Ditto.
I’ve read perhaps half a dozen books on the FLDS.
While never ideal, IMO, the lifestyle is not inherently completely abusive of women and children. It is similar to the life most humans have lived throughout history in the relations between men, women and children.
The big problem is that their system gives absolute power and authority to The Prophet. And we all know what absolute power does. When given to a man like Jeffs, who was already corrupt before he came to power, terrible things happen. For instance, marriage of truly underage girls has become frequent only in the recent decades of the FLDS. Prior to that most married in their late teens or even early 20s.
While never ideal, IMO, the lifestyle is not inherently completely abusive of women and children.
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Wow. Just WOW. You came to that conclusion based on reading a few books?
I have known several FLDS (and other Mormon breakoff groups) families. I know even more people who left. My husband and I are registered as a ‘safe house’ for women who leave and My husband has offered to do legal work for these women pro-bono.
I have discussed and listened to their testimonies for hours on end. I have spent years researching Polygamy in Mormonism (and the breakoffs).
To say that it is not inherently abusive is absurd. Women are not valued except as cattle, there is widespread sexual abuse (often by preteen boys) against little girls. Rape is common and the women are blamed. There is lack of education for women, in part to control them, God is used to condone rape, violence, physical abuse and to ‘keep them in their place’. I have seen these things even in ‘independent’ polygamous families (ie no prophet). And that isn’t even starting on the abuse of young boys.
There are re-education camps where women are starved and isolated if they dare to speak out or contradict a man or to assert any independence. It is also a fallacy to state that underage marriage is a recent development. Underage marriage goes back to Joseph Smith (in this theology) and was common in the 19th century. In the breakoff groups, underage marriage has continued since the 1920’s. I know at least two women who were ‘married’ early to mid teans in the 1950’s.
Shame on you for reading a few books and asserting it is not inherently abusive, because the truth is completely different from your assertions.