Either you break of families that aren't hurting anybody* or you force them underground and crazy abuses start to occur.

I think the idea that the abuses common to these set-ups is a result of having been forced underground is a huge leap to make.

It sounds like the Short Creek families were functional and healthy, albeit with an alternate lifestyle that got dealt with way too harshly. By contrast, the cult being raided now is harsh and abusive, and, well, a cult.

Allyson, if you are feeling overwhelmed it might help to write every single thing that comes into your head that you think needs doing (GTD technique). The idea is that once you put is down it will stop swirling around in your head and causing anxiety.

This is a fantastic technique. I just keep forgetting to put a damn notepad in my purse. Which, frankly, is telling.

Well, you need to remember to write down that you need to put a notepad in your purse so that you can...write down things you need to remember...

Dang!

Both myself and my assistant gasped out loud when we saw that outfit.

THEY don't know its freaky to have two dozen siblings and four Moms. To them its not.

Or to be married off at 13 to a man five times their age, etc. Again, I'm not sure the five-year-old's perspective on all this is all that illuminating.

As long as everybody is of age, I don't see how its anybody's business how many spouses people have.

The thing about this particular cult that freaks me (besides the child molesting and forced marriages) is that they will throw a man out of the group and assign his wife and children to some other man.

Exactly. I mean, I'm sure it was very traumatic for any kid in that situation. No, in any situation where they're being taken out of their homes and away from their families. That doesn't mean it's a bad thing to do, in this and any number of other cases.

But it might have been a bad thing here -- at least that was the response of the public. You had dozens of clean, well fed, (and white, to be sure) children thrown into foster care.

It wasn't the sympathy for the children that weirded me out, it was the lack of so much as a mention of any reason the authorities might have acted other than being mustache-twirling villians.

Sure, well that's just fucking creepy -- though I can see "we weren't hurting anybody" making a person very indignant.

I think the idea that the abuses common to these set-ups is a result of having been forced underground is a huge leap to make.

I don't think it is. It's the same premise behind legalizing prostitution and certain drugs and any other number of vices -- you have that bright light of law shining on you and its harder to marry a teenager. When you HAVE to hide everything you GET to hide everything.

Or to be married off at 13 to a man five times their age, etc. Again, I'm not sure the five-year-old's perspective on all this is all that illuminating.

But it appears that wasn't so common then. There is considerable assertion that things didn't get really freaky until one leader died and his son took over.

But it might have been a bad thing here -- at least that was the response of the public.

In general, the response of the public to a news story is probably not the most informed response. The Wikipedia article doesn't say one way or the other whether, e.g., age-of-consent laws were being respected or not.

The Wikipedia article doesn't say one way or the other whether, e.g., age-of-consent laws were being respected or not.

It doesn't. A lot of what I'm half-remembering is from Jon Krakaur's "Under The Banner of Heaven". Like I said, I'm pretty sure that the age of consent and discarded boys [link] began with more recent leadership and wasn't the case at Short Creek.