The Texas Pedophile Cult

The most gut-wrenching science on the planet must be forensic psychiatry. Where else do you find titles like: “A Father Marries His Daughters: A Case of Incestuous Polygamy,” a case study by Wade C. Myers, M.D. and Steve J. Brasington, M.D.(Journal of Forensic Science, Vol. 47, No. 5, Sept. 2002). This sickening study provides a good touchstone for the science of polygamy and its handmaiden, loosened incest taboos:

Polygamous families tend to be large and isolated from persons who do not share their value system. Polygamy is a risk factor for incest, as incest is associated with large family size and isolation in rural areas…abused children are twice as likely to come from families with four or more children compared with the general population…It is believed that polygamists commonly choose pubertal girls to marry in unlicensed secret religious ceremonies…Not until 1890 did the Mormons prohibit incestuous practices.

 The scientific and legal consensus is that polygamy, as practiced by the tens of thousands of these people, is not only a risk factor for incest, but has a huge social cost besides. Consider:

Given biological realities, it is impossible to sustain a patriarchal, polygamous culture without removing males from the community. The common practice among modern fundamentalist practitioners is to discard teen-age boys on the street corners of major cities - with…a promise of violence if they ever return…The distortion of the male-female balance also leads the husbands to seek younger and younger women. The result is that too many girls face abuse: When a girl is secretly “married” before the age of consent…the marriage's “consummation” is more accurately described as statutory rape…polygamy rests, inevitably, on child abuse and neglect…

(“The Reality of Polygamy: Very Different From What’s Depicted on HBO’s Big Love,” Marci Hamilton, Findlaw.com, 3/23/06)

The Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints (FLDS), a pedophile cult if there ever was one, has around 10,000 members in several international compounds and is in total control of two towns straddling the Utah-Arizona border, from the mayoralty to the police on down, despite formal renunciation by the Mormon Church.

The history of the group is an appalling story of degeneracy. Their family values permit the routine exile of teenage boys and the words “sister,” “mother,” and “wife” appear to be hopelessly conflated.

The absolute ruler of the group is the “prophet” who receives God’s word and cannot be effectively challenged. Roulon Jeffs, the elderly prophet of the FLDS, said the end was near and that he would live 350 years to see his people into Heaven. When he died in his nineties, his son Warren seized the title of “prophet” in the confusion.

According to lawsuits later filed against him, Warren Jeffs (and two brothers) were already accomplished sodomizers of 5-year-old boys, according to Mormonfundamentalism.com, a survivor’s site.

In a letter circulated among the community in the wake of Jeffs’ power grab, within a week he’d married most of his father’s 70 wives, including his own mother. (The alleged text of the letter may be found at Nndb.com. Also see Mormonfundamentalism.com)

Excommunication of teenage boys ramped up to a fever pitch. According to Cnn.com (9/12/07), hundreds of these “lost boys” roam the streets while legal challenges to the practice continue. Any adult male was also subject to summary ejection, their wives and daughters reassigned to other men in Jeffs’ favor.

 Ex-members told the San Francisco Chronicle (11/19/06) that dissident wives were incarcerated in mental institutions run by cult doctors. With the law closing in on him in Utah and Arizona, Jeffs hand-picked children under the age of six to move to the Texas site with him and his inner circle (“Polygamists to children: world is hostile, immoral,” Associated Press, April 12, 2008). Jeffs is now in prison as an accomplice to rape and incest.

“[Author John] Cairncross recounts that [Mormon founder] Joseph Smith began floating the idea of polygamy by his followers in 1835, the same year Fanny Alger, a 17-year-old orphan living in his household, became pregnant.” (J. Cairncross, After Polygamy Was Made a Sin: The Social History of Christian Polygamy, 1974, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul)

The problem with the absolute authority of a holy leader is there’s little protection from them if they turn out to be corrupt, evil, or incompetent. (Reminds us of a problem with the Unitary Executive theory.)