EnMasse

anne cameron · Posted: Wed Aug 10, 2011 4:03 pm Post subject:

When Warren Jeffs called down the wrath of his God, his followers listened. Now every slip and slide of the stock market, every flood, every high wind, even the drought afflicting Texas and Arizona will be "proof" the prophesy is bang-on.

They'll find a new or interim prophet, a new leader, and will assure each other that every move any police or other government agency makes is proof they are being assaulted and assailed by the devil and the devil worshippers. Each man arrested for the sexual abuse of children will be deemed a martyr.

It's not as if it's possible to reason with some people. They are what they have been brainwashed and conditioned to be. I really believe the best thing we can do is provide easily accessible intervention houses for those who haven't swallowed the b.s., give those who are fleeing the cult every chance to do so safely.

The big worry is that the "faithful" will arm themselves to the teeth and start shooting at police and welfare investigators. Then we can all cringe at another blunder such as the one kicked off when they tried to move in on David Koresh.

The Taliban isn't the only group promising celestial reward for martyrs.

voice of the damned · Posted: Fri Aug 12, 2011 7:31 am Post subject:

Jeffs convicted with Canadian evidence(or so says the BC government)

voice of the damned · Posted: Wed Nov 23, 2011 5:28 pm Post subject:

Hey, I was wondering when this thread would get another installment, and now here we go...

voice of the damned · Posted: Wed Nov 23, 2011 7:03 pm Post subject:

voice of the damned · Posted: Wed Nov 23, 2011 7:05 pm Post subject:

Interesting that the judge specifies that prosecutors need not demonstrate evidence of abuse or coercion. The mere fact of it being a polygamous marriage is enough.

Tehanu · Posted: Wed Nov 23, 2011 7:11 pm Post subject:

And the law was upheld, with the clarification that someone who enters into a polygamous marriage as a minor should be exempt from prosecution. The second part? A bit irrelevant, I'd say, when was the last time someone was successfully prosecuted? And a bit frustrating, given that he refers to minors from "12-17" ... so anyone "marrying" them should be, as so many of us have argued, charged with sexual assault, rather than polygamy.

But it also sounds as though the judge highlighted very effectively the many problems stemming from the type of polygamy practised in Bountiful. He said the law against it is an appropriate limitation of individual rights.

voice of the damned · Posted: Wed Nov 23, 2011 9:11 pm Post subject:

6079_Smith_W · Fulltime enMasse Member Joined: 15 Nov 2011 Posts: 593

I'll wait to hear from the SCC, because I think it is a bad ruling.
It is unfortunate that the government has not been able to make charges of child abuse, assauit and forcible confinement stick. But that does not make it right to criminalize something which is incidental, and which in and of itself does no harm, and should be a free choice.
After all, it wasn't too many years ago that the govenrment of Ontario recognized three-way custody for a child. Families and valid relationships do not come in just one form.
Just my opinion, and I realize it may not be a popular one.

Tehanu · Posted: Wed Nov 23, 2011 10:14 pm Post subject:

Nope, I think that there's a fairly broad consensus here that polygamy (or multi-person marriage) is not inherently a bad thing between consenting adults.

My issues in this case are with the sexual assaults of children (should be prosecuted), the oppressively misogynistic nature of these particular religionist "marriages" (should be condemned), and from what I understand, pretty blatant abuse of the welfare system (should be prosecuted).

TS. · Posted: Wed Nov 23, 2011 11:43 pm Post subject:

I'm (slowly!) making my way through this ruling, but so far it seems to be vulnerable to being reversed on at least the point that the judge seems to have accepted the "harm principle" as being the basis of criminal law, a proposition that was flatly rejected by the majority of the Supreme Court in R. v. Malmo-Levine (which upheld the marijuana laws). He also seems to have concluded that simply decriminalizing polygamy leads to a whole bunch of inevitable harms which cannot be prevented other than by criminalization. This is just my first blush opinion, and I will hopefully have something a little more in-depth to say after I've finished reading the ruling.
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anne cameron · Posted: Thu Nov 24, 2011 1:43 am Post subject:

Polygamy, in and of itself, doesn't bother me one little bit. Nor does the other side of the coin, I think it's called polyandry...AS LONG as the ones involved are adults, and enter into the arrangement freely. I know that 'legally' in this country you can only be married to one person at a time; but where does "marriage" come into it, anyway. If people want to live together, be sexually active together, in whatever/whichever combination it's really no skin off my nose.

Just keep the kids out of it. The police have had their heads comfortably shoved shoulder-deep up a very basic fundament for years. If twelve year old girls are being taken over the 49th parallel and handed over in 'marriage' to adult men, some of them old enough to be at least the grandparent of the kid, then surely to God (and three reliable witnesses) it shouldn't strain the capabilities of the Mounties to prove such a thing happened. And to lay charges against anyone and everyone who in any way contributed to the matter. That would include whoever drove the car, for example. Probably include the mom and dad who agreed to the matter. Certainly include the groom and the preacher!

This verdict is just going to continue the back-and-forth legal tennis match, it will spend a whole-bunch of money, waste a lot of time, and keep the TV reporters busy driving out for yet another interview. And while the pavanne continues more children will be born to underage moms, more "lost boys" will be turfed out into a world where they are under educated, unskilled and unprepared, and more girls will wind up being impregnated by much older men.

And what "free choice" does a girl have if she is born into a situation such as has been reported and exposed at Bountiful. From birth she is taught it is an honour, from birth she is carefully brainwashed to believe God not only approves, but demands her cooperation. All her brief life she is told that if she resists and refuses the "honour" she will go to hell and burn for eternity...so she might as well smile, smile, smile and go along with it because nobody has introduced her to any kind of perceivable option.

So much money spent on this farce, and more will be spent when the appeal process unwinds. But we "can't afford" to set up an Information Centre where anyone who wants to leave the sect can go and receive help, be given transportation out, a place to stay, counselling, and be put in touch with others who have successfully left. Oh no, that might in some way offend someone.

And in the meantime more little girls are taught that they do not count as individual people, that their sole value is in their ability to reproduce, that they were designed by the Almighty to be impregnated by some wattle-necked old geezer and the kicker is, they are supposed to consider it an honour.

Once again the law in its infinite wisdom has done sweet fuck all to protect children.

Well, hell, it's easier to make more of them than to take care of the ones already here!

6079_Smith_W · Fulltime enMasse Member Joined: 15 Nov 2011 Posts: 593

@ anne cameron
I agree with your assessment and your frustration. The fact is that there are communities which are similar in many respects except that they do not practice polygamy. The same indoctrination of children; the same misogyny, the same seige mentality, and the same expulsion and shunning of those who do not fit in.
Yet in the case of these other communities, and even cults, we cannot compel except by the law.
Again, as frustrating as it is, I think the same standard should be applied here. One could argue that the fact polygamy is illegal has driven the abuses even further underground, and made it harder to reach a conviction.
I just see cutting corners like this, and counting on the moral outrage of the public to justify it as a dangerous precedent. It does not only affect people in those communities, and even if it did, it does not necessarily make it right.

m0nkyman · Posted: Thu Nov 24, 2011 4:42 am Post subject:

I'm just trying to figure out an experiment that would show how monkeys would react to having their grapes taken because one of the one hundred monkeys needs them all because he lost them in the cucumber derivative market.
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bshmr · Posted: Thu Nov 24, 2011 4:53 am Post subject:

Secular, legal, marriage is a broad set of laws and services which have evolved to be provided by the State for what is considered the best interest of the involved as well as other citizens.

The religious aspects are irrelevant as far as divorce, civil rights, property, familial responsibility, ... and so on of secular, legal, marriage is concerned.

I do care that poly-whatever is more likely to create disadvantaged in all forms than a restrictive simple monogamy/mono-andry(?).

This is in addition to trysts and abuse with minors or by minors being abominable.

Raos · Posted: Thu Nov 24, 2011 5:47 am Post subject:

Are social harms or abuse of the disadvantaged/vulnerable more prevalent (in so far as they actually may be) in polygamous communities than monogamous because of something inherent to polygamy, or might its status as illegal, which thus drives it underground and out of the light of scrutiny or oversight and without (equal) access to legal protections and other forms of public assistance, be somewhat responsible? As with alcohol, as with marijuana, as with prostitution, prohibition introduces a host of associated problems that are not truly attributable to the subject in question, the status of il/legality itself is a confounding variable.

It could be entirely true (now, in the existing context) that the real harms (child abuse, forced marriage, spousal abuse, etc.) are unable to be addressed directly in polygamous situations like these, while also true that if polygamy were not illegal and consequently isolated that they could be addressed directly. Finding the former as a justification to outlaw polygamy does not preclude the latter, which would suggest that (even if the evaluation of harm is found to outweigh the restriction to freedom) the infringement is unnecessary and unreasonable.

[pedantic grammarian] *gamy (polygamy, monogamy, etc.) is the gender-neutral, general case term covering both sides of the coin; *gyny (polygyny) is the form covering relationships with women and *andry (polyandry) the analogous form for relationships with men.[/pedantic grammarian]

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Senor Magoo · He's got a big one Joined: 11 Apr 2006 Posts: 8700

voice of the damned · Posted: Sat Nov 26, 2011 4:58 pm Post subject:

And back south...

voice of the damned · Posted: Sat Nov 26, 2011 5:45 pm Post subject:

And back north, the polyamorists weigh in...

anne cameron · Posted: Sat Nov 26, 2011 6:40 pm Post subject:

Hey, howdy: out here on Vancouver Island we mostly don't use the blackberry wine for such goings-on because it stains yer teeth and tongue somethin fierce and that gives ya a goulish sort'a look when yer dancin around the bonfire nekkid, because when ya laugh ya look as if ya'v got a black maw instead of a mouth.

And, mostly, it isn't the great goddess we honour, she's got her own set of followers. Those of us who are happy to love just about anybody or even everybody as the case may be are more inclined to give a hoot to the Great I-Yam

Mind you, we don't do it very often. Bein nekkid is a chilly process in the teemin' down rain, and ya know (I expect) what happens to the guys when they get chilled. Shrinkage, so ta speak. Which kind of knocks the whole reason for the celebration flat on it's duff. And it's real hard to keep the bonfire burnin in the downpour. Mostly what we do is take a propane tank with us and run a hose-thingy so's the gas is directed into the bonfire to keep it burning...and we ain't nekkid, we're togged out in dry-backs and gumboots...

voice of the damned · Posted: Sun Nov 27, 2011 9:14 am Post subject:

Heh heh. I knew I might get roasted for my foray into "west coast hippie" stereotypes.

For the record, I just said "the Goddess" because she seemed like a more plausible candidate for such a ceremony than "God". And I admit that I got blackberry wine from the Gordon Lightfoot song.

And I never said anyone was naked! (Isn't the correct ritual term "skyclad"?)

6079_Smith_W · Fulltime enMasse Member Joined: 15 Nov 2011 Posts: 593

@ Voice of the damned

They can't forego a ceremony because the whole idea is for them to be married in their temple so they can be together in the afterlife.
Being a church that believes in modern revelation, I'm sure they could arrange for a workaround (like god in the mormon church suddenly deciding that it was okay for people of African heritage to hold the priesthood) but somehow I don't think they would do that with the temple ceremony.
Besides, it's not one church - part of the reason all this shit is going on is because of the schism created by Warren Jeffs.
I remember reading in an article a year or so ago that the law includes as "ceremony" not just legal marriages, but any outlaw ceremony with the same intent.

6079_Smith_W · Fulltime enMasse Member Joined: 15 Nov 2011 Posts: 593

If the law were fine-tuned to focus on the abuses particular to that organization I think it would be great - an an aggravating aspect, for instance.
And if there is indeed a loophole for polyamory, great (though there are still obvious problems about those relationships NOT being able to be legal)
But I am also thinking of other cultures for which polytamy is formally recognized. That other legal case in ontario, for instance, in which a murdered woman is refered to as the ex-wife when in fact she was the first wife in a polygamous family.
From the court records it is pretty clear that was a highly abusive situation, but I am wondering if the fact her relationship had to be hidden made her enough of a liability that it contributed to the alleged decision to murder her. I am just guessing, of course, but I do wonder.

voice of the damned · Posted: Sun Nov 27, 2011 3:59 pm Post subject:

6079_Smith_W · Fulltime enMasse Member Joined: 15 Nov 2011 Posts: 593

Plus "abuse of authority" is a professional matter - grounds for a guild, or employer to discipline, or at the very most something that might be a factor in a civil suit. I don't think it is by itself a criminal matter (honest question though - please correct me if I am mistaken).
After all, when a person in authority counsels you in good faith to do something which benefits you, it is also a use of that authority. So it seems to me it is only relevant as an aggravating factor to something else which would be damaging or criminal - abuse, bodily harm or fraud.

anne cameron · Posted: Sun Nov 27, 2011 5:19 pm Post subject:

Of course this decision will be appealed...so that will drag on for, what, two more years? During which time nothing substantive will change... certainly nothing is going to improve... but, once again, the government of BC will be able to wring it's hands and say we're trying, we're trying... while actually not trying very hard at all...stop funding the schools in Bountiful which teach repressive ideals, send the kids to regular public school, investigate the welfare fraud, enforce income tax ... all the things which are not being done and haven't been done... get convictions and send the men to jail, give the kids a break... if this was a collection of non-white non-Christians it wouldn't take six months to make a significant dent in the incidences of abuse...

6079_Smith_W · Fulltime enMasse Member Joined: 15 Nov 2011 Posts: 593

@ anne cameron

Exactly.
Actually there was one case in which the law was enforced - back in 2005 three of the women married to Winston Blackmore tried to apply for residency because of the schism which was happening in the community.

The three women were were all deported back to the U.S. - without their children

http://www.vancouversun.com/Immigration+brought+bear+bountiful/1227...

According to this story they live just south of the border in Idaho. As well, two other women named in indictments against Blackmore married each other after same sex marriage became legal in Canada:

http://www.childbrides.org/canada_VS_2_charged_appear_in_BC_court.h...

If the authorities were as zealous about the laws which apply to the men, and to the community as a whole would there be any need to haggle over the marriage law?

anne cameron · Posted: Sun Nov 27, 2011 6:43 pm Post subject:

Daphne Branham has done a very good job of investigating and reporting the very complicated situation at Bountiful. For those who are interested in the history of the colony, her books are a valuable resource. She doesn't get all "nun in a whorehouse" about the sexual antics of these men, she doesn't seem interested in how they schedule their attentions... she just very calmly reports salient facts. I highly recommend her books to anyone who wants some background on this on-going foot-dragging b.s. on the part of the governments of this province.

If anyone has questions about the character of Winston Blackmore, I suggest you think about how he is using his own children as pawns in this immigration case... those kids could be with their mothers but Winston says no... and what Winston says , goes. Not just with his followers in this cult, but, it would seem, with the RCMP, the federal immigration drones and the power brokers in Victoria.

voice of the damned · Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2011 1:59 pm Post subject:

voice of the damned · Posted: Tue Jan 24, 2012 8:22 am Post subject:

voice of the damned · Posted: Tue Jan 31, 2012 4:42 pm Post subject:

Two UBC anthroplogists. including an expert witness from the recent BC court hearings, have written a study on the impact polygamy on women's rights and other indicators. Their conclusion...

6079_Smith_W · Fulltime enMasse Member Joined: 15 Nov 2011 Posts: 593

Not to speak ill of Hutterites' but they tend to have very fine vehicles, and top-of-the-line equipment. I don't think the religious excuse should necessarily apply in their case either, when so many other independent farmers do not enjoy those kind of breaks.

Sorry... thread drift.

voice of the damned · Posted: Wed Feb 01, 2012 12:00 am Post subject:

6079_Smith_W · Fulltime enMasse Member Joined: 15 Nov 2011 Posts: 593

@ VOTD

It's in the second quote in this post: Jan 24, 2012 8:22 am

I know it's a bit of a tangent, and I don't mean it as a slight against Hutterites, but I question how an exemption for their economic structure is valid, when it doesn't apply to other communities, and other people who decide they don't want to deal with money, property and private ownership.

And on the specific argument about Bountiful, although I think that tax lawyer may have some valid points, I think the claim that the community is not a congregation isn't all that sound.

Whatever it is, it is very much an intentional religious community, just as much as the Hutterites are. After all, how many non-FLDS people live there?

Senor Magoo · He's got a big one Joined: 11 Apr 2006 Posts: 8700

IANAL, but as I read it, the Hutterites pay taxes communally, because they live communally with none of them owning or earning anything individually.

In Blackmore's case, it would appear that the Crown is saying that the residents of Bountiful earn their own money and have their own possessions, and so should pay taxes individually like other Canadians. That they live in a community isn't the point, it's whether their finances are genuinely communal.

I'm not sure what "breaks" there are in this system, particularly of the type that some independent farmer might want a cut of.

I don't think the deal is that Hutterites pay zero tax, while other farmers pay tax.
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6079_Smith_W · Fulltime enMasse Member Joined: 15 Nov 2011 Posts: 593

From this Vancouver Sun article it looks like the question isn't whether a communal order exists - it does.
The problem seems to be that Blackmore had businesses on the side which had nothing to do with it, and he wrongly made tax claims as if it were part of the FLDS Trust.

http://www.vancouversun.com/life/Winston+Blackmore+Bountiful+centre...

anne cameron · Posted: Thu Feb 02, 2012 5:22 am Post subject:

I'm re-reading Daphne Bramham's book on Bountiful, "The Secret Lives of Saints". I recommend it to everyone interested in the several aspects of the Bountiful tragedy.

Bramham manages to stay fairly low-key and moderate in spite of her obvious outrage, not so much at Winston and the other men with their multiple and usually much younger wives, but at the generational governmental cluster fuck from ALL political parties. Time and again all levels of government have refused to deal with sometimes stunning and outrageous abuse of government funds and the lives of vulnerable and often helpless people, too many of them mere children. Over and over again bureaucrats and ministers have chickened out.

Well, why not, the worst behaviour comes down on women and children and who gives a rats' ass about them?

Socred, Liberal, and NDP governments have allowed to continue what are egregious violations of civil rights. They have, to put none too fine a point on it, kissed Blackmore's fat ass, possibly in the hope he'll send his followers to the polls to cast their vote in a particular way.

Winston might work overtime at portraying the image of a tubby hillbilly but he's a crafty bastard with plenty of money to hire highly skilled lawyers.

My hope is their dicks fall off. What has been done to children in this festering sinkhole is a shame on the entire province.

fork · Posted: Fri Feb 03, 2012 5:52 pm Post subject:

6079_Smith_W · Fulltime enMasse Member Joined: 15 Nov 2011 Posts: 593

If I read the Sun article correctly the only religious aspect of this is that the FLDS trust was presumably set up with religious exemptions (though it isn't stated explicitly).

And as for the link, that is the Justice department's argument. The only communal argument being made relevant to the case is Blackmore's attempt to claim his personal business as part of the trust and his multiple wives as dependents

In other words, the argument has nothing to do with the question of whether the trust or the community are religious, and everything to do with Blackmore trying to pull a fast one regarding his personal holdings and household.

I am not sympathetic to Blackmore, but I do find the claim that "bountiful is not a religious commune" to be misleading. It means one thing in the context of the trial and the technicalities of the legislation. Quite another when one is actually talking about the community.

Similarly, using the LDS Church as a source to discredit the FLDS is ridiculous, on the same order as the Pope calling protestantism a heresy.

http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Bountiful+religious+commune+polyga...

fork · Posted: Mon Feb 06, 2012 8:10 pm Post subject:

6079_Smith_W · Fulltime enMasse Member Joined: 15 Nov 2011 Posts: 593

voice of the damned · Posted: Tue Feb 07, 2012 12:06 am Post subject:

6079_Smith_W · Fulltime enMasse Member Joined: 15 Nov 2011 Posts: 593

@ VOTD

THe reference to the LDS church was in the first article about the tax trial.

And I think Jeffs's comments go far beyond what any LDS Mormon would say about their prophet. No one would put the prophet on the same level as their god.

Though yes, the Mormon god is different than other christians in that he is not presumed to be the only god there is, and that he is, essentially the same as us, though in a higher state.

fork · Posted: Tue Feb 07, 2012 4:37 pm Post subject:

6079_Smith_W · Fulltime enMasse Member Joined: 15 Nov 2011 Posts: 593

fork...

No, I don't think the question of whether the community is religious or not is relevant. Why? because this is not about the taxes of everyone else in the community, nor is it about the community pooling assets. The rest of the community is not on trial here.
This is about Blackmore claiming that he did not personally own shares which he did own. If they were actually part of the trust, why were they not listed as assets of the trust? Not asking you, but rather making the rhetorical point that it should have been clear. And at this point it seems Blackmore is claiming ignorance and blaming the bookeeper.

He may be making the argument that he wasn't aware, and that he thought he was just holding them in trust, but I think this has more to do with him covering his ass after the fact. Is there anything in this to suggest that everyone else in Bountiful should be able to file their taxes in the same way? I don't think so. This is just one guy trying to weasel his way out of a conviction.

Really, I don't see that we are taking opposing positions, since I agree with your points, except this is really about him claiming that HE qualifies for the exemption. The community is not on trial here. That, I expect, will come soon enough in another court.

fork · Posted: Tue Feb 07, 2012 5:41 pm Post subject:

voice of the damned · Posted: Tue Feb 07, 2012 6:06 pm Post subject:

6079_Smith_W · Fulltime enMasse Member Joined: 15 Nov 2011 Posts: 593

And really, bringing up the LDS Church only makes the point that they are not LDS. As to which is the offshoot, I think the LDS might have a hard time proving their case, since they are the ones which changed from the original belief, under pressure from the govenrment.

fork · Posted: Wed Feb 08, 2012 1:11 pm Post subject:

fork · Posted: Wed Feb 08, 2012 1:38 pm Post subject:

This Maclean's article might shed some light on why LDS was brought into the picture: