I'm not sure I am saying this exactly correctly, so if I am not, please be gentle. I know what I need to ask, but it is so strange to me that it is hard to find the words.
One of the many things which puzzles me about the FLDS vs the LDS is the disparity of education of at least the valued members, the males.
I do not want to stereotype but all the LDS members I have known who are in the workplace have a high level of education and an extremely productive work ethic. They stand out because of their excellence in many places I have worked... One only had to pay attention for a bit to realize that they were LDS because of the no caffeine, calling each other Brother and Sister, etc..( The LDS women I knew were past child-rearing age, the men were of all ages).
Now, to the FLDS.
WHY are the FLDS men against the younger men, at least, getting educations? How exactly do they support their communal style of living? Do they recruit wealthy men into the promise of virginal brides forever more, then empty their bank accounts? Exactly how are they self-supporting with so many members and no education to produce skilled workers?
The LDS do not believe in social welfare programs. They have storehouses and canneries and clothing storage facilites, furniture, housing, you name it for members in time of temporary need. And I know it is temporary, because of their work ethic and personal ethics and church mandate to take care of their families and personal needs so well. Mormons are the best prepared people on the planet for food shortages if they practice the Word of Wisdom and have a year's supply of food for each family member.
It is a basic tenet that every society which has flourished has increased in knowledge and wisdom from generation to generation. The flow of education and learning does NOT go backwards in civilized societies. In today's society in industrialized nations, this means that children go to school, from kindergarten through 4 years of college, at least. Education has made millionaires out of paupers, has created scientists and fostered brillance in all disciplines and arts. Education has created lives of equity and equality for those who started out as disadvantaged.
Why are the male FLDS children and teenagers not valued as the future leaders?
Why do the male FLDS children not receive formal education? I can wrap my mind around the sexual deviancy a bit better because of everything I have read here at WS and in the news, etc. Deprativy is rampant in our world, whether in a relgious cult or a man who locks his daughter in a closet and she bears his seven children over many years.. We all have read the sickness.
One thing that I have not seen addressed, and I mean NO disrespect, but if Warren Jeffs had the early physical problems he is said to have, and if he has propogated all these incestuous families under his wing, then isn't there a possiblity that a great percentage of the third and fourth generation children who were taken from the compound are mentally retarded or otherwise mentally handicapped, as can certainly rapidly occur with the genetic Fumarase deficiency?
Is it legal for the state of Texas to test the chidren's mental capabilites and IQ?
I have read statements several times from Texas CPS workers that " These children could not survive in the outside world", which now, after reading this thread about genetic diseases, causes me to think that they do not mean cannot adapt due to cultural differences.
Perhaps they are referring to what they see but we cannot--- that they lack the mental capacity for learning, which is necessary for survival of the individual.
It would maybe partially explain why the children are used and abused, and not even given individual identities by human beings who gave them life.. they are expected to die.
Maybe so many children die from disease that this generation of adults has been told not to bond with their children? I know of no other civilization which does not and has not valued its offspring. Animals will abandon a deformed or inactive offspring. It seems that the FLDS operate on an animalistic level rather than a humanistic level.
Is it possible that many of the FLDS children are deemed unworthy of basic loving because the genetic diseases have caused physical and mental problems? That they are deemed to be deficient in the eyes of the males who produced them and are given to the women to deal with? IF a percentage of them do have an inborn error of metabolism, which the fumarase deficiency is, then mental abilities are affected very early in life. If they have Osteogenesis Imperfecta then they are not able to perform daily tasks or bear children. Read up on it. There are degrees of bone involvement, but if it is the most severe form where both parents have the gene, then there's no way the female children with the disease could bear a child, if she lived to the age of puberty. All of this is so foreign and certainly repugnant to me, but I am trying to understand how any sort of closed sect can survive if the male children, at least, are not given advantages, status, education..
Maybe the genetic diseases and deficiencies have been problems in polygamous cults for a longer time than we can imagine due to the secrecy. Everything about them is secretive because of the law-breaking polygamy.
I don't know what the situation is with the children and women in Texas, and it's probably something we will not know due to the HiPAA act, but someone knows something.. the women who left know.
If you are interested in the FLDS cult, I would love to read your opinion based on what is written here, and what has been officially stated by Tx CPS about the very young women and the children not being able to survive outside their native environment.
Maria
