldorado hometown paper, addressed to "all unknown parents, and any person claiming to be a parent of, any one or more of the children removed from the YFZ Ranch."

The notices, filed by attorneys for the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services, announces the petitions for hundreds of children taken from the Fundamentalist LDS Church's Texas ranch. "You have been sued. You may employ an attorney. If you or your attorney do not file a written answer with the clerk who issued this citation by 10:00 a.m. on the Monday next following the expiration of twenty (20) days after you were served this citation and petition, a default judgment may be taken against you."
http://www.deseretnews.com/article/1...270150,00.html

Note: The Desert News is owned and operated by the Main Church.
http://www.deseretnews.com/home/1,5125,,00.html

From the Main Church's web site:
Reports of Polygamy Story Vary Across the World


SALT LAKE CITY 10 April 2008 The public affairs office of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints today complimented U.S. media outlets for being careful to distinguish between the 13-million-member international Church and a small polygamous sect raided by Texas state officers late last week. However, the Church said that some international news outlets are running misleading reports that confuse the Church with the polygamous group. Some news outlets have even run photographs of the Mormon temple in Salt Lake City alongside the story of the polygamists. Several headline writers have inserted the term “Mormon” into headlines without making distinctions.
http://www.newsroom.lds.org/ldsnewsr...ross-the-world
To their credit, they do have what seems to be several fair /balance links off of their own site.

Compound considered home for sect’s ‘elect’

Members of polygamist group aspired to live at Yearning for Zion Ranch

ELDORADO, Texas - The secretive and insular community established near this West Texas town by a radical offshoot of the Mormon Church is considered by the sect's members to be a holy shrine populated by its most fervent adherents and is propped up financially by members of the group living in other states, according to law enforcement officials and former members.
Interviews with law enforcement authorities and former members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints depict the Yearning for Zion Ranch, which was raided last week by Texas authorities, as an outpost whose adult residents were considered the sect's elite. They were handpicked by the church's leader, Warren Jeffs, who was convicted last year in Utah of being an accomplice to rape for arranging the marriage of a 14-year-old girl to her cousin.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24089507/

Trouble on the West Texas prairie

Land sale for 'hunting lodge' created polygamist nightmare for town

ELDORADO, Texas - The guy didn't look much like a hunter. He was beanpole tall — scarecrowish, some might say, with a high, collegiate forehead and a reluctant handshake. Even in a pearl-snap shirt and jeans, this cowboy somehow seemed better suited for a college lecture hall than a saddle.
Still, he wanted land — lots of it — for a corporate hunting retreat. Said he might build a lodge, to entice some big-roller clients of his in Vegas. North of town, the old Isaacs ranch — rocky and dotted as it was with rusty oil rigs, cactus and gnarled mesquite trees — caught his eye. It was plenty cheap, he said, and plenty remote.
But it didn't take long for the sheriff and everyone else in Schleicher County to figure out that their new neighbor, David S. Allred, president of YFZ Land LLC had much more on his mind than the hunting of whitetail.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24216507

Hunting Lodge my a$$

Has anyone made mention of these women's hairstyles yet? And unibrows?

I thought that would be insensitive. :o

Wait.

I've been on the road and this is the first time I've posted.


Seriously, I've just watched a couple of days worth of coverage and my question is where are the men?

I've only seen wives interviewed, and some of the speech patterns and body language are nearly scary. Very robotic. Rehearsed? Staged?

I've tried to refrain from making hairstyle/clothing/incest jokes, but frankly after seeing all the photos and news coverage, and hearing the stories about how marriages were formed, it's really hard not to. Or maybe not jokes, but certainly speculation that people were marrying relatives far too close to them genetically. One can't help but notice that many of the people look odd...and I'm not talking about the clothes and hair.

Compound raid in Texas
 

I don't know if there was abuse involved. You have to wonder, which abuse is acceptable to the public. Is it abuse to have a swat team remove children and probably cause mental trauma to the children? Now that these children are in custody, are they going to be cared for by the state forever? Are the foster homes going to be safe? How many times do we hear foster children tell the horrors of abuse in foster homes? Hope it is not the case, but have to wonder if these children are the pawns of super aggressive do gooders who have been itching to 'safe' these children. Watching the mothers on tv, they are different from me, but I don't know that they are unfit. I am not into plural marriage, but I also am not willing to take 400+ children and put them into a system that is so broken.

My thoughts exactly. And the way they all talk and dress and groom alike-- they really do seem like some kind of pod-people. I'd wondered if the similarities had some significance, but when asked today by Meredith Vieira, one of the women said no, that their appearances (the chosen part of appearance, anyway) were all personal choice. I'm still not convinced.

The men have definitely taken the back seat and it seems to be both due to the gender norms in their sect and also about what appeals to the "court of public opinion."

They showed a few men at the court hearing the other day and interviewed a couple of them. However, it seems like the women (surprise, surprise) are taking a lot of the blame for this and are the ones who are very visible because they are appealing on behalf of motherhood/what's supposedly best for the kids.

I guess everyone is starting to ask that question. They were talking to some of the men on the Today Show and asked.

There's something about their faces that's odd. It's like they age 10x faster than us. The way they talk is creeping me out too, like they're all on an acid trip.

I'm gona go out on a limb and guess that you're LDS?